Occupy Chicago!

......

Ever since the Authorities started running around with their pants on fire crying "Cyberwars are coming! Cyberwars are coming!" and RIM gave their codesORwhatever to the Authorities, the Blackberries have been going down. Is that a coincidence?

And what effect does this Blackberry Outage have -- or should I say, is this INTENDED to have -- on OCCUPY our own country events/actions?

------------
++++++++++++

YES! OCCUPY OUR OWN COUNTRY!

The fascist imperialist GlobalistAuthorities want to treat us like a colony like they treat the rest of the world they occupy -- but they won't let us U.S. citizens occupy our own PUBLIC spaces on U.S. soil.

Class warfare only? I think it's more than that. It goes back further than that. It is about total reestablishment of the overlord-to-serf relationship on a global scale. These predatory capitalists at the top of the heap desire no less than feudalism complete with their castles on the hills.

This is how I think they think: "Technology? Blackberries? That's not for the riff-faff. Look, they only misuse it and plan revolts! The glorious advancements of science are not for the riff-raff! Oh, yes, they pay for their development and labor to produce them, but these are not for them! And they won't even notice we are depriving them of their new found communication advancements. Look how easy it has been to get them to pay for medical advances but enjoy minimal to absent medical care -- while we rich have access to any and every medical treatment we desire (the research and development for which the riff-raff paid)! Ha-ha! The fools! Let them pine away for their social media, their Twitter and emails! Ha-ha!"

Oooo, I wish I could draw political cartoons of what I think these capitalist turds look like-- self-satisfied and insulated, sick with greed and getting greedier by the minute, uncaring and cold to human needs and humankind's aspirations for justice and equity.

I mean, why doesn't he get the label like 'neo-con'?

And he is always referred to as a Constitutional Scholar. Hey, is that the John Yoo school of Constitutional Law Interpretation???

Sheesh.

THE BOB EDWARDS SHOW SCHEDULE
Monday, October 10, 2011

John Carlos won bronze in the 200 meter dash at the 1968 Olympics, but it was his raised-fist salute alongside gold medalist Tommie Smith that etched him into the lasting iconography of sports. His autobiography, co-written with progressive sports journalist Dave Zirin, is titled “The John Carlos Story: The Sports Moment That Changed the World....
http://www.bobedwardsradio.com/bes/

Dave Zirin's new book:

The John Carlos Story
The Sports Moment That Changed the World
By John Carlos and Dave Zirin, Foreword by Cornel West

Seen around the world, John Carlos and Tommie Smith’s Black Power salute on the 1968 Olympic podium sparked controversy and career fallout. Yet their show of defiance remains one of the most iconic images of Olympic history and the Black Power movement. Here is the remarkable story of one of the men behind the salute, lifelong activist, John Carlos.
http://www.haymarketbooks.org/hc/The-John-Carlos-Story

And more history is made:

Dr. John Carlos Raises His Fist With Occupy Wall Street
Dave Zirin on October 11, 2011 - 12:20pm ET

Last night I had the privilege of introducing 1968 Olympian Dr. John Carlos to the General Assembly at Occupy Wall Street. This morning I had the duty of introducing John Carlos to Senator Chuck Schumer in the MSNBC green room. Both were unforgettable experiences. When Dr. Carlos and I arrived an Occupy Wall Street, it comprised all the ordered chaos you could imagine. People of all backgrounds and ages were packed shoulder to shoulder in Zucotti Park. Police stood at attention, glowering from the outside. Homemade signs ranging from “Undocumented immigrants are part of the 99%” to “We Remember Troy Davis” to “Tax the Rich!” encircled the square. John Carlos looked at me with that twinkle in his eye and said, “It’s great to be home.”

With the help of the Occupy Wall Street regulars who invited us to speak, we worked our way to the front of the General Assembly. Here we encountered our first problem: the agenda had been reordered so announcements would come at the end. We would have to wait “two, maybe three hours” to give five minutes of greetings. I asked the head of the facilitation team if John Carlos could skip the three hours and say just a few words. She looked at my quizzically and said, “Who’s John Carlos?” I answered, “One of the two men who raised their black-gloved fist at the 1968 Olympics.” I then did a poor man’s impression of the medal stand moment, bowed my head and raised my fist. Her eyebrows raised an inch and then her face lit up. She got it. This was someone born years, possibly decades after 1968, and now she was on a mission to make it happen. The other people on the facilitation team were also excited, and they exercised a process point called an “emergency announcement” and John Carlos was able to get on the “People’s Mic” and to say a few words. “I am here for you,” he said in his raspy voice. Then “I am here for you” was repeated loudly in successive waves on the “People’s Mic,” a beautiful moment unto itself, but Dr. Carlos wasn’t done. “Why? Because I am you. We’re here forty-three years later because there’s a fight still to be won. This day is not for us but for our children to come.”

The response was electric as people in the crowd pumped their fists and then mobbed us when we got off “stage.” The next day, the New York Daily News, Salon and Democracy Now! all had reports about the curious presence of the 1968 Olympian in Zucotti Park. But talking to the people in the square, the connection is an obvious one and John Carlos made it well: he is them. His boldness, his daring and his sacrifice in 1968 echo strongly in our struggles today............
http://www.thenation.com/blog/163891/dr-john-carlos-raises-his-fist-occu...

agenda item through. He never gave a damn about his "jobs" bill, and knew it would never pass anyway. That was strictly campaign fodder.

Isn't Obama a free market Chicago School guy?
Submitted by nora on Wed, 10/12/2011 - 2:20pm.

Congress poised to OK stalled free trade deals

Congress was set to approve on Wednesday free trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia and Panama that have the potential to spur economic activity and put Americans back to work. President Barack Obama and Republicans said the expected action showed that they can cooperate to revive the struggling economy.

The deals are "an area of common ground where we have worked together," said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio........

Republicans criticized Obama for taking several years to send the agreements, all signed in the George W. Bush administration, to Congress for final approval. Many among Obama's core supporters, including organized labor and Democrats from areas hit hard by foreign competition, were unhappy that the White House was espousing the benefits of free trade.

Democratic opposition was particularly strong against the agreement with Colombia, where labor leaders long have faced the threat of violence.

"I find it deeply disturbing that the United States Congress is even considering a free trade agreement with a country that holds the world record for assassinations of trade unionists," said Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif....

The administration says the three deals will boost U.S. exports by $13 billion a year and that just the agreement with South Korea, America's seventh largest trading partner, will support 70,000 American jobs.

Groups that oppose the pacts, including the AFL-CIO, point to past cases where free trade agreements were linked to factories moving overseas and they dispute the job growth figures....

Republicans welcomed the prospect of increased exports but said those benefits could have come sooner if Obama had acted more quickly. They said American businesses have paid $3.8 billion in tariffs to Colombia since the trade agreement was signed, and that Americans are losing markets in South Korea because of a Korea-European Union free trade agreement that went into effect in July.

"There's no reason we should have had to wait nearly three years for this president to send them up to Congress for a vote, but they're a good start nonetheless," Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said....
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/12/ap/congress/main20119052.shtml

Yep, just like Bill Clinton. All the corporatist crap that a Rethug prez could never get passed will sail right through. Listen to Stephanie Miller tomorrow tell her useful idiot listeners what a great thing obama has just done by exporting even more American jobs.

New Free Trade Agreements Threaten to Kill Jobs and Labor Rights
Tuesday 11 October 2011
by: David Bacon, Truthout | News Analysis

Last week, President Obama broke his campaign commitment and put three free trade agreements up for a vote in Congress. Business interests, ecstatic at the prospect, promise they'll bring us jobs. Experience tells us, however, their promises are worthless.

Nineteen years ago, when the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was in Congress, supporters said it, too, would create jobs and protect labor rights. Before agreeing to new free trade treaties with Colombia, South Korea and Panama, Congress should look at the dismal record......
http://www.truthout.com/new-free-trade-agreements-threaten-kill-jobs-and...

with their #1 foreign policy item as well:

US steps up pressure on Iran over alleged plot to kill Saudi envoy

Secretary of state Hillary Clinton vows to isolate Tehran as Iran dismisses claims of 'murder-for-hire' plot as fabricatio
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/12/us-iran-plot-saudi-arabia

Won't be a lotta headline space for Occupy America after obama starts bombing Tehran.
We needed a war against Wall Street a long time ago. But what we got was war against Tripoli. Well now that finally got the right war started it is even more imperative that the WH take on a more worthy adversary.

figures for decades:

Wall Street Journal circulation scam claims senior Murdoch executive

One of Rupert Murdoch's most senior European executives has resigned following Guardian inquiries about a circulation scam at News Corporation's flagship newspaper, the Wall Street Journal.

The Guardian found evidence that the Journal had been channelling money through European companies in order to secretly buy thousands of copies of its own paper at a knock-down rate, misleading readers and advertisers about the Journal's true circulation.

The bizarre scheme included a formal, written contract in which the Journal persuaded one company to co-operate by agreeing to publish articles that promoted its activities, a move which led some staff to accuse the paper's management of violating journalistic ethics and jeopardising its treasured reputation for editorial quality....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/oct/12/wall-street-journal-andrew-l...

Ah yes, the beauty of the "invisible hand" of the free market.

Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has asked for a taskforce to be set up to look at ways to legalise houses in illegal settlements that are built on private Palestinian land, according to Israeli media reports.

Israel mulls 'legalising settler outposts'
Netanyahu has bowed to political pressure over illegal Jewish settlements on private Palestinian land, reports say.

Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has asked for a taskforce to be set up to look at ways to legalise houses in illegal settlements that are built on private Palestinian land, according to Israeli media reports.

A report published in Haaretz on Tuesday said that Netanyahu had bowed to pressure from settlers and their supporters following plans to demolish several outposts earlier this year, and had asked Yaakov Neeman, the justice minister, to find ways to legalise the buildings..........
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/10/2011101163959268175...

-The right wing has used this tactic to phony-up book sale....
Submitted by ghettodefender on Wed, 10/12/2011 - 4:02pm.-

Bleh....See how bad some people suck...?

Apparently, the Courthouse Square Park is closed 10pm to7am....

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=184618548279870

http://www.meetup.com/occupytogether/Sonora-CA/385412/

...Some bloggers might recognize the name Julian Kaye.. *wink wink*

"I mean, why doesn't he get the label like 'neo-con'?"

Mostly because it's not accurate.

And technically "neo liberal" is what people usually mean when they say "neo con"

The political descriptors in this country are so screwed up that few even understand what the terms really mean any more.

Even something as simple and broad as left and right get people so confused they can't tell the difference.

For example

Libertarianism is actually a leftist ideology and virtually the same as anarchism but in this country it's placed on the right because of affiliation with the republicans, where they mostly agree on breaking things.

An Urgent Call for Peace: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s Speech Before the United Nations
September 27, 2011

....We should always remember that “saving future generations from the scourge of war” is mentioned in the Preamble of the Charter of the United Nations – but it’s just dead letter. From 1945 on, wars have done nothing but inexorably increase and multiply. We see, once again, Libya destroyed and bloodstained by the will of the powerful.

I call on the governments of the world to reflect: Since September 11th, 2001, a new and unprecedented imperialist war has begun, a permanent war, in perpetuity....

We have to look directly at the terrifying reality of the world we live in. It is necessary to ask a series of questions on the basis of the risks and threats we face: Why is the United States the only country that fills the planet with military bases? What does it allocate such a staggering budget for increasing its military power? Why has it unleashed so many wars, violating the sovereignty of other nations which have the same rights to their own fates? How can international law be enforced against the United States’ insensible aspiration to military hegemony of the world in order to ensure control over energy sources to sustain their predatory and consumer model? Why does the UN do nothing to stop Washington? If we answer these questions sincerely we would understand that the empire has awarded itself the role of judge of the world, without being granted this responsibility by anyone, and, therefore, imperialist war threatens us all.

Washington knows that a multipolar world is already an irreversible reality. Its strategy consists of stopping, at any price, the sustained rise of a group of emerging countries, by negotiating great interests with its partners and followers in order to guide multipolarity along the path the empire wants. What is more, the goal is to reconfigure the world so it is based on US military hegemony....

Humanity is facing the very real threat of a permanent war. The empire is ready to create the political conditions for triggering a war anywhere, and the case of Libya is proof. Within the imperial view of the world, Clausewitz’s axiom is being reversed: politics are the continuation of war by other means.

What is behind this new Armageddon? The absolute power of the military-financial leadership that is destroying the world in order to accumulate even more profits; a military-financial power that is subordinated, de facto, to an increasingly larger group of States. Keep in mind that war is capital’s modus operandi: war ruins the majority and makes only a few wealthier.

Right now, there is a very serious threat to global peace. A new cycle of colonial wars, which started in Libya, have the sinister objective of reviving the capitalist global system which is going through a structural crisis today. There are no limits to its consumerist and destructive voracity. The case of Libya should alert us to the attempt to implement a new imperial kind of colonialism, that of military interventionism backed by the antidemocratic organs of the United Nations and justified on the basis of prefabricated media lies....

....Remember that the “Libyan Case” was brought before the Security Council on the basis of an intense propaganda campaign by western mass media, who lied about the alleged bombing of innocent civilians by the Libyan Air Force, not to mention the grotesque media manipulation of Tripoli’s Green Square. This premeditated bunch of lies was used to justify irresponsible and hasty decisions by the Security Council, which paved the way for NATO’s military regime change policy in Libya.

It is worthwhile to ask: What has the no-fly zone established by Security Council resolution 1973 become? How could NATO perform more than 20,000 missions against the Libyan people if there was a no-fly zone? After the Libyan Air Force was completely annihilated, the continued “humanitarian” bombings show that the West, through NATO, intend to impose their interests in North Africa, turning Libya into a colonial protectorate.

How can we say that an arms embargo was imposed on Libya when it was NATO itself that introduced thousands of heavy weapons to support a violent upheaval against that country’s legitimate government?

The embargo was, of course, meant to prevent the Libyan government from defending its sovereignty....

....we ask ourselves how much is being spent to destroy Libya. This is the answer of US congressman Dennis Kucinich, who said: “This new war will cost us $500 million during its first week alone. Obviously, we do not have financial resources for that and we will end up cutting off other important domestic programs’ funding”.

According to Kucinich himself, with the amount spent during the first three weeks in Northern Africa to massacre the Libyan people, much could have been done to help the entire region of the Horn of Africa, saving tens of thousands of lives.

The reasons behind the criminal military engagement in Libya are not humanitarian at all: they are based on the Malthusian notion that “there are just too many people in the world” and they have to be eliminated by generating more hunger, destruction and uncertainty, and creating – at the same time –more financial profits. In this regard, it is frankly regrettable that in the opening address of the 66th General Assembly of the UN, an immediate appeal to solve humanitarian crisis in the Horn of Africa was not made, while instead we were assured that “the time has come to act” on Syria.

As of 2010, 19 UN General Assembly votes confirm the universal will demanding that the United States stop the economic and trade blockade against Cuba. Since all sensible international arguments have been exhausted, we have no choice but to believe that such cruel actions against the Cuban Revolution result from imperial arrogance in view of the dignity and courage shown by the unsubmissive Cuban people in their sovereign decision to determine their own fate and fight for their happiness.

From Venezuela, we believe it is time to demand of the US not only an immediate and unconditional end to the criminal blockade imposed against the Cuban people, but also the release of the five Cuban antiterrorist fighters held hostage in the prisons of the US Empire for the sole reason of seeking to prevent the illegal actions of terrorist groups against Cuba, under the protection of the US government..............
http://www.chavezcode.com/2011/09/urgent-call-for-peace-venezuelan.html

This demonstrates, once again, the cruel logic of international relations, where the law only applies to the weak. What is the real reason for this military intervention? Recolonizing Libya in order to capture its wealth.

Everything else is related to this goal. “Nobody colonizes innocently”, as the great Martinican poet Aime Cesaire said, quite rightly, in his extraordinary essay called “Discours sur le colonialisme”.

By the way: the Residence of the Venezuelan Ambassador in Tripoli was invaded and looted, and the UN did nothing, remaining ignominiously silent.....

that's all fine and dandy except for the part where no one is actually colonizing anything, there was no massacre and that Obama has actually eased restrictions on Cuba already...

Updated: 4/19/09 6:55 PM EDT
Obama's new Cuba policy

President Barack Obama said Sunday that America’s 48-year economic embargo of Cuba had failed to bring change to the island, and that he hoped the country would move towards embracing democratic values, including freedom of speech and religion, on the path towards launching better relations with the United States.

“The policy we’ve had in place for 50 years hasn’t worked the way we wanted it to – the Cuban people are not free,” Obama said. But after the recent actions taken by his administration – including lifting travel restrictions and remittances for Cuban-Americans—Obama said he was looking for reciprocal moves by the Cuban government before taking additional steps.

Obama said that while he may not always agree with leaders such as Cuba’s Raul Castro and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, he believed the United States could find ways to work with them toward common goals, saying it was time to end “old ideologies and stale debates.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Fua8XliZk1Q

(sorry, for some reason I can't embed youtubes anymore.)

...broadcast this, no license. If we only had a FCC and a truth in political advertising law.

When you head the word 'blockade' you think ships circling Cuba not letting anything in or out...However, that's not what this is about, as Cuba continues to trade with everyone EXCEPT us and what they're really bitching about is the loss of a once lucrative tourism market from the US.

Cuba Isn't Happy With Obama's New Travel Edict

HAVANA — Cuba said Sunday that the Obama Administration's decision to lift some travel restrictions on students, academics and religious groups and make it easier for Americans to send money were positive steps, but not nearly enough while Washington maintains its 48-year trade embargo on the island.

The changes announced last week mean that students seeking academic credit and churches and synagogues traveling for religious purposes will be able to go to Cuba. Any U.S. international airport with proper customs and immigration facilities will be able to offer charter services to the island.

...

The ministry said most of the changes simply bring U.S. policy back to where it was during the Clinton Administration, before President George W. Bush toughened restrictions. They do not alter Washington's trade embargo, which Cuba refers to as a "blockade."

"These measures confirm that there is no will to change the policy of blockade and destabilization against Cuba," the ministry said. "If there exists a real interest in widening and facilitating contacts between our peoples, the United States should lift the blockade and eliminate the restrictions that make Cuba the only country in the world to which North Americans cannot travel."

Under the embargo, American tourists are still prohibited from visiting Cuba and most trade with the island is barred.

"(sorry, for some reason I can't embed youtubes anymore.)"

You have to click

Use old embed code [?]

When your youtube cookies expire it doesn't refresh that setting and defaults to the iframe code which will not work here.

Uptown, past the millionaires apartments on Park Ave. Great energy, lots of people of all ages. I'll post some pics when I get a chance. That march should take place every week I think.

Can't stay, hopefully have time to catch up later or tommorrow.

'Use old embed code [?]'

Yep did that...

but you lost me at: "what are you talkin' about?" (Sam's daughter, Myla rendition)

'When your youtube cookies expire it doesn't refresh that setting and defaults to the iframe code which will not work here.'

...if you care to explain.

The old embed code starts with "object width" the new code starts with "iframe width"...You have to make sure that the code you paste in is the right one that's all...here's your embed though.

Don't know when I'll be back...

Try to keep your heads level in the meantime...(you know who you are)

You can call me soccer mom to the revolution now...lol.

I mean it...BEHAVE YOURSELVES.

be safe.

**

August 2008
The wrecking crew:
How a gang of right-wing con men destroyed Washington and made a killing
By Thomas Frank

Corruption is uniquely reprehensible in a democracy because it violates the system’s first principle, which we all learned back in the sunshiny days of elementary school: that the government exists to serve the public, not particular individuals. We Are the Government, insisted the title of a civics primer published in the earnest year of 1945. “The White House belongs to you,” its dust jacket told us. “So do all the other splendid buildings in Washington, D.C.” This idea runs so deep in the American grain that many of us can’t bring ourselves to question it, even in this disillusioned age. Republicans and Democrats may fight over how big government should be and exactly what it should do, we tell ourselves, but surely everyone shares those baseline good intentions, that simple devotion to the public interest.
Continue reading:
http://harpers.org/archive/2008/08/0082132

...only some of the players have changed but their aim is the same.

Libertarianism is actually a leftist ideology and virtually the same as anarchism but in this country it's placed on the right because of affiliation with the republicans, where they mostly agree on breaking things.
===
Not true at all. Anarchism is very anti-capitalist, while libertarianism is quite pro-capitalist. Simple as that.

Things just get more weird the more money these guys accumulate.

Long piece starts like this--

Karl Rove’s team and the Koch brothers’ operatives quietly coordinated millions of dollars in political spending in 2010, but that alliance, which has flown largely under the radar, is showing signs of fraying.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/65504.html#ixzz1adpIYiLk

Amazing animation of the ancient Egyptian temple complex -- KARNAK:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROg1-enJEms&feature=related

eet

Frances Fox Piven has spent decades writing about and participating in social movements in the United States. She was gracious enough to sit down for an interview with Chris Maisano, a writer and activist in the New York local of Democratic Socialists of America, to discuss the Occupy Wall Street protests, the complex interplay between social movements and electoral politics, and the future of the occupation movement.

Chris Maisano: What have you thought of the protests so far?

Frances Fox Piven: I think they’ve been pretty terrific. And I really am hopeful that it’s the beginning of a new period of social protest in this country. I think a lot about the protest is absolutely on target, it’s so smart. It was so smart to pick Wall Street because Wall Street looms so large not only in the reality of inequality and recession policy, but it looms so large in the minds of people now because everybody knows that they’re stealing the country blind. So they picked the right place, they had somehow — I don’t know how self-consciously, maybe self-consciously — absorbed a kind of lesson from Tahrir Square of staying there, because usually we have demonstrations and marches and parades and things, and they’re over in a nanosecond. And all that the authorities have to do is wait, because they’re gonna be over.

So what they tried to do is take this classical form of the mass rally — they didn’t do it alone, obviously it happened in Egypt too — and connected it with the disruptive potential of mass action because they said “we’re staying.” And “we’re staying” is more troublesome. Not only that, “we’re staying” makes it possible for them to organize and mobilize throughout the course of the action, which is what they do. So that part of it was pretty, pretty smart.

They are smart in being very inclusive. I mean, they’re very happy to include everybody, and they’ve actively reached out to the unions. When has a youthful protest done that in living memory? A very long time since that’s happened. But they knew from the beginning — probably they were helped to learn that from Wisconsin. And they’re so happily counter-cultural, you can’t even get angry at them if you’re a stiff old person! Then you read their statements, I’m sure you do. Well, I do too. And I think they’re very thoughtful for statements issued by a general assembly sitting on the cold cement – they’re very good statements, and they really are statements that include the 99%. So it’s great.
http://theactivist.org/blog/from-protest-to-disruption-an-interview-with...

Anyways...I'm off to Occupy Seattle...
Submitted by Nobody on Wed, 10/12/2011 - 6:44pm

Mumia Abu-Jamal's Radio Broadcasts
Higher Quality Audio files available info@prisonradio.org
Copyright 2011 Mumia Abu-Jamal/Prison Radio
"The Occupation"
Recorded 10-09-11
http://www.prisonradio.org/audio/mumia/2011MAJ/Oct2011/TheOccupation_lon...

http://www.blm.gov/live/][

Poll: Obama And House GOP Both In Trouble In 2012

...While President Obama faces sagging poll numbers, Congress faces approval ratings near historic lows. At this early juncture, it is plausible that the nation could end up with a Republican President and a Democratic House in 2013...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/23/poll-obama-and-house-gop-_n_977...

The President of the National Organization for Women Terry O'Neill with Philly NOW President Caryn Hunt and Philadelphia Sheriff candidate Cheri Honkala held a press conference on October 1, 2011 to address the economic and political issues surrounding women running for political office and to announcing Philadelphia NOW’s endorsement of Cheri Honkala Green Party Candidate for Sheriff of Philadelphia on a zero evictions platform.
http://vimeo.com/29976412

http://www.cherihonkala.com/?p=1146

Aggression behind the 'restaurant bomb plot'
"It reads like a Hollywood film script" said the FBI Director Robert Mueller at the podium on the breakfast news unveiling what might be an Oscar-Winner at least in the "Wag the Dog" category.....

...This mangy Wag the Shaggy Dog story may well run out of the same trap as any one of a long line of FBI entrapment tales like the "Breaking News" plot by "Al Qaeda" to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago which started life on CNN as a Bin Laden plot but which turned out be the ravings of a mentally ill Muslim- American, set up to talk about such a plot by the FBI itself. Or in the longer tradition of "False Flag" operations that anyone who has read Graham Greene's "Quiet American" will recognise. The US has never shirked from even the crudest of such operations from the Bay of Pigs and other Cuban adventures through the fake Gulf of Tonkin incident which was used to propel American forces into the disastrous quagmire of Vietnam.

This story does seem to mark a stepping up of US preparations for aggression against Iran, involving as it does the highest officials of the Unites States in a claim which the gullible, which includes the British government which was quick to say that Iran must be held "accountable" for
this alleged crime, will regard as a legitimate casus belli....

There is an Arabic saying, unique I think to Iraqis, which translated says "you cannot hurt someone who is holding you by the balls". Iran is holding the US by the balls in Iraq and in the Gulf region as a whole. The destruction of the former regime in Iraq, as any half-informed observer must have known, could only have as one of its principal consequences, a surge in the power and influence of the Islamic Republic of Iran next door. Frustration at this, and at the losing battle in Iran's other neighbour Afghanistan, may well have tipped the ailing and failing US administration of Barak Obama into a disastrous attempt to break the logjam. If it has, then they and us as their "shoulder to shoulder" ally, may have plenty of cause to regret it....
http://www.votegeorgegalloway.com/2011/10/aggression-behind-restaurant-b...

http://soundcloud.com/richardduguayrocks/were-the-99-short-version

Due to popular demand or a short attention span... A shorter version of "We're the 99" Free download!!! Recorded this weekend at Chapter 11 Studios. Paula Tiberius & I wrote a song for the Occupy Wall St. protesters. Please download & re-share. Thanx.

Black Libyans Make Their Stand in Sirte and Bani Walid
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

Both NATO and their Libyan rebel surrogates express wonder at the fact that loyalist forces continue to fight so fiercely in the contested cities of Sirte and Bani Walid, despite being vastly outnumbered on the ground and unceasingly pummeled from above by the world’s largest air armada. But one look at a picture of Gaddafi loyalist prisoners, captured at a hospital in Sirte, tells the story: they are all Black. The assault on Libya has largely devolved into a race war, and the Black soldiers are fighting for survival against the world’s biggest lynch mob, armed to the teeth by the United States and Europe.

Where are the people of Tawurgha, the mostly Black Libyan city that was wiped from the face of the earth by the rebels? Many of those who were not killed or captured have clearly made their way to Sirte and Bani Walid, to make a last stand against the racist killers that westerners like Amy Goodman, of Democracy Now! call “revolutionaries.” The rebels are brazen – absolutely without shame – in their determination to cleanse Libya of its Black population. They are like Arab Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, backed by a European and American air force, a racist militia whose fighters have vowed to “purge Black skin” and who scrawl the Arabic equivalent of “nigger” on the homes of their vanquished Black countrymen. Their rationalizations for ethnic cleansing and summary executions of Black prisoners are quite familiar to the American ear, identical to our own practitioners of White Terror...

...NATO says it will keep bombing until the last resistance to their Libyan rebel surrogates, is crushed. That appears to mean, until the last free Black men in Libya are captured or killed, their families caged at the mercy of racist brutes and sexual marauders. Black civilians are clearly not the kind of people that the Euro-Americans had in mind, when they claimed to be on a mission to protect civilians.

No wonder, then, that the defenders of Sirte and Bani Walid fight like lions, against all odds. They are heroes, but they also have no choice. The racist death squads will have no mercy. Black skin will be purged, Black women raped and then killed. The First Black President of the United States has unleashed a hell on Black Libya. No decent person can ever forgive him.
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/black-libyans-make-their-stand-...

A Pakistani commission investigating the US raid that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has said a doctor who worked for the CIA should be tried for "high treason", a move likely to anger US officials pushing for his release.

The government commission said in a statement on Thursday that it was of the view that "a case of conspiracy against the state of Pakistan and high treason'' should be registered against Dr Shakil Afridi on the basis of the evidence it had gathered. It did not elaborate.

Such a charge carries the death penalty......
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/10/201110723854479984.html

Others respond differently:

Bombs raise fear of German left-wing attacks
Security stepped up in Berlin after the discovery of the sixteenth firebomb in less than a week.

...A previously unknown leftist group claimed responsibility for the bomb, saying they were protesting against Germany's military involvement in Afghanistan and the country's role as an arms exporter.
http://english.aljazeera.net/video/europe/2011/10/20111013165514504205.h...

The beat goes on:

'US drone raids' kill fighters in Pakistan
Officials say seven fighters have been killed by missiles fired from unmanned aircraft in North and South Waziristan.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/10/201110134250729444.html

For Refusing To Reveal Its Secret Interpretation Of The PATRIOT Act

We've been covering for a while now how Senators Ron Wyden and Mark Udall have been very concerned over the secret interpretation the feds have of one piece of the PATRIOT Act. They've been trying to pressure the government into publicly explaining how they interpret the law, because they believe that it directly contrasts how most of the public (and many elected officials) believe the feds are interpreting the law. While the two Senators continue to put pressure on the feds and to hint at the feds' interpretation, just the fact that the government won't even explain its own interpretation of the law seems ridiculous.

Given all of this, reporter Charlie Savage of the NY Times filed a Freedom of Information Act request to find out the federal government's interpretation of its own law... and had it refused. According to the federal government, its own interpretation of the law is classified. What sort of democracy are we living in when the government can refuse to even say how it's interpreting its own law? That's not democracy at all.

Julian Sanchez points us to the news that Savage and the NY Times have now sued the federal government for not revealing its interpretation of the PATRIOT Act, pointing out that if parts of the interpretation contain classified material, the Justice Department should black that out and reveal the rest, but simply refusing to reveal the interpretation entirely is a violation of the Freedom of Information Act. You can bet that the feds will do everything they can to get out of this lawsuit, just as they did with the various lawsuits concerning warrantless wiretapping. Here's hoping the court systems don't let them. No matter what you think of this administration (or the last one) and how it's handling the threat of terrorism, I'm curious how anyone can make the argument that the US government should not reveal how it interprets the very laws under which it's required to operate.

http://missrepresentation.org

When the new documentary film Miss Representation premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, audiences were riveted, and Oprah Winfrey acquired its broadcast rights.

The film accumulates startling facts and statistics that leave audiences shaken, armed with a new perspective, and asking the question, “What can we do?”

...It breaks up old nationalities and pushes the antagonism of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie to the extreme point. In a word, the free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone, gentlemen, that I vote in favor of free trade.

Marx & Engels, On Free Trade (1848)

South Korean opposition resists US trade pact

South Korea's opposition party has said it will resist any bid to force a sweeping free-trade agreement with the US through parliament, following ratification of the dealy by US congress.

The ruling Grand National Party (GNP) urged opposition legislators on Thursday to swiftly approve the long-delayed deal but the Democratic Party (DP) says the pact is one-sided....

...the DP and five other splinter groups held a joint rally on Wednesday with activists at parliament and pledged to stop the ruling party forcing the bills through.

"The FTA, which the ruling party and the government are seeking to push through, is feared to deepen the rifts within our society and worsen polarisation," Sohn Hak-Kyu, the DP leader, said, calling for greater protection for farmers.

Kim Jin-Pyo, the DP floor leader, said the party would use tough tactics - filibustering and occupation of parliament - if there is an attempt to railroad the bills.........
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2011/10/20111013621131073...

"Stop Peddling this crap!"

Libertarianism is actually a leftist ideology and virtually the same as anarchism but in this country it's placed on the right because of affiliation with the republicans, where they mostly agree on breaking things.

"Not true at all. Anarchism is very anti-capitalist, while libertarianism is quite pro-capitalist. Simple as that."

Not true at all? libertarianism as an ideology doesn't care whether people are capitalists or not and the same is true of anarchism, in fact the central tenent is 'individual freedom' which is also the central tenet of anarchism.

What they also have in common because of that central tenant of 'individual freedom' is a dislike for the 'system' whatever that system is or more specifically who they see as holding the power over them.

Basically. both come down to the singular phrase "you're not the boss of me".

Whether or not that 'feeling' has been hijacked for other purposes since time immemorial, well that's beyond question.

Like it or not that's the truth of it.

"...the free trade system is destructive...."

And yet we have free trade between the states and the effect is?

It's easy to forget since we think of ourselves as belonging to one country that technically each state is a country unto itself.

That being said...there would be huge problems in this country with free trade between the states if it weren't for the wealth redistribution that occurs from the north to the south.

Internationally there is no parallel to compensate for the effects of free trade. Even amongst other unions like the EU where they have a singular currency they do not have a "welfare" offset and we get problems like Greece.

This is what the 'capitalists' overlook when they use the US as their grand model for free trade between 'states'.

about Anarchism if it can be reduced to the idiotic level you describe it as....

The mayor had offered the occupiers space at city hall and everyone was going to move there as the park would be closed at 10 pm last night...Yesterday someone sparked a second vote and it was decided that everyone would stay instead and force a confrontation with police.

All except for one group everyone took down their tents and collected their gear. The cops moved in and a few people were still trying to instigate as everyone else sort of milled around. The cops did not take the bait and kept their cool. The group around that singular tent locked arms and 4 of them were arrested and the tent was taken down...and then the cops just left.

See it's not illegal to be in that park or protest in that park but it is illegal to camp in it. So except for those 4 nothing changed. The kids stayed there and this old man went home after pointing out what the instigators were trying to do and made them promise not to embarrass this old hippy.

The 'novement' doesn't need martyrs and it doesn't need to be portrayed as fools.

Maybe it's different here because local government is on the side of the protesters. Maybe it's different because of our collective experience with WTO but it shows that the way the NYC government is handling things is not the only way or even the best way.

I left, proud of my people both in uniform and out.

and that, to me, is like Anarchism..a piece of Anarchism...

"Ya know,, somehow I don't think so many scholars would write

about Anarchism if it can be reduced to the idiotic level you describe it as...."

Then you don't know a damned thing about scholars...

LOL

There are big differences to the language used in published papers or in speeches and that which is used conversationally.

Hero worship is foolish.

"People are taking care of each other for the collective good

and that, to me, is like Anarchism..a piece of Anarchism..."

but it's technically not that at all...that would more technically be called socialism...or more broadly, humanism.

It's a shifting of terms used by social engineers...like for instance "republicanism" was originally about "minority rights" but it's been changed to be more about "elitisim"...

I don't really give a shit what you think a word means...it is what it is.

You're fencing yourself in with your own misuse of the language.

Ex-Hedge Fund Boss Sentenced To 11 Years In Prison

A former billionaire described by the government as "the modern face of illegal insider trading" was sentenced Thursday to 11 years in prison, the longest insider-trading sentence ever but far short of the two decades sought by prosecutors.

Galleon Group founder Raj Rajaratnam, 54, also was fined $10 million by U.S. District Judge Richard J. Holwell, who said he concluded that Rajaratnam made well over $50 million in profits from his illegal trades.

"His crimes and the scope of his crimes reflect a virus in our business culture that needs to be eradicated," Holwell said.

...

The sentencing culminates a series of convictions and sentencings that followed the October 2009 announcement of Rajaratnam's arrest. More than two dozen people were arrested; all were convicted. The other defendants got sentences ranging from a few months to 10 years.

Best Occupy Wall Street Protest Signs

Funny and Clever Protest Signs From Occupy Wall Street

If I were there I'd suggest turning these protests mobile like they were in Egypt...but no one would listen.

Occupy Wall Street No Longer Allowed Tarps and Sleeping Bags In Zuccotti As Of Tomorrow

As we reported earlier, the city is coming in to clean Zuccotti Park tomorrow whether Occupy Wall Street likes it or not. (They don't). And now they're stepping up their response another notch: Ray Kelly told reporters that "People will have to remove all their belongings and leave the park." Not only that, they won't be allowed to bring back camping gear or even lie down, thus ending the sleeping part of the occupation. Things might get messy, since OWS shows no signs of giving in.

They've put out an "EMERGENCY CALL TO ACTION: Prevent the forcible closure of Occupy Wall Street!" and are urging people to go to Zuccotti at 6 a.m. tomorrow for "non-violent eviction defense."

According to the Daily News' Twitter, protesters are asking the crowd to "mobilize at 6 a.m. with 'differently [sic] levels of cooperation, depending on your arrestability.'"

OWS spokesman Patrick Bruner said today that a "variety of actions" are being considered for tomorrow morning, and that "the consensus seems to be that we will not leave the park."

-I don't really give a shit what YOU think a word means either ...it is what it is.-

You'd think that a librarian would be a little more familiar with a dictionary.

;)

As Occupy Wall Street protests continue, a San Jose grassroots group takes different route

Organizers of Wednesday's anti-Wall Street protest in San Francisco got what they wanted after surrounding the Wells Fargo Bank corporate headquarters and blocking its entrances: 11 demonstrators arrested and plenty of headlines.

In New York, police arrested four people outside JP Morgan Chase offices, where protesters called in vain for a meeting with Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon.

But on the same day in San Jose, a different kind of protest was getting real -- and permanent -- results.

Nice & Refeshed. Tyhx. Kewl. ;)

Occupy Big Coal: Kentuckians to Protest Most Corrupt Member of Congress on Friday

Wall Street and Big Coal corporations have no better friend than Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY), the "prince of pork" and powerful chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

Hailed as the most "corrupt member of Congress" by the non-profit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Rogers' 5th District in eastern and south-central Kentucky also ranks at the bottom of the nation in virtually every quality of life indicator.

After thirty years of his abysmal record, Rogers' constituents have had enough. This Friday, at 3pm, Oct. 14, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth will hold a peaceful demonstration at Rogers' Somerset office to ask a simple question: Doesn't Kentucky deserve better?

There might not be a better 99% vs. 1% scenario of political and corporate wanton abandon in the nation.

Old guard back in the trenches at 'Occupy' protests

Activists from other eras — Vietnam, civil rights and anti-nuclear — join the 'kids'

NEW YORK — As soon as 62-year-old William Johnsen finished his intravenous drip, he waited for the nurse to apply a Band-Aid, said goodbye to the other patients and then left the veteran’s hospital for the spot where he has been spending his days for the last 3-and-a-half weeks — the “Occupy Wall Street” protest.

Johnsen, a disabled Vietnam combat veteran who suffered a heart attack in December, can’t sleep outside overnight like the young protesters due to his health issues — he has a genetic condition that has triggered emphysema and liver disease. But though the disease tires him out, the animated New York native isn’t about to sit out the crusade, which he says has given him a new sense of purpose.

“We are awakening, we’re waking up to the fact that it’s up to us,” Johnsen said Tuesday at the camp in Zuccotti Park, not long after finishing his treatment at the hospital. “Government and our other institutions of authority are so corrupt that we cannot trust them anymore. There is a rebirth of realization that it’s in our hands.”

“As somebody who has walked thousands of miles for jobs, democracy and justice, this is the type of spirit that was lacking in so many of my walks that I’ve done alone reaching out to people,” he added.

Older activists like Johnsen — some hobbling along on canes and leg braces — are quickly becoming a presence at “Occupy” protests across the country. And the veterans of the civil rights movement, anti-Vietnam war protests and anti-nuclear proliferation demonstrations appear to be relishing being back in the struggle, supporting the “kids” and mobilizing other seniors to join in.

...

In fact the old guard, while offering strategies on nonviolence and how to behave around the police, has learned a lot from the kids, said Mike Ferner, acting director of Veterans for Peace.

“They bring some real different approaches to this … a lot of different technology,” particularly social media, said Ferner, whose group whose group helped plan the first occupy Washington, D.C., protest for Oct. 6 — the tenth anniversary of the war in Afghanistan.

“One of the things that we’re learning from them is how to facilitate large meetings of people in a really democratic fashion. And it’s a real pain,” he said with a chuckle, referring to the “Occupy” movement’s “general assemblies.” “It’s really lengthy, but what we’ve seen at the occupation in Washington and a few other places that our members have been involved, the young people are really pretty expert at being able to do that and that’s a real skill.”

The respect is mutual. Cara Hartley, 27, a New York restaurant hostess involved in outreach for the “Occupy” movement, said the older activists brought skills and experience in keeping a large group of people safe and peaceful.

...

good in mind...

{Eye-Roll} ALL ACTIONS {SHARDS} ARE NEEDED To Make This Earth {Gem} WHOLE! {i missed u teehee ;}
Mwah HaHa Brew HaHa TeaCheers! ;) gotta "Fly" *poof*

involved...

You and CeeCee and most every one who is or has been on this blog keep insisting on the idea's impossibility...I'm sure you know there are many, many examples of this happening in the history of the world...

Now I'm going back to ignoring the disagreement, because it's not my job to prove anything to you...I'm here to post what I like and not be fighting, struggling and debating all the time...what some call a civil disagreement or debate is not what it really reads like...I'm not that connected to the issue to spend my time here that way...

Are you seriously going to try and bust my nuts over the proper usuage and meaning of words?...You need to rethink that.

Socialism

Socialism /ˈsoʊʃəlɪzəm/ is an economic system in which the means of production are either state owned or commonly owned and controlled cooperatively; or a political philosophy advocating such a system.[1] As a form of social organization, socialism is based on co-operative social relations and self-management; relatively equal power-relations and the reduction or elimination of hierarchy in the management of economic and political affairs.[2][3]

I'm just fond of guerilla mobility in response to dynamic forces...

If your aim was better you wouldn't miss me...I can't dodge for shit all any more...lol

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a major Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of 18th-century Romanticism. His political philosophy heavily influenced the French Revolution, as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological and educational thought.

His novel, Émile: or, On Education is a seminal treatise on the education of the whole person for citizenship. His sentimental novel, Julie, ou la nouvelle Héloïse, was of great importance to the development of pre-romanticism[1] and romanticism in fiction.[2] Rousseau's autobiographical writings: his Confessions, which initiated the modern autobiography, and his Reveries of a Solitary Walker were among the pre-eminent examples of the late 18th-century movement known as the Age of Sensibility, featuring an increasing focus on subjectivity and introspection that has characterized the modern age. His Discourse on the Origin of Inequality and his On the Social Contract are cornerstones in modern political and social thought and make a strong[citation needed] case for democratic government and social empowerment.

http://occupyhalloween.tumblr.com/

tis a sign that at 108 I need to re-read or research again ... ;)

I'm 109 and barely remember it myself...lol

I just think that it's a good idea to read the works of the scholars that the scholars themselves read.

;)
Oh how gallant that U helped another with "EMBED"
~ yet honestly I would have "figured", but you saved me MUCH STRESS & Searching 4 info & TIME!

http://photos.denverpost.com/mediacenter/2011/10/live-camera-view-of-the...

http://www.livestream.com/owsoccupyseattle

Cops trying to sweep out the people I read...

alright...now you're starting to scare me...you're being so sweet that I had to look over my shoulder to make sure someone wasn't sneaking up on me...

that being said...

do me a favor and pass around some of whatever it is your smoking to the others around here...they're kinda cranky lately...

Occupy Seattle will break up and reform over and over again...someone planted that seed last night...

Of course...part of Occupy Seattle has already moved to city hall where the mayor has said that camping is welcome.

There's only 5 ppl inside the park...300 surrounding it...lol

About the same as last night.

www.kfiam640.com/mediaplayer/?station=KFI-AM&action=listenlive&channel_t...

Deepak Chopra is going to debate some guy...hasn't started yet, just Deepak talking right now.

Occupy Sonora is so far planning to be together each Saturday - I doubt anyone would even attempt to break the park closing time to spend the night...I won't. Going to start here this Saturday, because last Saturday the few people who went didn't know each other...Hellcats are playing NorCal Derby in Chico Sat. so I'm going to check out Occupy Chico...Still not sure if I want to be seen at my localest one here in Sonora...

:)

[hug]

The technique that Occupy Seattle is using is to simply step out of the park when cops come...literally only crossing the street.

a dozen arrested tonight...4 arrested last night...the majority of people just standing on the other side of the street...and they come back when the cops leave...

no matter where you go try and take that idea with you...

Let's go blow up Iran.

I believe the response was actually only sanctions...not war.

US says another Country did something to us...or why, even if it's true, that we need to make civilians suffer for it...

I would say....

http://www.youtube.com/user/WeAreNinetyNine#p/u/2/EaUi4gQ_3Z4

And he answered:

At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom,

Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them.

Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff.

And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfillment.

You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief,

But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound.

And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour?

In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle the eyes.

And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free?

If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead.

You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them.

And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed.

For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their won pride?

And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you.

And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared.

Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape.

These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling.

And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light.

And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom.

=Khalil Gibran=

Hey, Iran could just say that they didn't have anything to do with it and don't sanction the killing of people on US soil...

Weird how they haven't done that...

Frankly though it does look like a frame up from someone inside Iran on this guy that tried to hire the bomber...

I've been very busy this last couple days and I haven't had enoough sleep...

later

H.E. Mr. Ban Ki-moon Secretary General United Nations, New York

In the name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful No. 1110 11 October 2011

Excellency,

I am writing to you to express our outrage regarding the allegations leveled by the United States officials against the Islamic Republic of Iran on the involvement of my country in an assassination plot targeting a foreign diplomat in Washington.

The Islamic Republic of Iran strongly and categorically rejects these fabricated and baseless allegations, based on the suspicious claims by an individual. Any country could accuse other countries through fabrication of such stories. However, this would set dangerous precedents in the relations among States.

Iran has always condemned terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. Iran has been a victim of terrorism, a clear recent example of which is the assassination of a number of Iranian nuclear scientists in the past two years carried out by the Zionist regime and supported by the United States.

The Iranian nation seeks a world free from terrorism and considers the current US warmongering and propaganda machine against Iran as a threat not just against itself but to the peace and stability in the Persian Gulf region. The Islamic Republic of Iran warns against the implications of this horrible scenario and submits that the continuation of such divide-and-rule policies could have detrimental effects on peace and security.

The US allegation is, obviously, a politically-motivated move and a showcase of its long-standing animosity towards the Iranian nation. The Islamic Republic of Iran categorically and in the strongest terms condemns this shameful allegation by the United States authorities and deplores it as a well-thought evil plot in line with their anti-Iranian policy to divert attention from the current economic and social problems at home and the popular revolutions and protests against United States long supported dictatorial regimes abroad.

The Islamic Republic of Iran underlines its determination to maintain its friendly relations with all regional countries, particularly with its Muslim neighbors, and invites all to be vigilant against the vicious campaigns targeting stability and peace and friendly relations among States in our region.

As the Secretary-General of the United Nations you have an important responsibility in enlightening the international public opinion about the dangerous consequences of warmongering policies of the United States Government on international peace and security.

I am sending identical letters to the President of the Security Council and the President of the General Assembly. It would be appreciated if this letter could be circulated as a document of the General Assembly under the agenda item 83 and of the Security Council.

Please accept, Excellency, the assurance of my highest consideration.

Mohammad Khazaee Ambassador Permanent Representative

....

And there appears to be more than one person
Submitted by Alice on Thu, 10/13/2011 - 8:07pm.
involved...

You and CeeCee and most every one who is or has been on this blog keep insisting on the idea's impossibility...I'm sure you know there are many, many examples of this happening in the history of the world...

Now I'm going back to ignoring the disagreement, because it's not my job to prove anything to you...I'm here to post what I like and not be fighting, struggling and debating all the time...what some call a civil disagreement or debate is not what it really reads like...I'm not that connected to the issue to spend my time here that way...

...I prefer to call it substantiating your argumentative opinion. Sorry challenging your posts, or anyone's for that matter, are just as welcome here as yours are and if you feel strongly about an issue then IMHO you would also be willing to defend it, rationally, succinctly and credibly. By doing so, it could garner support or lead to personal re-evaluation. Otherwise, you are treating the blog as a dumping ground and jeopardizes not only your relevancy but the blog's.

The breaking news is that heavy fighting has broken out in "liberated" Tripoli.

On Oct. 14, 1964, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. was named winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

"I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. I believe that even amid today's mortar bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow. I believe that wounded justice, lying prostrate on the blood-flowing streets of our nations, can be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men. I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down men other-centered can build up..."

Martin Luther King's Acceptance Speech, on the occasion of the award of the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo.

Conservatives smear ‘Occupy Wall Street’ protests as anti-Semitic

The Emergency Committee for Israel, a Republican group, has become the latest to claim the “Occupy Wall Street” protest in lower Manhattan is anti-Semitic.

The group has created a video advertisement that shows anti-Semitic signs at the protests. The video will air in a “substantial” buy in New York and Washington, D.C., according to Politico.

The ad says that Democratic party leaders are “turning a blind eye to anti-Semitic, anti-Israel attacks.”

“Tell President Obama and Leader Pelosi to stand up to the mob,” the ad concludes.

Conservative media outlets, including Fox Business, have been circulating a video of a young New Yorker at the “Occupy Wall Street” demonstration berating an elderly Jewish man.

The young man has been portrayed as an “Occupy Wall Street” protester, but the vocal New Yorker is Danny “Lotion Man” Cline. He is Jewish.

The “Lotion Man” can be seen in other videos on YouTube harassing Wall Street demonstrators and picking fights with the homeless................
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/10/13/conservatives-smear-occupy-wall-st...

US says terrorists seeking missing Libyan missile

Terrorist groups have expressed interest in obtaining some of the thousands of shoulder-launched missiles that have gone missing in Libya and the issue has become a priority for the Obama administration, a senior U.S.official said Friday.

Andrew J. Shapiro, Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs, said Friday the missiles "could pose a threat to civil aviation."

"We know that terrorist groups have expressed interest in obtaining these weapons," he said, adding that the issue issue of securing the weapons was a priority for President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Libya was believed to have about 20,000 such missiles in its arsenals before civil war began in March, Shapiro said.......
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9895284

Lesley Stahl on U.S. sanctions against Iraq: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: I think this is a very hard choice, but the price--we think the price is worth it.

...to drive him before you, to see his cities reduced to ashes..."
Genghis Khan

Obama, SKorea's Lee promote trade deal in US

President Barack Obama and South Korea's President Lee Myung-bak are promoting a new trade deal by visiting an auto plant in Michigan, a state battered by Asian car imports, in a rare joint appearance outside of Washington by a U.S. president and a visiting head of state.

In choosing General Motors Co.'s Orion assembly plant for Friday's tour, the two leaders will draw attention to an aspect of a U.S.-South Korea trade agreement that had been among the most difficult to negotiate. Congress approved the deal Wednesday after negotiators overcame U.S. auto industry complaints that previous efforts at a deal failed to do enough to lift South Korea's barriers to U.S.-made cars.

Obama is taking Lee to the heart of the region that has been hardest hit by foreign car competition, especially the influx of vehicles like South Korea's Hyundai.....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9895291

the problem is that there actually are bad guys out there...there's bad guys on our side...and theirs.

Iran has a right wing too bub...in fact some of the phoney intel that was used to start the Iraq war came from Iran, Pakistan and collated by Israel before it was passed to the Brits before it was passed to Bush...

Do keep that in mind.

Nicholas Cosmo Receives 25 Years in Prison for $413 Million Ponzi Scheme

Nicholas Cosmo, who pleaded guilty to running a $413 million Ponzi scheme that defrauded thousands of investors, was sentenced to 25 years in prison, prosecutors said.

Cosmo, owner of Agape World Inc. and Agape Merchant Advance LLC, was arrested in January 2009. He claimed Agape solicited investor funds that were used to make short-term bridge loans. Agape received about $413 million from investors, while only about $30 million in loans were made, according to the government. Actual losses to victims were about $195 million.

“Those who lie and steal from the investing public are on notice that they face severe penalties,” U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch in Brooklyn said today in a statement. “As recounted today in court by several of his victims, the defendant’s actions crushed the hopes and dreams of everyday citizens.”

Cosmo, who was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Denis Hurley in Central Islip, New York, operated the scheme from October 2003 to January 2009. He solicited funds from investors “well in excess” of what he told them was needed for bridge loans, prosecutors said, and then pocketed the money.

Thank you for that. And you're examples of correct tactics are important reads as well.

This morning occupy Trenton had state policemen show up without a warning, and stand there while some guys- literally, some guys - they wouldn't say if they were cops, my guess is they were just hired goons, carry their plastic crates with laptops and streaming equipment and everything away. Someone got it all on tape. I was watching livestreams all over the place this morning, saw it when it happened. Occupy Trenton is small, they would've moved if they were given a chance. But they're learning fast. They're gonna get a cheap rv and go mobile, I think.

Occupy Jersey City is going to to get big tomorrow, I think. It's also the fall back plan from Wall Street, if things got really really Really bad.

Denver had trouble, too. As in a hostile Mayor trouble, not a few instigators (I like that word. It could be provocateurs, or just idiots) trouble.

Boston had a tough time this week. Philly and LA seem to have it a little better off.

So much going on.

Good one.

Occupy Seattle was down to about 50 ppl this morning...

Before I clicked off the live stream they were asking for people to stand up and be leaders while at the same time telling them that leaders would be rejected...idealism without practicality is FAIL...which they're learning the hard way...

Some of the older people have been trying to rescue this but so many were turned away early on because the 'collective' had it's head up it's collective ass that I just don't know what's going to happen...Every time they had a GA more and more people disappeared because the 'majority' was making bad decisions. Like trying to force confrontations with the cops who were extremely cool about the whole thing...like protecting a sukkah built by a guy who's publically stated aim was to set up conditions to sue the city on religious grounds...the same guy this morning claims to be running for mayor...I'm thinking mental patient.

Basically Occupy Seattle has lost the PR war and about every radio station in the area has started laughing at them and the press has turned negative.

The mayor gave Occupy leave to use city hall for camping at night, even had portable toilets brought in and the morons at the park stayed to instigate shit with the cops. They even screwed up their permits for the day occupation of the park by violating the terms of those permits.

When they were told that they needed to pack up their gear it took them an hour to decide whether or not they were going to do it because they were arguing over proper protocol for a general assembly...finally one chick stepped up...and they're sleeping at city halls and occupying the park in the day...and you can actually be in the park 24 hours a day...just no structures without permit and no sleeping...

NOT ONE SINGLE ISSUE WITH LOCAL GOVERNMENT SO THEY"RE CREATING IT...IDIOTS.

I dunno maybe after I stop being so pissed...

On the other hand Occupy Portland has adopted the mobile protest strategy and has grown pretty well unstoppable.

lesson number 1...your movement must be used friendly and not confined to any cool kid clique
lesson number 2...anarchy is fail...this is also lesson number 3 through 99

Not true at all? libertarianism as an ideology doesn't care whether people are capitalists or not and the same is true of anarchism, in fact the central tenent is 'individual freedom' which is also the central tenet of anarchism.
===
To be an anarchist is to be a socialist. Read the classic anarchist writings. Bakunin. Rudolf Rocker. Many more. Central "tenent" is freedom for everyone within a free society. I don't know what you are talking about, but it is not anarchism.

Libertarians are not all for freeing up the markets? And getting rid of government programs?

Seize the Time
By Michael Albert

Friday, October 14, 2011

I am in a room in Dublin Ireland, using a thready connection, typing on a glass screen too small for my fingers, continuing a speaking tour, marveling, celebrating, and honestly - wishing I was back in the USA, in New York, on Wall Street, which is, for me, ordinarily, the most despised place I could imagine, and now, instead, is the pulsing heart of a new organism.

Yesterday I visited the Occupy encampment at Dublin's main Bank, in the heart of their downtown, quite like Wall Street sits in New York. The Dublin occupiers see themselves as entwined with people sitting in New York, entwined with people sitting in an incredibly long and swelling list of other U.S. cities, entwined with people sitting in Barcelona, entwined with people sitting in Athens, spreading occupations further, ever faster, all over. They say hi. They say power to you. They say carry on. They pledge to carry on too. There is something in the air.

The Dublin occupiers are not long time activists. They are people overwhelmingly new to protest and certainly new to affirmation of positive aims. They are new to constructing the seeds of the future in the present. They are modest. They are listening. They are learning. They are teaching.

A couple of days ago I was in London, where, of course - and yes, it is "of course," because in just a few weeks it has gotten to the point where one expects occupation or at least efforts to create occupation virtually everywhere one goes - Londoners are embarking on their own home grown occupy efforts.

Though my given topics were different, I had chances to speak, as well, as an old timer with new timers. And I very explicitly addressed the younger people at a large London Media conference. My message - they surely didn't need it, but in some things redundancy generates greater confidence - was a simple one.

Years back, actually decades back, and almost eons back, we had a slogan: "Seize the Time." We tended to overuse it, cheapening its import a bit. But it is true that there are rare moments that carry incredible potential. There are rare moments when completely unexpected and virtually unfathomable conjunctures of pain, anger, desire, action, and accident conspire to gel what was amorphous into what is coherent - and so activist tides rise.
http://www.zcommunications.org/seize-the-time-by-michael-albert

...

206 NATO troops poisoned in Afghanistan

NATO has confirmed that at least 206 troops working with the US-led military alliance have been poisoned near Mazar Sharif, capital of the northern Afghan province of Balkh, Press TV reports.

The NATO- led International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) says the soldiers fell ill after dining in Camp Marmal near Mazar Sharif late Wednesday, a Press TV correspondent reported on Friday.

Around 138 of the victims are German while the rest are from other NATO countries engaged in the Afghan war.

Mazar Sharif is located some 310 kilometers (192 miles) north of the capital Kabul.

Nobody has yet claimed responsibility for the incident as NATO has launched a probe into the cause of the food poisoning.

This comes as according to a United Nations report on September 28, Afghanistan saw a near 40-percent rise in the number of security incidents compared with the same period in 2010.

Violence has also spread from Afghanistan's volatile south to relatively peaceful areas over the course of the past year despite the presence of some 150,000 foreign troops.

The increasing number of troop casualties in Afghanistan has caused widespread anger in the US and other NATO member states, undermining public support for the Afghan war.

War's mouth or theirs...ya know...maybe.

#OccupySF
March starts at 3pm (tomorrow) in front of the Federal Reserve Bank. Feel free to come anytime before then : )
57 minutes ago

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#Occupy Chico
Join us this Saturday at Noon @ the Hands in Downtown Chico!
Occupy Chico International Day of Peaceful Demonstration

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Occupy Los Angeles
Join us tomorrow! Please arrive as early as possible! We have a day full of events! The day kicks off with a march & rally for the Global Day of Action with occupiers from all over the World! Later in the day, we will have speakers, musicians, and entertainment. Please click "attending" and share with your friends!

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Occupy Sonora
FRONT PAGE BABY!!!!!!!!!!!
Union Democrat Photos
uniondemocrat.mycapture.com

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Occupy "Oakland" Together
Start Occupy Oakland Now. Come together for march for a different equality for the people. The governmental system has got to change and we are the only ones that can do that. Wait no longer.

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Occupy Merced
Friday evening, Oct 14, Occupy Merced thanked Occupy Japan standing with us, half a world away, in solidarity for a better future. The following message was translated to hundreds in the audience:

It is amazing to see people uniting people for the common cause of stopping greed and violence at the global level.

People speaking out against injustice is truly inspiring.

Now is the time to think of ourselves as part of the global community and we are happy to take the stand together in our respective cities and all over the world.

Our worlds are very connected, very intertwined. As common people, we are closer to one another than to our governments.

We stand in solidarity with you against nuclear power and the dangers it brings to this planet.

We must sustain a global consciousness for our mutual success in overturning all instantiations of greed and make this world a friendly place for all common people.

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Occupy Modesto | Oct 14
www.meetup.com
As decided at the Queen Bean Meeting on Saturday, October 8th, we will be meeting around 5:30 and starting the meeting/discussion at 6:00.

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Occupy Sesame Street

"Central "tenent" is freedom for everyone within a free society."

and that somehow sounds different than "individual freedom"?

"Libertarians are not all for freeing up the markets? And getting rid of government programs?"

Are not markets also someones freedoms?...what you're describing is how they've interpreted the central tenet...of 'freedom for everyone within a free society'

Anarchism and socialism are not the same thing...although many, especially in the US have tried to sell socialism under the label of anarchism when the word 'socialism' fell out of favor in the 50s...

Do you not find it odd that you're reacting the exact same way as if I'd challenged your religion?

Think about it.

But in the mean time...

Libertarianism

Libertarianism has been variously defined by sources. In the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view. Libertarianism includes diverse beliefs, all advocating strict limits to government activity and sharing the goal of maximizing individual liberty and political freedom.[1]

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be immoral,[1][2] or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations.[3][4][5][6][7][8] Proponents of anarchism (known as "anarchists") advocate stateless societies based on non-hierarchical[3][9][10] voluntary associations.[11][12]

There are many types and traditions of anarchism, not all of which are mutually exclusive.[13] Anarchist schools of thought can differ fundamentally, supporting anything from extreme individualism to complete collectivism

...

Etymology and terminology
For more information, see Anarchist terminology.
The term anarchism derives from the Greek ἄναρχος, anarchos, meaning "without rulers",[32][33] from the prefix ἀν- (an-, "without") + ἀρχή (archê, "sovereignty, realm, magistracy")[34] + -ισμός (-ismos, from the suffix -ιζειν, -izein "-izing"). There is some ambiguity with the use of the terms "libertarianism" and "libertarian" in writings about anarchism. Since the 1890s from France,[35] the term "libertarianism" has often been used as a synonym for anarchism[36] and was used almost exclusively in this sense until the 1950s in the United States;[37] its use as a synonym is still common outside the United States.[38] Accordingly, "libertarian socialism" is sometimes used as a synonym for socialist anarchism,[39][40] to distinguish it from "individualist libertarianism" (individualist anarchism). On the other hand, some use "libertarianism" to refer to individualistic free-market philosophy only, referring to free-market anarchism as "libertarian anarchism".[41][42]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/health/policy/15health.html?_r=1&hp

The Obama administration announced Friday that it was scrapping a long-term care insurance program created by the new health care law because it was too costly and would not work.

Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services, said she had concluded that premiums would be so high that few healthy people would sign up. The program, which was intended for people with chronic illnesses or severe disabilities, was known as Community Living Assistance Services and Supports, or Class.

“We have not identified a way to make Class work at this time,” Ms. Sebelius said. She said the program, which had been championed by Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, was financially unsustainable.

Kathy J. Greenlee, the assistant secretary of health and human services in charge of the program, said: “We do not have a viable path forward. We will not be working further to implement the Class Act.”

The administration’s decision was another setback for the new law, which is under attack in court, in Congress and in many state legislatures. Ms. Sebelius said her decision “does not affect the rest of the health care law,” which is supposed to provide coverage to more than 30 million people who are uninsured.

But the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said the long-term care program was “only one of the unwise, unsustainable components of an unwise, unsustainable law.” He and other Republicans in Congress want to repeal the entire law.

Advocates for older Americans and people with disabilities expressed disappointment at the decision, and Ms. Sebelius said Americans still had an “enormous need” for long-term care insurance. “At $75,000 a year for a nursing home and $18,000 a year for home health care, most families cannot afford to pay out of pocket,” she said.

The program was intended for people with severe disabilities who wanted to live in the community, though benefits could also have been used to help pay for nursing home care or assisted living. It would have been financed with premiums paid by workers, through voluntary payroll deductions, with no federal subsidy. Premiums were supposed to have ensured the solvency of the program over 75 years.

But Ms. Sebelius said she agreed with actuaries who feared that “not enough young, healthy people” would enroll. “This could have led to a vicious cycle where premiums would have to be set higher and higher to cover the likely costs of benefits, leading fewer and fewer healthier people to sign up for the program,” Ms. Sebelius said.

Two early critics of the Class program — Senator John Thune of South Dakota and Representative Charles Boustany Jr. of Louisiana, both Republicans — said they had been vindicated.

“The Obama administration ignored repeated warnings about the financial solvency of this massive new entitlement and suppressed information on the viability of the program,” Mr. Thune said.

In an interview, Mr. Boustany said that “in their haste to get the bill passed,” President Obama and Congressional Democrats ignored warnings about the program’s financial risks.

When Congress was developing the program in late 2009, Senator Kent Conrad, Democrat of North Dakota and chairman of the Budget Committee, described it as “a Ponzi scheme of the first order” because it required an ever-increasing stream of premiums to cover the cost of benefits. Connie Garner, who helped devise the long-term care program as an aide to Mr. Kennedy, said she was “very, very disappointed” by the decision. “The program could have been made to work” if the administration had tried harder, Ms. Garner said.

Rick Perry officials spark revolt after doctoring environment report

Officials in Rick Perry's home state of Texas have set off a scientists' revolt after purging mentions of climate change and sea-level rise from what was supposed to be a landmark environmental report. The scientists said they were disowning the report on the state of Galveston Bay because of political interference and censorship from Perry appointees at the state's environmental agency.

By academic standards, the protest amounts to the beginnings of a rebellion: every single scientist associated with the 200-page report has demanded their names be struck from the document. "None of us can be party to scientific censorship so we would all have our names removed," said Jim Lester, a co-author of the report and vice-president of the Houston Advanced Research Centre.

"To me it is simply a question of maintaining scientific credibility. This is simply antithetical to what a scientist does," Lester said. "We can't be censored." Scientists see Texas as at high risk because of climate change, from the increased exposure to hurricanes and extreme weather on its long coastline to this summer's season of wildfires and drought.

However, Perry, in his run for the Republican nomination, has elevated denial of science, from climate change to evolution, to an art form. He opposes any regulation of industry, and has repeatedly challenged the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency

...
Bleh...

I'll try to put up some pics of Occupy Chico tomorrow...Goodnight. Oh and from the scrumptious Sierra Nevada Brewery that I will be touring on Sunday...woo hoo! Best beer in the known and unknown universe... xoxo

"It would have been financed with premiums paid by workers, through voluntary payroll deductions, with no federal subsidy. Premiums were supposed to have ensured the solvency of the program over 75 years."

Now of course this means that they're going to have push single payer again since this was the more expensive 'substitute' for single payer and designed primarily to support the health insurance industry...

The Public Option in Banking: Another Look at the German Model

Publicly owned banks were instrumental in funding Germany's "economic miracle" after the devastation of World War II. Although the German public banks have been targeted in the last decade for takedown by their private competitors, the model remains a viable alternative to the private profiteering being protested on Wall Street today.

One of the demands voiced by protesters in the Occupy Wall Street movement is for a "public option" in banking. What that means was explained by Dr. Michael Hudson, professor of economics at the University of Missouri in Kansas City, in an interview by Paul Jay of the Real News Network on October 6:

[T]he demand isn't simply to make a public bank, but is to treat the banks generally as a public utility, just as you treat electric companies as a public utility.... Just as there was pressure for a public option in health care, there should be a public option in banking. There should be a government bank that offers credit card rates without punitive 30% interest rates, without penalties, without raising the rate if you don't pay your electric bill. This is how America got strong in the 19th and early 20th century, by essentially having public infrastructure, just like you'd have roads and bridges.... The idea of public infrastructure was to lower the cost of living and to lower the cost of doing business.

New Study Finds 400,000 Farmers in Southern Africa Using 'Fertilizer Trees' to Improve Food Security

ScienceDaily (Oct. 14, 2011) — On a continent battered by weather extremes, famine and record food prices, new research released October 14 from the World Agroforestry Centre documents an exciting new trend in which hundreds of thousands of poor farmers in Southern Africa are now significantly boosting yields and incomes simply by using fast growing trees and shrubs to naturally fertilize their fields.

The analysis of two decades of work to bring the soil-enriching benefits of so-called "fertilizer trees" to the nutrient-depleted farms of Africa was published in the most recent issue of the International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability.

"In only five African countries, there are now some 400,000 smallholder farmers using fertilizer trees to provide critically needed soil nutrients -- and many report major increases in maize yields -- which shows that it is possible to rapidly introduce innovations in Africa that can have an immediate impact on food security," said Oluyede Ajayi, Senior Scientist at the World Agroforestry Centre and the paper's lead author.

You are hopeless, N!

"Anarchism and socialism are not the same thing...

Wrong as one can be. Anarchism is socialism, albeit one that requires no centralized leadership. No bolsheviks.

"although many, especially in the US have tried to sell socialism under the label of anarchism when the word 'socialism' fell out of favor in the 50s..."

Absolute bullshit! Anarchists have always opposed the brand of socialism that socialism fell out of favor in the 1950s. Why did it fall out of favor: Because it was tied to the atrocities committed by the Soviet Union.

Since most mainstream/Left/liberal accounts of Howard Zinn’s legacy are likely to gloss over the man’s actual politics, here’s a 2008 interview by AK author, Ziga Vodovnik.
——-
An Interview with Howard Zinn on Anarchism
Rebels Against Tyranny
By Ziga Vodovnik
Howard Zinn, 85, is a Professor Emeritus of political science at Boston University. He was born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1922 to a poor immigrant family. He realized early in his youth that the promise of the “American Dream“, that will come true to all hard-working and diligent people, is just that—a promise and a dream. During World War II he joined US Air Force and served as a bombardier in the “European Theatre“. This proved to be a formative experience that only strengthened his convictions that there is no such thing as a just war. It also revealed, once again, the real face of the socio-economic order, where the suffering and sacrifice of the ordinary people is always used only to higher the profits of the privileged few.
Although Zinn spent his youthful years helping his parents support the family by working in the shipyards, he started with studies at Columbia University after WWII, where he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation in 1958. Later he was appointed as a chairman of the department of history and social sciences at Spelman College, an all-black women’s college in Atlanta, GA, where he actively participated in the Civil Rights Movement.
From the onset of the Vietnam War he was active within the emerging anti-war movement, and in the following years only stepped up his involvement in movements aspiring towards another, better world. Zinn is the author of more than 20 books, including A People’s History of the United States that is “a brilliant and moving history of the American people from the point of view of those who have been exploited politically and economically and whose plight has been largely omitted from most histories…” (Library Journal)
Zinn’s most recent book is entitled A Power Governments Cannot Suppress, and is a fascinating collection of essays that Zinn wrote in the last couple of years. Beloved radical historian is still lecturing across the US and around the world, and is, with active participation and support of various progressive social movements continuing his struggle for free and just society.
Ziga Vodovnik: From the 1980s onwards we are witnessing the process of economic globalization getting stronger day after day. Many on the Left are now caught between a “dilemma”—either to work to reinforce the sovereignty of nation-states as a defensive barrier against the control of foreign and global capital; or to strive towards a non-national alternative to the present form of globalization and that is equally global. What’s your opinion about this?
Howard Zinn: I am an anarchist, and according to anarchist principles nation states become obstacles to a true humanistic globalization. In a certain sense, the movement towards globalization where capitalists are trying to leap over nation state barriers, creates a kind of opportunity for movement to ignore national barriers, and to bring people together globally, across national lines in opposition to globalization of capital, to create globalization of people, opposed to traditional notion of globalization. In other words to use globalization—there is nothing wrong with idea of globalization—in a way that bypasses national boundaries and of course that there is not involved corporate control of the economic decisions that are made about people all over the world.
ZV: Pierre-Joseph Proudhon once wrote that: “Freedom is the mother, not the daughter of order.” Where do you see life after or beyond (nation) states?
HZ: Beyond the nation states? (laughter) I think what lies beyond the nation states is a world without national boundaries, but also with people organized. But not organized as nations, but people organized as groups, as collectives, without national and any kind of boundaries. Without any kind of borders, passports, visas. None of that! Of collectives of different sizes, depending on the function of the collective, having contacts with one another. You cannot have self-sufficient little collectives, because these collectives have different resources available to them. This is something anarchist theory has not worked out and maybe cannot possibly work out in advance, because it would have to work itself out in practice.
http://www.revolutionbythebook.akpress.org/an-interview-with-howard-zinn...

In the popular mind, an Anarchist is a person who throws bombs and commits other outrages, either because he is more or less insane, or because he uses the pretense of extreme political opinions as a cloak for criminal proclivities. This view is, of course, in every way inadequate. Some Anarchists believe in throwing bombs; many do not. Men of almost every other shade of opinion believe in throwing bombs in suitable circumstances: for example, the men who threw the bomb at Sarajevo which started the present war were not Anarchists, but Nationalists. And those Anarchists who are in favor of bomb-throwing do not in this respect differ on any vital principle from the rest of the community, with the exception of that infinitesimal portion who adopt the Tolstoyan attitude of non-resistance. Anarchists, like Socialists, usually believe in the doctrine of the class war, and if they use bombs, it is as Governments use bombs, for purposes of war: but for every bomb manufactured by an Anarchist, many millions are manufactured by Governments, and for every man killed by Anarchist

violence, many millions are killed by the violence of States. We may, therefore, dismiss from our minds the whole question of violence, which plays so large a part in the popular imagination, since it is neither essential nor peculiar to those who adopt the Anarchist position.

"More mindless flack, huh?"

Is that a threat? If so it's a credible one.

One of us has studied political science, philosophy and history and the other one reads a few contemporary authors.

You're making the classic mistake of thinking that someone that disagrees with you just doesn't understand what it is that they're disagreeing with.

Btw...I really love Bertrand Russell...Notice the distinctiona made between Anarchists and Socialists in the following sentence..."Anarchists, like Socialists, usually believe in the doctrine of the class war"

I also much prefer Howard Zinn, the political science professor to reading Noam Chomsky, the linguistics professor, which most people attempt to berate me with on this topic.

Regardless, none of the people that you cite would have much argument with the following, which you so casually overlooked, the anarchism article alone having 227 separate citations. Nor does anything that you've posted contradict anything that I've said at all, except of course your own heated assertions.

Libertarianism

Libertarianism has been variously defined by sources. In the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view. Libertarianism includes diverse beliefs, all advocating strict limits to government activity and sharing the goal of maximizing individual liberty and political freedom.[1]

Anarchism

Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be immoral,[1][2] or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations.[3][4][5][6][7][8] Proponents of anarchism (known as "anarchists") advocate stateless societies based on non-hierarchical[3][9][10] voluntary associations.[11][12]

There are many types and traditions of anarchism, not all of which are mutually exclusive.[13] Anarchist schools of thought can differ fundamentally, supporting anything from extreme individualism to complete collectivism

...

Etymology and terminology

The term anarchism derives from the Greek ἄναρχος, anarchos, meaning "without rulers",[32][33] from the prefix ἀν- (an-, "without") + ἀρχή (archê, "sovereignty, realm, magistracy")[34] + -ισμός (-ismos, from the suffix -ιζειν, -izein "-izing"). There is some ambiguity with the use of the terms "libertarianism" and "libertarian" in writings about anarchism. Since the 1890s from France,[35] the term "libertarianism" has often been used as a synonym for anarchism[36] and was used almost exclusively in this sense until the 1950s in the United States;[37] its use as a synonym is still common outside the United States.[38] Accordingly, "libertarian socialism" is sometimes used as a synonym for socialist anarchism,[39][40] to distinguish it from "individualist libertarianism" (individualist anarchism). On the other hand, some use "libertarianism" to refer to individualistic free-market philosophy only, referring to free-market anarchism as "libertarian anarchism".[41][42]

Socialism

Socialism /ˈsoʊʃəlɪzəm/ is an economic system in which the means of production are either state owned or commonly owned and controlled cooperatively; or a political philosophy advocating such a system.[1] As a form of social organization, socialism is based on co-operative social relations and self-management; relatively equal power-relations and the reduction or elimination of hierarchy in the management of economic and political affairs.[2][3]

...

"To understand a name you must be acquainted with the particular of which it is a name."

Bertrand Russell

"Men are apt to mistake the strength of their feeling for the strength of their argument. The heated mind resents the chill touch and relentless scrutiny of logic."

William E. Gladstone

(for those unaware of the nomenclature of the day or tempted to use sex based argument, "men" as used in the preceeding quote is a synonym for "humans""

of shit. You don't have a conception about arguing. You are just baffling with bullshit.

"You are still full of shit."

Your response to evidence and indisputable facts is to say what...that I made it all up, to ignore the proof itself?

"You don't have a conception about arguing."

Is that so?...

Argumentation theory

...

Key components of argumentation

Understanding and identifying arguments, either explicit or implied, and the goals of the participants in the different types of dialogue.

Identifying the premises from which conclusions are derived.

Establishing the "burden of proof" — determining who made the initial claim and is thus responsible for providing evidence why his/her position merits acceptance

For the one carrying the "burden of proof", the advocate, to marshal evidence for his/her position
in order to convince or force the opponent's acceptance. The method by which this is accomplished is producing valid, sound, and cogent arguments, devoid of weaknesses, and not easily attacked.

In a debate, fulfillment of the burden of proof creates a burden of rejoinder. One must try to identify faulty reasoning in the opponent’s argument, to attack the reasons/premises of the argument, to provide counterexamples if possible, to identify any logical fallacies, and to show why a valid conclusion cannot be derived from the reasons provided for his/her argument.

...

"You are just baffling with bullshit."

The burden of proof now rests on you to prove the premise of that statement. I have proven my argument whether or not you wish to acknowledge the existence of that proof.

LOL

Breaking: 30 Citibank customers arrested for closing their account

by DuvalDemFollow
Share3569 1155
permalink 370 Comments

Was just watching Global Revolution live stream where they were live at a Citibank in LaGuardia watching the police holding 30 customers in a Citibank branch where they were in line to close their bank accounts. There was a large group of protesters outside chanting various rejoinders to the bank officals and the police, who seemed to be their in force. The livestream chat is still buzzing about the arrests and you can see various Citibank numbers passing by to call in protest, especially the Citibank customer relations number.

I must say this is strange considering the number of people outside with video recorders and this live stream. I'm not sure what Citibank is thinking here but this seems to be a panic move on their part for taking this rather drastic action. My wife and I are plotting now to move our Bank of America accounts to a local bank or credit union in town now. I know this move from our little family won't have much of an impact but it will at least help me sleep at night.

Here is the link for the live stream: http://www.livestream.com/...

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/10/15/1026740/-Breaking:-30-Citibank-...

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150418737710127.411568.65058...

And I read that about 100 were @ Occupy Sonora...

Back on track...

local government being supportive...police very mellow and professional...parks dept. slacking on enforcing rules...

No violence...No arrests...groups of people spread all over the city...

Agitators = fail.

http://www.livestream.com/owsoccupyseattle

Hola Sederistas! Here's something you don't see every day.
Occupy Cleveland Protesters Needed Tents, So Who Supplies Them? The Cleveland Police
OhioGringo @fdl Friday October 14. "Rain was in the forecast. The Occupy Cleveland protesters had no tents, because the City of Cleveland had not permitted them. So the protesters sent out a cry for help. Who delivered? The Cleveland Police themselves. Individual officers supplied the protesters with tents. (video)
REDDIT entry OhioGringo cites:

The City of Cleveland said "No tents!" It started raining, so we errected tents anyway. They changed our permit over-night so we are now considered a "special event" and tents are permitted. Then the Cleveland Police Department came and donated their own personal tents and tarps to the movement.

You gotta like that! But wait there's more!

The 1st Amendment is Our Permit WASHINGTON - October 14 - This is an emergency appeal. Spread it widely. Our permit to occupy is called “The First Amendment.” This morning, Occupy Wall Street protesters celebrated when New York authorities beat a last-minute retreat from clearing Liberty Plaza – as hundreds of labor and other activists rushed to defend the square. But at the same time this morning, dozens of state troopers in riot gear cleared out Occupy Denver protests. In cities across the country, Occupy protesters have faced police violence and arrests. Some occupations have been forcibly removed while others have stood their ground successfully. The authorities say we don’t have the proper permits to occupy public spaces. Our permit to occupy is The First Amendment.
Quickly sign the following statement which will be delivered to mayors, police chiefs and major media across the country:

Action for a Progressive Future (the organization that runs RootsAction) is a nonprofit, progressive, public policy advocacy group that will engage citizens in the democratic process and help make sure legislators hear their voices.
BRILLIANT!

Much more on
Brick TeeVee Occupy the World!
#blogspot link

How are ya?

Paul's first post-Beatles single that came out before his 1st album RAM and is NOT on that album.

That is just too damned cool of them...

So, the Obama Administration is overtly sending AFRICOM troops into Uganda and other African nations.

Hear Dr. John Henrick Clarke's words which today are proved to be prescient--regarding imperialists planning the reenslavement of Africa....

Start at 8 minutes 42 seconds for Dr. Clarke's words--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm4pzEY9ntA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgJWzgretLA&feature=related

(The above is parts one and two of a 15-part video of the argument surrounding the issues brought forth by the book "Black Athena" by Martin Bernal.)

Sometimes the train jumps the track.

On this date:
1793 Marie Antoinette was beheaded during the French Revolution.

1859 Abolitionist John Brown, hoping to start an anti-slavery rebellion, led a raid on a federal armory at Harpers Ferry in present-day West Virginia.

The Million Man March was a gathering of social activists, en masse, held on and around the National Mall in Washington, D.C. on October 16, 1995.......
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Million_Man_March

Sam was on "UP" this morning.
I over slept but caught the on-line replay a few hours later.

Bob Herbert & Sam

Check Here
later for video clips

Occupy Chicago protesters find Mayor Rahm Emanuel's Chicago to be intolerant

When it comes to Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s Chicago, the rules are strict and quite different for protesters as the Occupy Chicago protesters find themselves arrested late Saturday night.

After a peaceful demonstration lasting the better part of the day on Saturday, many of the 2,000 protesters moved to Grant Park, expecting to be given the same leeway given peaceful protesters in other parts of the country. However, protesters were warned to leave Grant Park and ultimately arrested when they refused to leave the public park. Early Sunday morning after 1:30AM, protesters began shouting ‘Shame on Rahm!’ which reminded observers that there was much more tolerance of the Occupy Wall Street-styled protests elsewhere, including New York City where the protests began some weeks ago.....

While sitting, protesters formed a human chain, refusing to leave the area when police told them individually to leave late Saturday night. When they refused to leave the Park, the police arrested one-by-one. When the arrests were enacted, there were a couple hundred persons remaining amongst the protesters. Earlier in the day, at its peak, approximately 2,000 Occupy Chicago protesters were in the city rallying to voice their concerns and causes.

There were other chants from the protesters besides:

Shame on Rahm!

WGN radio reported that protesters also chanted:

[The Chicago Police] were the instruments of the one percent.

Also, it was reported that protesters revisited the chant of Chicago’s 1968 Democratic National Convention protests and riots by yelling:

The whole world is watching....
http://www.examiner.com/conservative-in-national/occupy-chicago-proteste...

(In other news, Senator Feinstein introduced the WH's 2012 reelection slogan:

Collision Course With Iran

....“Iran is escalating, I believe, its nuclear development. Iran is increasingly hostile,” she said in an interview with Fox News Sunday. “It’s a very dangerous situation.”

“If you project out a number of years, we are on a collision course. If we want to avoid it, we have to take action to avoid it,” she said......)
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/10/16/sen-feinstein-u-s-on-collision-cou...

"Sometimes the train jumps the track."

"To the indefinite, uncertain mind of the American radical the most contradictory ideas and methods are possible. The result is a sad chaos in the radical movement, a sort of intellectual hash, which has neither taste nor character."

Emma Goldman

History not only provides warning of what doesn't work but reminds of us what does.

The energy of youth is made more powerful with the guidance of elders.

Yes I saw this early morning {4 me ;} ... He was marvelous! He was prolific and a tad jovial = Marvelous!

BTW TeaCheers Sederville ~ but have to Brew
HaHa ;)

That's a serious picture.

I listen to the first half of the last hour of Alan Colmes when I wash dishes, and some rightwing caller defended racist immigration exclusionism with the claim that ancient Egypt lasted so long because it also excluded foreigners. SO MISLEADING.

Actually ancient records show that Egyptians were hospitable and generous and humane. Due to droughts and famine there were incidences of influx of peoples into the rich Nile Valley and these were permitted and recorded with what seems to be mercifulness to me.

About halfway through the ancient Egyptian 'dynastic' civilization it appears that this hospitality was given freely to a people called the Hyksos. The problem was not that the Hyksos did not leave because often immigrant peoples did not leave. The problem was that the Hyksos were aggressive and warring and decided to dominate the Nile Delta and did take over the lower Nile region for about 250 years in what egyptologists call the Second Intermediate Period. Finally the Egyptians from the Upper Nile went down to the Delta and ended the Hyksos domination, and the Egyptian control over the entire Nile valley continued another 1,200 years.

Could that caller have been getting the ancient Egyptians mixed up with the ancient Greeks? I understand some scholars consider the ancient Greeks to have incorporated xenophobic attitudes into their civilization.

Our current Western civilization has become so corrupted that it is literally robbing us of a future: Some examples --

o we are being robbed of clean water and air because of corporate pollutionist policies

o kids are being robbed of decent educations because of a ruthless bottomline mindset that puts abstract money before the actual reality of knowledge and learning

o we are being robbed of the ability to raise crops naturally with proven, long-lived, viable, natural seeds because a few are operating a world food control scam

Those in control right now -- the Corporatists and Fascists -- have no sense of future beyond their GET RICH QUICK/GET POWER FAST schemes. THEY HAVE NO LONG TERM PLAN worthy of the Planet, THEY HAVE NO LONG TERM PLAN worthy of the vast imagination and energy and potential of humankind.

Those in control now are GREEDMONGERS; watch the ads they use to convince consumers to join their greedy get-it-all worldview -- and you'll start to see in those ads the reflection of those Corporate Greedmongers. In general, any decent character trait has been contorted to fit their GREED ETHIC.

And their GREED ETHIC is devoid of building any mutual future. They are self-centered and predatory, and they are incapable of building a mutual future. Their GREED ETHIC is based on TAKING. They scoff at the idea of giving or sharing anything, they belittle the need for supporting anything, they turn their backs on the necessity for nurturing anything.

They lack any ennobling code of ethics whatsoever. For them, it is ALL about gratifying their insatiable hunger for MORE, for hoarding more and more.

It seems necessary to get inspiration for acting in the present in a way that assures our future by again and again going back to pockets in time where some people took a stand (some people with some sort of Progressive goal) to aim to behave, and so behave in ways that created the "space" in which to truly assure a FUTURE in which things WORK and human experience may improve. These were pockets of time that became FUTURE-ORIENTED, like the American Revolution and its response to corporate tyranny against the colonists, and also FDR's cabinet's response to the peoples' plight brought on by the Wall Street banditry that caused The Crash of 1929 and The Depression. And key in those pockets of time are the tasks of breaking free from, clamping down on and controlling the Greediest amongst us. Rejecting the ethics of the Greedy means recognizing we can have a superior ethical standard that is FUTURE-ORIENTED, that goes far into the future, way far beyond the Greediests' mere desire to live their personal lives in immediate gratification and instant opulence.

There's a big difference between the majority's willingness to work hard and strive today so that things can be better in the future, and the Greedmongers ideal to manipulate/scam/steal as much as possible today in order to have the rich base from which to continue more manipulation/scamming/thievery tomorrow. The Corporate Greedy are not building a BIG MUTUAL FUTURE of mutual benefit; they are only creating a parasitic domination that will sustain their greed.

Hearing that great discussion about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. brings the reminder that if there is one thing worth sacrificing/fighting for it is JUSTICE!

you're much improved...thank you.

Looking good--

http://occupywallst.org/attendees/

Go Vegan Radio's Bob Linden tells how 51% of planetary pollution is caused by human/corporate meat and dairy food choices. He points out how a meat eater's diet uses 32 times more water than a vegan's diet!

The single most potent pro-Planet choice one can make: GO VEGAN!

Goooood radio:

http://www.goveganradio.com/flashplayer/player32.html?showDate=2011-10-1...

After you listen to this show, you'll know what 'chicken furniture' is....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/veterans-unemployment-out...

[excerpt]

...

Despite the marketing pitch from the armed forces, which promises to prepare soldiers for the working world, recent veterans are more likely to be unemployed than their civilian counterparts.

Veterans who left military service in the past decade have an unemployment rate of 11.7 percent, well above the overall jobless rate of 9.1 percent, according to fresh data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The elevated unemployment rate for new veterans has persisted despite repeated efforts to reduce it.

The latest to attempt it is the White House. In the jobs package President Obama has been promoting across the country is a tax credit of up to $9,600 for each unemployed veteran a company hires.

...

[read more at link]

Is cancer an Industrial Age/Chemical Age disease?

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/03/30/the-war-on...

[excerpt]

...

...cancer is likely a man-made disease caused primarily by toxic overload.

Just a few months ago, I wrote about a fascinating study into ancient mummies that determined cancer is not a "natural" disease at all, and genetics are not a primary factor. Tumors were extremely rare until recent times, when pollution and poor diet became issues. So why are the medical and science communities, by and large, ignoring these basics?

Getting to the Root of the Problem

I strongly believe the cancer rates are escalating because they are in no way shape or form addressing the underlying cause of most cancers. Instead, most of the research is directed towards expensive drugs that target late stages of the disease and greatly enrich the drug companies but simply do not prevent cancer.

If ever there was an area in which an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure it is cancer. I strongly believe that if you are able to work your way up to the advanced health plan, that you will virtually eliminate the risk of most cancers.

Environmental- and lifestyle factors are increasingly being pinpointed as the primary culprits fueling our cancer epidemic. This includes:
[list follows]

[read more at link]

===========

AND--

Fabricated cancer research data leads to a decade of further research down a false path?

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/10/15/mayo-clini...

Seeing that clenched fist logo does make one pause and wonder...

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27053

This 'article' in itself is divisive and propagandist in nature.

The author uses non sequitor logic and exaggeration, relying on psychology to cover that up but of course we are talking about Michel Chossudovsky after all and Michel Chossudovsky is very good at doing just that.

I won't go through a complete dissection of the article, as that dissection would be 10x longer than the original article itself...I will however point out one rather crucial piece of information that was quite deliberately left out.

When you paint only in red it's because you want people to see only red.

Raised fist

Groups that have used the symbol
Albanian National Liberation Front
April 6 Youth Movement
American Indian Movement
Anarchist Black Cross
Black Panther Party
Democratic Labour Party of Brazil
Earth First!
Women's Liberation
Food Not Bombs
International Brigades
International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
International Socialist Organization
Italian Radical Party
Jewish Defense League
Kach
National Equality March
Occupy Wall Street
Otpor
Parti Sosialis Malaysia (Socialist Party of Malaysia)
Revolutionary Socialist Workers' Party (Turkey)
Red Front Fighters' League
Saor Éire (1967-1975)
Socialist International
Socialist Party of England and Wales
Socialist Workers Party (Britain)
Socialist Youth Front
United Farm Workers
Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front

The article doesn't mention the mandatory psyche evaluations and counselling that follow these sort of things...

APNewsBreak: NYC inspector broke pepper spray rule

NEW YORK (AP) — An internal New York Police Department review has found an official violated department guidelines when he used pepper spray on Occupy Wall Street protesters last month, a person with knowledge of the investigation said Tuesday.

Deputy Inspector Anthony Bologna faces discipline of a loss of 10 vacation days after the Sept. 24 incident near Union Square, shortly after the now-global protests began in a tiny private plaza in lower Manhattan, the person said. The person had direct knowledge of the review but was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Commodity Futures Subject to New Federal Limits.

Federal regulators have capped the volume of futures trading for 28 commodities, with an eye to clamping down speculative trading. The action Tuesday by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission affects futures contracts for agricultural commodities, energy and metals that are traded on several U.S. exchanges.

Regarding my earlier post at 10/18 6:25am--

Don't forget this part:

Think of all the greediest, least-ethical, most immoral CORPORATIONS and CORPORATISTS you will DEPRIVE of profits if you just say "NO" to their meat and dairy and GMO products and numerous livestock torture by-products.

Here's an example from my daily experience: I feel really GREAT when I lather up in the shower with a plant oil-based bar of soap each morning. That's because I know that I am not only NOT spreading slaughterhouse animal fat renderings all over my body (because that is what most supermarket bar soap is made of), but also I am DEPRIVING certain cruel animal exploitation giant corporation bigwigs from profitting from my need for a soap with which to wash!

It's the same sort of thing with food choices. I like my food dollars bypassing the Corporate creeps who exploit the animals cruelly as part of their additional plan to exploit me and other consumers.

Nobody on Tue, 10/18/2011 - 6:40pm.

This 'article' in itself is divisive and propagandist in nature.
...

========================================

Nobody, you'd come off better if you just outright shared what knowledge you've accrued rather than initially always berating others and imagining they are less than you, less interested in better understanding than you are. You obviously fear an enemy, but must you see it on average one or two posts per thread?

I don't want anyone to allow a true populist desire for change to be exploited/undermined by non-populist centers of power.

I personally think our resolve for change should not be so fragile that we cannot look at information about these control methods.

If you have proof that there is no validity in this information, why not share it instead of pronouncing, sphinx-like, that it is mere propaganda. I want all the information I can get -- including anything you can offer to prove this is only propaganda; Who is this propaganda for? What ultimate end does this propaganda seek to reach from your informed perspective?

Can you prove this is not true?--

[excerpt]

...

OTPOR and the Centre for Applied Non Violent Action and Strategies (CANVAS)

Dissidents of Egypt's April 6 Youth Movement, which, for several years, was in permanent liaison with the US Embassy in Cairo, were trained by Serbia's Centre for Applied Non Violent Action and Strategies (CANVAS), a consulting and training firm specializing in "Revolution" supported by FH and the NED.

CANVAS was established in 2003 by OTPOR, a CIA supported Serbian organization which played a central role in the downfall of Slobodan Milosevic in the wake of the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.

...

"The Revolution Business"

OTPOR's Centre for Applied Non Violent Action and Strategies (CANVAS) describes itself as "an International network of trainers and consultants" involved in the "Revolution Business". Funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), it constitutes a consulting outfit, advising and training US sponsored opposition groups in more than 40 countries.

OTPOR played a key role in Egypt.

Egypt Tahir Square: What appeared to be a spontaneous democratization process was a carefully planned intelligence operation. View video below.

...

Both the April 6 Movement and Kifaya (Enough!) received prior training from CANVAS in Belgrade "in the strategies of non-violent revolution". "According to Stratfor, The tactics used by the April 6 Movement and Kifaya "were straight out of CANVAS's training curriculum." (Quoted in Tina Rosenberg, Revolution U, Foreign Policy, February 16, 2011 )

[end excerpt; read more at link]

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27053

==============================================

I have no idea what the ULTIMATE truth is. Do you, Nobody? (If you do, why not share?)

But I do know that any group can be a target for infiltration, and it does us no good to be unaware of all forms of data and analysis (or, from your viewpoint, mere counterproductive kill-joy perspectives) regarding that. (Personally, my desire for change is strong enough to look at views like Chossudovsky's. Tell me, Nobody, is your resolve for change so fragile you cannot bear to know there may be a couple of false pillars on this 'occupy' structure?)

If Chossudovsky is correct in following these threads from other past national destabilization 'colored revolutions' exercises to this year's events, isn't it wise to take note and work to save the movement from exploitation?

It does not seem to be an understatement that imperialists do their best to destroy real people-based democracy.

********

Here's an excerpt from the book The Destruction of Black Civilization by Chancellor Williams (copyright 1975, 1987):

"From the researcher's viewpoint the most important part of the investigation was the beginning of the task of singling out and clearly setting forth the precise nature of Africa's own independently developed civilization. A continent-wide study of the traditional customary laws of the Blacks, for example, enabled us to learn, for the first time, that a single constititional system prevailed throughout all Black Africa, just as though the whole race, regardless of the countless patterns, lived under a single government. A similar continent-wide study of African social and economic systems through the millenia reveal the same overall pattern of unity and sameness of all fundamental institutions...." [page 21]

[and]

"...some of the most fruitful sources for study came from white scholars. A case in point was at Oxford. The course was "The History of Colonialism in Africa." The presence of two or three Blacks in the class, while obviously uncomfortable for some, was generally ignored. For African studies were of long standing an integral part of the imperial system. They [the classes] were not planned for Africans at all, but for the future administrators of the Empire in Africa. So Professor Madden was pointing out in his lecture how difficult, and even impossible, it was to rule Africans in view of their "wild and most primitive system of democracy." For just as fast as African kings or chiefs undertook to carry out British laws (which displeased the people), "the people would remove them from office," therefore, this "primitive African democracy had to be destroyed" before the British system of Indirect Rule could be effective.

The point here is that these sneering remarks by an eminent British historian revealed to me an entirely new field of research. That lecture led me into the study of one of the most significant developments in the entire history of the black race: an ancient system of democracy (existing before Greece) evolved from a continent-wide constitution that governed the whole African people as a single race. This all-important finding was arrived at by comparative studies of African customary laws in every region of the continent. The Europeans were confronted with a real social democracy that existed long before the terms "socialism" and "democracy" were invented in the west. For Dr. Madden it was "savage" because the people were the real rulers, in fact, and not merely in theory." [pages 25-6]

"Nobody, you'd come off better if you just outright shared what knowledge you've accrued"

I share what I can when I can...

"... rather than initially always berating others and imagining they are less than you, less interested in better understanding than you are."

The rest of your statement above is projection.

"I personally think our resolve for change should not be so fragile that we cannot look at information about these control methods."

And yet every time that I point out that something that you've just posted is blatant propaganda you flip out at me?

"If you have proof that there is no validity in this information, why not share it instead of pronouncing, sphinx-like, that it is mere propaganda. I want all the information I can get -- including anything you can offer to prove this is only propaganda; Who is this propaganda for? What ultimate end does this propaganda seek to reach from your informed perspective?"

Wow, that is an awfully impolite method of asking me to go to the trouble of deconstructing something for you, don't you think?

The simplest deconstruction is based upon who it points to as enemies or agents to be feared. You can reread the article with that in mind and answer those questions yourself.

"I have no idea what the ULTIMATE truth is. Do you, Nobody? (If you do, why not share?)"

It's best that you instead learn how to question rather than asking of me the answer.

"But I do know that any group can be a target for infiltration, and it does us no good to be unaware of all forms of data and analysis (or, from your viewpoint, mere counterproductive kill-joy perspectives) regarding that."

That's the thing though isn't it...I say "examine this more closely because it is propaganda" and then you get mad.

"(Personally, my desire for change is strong enough to look at views like Chossudovsky's. Tell me, Nobody, is your resolve for change so fragile you cannot bear to know there may be a couple of false pillars on this 'occupy' structure?)"

If you knew anything of what you were talking about this conversation would be a whole lot easier but you never do. I merely encouraged you to reexamine that article with an eye to the propagandist techniques used within.

"If Chossudovsky is correct in following these threads from other past national destabilization 'colored revolutions' exercises to this year's events, isn't it wise to take note and work to save the movement from exploitation?"

The effect of such articles is to spread fear and paranoia, to promote fear of the other in particular. Fear of the other is the enemy of unity.

Michel Chossudovsky definitely does not wish to see this movement grow. Do note that all of his listed "enemies" in the aforementioned article are also the "enemies" of the likes of Glenn Beck and the Birchers...

One of the rules of every Occupy stream is..."NO CONSPIRACY THEORIES"...

Because those conspiracy theories have been used for decades as divisive propaganda tools.

I've tried to teach you what I know Nora...I continue to try...You continue to reject it.

Deconstruct that article yourself...That is the only way that you'll see it...Question the purpose of every word and you will see it. Michel Chossudocksy is not particularly skilled nor particularly clever.

The activist Anna Hazari who tried to conduct a public fast in protest of corruption throughout India was correct -- the issue is CORRUPTION.

If certain people have disgustingly absent morals or low ethical codes of conduct, I guess that is their personal business -- UNLESS THEY ARE DOING THE PEOPLE'S BUSINESS AND TAKING/RECEIVING/CONTROLLING THE PEOPLE'S RESOURCES, LABOR, MONEY.

Occupy Wall Street is going for the small stuff if its only goal is limited to getting the investor/banking/financial class to pay a tax per financial transaction as called for by adbusters ( http://www.salon.com/2011/10/18/adbusters_occupy_should_call_for_robin_h... ).

A transaction tax -- as well as paying a fair share of income taxes that benefits the larger community goals -- should not be considered the ultimate goals here, but only the NO BRAINER requirements expected from The Rich for their getting to participate in society and enjoy our labors and our consumption and our PUBLIC resources!

If The Rich want to be nasty creeps, it will have to be limited to their personal lives, BUT NOT THEIR PUBLIC PARTICIPATION. We can no longer permit them to project their lack of ethics onto the public sphere in the form of CORRUPTION.

Follow Anna Hazari's lead on this, please.

Wall Street rejects Dem fundraising

NEW YORK, Oct. 18 (UPI) -- Wall Street lobbyists are telling Democrats they can't have it both ways: They can't support Occupy Wall Street protests and then ask for Wall Street cash.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sent a recent e-mail calling on supporters to sign a petition backing the protests. Then livid banking executives called DCCC officials demanding answers, financial services lobbyists told Politico.

"Most Wall Street guys, they feel like they're going to be burned in effigy," Anthony Scaramucci told the newspaper. Scaramucci is a managing partner of SkyBridge Capital who gave to the Obama campaign in 2008. Now he is fundraising for Mitt Romney, and told Politico other moderate donors "fled from Obama in his support of the Wall Street protests."

Obama narrowly raised more Wall Street campaign funding in 2008 than Republican nominee Sen. John McCain of Arizona. But now Democrats are facing a particularly hard sell, the newspaper said.

"You can't have it both ways," one unnamed in-house financial services lobbyist told Politico. "It just makes it harder for people who are Democrats in New York, Boston, Chicago to on the one hand be demogagued and then be asked 'Hey, you can get your picture with the president for $30,000.' It doesn't square."

;)

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/10/17/345603/corporate-profits-50-...

[excerpt]

...

Corporate profits as a share of the nation’s gross domestic product, in fact, are at their highest point since 1950. Recent snapshots, however, tell a much different story on Main Street, where small businesses are limping through an economic recovery that treated corporations much more kindly. According to the National Federation of Independent Businesses’ September report, two out of every five small businesses reported that profits are falling:

Reports of positive earnings trends were 1 point worse in September at a net negative 27 percent of all owners, not a pretty picture, but still one of the best readings in years. Not seasonally adjusted, 17 percent reported profits higher (down 3 points), and 40 percent reported profits falling (unchanged). Corporate profits are at a record high level as a share of GDP, but the story is very different on Main Street.

Small business sales are also dragging, as the percentage of all firms reporting higher sales fell over the last three months, and more businesses reported sales trending down than up. Worse yet, small business owners expect sales to continue falling over the next three months.

Corporations aren’t content just ignoring these problems, instead choosing to help exacerbate them. The largest corporations have continued hoarding cash instead of investing in job creation that would help small businesses and the economy recover. At other times, they’ve spent millions lobbying for ineffective tax holidays or lax regulatory rules that led to the 2008 financial crisis. They continue to pay some of the world’s lowest tax rates. And executive pay at the largest companies continues to rise even as wages remain stagnant for most American employees. That has led to growing income inequality that rivals many African nations, saddling the American economy with problems that are becoming increasingly hard to fix.

[more at link]

{The Homeless Haunts - Human & Animals :):( and Society Hurts & Kills.)

;)

"Occupy Wall Street is going for the small stuff if its only goal is limited to getting the investor/banking/financial class to pay a tax per financial transaction as called for by adbusters"

It's really much more than that...MUCH MORE.

"...drop dead in a hurry."

Occupy Wall Street: What You Can Demand versus What You Must DO

by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

“What does a movement of the 99% versus the 1% mean by democracy, when measured against the privileges of money?”

Occupy Wall Street activists are under some pressures to come up with demands to make of the powerful. However, “in many cases, there is no point in demanding anything from your enemy, except that he drop dead in a hurry.” If Wall Street is an unadulterated evil as many OWS folks claim – and they are right – then what is to be demanded of the banksters and their friends? That they commit suicide, forthwith? And how do you reform a cancer away? “Well before 1999, Wall Street power had passed the point where it could be controlled by conventional regulation.”....

It is by no means clear to me that all of the folks who claim to be bankster-slayers really want to kill the beast, or merely attempt to shrink or tame it. The logic of political economy, historical experience and common sense dictates that, if the vast wealth and power that flows from concentrated private capital is what allowed Wall Street to achieve hegemony over every important aspect of U.S. society, then concentrated capital must be vanquished; that it be given no space or opportunity to regroup to make further war on democracy....

Does anyone seriously believe that today’s Masters of the Universe will allow themselves to be shut out – as a class – of the electoral pathways to state power, without wreaking havoc on an impudent society through their current control of every lever of power and the sheer crush of their money? One cannot simply leave the hegemon intact, allowing him to retain all the powers of concentrated capital that made him Master, and expect him to accept the new limitations.

The idea that the plutocrats can be quarantined from power, while remaining plutocrats, is absurd. And no, there is no difference between Warren Buffet, the Koch brothers, Bill Gates, Michael Bloomberg, the Walton (Mal-Mart) family and the late Steven Jobs. Their very existence is an insult to any legitimate concept of democracy. Every one of them would kill a million people to preserve his billions. They already do.

“The idea that the plutocrats can be quarantined from power, while remaining plutocrats, is absurd.”

A movement must be prepared to break the plutocrats’ power – confiscate his fortune or make it impossible to spend – or find themselves like Lilliputians trying to tie down a huge and vicious unchained Gulliver while he stomps on you like roaches....
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/occupy-wall-street-what-you-can...

Durbin: Wants Major League Baseball to ban players from using tobacco at ballpark

"Tomorrow night, an expected 15 million viewers, including many children, will tune in to watch the first game of the series. Unfortunately, as these young fans root for their favorite team and players, they also will watch their on-field heroes use smokeless tobacco products," wrote Durbin and other senators to MLB executive director Michael Weiner.
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2011/10/durbin_wants_major_league_base.h...

Published on Wednesday, October 19, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
Subcomandante Marcos Comes to Wall Street
by César Chelala

...he Mexican government allowed Bishop Ruiz to mediate its conflict with the Zapatistas, the government accused the Bishop of being the driving force in the rebellion. Bishop Ruiz, however, always advocated non-violence as a way of resolving conflicts, and repeatedly stated that a spiral of violence, once started, cannot be easily resolved once the weapons stop firing.

“This war was not carried out to shed blood and take power but to be heard. When they [the insurgents] were heard they laid down their weapons and chose the pathway of dialogue,” said Bishop Ruiz in a movie called “A Place Called Chiapas.”

After the clashes with the much superior forces of the Mexican army, the EZLN decided to stop using their weapons, and to put special emphasis on the political solution of the conflict with the Mexican government. Ina 2009 article for Le Monde Diplomatique Sub Comandante Marcos stated, “We don’t want to impose our solutions by force, we want to create a democratic space. We don’t see armed struggle in the classic sense of previous guerrilla wars, that is, as the only way and the only all-powerful truth around which everything is organized. In a war, the decisive thing is not the military confrontation but the politics at stake in the confrontation. We didn’t go to war to kill or be killed. WE went to war in order to be heard.”

Sub Comandante Marcos made it clear that he wanted the government respond to what he saw as legitimate indigenous people’s claims for better education, more and better health services, equal work opportunities, and better roads to the indigenous communities. After the government sent an unprecedented amount of funds to Chiapas, and for what I saw during my visit there, most of these goals have, to an important extent, been accomplished....
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/10/19-7

By Dave Zirin
Last night I had the privilege of introducing 1968 Olympian Dr. John Carlos to the General Assembly at Occupy Wall Street. This morning I had the duty of introducing John Carlos to Sen. Chuck Schumer in the MSNBC green room. Both were unforgettable experiences. When Dr. Carlos and I arrived an Occupy Wall Street, it comprised all the ordered chaos you could imagine. People of all backgrounds and ages were packed shoulder to shoulder in Zucotti Park. Police stood at attention, glowering from the outside. Homemade signs ranging from, "Undocumented immigrants are part of the 99%" to "We Remember Troy Davis” to “Tax the Rich!” encircled the square. John Carlos looked at me with that twinkle in his eye and said, "It's great to be home."..........

As Dr. Carlos and I were leaving the MSNBC studio, we bumped into someone also very familiar with Wall Street, albeit the non-occupied sections, New York Senator Chuck Schumer. I made the introduction, on my best green room behavior, and bit my tongue. Chuck Schumer then looked at John's body up and down and said, You're in great shape! Are you still running?" John paused beautifully and said, "Running for justice." Schumer, perhaps for the first time, was tongue-tied. I would just add that John isn’t “just running for justice,” he's running toward justice; and he has a hell of a lot of company.
http://www.edgeofsports.com/2011-10-14-656/index.html

Michelle Obama announces firms' plan to hire 25,000 veterans

Michelle Obama joined President Barack Obama Wednesday on the last day of his three-day bus tour across two politically potent Southern states, announcing a pledge by major U.S. manufacturers to hire 25,000 veterans and military spouses by the end of 2013.

The commitment by the companies - including Tysons Foods, Coca Cola, Unilever and ConAgra -.........
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/10/19/127699/michelle-obama-announces-fi...

According to journalist Ann Garrison, the real reason the US African Command (AFRICOM) is interested in the region is oil and other natural resources. South Sudan, northern Uganda and eastern Congo all have well-known oil fields. "In September there was a conference in Kenya about building a pipeline to run the oil from that region out to the Indian Ocean," she said, noting that American involvement in the region has already caused casualties and the displacement of thousands of locals.
http://www.gp.org/video/display.php?ID=65

Although Rep. Paul has introduced several bills like this one in the past, there are several reasons that this bill should be passed now. Hemp has an amazing number of uses. Its fiber can be used in carpeting, home furnishings, construction materials, auto parts, textiles, and paper. Its seeds can be used in food, industrial oils, cosmetics, and pharmaceuticals. There are assertions, reported by The Guardian and in Biodiesel Magazine that using industrial hemp in biofuels instead of crops like corn and other feedstock provide greater environmental benefits. The expansion of industrial hemp as a feedstock for biofuels could also help to reduce oil imports.

Not only does hemp have a wide range of uses, but its cultivation in the United States could help to spur our lagging economy. Since the cultivation of hemp is outlawed in the United States, the U.S. market for hemp and hemp-based products is entirely dependent upon imports. A 2010 Congressional Research Service report cited an estimate that the U.S. market for hemp-based products may exceed $350 million annually.

A ban on the agricultural production of hemp simply doesn’t make sense. Farmers in places like Iowa could benefit greatly from the production of industrial hemp. In a crippling recession, unemployed Americans could receive a boost from such an emerging industry, from farm to value-added businesses. And many firms here in the United States that sell hemp-based products would reap the benefits. Currently they import their hemp from places like Canada, China, or France, which can increase their costs from 10 to 15 percent or more. As the only remaining developed nation in which the production of industrial hemp is not permitted, the United States is not only missing out on a large – and growing – global market, but limiting the livelihoods of farmers, processors and fabricators.

Industrial hemp could benefit our environment greatly. A range of studies have shown the benefits: hemp can thrive with minimal – or even without – herbicides, it reinvigorates the soil, and it requires less water than crops like cotton. Furthermore, it could prevent the deforestation of large portions of the U.S. landscape and presents significant benefits compared with wood in the production of paper. Industrial hemp matures in three to four months. It takes years for trees to grow. It can also yield four times as much paper per acre as trees.

Critics of industrial hemp may point to its relation to marijuana in order to claim that if one smokes industrial hemp, they can become high. Although industrial hemp and marijuana share the same species, cannabis sativa, industrial hemp is genetically and chemically different. Industrial hemp, at most, contains one third of 1 percent THC, the drug that produces a psychoactive effect in marijuana. However, marijuana is often between 10 and 30 percent THC. Smoking industrial hemp will not make an individual high.

The DEA will claim that growing industrial hemp next to marijuana may serve to impede law enforcement against the latter. However, countries that have legal cultivation of industrial hemp do not have similar problems. Furthermore, since industrial hemp has such little THC, growing it next to marijuana would only serve to dilute by cross pollinations the illegal marijuana plants – something no marijuana grower wants.

Industrial hemp has a distinguished history in this country dating before the revolution and its founding. The Declaration of Independence was drafted on hemp paper and George Washington and Thomas Jefferson grew industrial hemp on their farms. During World War II, hemp was used to make very strong rope and the Department of Agriculture made a film, “Hemp for Victory” to encourage its cultivation.

Despite the importance of this issue, we rarely see it discussed in the headlines or by political candidates. Farmers in Iowa could benefit greatly from the cultivation of industrial hemp. Citizens in Iowa, who have the ear of presidential hopefuls, have an opportunity to move this issue back into the spotlight during the December 10th Republican Presidential Primary debate.

Let’s hope Congressman Paul and his fellow candidates agree that it is time to allow farmers in Iowa and other states to once again start growing industrial hemp.

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Tell your friends to visit http://www.nader.org/ and sign up for Ralph Nader's weekly column.

The GREED ETHIC -- And Back to the Future, sort of

*******

The Link
if anyone was looking..

http://www.thomhartmann.com/users/nora/blog/2011/10/time-control-greed-e...

**

"Hello to our friends and fans in domestic surveillance."

MMRules

"The DEA will claim that growing industrial hemp next to marijuana may serve to impede law enforcement against the latter. However, countries that have legal cultivation of industrial hemp do not have similar problems. Furthermore, since industrial hemp has such little THC, growing it next to marijuana would only serve to dilute by cross pollinations the illegal marijuana plants – something no marijuana grower wants."

Umm...Ralph is a little out of date here since allowing pollination at all ruins the buds as it causes seed production...the dea would know this...just saying.

When the 9/11 investigation gets going, this guy needs to be subpoened, maybe even first on the list...Jerome Hauer. If this stuff is accurate, sheesh, this guy looks like he was everywhere --
http://truthmovecom.blogspot.com/2008/07/jerome-hauer-911-suspect-awaiti...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwq04_KhCeI&feature=related

In 13 youtube segments. Here's part one--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b74naeawdCs&feature=rellist&playnext=1&li...

This is an article by Kevin Ryan that digs deeper into the facts and astounding interconnections amongst groups and individuals involved in 9/11. Small world full of fast risers!

http://911review.com/articles/ryan/demolition_access_p1.html

[excerpt]

...

[12] This coincidence was amplified by the fact that one tenant occupied all of those floors – Marsh & McLennan (Marsh), which at the time was the world's largest insurance brokerage company. One other tenant, Sumitomo Bank, shared part of floor 96 with Marsh.

During the years from 1993 to 2001, Marsh made several modifications to these floors, in addition to the fireproofing upgrades mentioned above. According to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Marsh made modifications to the south side of floor 94 in 1998. That same year, the PANYNJ helped Marsh demolish floors 95-98 in order to rebuild the fire alarm and sprinkler systems. Marsh did further modification work on floor 95 in the year 2000. [13] The full floor fireproofing upgrades on floors 93 through 100 were accomplished in August through November of 1998, except for floor 94, which was done in December 1996.

Marsh was a large company, with a number of subsidiaries, including Putnam Investments, Mercer, Johnson & Higgins, and Guy Carpenter, a company that occupied floors 47 to 54 of the south tower. Marsh was also known to be notoriously secretive, and had been likened to the CIA. [14] Its chief executive on 9/11 was Jeffrey Greenberg, a member of the Brookings Institution, the Trilateral Commission, and the son of the chairman of American International Group (AIG), Maurice Greenberg. AIG has been reported to be at the center of a number of CIA operations. [15]

Jeffrey Greenberg rose quickly through management at Marsh, having come there directly from AIG in 1995, and then becoming CEO just four years later. At Brookings, Greenberg hobnobbed with Lee Hamilton, co-chair of the 9/11 Commission, and the Iraqi Nemir Amin Kirdar, CEO of Investcorp, a BCCI-related company founded by the Saudi Abdullah Taha Bakhsh. [16]

BCCI was founded by a Pakistani named Agha Hasan Abedi, and was "made up of multiplying layers of entities, related to one another through an impenetrable series of holding companies, affiliates, subsidiaries, banks-within-banks, insider dealings and nominee relationships." In the early nineties, BCCI was extensively investigated for money laundering and terrorist financing, and was ultimately shut-down by the Bank of England in 1992. [17] Like BCCI, AIG developed the same fragmented and difficult to trace network of subsidiaries, spread across 130 countries and 400 regulators. [18]

Other very powerful and well-connected people worked in senior management at Marsh. These included Stephen Friedman, a senior principal at Marsh Capital and former partner at Goldman Sachs, who later became George W. Bush's top economic advisor. Friedman was also a member of the Brookings Institution, the Bilderberg group, the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, and the board at In-Q-Tel, the investment firm founded by the CIA in 1998. In-Q-Tel invests in state of the art technologies related to defense and intelligence work, including nano and chemical technologies, according to its website. [19]

In another interesting coincidence, Friedman belonged, through Cornell University, to a secret society called Quill and Dagger, the membership of which includes Paul Wolfowitz, Sandy Berger and Stephen Hadley. Wolfowitz, the neo-con deputy secretary of defense in the Bush Administration, was the author in 1992 of the "Wolfowitz Doctrine" of pre-emptive warfare. He also made comments about a "surprise like Pearl Harbor" months before 9/11, and met with Pakistani ISI General Mahmud Ahmed in the week before 9/11. [20] Berger, the National Security Advisor to President Clinton, was later caught stealing documents from the 9/11 Commission investigation. [21] Berger was also the boss of White House counterterrorism Tsar Richard Clarke, and together with Hadley - who was Condoleezza Rice's deputy - was responsible for delaying or obstructing Clarke's plans to stop Al Qaeda in January 2001. [22]

The President of Marsh Real Estate Advisors, from 1982 to 2001, was Craig Stapleton, the husband of George W. Bush's cousin, Dorothy Walker Bush. Stapleton's Marsh division was responsible for negotiating office leases in the US, Canada and Europe. He once co-owned the Texas Rangers with George W. Bush, a spectacular investment for all involved. In 1997, Stapleton was a member of the board of a company called Cendant that was charged in 1998 with massive accounting fraud. The President of Cendant at the time was Henry Silverman, a former partner of the Blackstone Group and later Vice Chairman of the PANYNJ. Stapleton went on to join Winston Partners, a privately owned investment firm founded in 1993 and led by George W. Bush's bother Marvin.

The Vice Chairman of Marsh on 9/11 was Mathis Cabiallavetta, a Swiss citizen. Although Cabiallavetta was a member of the Marsh board from 1993 to 2000, he took his position as Vice Chairman in 1999, after having been President of the Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) from 1996 to 1998. This was the same UBS that bailed out George W. Bush's Harken Energy in 1987, with the help of billionaire Jackson Stephens. UBS was linked in other ways to the fraudulent terrorist financing bank BCCI. [16,23]

Another connection to the Bush family can be seen in the Marsh acquisition of the New York insurance brokerage Johnson and Higgins in March 1997. Johnson and Higgins was the long-time employer of Prescott Bush Jr, brother to George H. W. Bush. Although Prescott Jr. no longer worked there, he had spent 33 years at Johnson & Higgins, retiring as Senior Vice President. After retirement, Bush continued to consult for the company, in Asian dealings. With Prescott Jr, Friedman and Stapleton, Marsh clearly had strong ties to the Bush network. Additionally, it seems possible that some members of Marsh management, particularly Stephen Friedman, through In-Q-Tel, had access to technologies that could have been used to bring about the deceptive demolition of the WTC buildings.

Add to this L. Paul Bremer, and the possible Marsh ties to demolition technology become clearer. One month after 9/11, Bremer would become the CEO for a new division called Marsh Crisis. Interestingly, the Yale graduate Bremer had been working to complete the National Report on Terrorism, and prior to that had been managing director for Kissinger Associates. According to a US Senate report, Kissinger Associates had a number of meetings with BCCI representatives in the late eighties and early nineties, and it refused to provide documents requested by the Senate investigators. [17] Bremer was also a member of the board for Akzo Nobel, the parent of International Paint, a company that produced a fireproofing application for skyscrapers called Interchar. [24]

Bremer was on the international advisory board for the Japanese mining and machinery company, Komatsu. At the time, Komatsu had been involved in a joint venture agreement with Dresser Industries, the oil-services/intelligence front in which Prescott Bush Sr. and George H. W. Bush got their start with Neil Mallon. The Komatsu-Dresser mining division operated from 1988 to 1997. In July 1996, it patented a thermite demolition device that could "demolish a concrete structure at a high efficiency, while preventing a secondary problem due to noise, flying dust and chips, and the like." [25] Residues of thermite, the highly energetic chemical mixture, have been confirmed in samples of the WTC dust, and the use of thermite at the WTC was also revealed by environmental data. [1, 2, 3, 4, 26] Dresser Industries merged with Dick Cheney's Halliburton in 1998.

It is less well known that Bremer's relationship to Marsh started earlier. In fact, on 9/11, Bremer was the CEO of Marsh Political Risk Practice and he had an office in the south tower. That day, he was interviewed on NBC television, stating that Osama bin Laden was responsible and that possibly Iraq and Iran were involved too, and he called for the most severe military response possible. Google removed the interview video from its servers three times, and blocked it once. [27]

Bremer was called away from Marsh in 2003, to be the Iraq Occupation Governor. His work in that role has been widely criticized. [28]

[read more at link]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2051008/Does-super-corpor...

[excerpt]

...

A University of Zurich study 'proves' that a small group of companies - mainly banks - wields huge power over the global economy.

The study is the first to look at all 43,060 transnational corporations and the web of ownership between them - and created a 'map' of 1,318 companies at the heart of the global economy.

The study found that 147 companies formed a 'super entity' within this, controlling 40 per cent of its wealth. All own part or all of one another. Most are banks - the top 20 includes Barclays and Goldman Sachs. But the close connections mean that the network could be vulnerable to collapse.

The 1,318 transnational corporations that form the core of the globalised economy - connections show partial ownership of one another, and the size of the circles corresponds to revenue. The companies 'own' through shares the majority of the 'real' economy
'In effect, less than one per cent of the companies were able to control 40 per cent of the entire network,' says James Glattfelder, a complex systems theorist at the Swiss Federal Institute in Zurich, who co-wrote the research, to be published in the journal PLoS One.

Some of the assumptions underlying the study have come in for criticism - such as....

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2051008/Does-super-corpor...

[excerpt]

US health care falls farther behind peers, report finds

By Noam N. Levey | McClatchy-Tribune News Service

WASHINGTON — The U.S. health care system is lagging further and further behind other industrialized countries on major measures of quality, efficiency and access to care, according to a new report from the nonprofit Commonwealth Fund, a leading health policy foundation.

...

And a third of adults [in USA] did not get medical care, did not fill a prescription or skipped a needed test or treatment because of cost.

...

Despite the problems with access and quality, however, the U.S., continues to spend far more than other industrialized nations on health care, with per-capita spending on health care now topping $8,000 a year, more than twice what most other industrialized countries spend.

...

Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/10/18/127600/us-health-care-falls-farthe...

http://tvnewslies.org/tvnl/index.php/editorial/jesse-richards-commentary...

[excerpt]

...

Understand that the United States has a so-called health industry that has every reason in the world to keep you sick and not one incentive at all to cure any diseases, reduce the frequency and quantity of your medical problems and issues, or keep you from having medical problems in the first place. Medical costs are out of control because the American medical industry is a for-profit business where the profits of investors and owners come before the fundamental ethics and mission of medical professionals. It is a system perverted by predatory capitalism and has grown into the most exploitative industry on this planet.

Argue all you want, call me all the names in the world, like commie, liberal, even though you probably don't know the definitions of those terms or what aspects of those terms apply here...but the hard fact is that medicine for profit is simply vile and shameful, but worse, it is counter productive. I am not saying that doctors, nurses, EMTs, and everyone in the medical industry do not deserve to be financially rewarded handily, but the system that exists now, here in America is immoral. Nurses and first responders don't drive up health costs, - investors and executives do! And do not for a moment leave out Big Pharma...the evil among evil...where even drug salespeople earn more than E.R. nurses. If you don't see a problem with that you should check your soul.

Imagine standing on a dock and falling into a river. You scream for help to a person on the dock who is holding a life preserver, and that person asks for payment before throwing it to you Or, imagine that person telling you that you can't have the life preserver at all because he does not accept your insurance. Or, imagine that you can have the life preserver, but you will owe them everything you have in the world. Well there it is...American 'health care'. The only thing missing in this story is the fact that you were pushed into the river, and the guy with the life preserver knows all about the gangs who push people into the rivers but it really does not help his business to acknowledge or address that little reality. That's America.

...

[read more at link]

obama propagandists, and Capital One pigs:

Alec Baldwin visits ‘Occupy Wall Street’ demonstration

...Baldwin however clashed with “We Are Change” activists who had asked him to denounce the US central bank, the Federal Reserve.

“Capitalism is worthwhile,” he said....
Watch video, uploaded to YouTube by We Are Change, below:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/10/19/alec-baldwin-visits-occupy-wall-st...

Why don't you do something actually useful, Alec, like calling little Ireland more often.
We could all use a good laugh.
You've insulted Occupy Wallstreet for the last time you thoughtless little pig.

obama is free to start bombing Tehran.

Gaddafi's final bastion falls to NTC
Libyan forces take full control of city, with loyalists of former leader fleeing after weeks of fighting
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/10/2011102092329271942.htm...

Published on Thursday, October 20, 2011 by Agence France-Presse
Libyan Fighters Declare Victory; Moamer Kadhafi Dead
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/10/20

NPR Gets Radio Host Fired for Occupying
By: David Swanson Wednesday October 19, 2011 8:07 pm

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National Public Radio on Wednesday discovered that a woman named Lisa Simeone who produced a show about opera called “World of Opera” had been participating in a nonviolent occupation of Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., organized by October2011.org. That same day, NPR persuaded a company for which Simeone worked to fire her, cutting her income in half and purging from the so-called public airwaves a voice that had never mentioned politics on NPR.

This frantic email was sent to all NPR staff:

From:NPR Communications
Sent: Wednesday, October 19, 2011 6:12 PM
Subject: From Dana Rehm: Communications Alert..........

....It may be difficult for NPR bigwigs to understand why we don’t all just rent $400 per night hotel rooms instead of littering a public square with tents. But NPR’s highly paid political agitators on behalf of the 1% are part of the problem. They are what we are protesting. And that is presumably what makes our speech and assembly “unethical.”

Or perhaps the breech of ethics is to be found in behaving as a decent citizen while simultaneously possessing some connection to the most insidious corporate loudspeaker in the country, one labeled “public” but belonging to the 1%.

The most important point to stress here, I think, is that all requests should be routed through NPR Communications at 202-513-2300 or mediarelations@npr.org
http://my.firedoglake.com/davidswanson/2011/10/19/npr-gets-radio-host-fi...

John Pilger
October 20

On 14 October, President Barack Obama announced he was sending United States special forces troops to Uganda to join the civil war there. In the next few months, US combat troops will be sent to South Sudan, Congo and Central African Republic. They will only "engage" for "self-defence", says Obama, satirically. With Libya secured, an American invasion of the African continent is under way.

Obama's decision is described in the press as "highly unusual" and "surprising", even "weird". It is none of these things. It is the logic of American foreign policy since 1945. Take Vietnam. The priority was to halt the influence of China, an imperial rival, and "protect" Indonesia, which President Nixon called "the region's richest hoard of natural resources... the greatest prize". Vietnam merely got in the way; and the slaughter of more than three million Vietnamese and the devastation and poisoning of their land was the price of America achieving its goal. Like all America's subsequent invasions, a trail of blood from Latin America to Afghanistan and Iraq, the rationale was usually "self defence" or "humanitarian", words long emptied of their dictionary meaning.

In Africa, says Obama, the "humanitarian mission" is to assist the government of Uganda defeat the Lord's resistance Army (LRA), which "has murdered, raped and kidnapped tens of thousands of men, women and children in central Africa". This is an accurate description of the LRA, evoking multiple atrocities administered by the United States, such as the bloodbath in the 1960s following the CIA-arranged murder of Patrice Lumumba, the Congolese independence leader and first legally elected prime minister, and the CIA coup that installed Mobutu Sese Seko, regarded as Africa's most venal tyrant.

Obama's other justification also invites satire. This is the "national security of the United States". The LRA has been doing its nasty work for 24 years, of minimal interest to the United States. Today, it has few than 400 fighters and has never been weaker. However, US "national security" usually means buying a corrupt and thuggish regime that has something Washington wants. Uganda's "president-for-life" Yoweri Museveni already receives the larger part of $45 million in US military "aid" - including Obama's favourite drones. This is his bribe to fight a proxy war against America's latest phantom Islamic enemy, the rag-tag al Shabaab group based in Somalia. The RTA will play a public relations role, distracting western journalists with its perennial horror stories.

However, the main reason the US is invading Africa is no different from that which ignited the Vietnam war. It is China. In the world of self-serving, institutionalised paranoia that justifies what General David Petraeus, the former US commander and now CIA director, implies is a state of perpetual war, China is replacing al-Qaeda as the official American "threat". When I interviewed Bryan Whitman, an assistant secretary of defence at the Pentagon last year, I asked him to describe the current danger to America. Struggling visibly, he repeated, "Asymmetric threats ... asymmetric threats". These justify the money-laundering state-sponsored arms conglomerates and the biggest military and war budget in history. With Osama bin Laden airbrushed, China takes the mantle.

Africa is China's success story. Where the Americans bring drones and destabilisation, the Chinese bring roads, bridges and dams. What they want is resources, especially fossil fuels. With Africa's greatest oil reserves, Libya under Muammar Gaddafi was one of China's most important sources of fuel. When the civil war broke out and Nato backed the "rebels" with a fabricated story about Gaddafi planning "genocide" in Benghazi, China evacuated its 30,000 workers in Libya. The subsequent UN security council resolution that allowed the west's "humanitarian intervention" was explained succinctly in a proposal to the French government by the "rebel" National Transitional Council, disclosed last month in the newspaper Liberation, in which France was offered 35 per cent of Libya's gross national oil production "in exchange" (the term used) for "total and permanent" French support for the NTC. Running up the Stars and Stripes in "liberated" Tripoli last month, US ambassador Gene Cretz blurted out: "We know that oil is the jewel in the crown of Libyan natural resources!"

The de facto conquest of Libya by the US and its imperial partners heralds a modern version of the "scramble for Africa" at the end of the 19th century.

Like the "victory" in Iraq, journalists have played a critical role in dividing Libyans into worthy and unworthy victims. A recent Guardian front page carried a photograph of a terrified "pro-Gaddafi" fighter and his wild-eyed captors who, says the caption, "celebrate". According to General Petraeus, there is now a war "of perception... conducted continuously through the news media".

For more than a decade the US has tried to establish a command on the continent of Africa, AFRICOM, but has been rebuffed by governments, fearful of the regional tensions this would cause. Libya, and now Uganda, South Sudan and Congo, provide the main chance. As WikiLeaks cables and the US National Strategy for Counter-terrorism reveal, American plans for Africa are part of a global design in which 60,000 special forces, including death squads, already operate in 75 countries, soon to be 120. As Dick Cheney pointed out in his 1990s "defence strategy" plan, America simply wishes to rule the world.

That this is now the gift of Barack Obama, the "Son of Africa", is supremely ironic. Or is it? As Frantz Fanon explained in 'Black Skin, White Masks', what matters is not so much the colour of your skin as the power you serve and the millions you betray.
http://johnpilger.com/articles/the-son-of-africa-claims-a-continents-cro...

VOICE OF DETROIT: The city's independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought
RUMOURS OF QADDAFI’S CAPTURE OR DEATH SPREAD BY NTC FOR HILARY CLINTON

Rumours are circulating with once again European and American leaders misinforming the public, and the usual media culprits Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabia broadcasting the occupation NTC (National Terrorist Council) claim of the capture or death of Muammar Qaddafi.

Green Committees have confirmed that the leader is alive, and that the enemy is seeking to take advantage of his being currently out of communications. The aim is to please Hillary Clinton who barked at her Arab slaves that she wants Muammar Qaddafi “dead or alive.”..............
http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/10/20/rumours-of-qaddafi%E2%80%99s-captur...

"The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media."

--William Colby, former CIA Director, quoted by Dave Mcgowan, Derailing Democracy

"Our job is to give people not what they want, but what we decide they ought to have."

-- Richard Salent, Former President CBS News.

"News is what someone wants to suppress. Everything else is advertising".

former NBC news President Rubin Frank

The House Un-American Activities Committee opened hearings into alleged Communist influence in the motion picture industry......

Building the 99% movement — National CPUSA teleconference Oct 25

...A key slogan of the Occupy Movement is "We are the 99%!" What is the 99% and what challenges does the movement face in building an all-inclusive coalition? What forms will it take? And how can all of us help build it?

This is the subject of our next national teleconference call:
Jarvis Tyner, CPUSA executive vice chair
Tuesday, October 25 at 8:00 pm Eastern
Teleconference number: 605-475-4850
Access code: 1053538#
Follow the great coverage from People's World/Mundo Popular:

No Surrender in Chicago as Occupy Movmeent mushrooms worldwide
Ten thousand occupy capitol, demand jobs now
Cass warfare: What goes around comes around
Teach-in promotes labor/student unity
Occupy El Paso Launched
Occupation spreads to Detroit!
Message from Occupy Missoula
http://www.cpusa.org/building-the-99-movement/

and who was their favorite snitch?...a guy named Ronald Wilson Reagan...one of the people he tried to snitch on...Betty White...

BETTY WHITE...

San Francisco 49ers
Watch a 49ers game with Dwight Clark! Text NINERS to 84444 for a chance to watch the 12/4 game vs. the St. Louis Rams in the Sprint Suite and spend a quarter with 49ers legend Dwight Clark.

Steve Jobs Biography Reveals He Told Obama, 'You're Headed For A One-Term Presidency'

...Jobs, who was known for his prickly, stubborn personality, almost missed meeting President Obama in the fall of 2010 because he insisted that the president personally ask him for a meeting. Though his wife told him that Obama "was really psyched to meet with you," Jobs insisted on the personal invitation, and the standoff lasted for five days. When he finally relented and they met at the Westin San Francisco Airport, Jobs was characteristically blunt. He seemed to have transformed from a liberal into a conservative.

"You're headed for a one-term presidency," he told Obama at the start of their meeting, insisting that the administration needed to be more business-friendly. As an example, Jobs described the ease with which companies can build factories in China compared to the United States, where "regulations and unnecessary costs" make it difficult for them.

Jobs also criticized America's education system, saying it was "crippled by union work rules," noted Isaacson. "Until the teachers' unions were broken, there was almost no hope for education reform." Jobs proposed allowing principals to hire and fire teachers based on merit, that schools stay open until 6 p.m. and that they be open 11 months a year...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/20/steve-jobs-biography-obama_n_1022786.html?icid=maing-grid7|main5|dl1|sec1_lnk3|106109

...Wondering what he's doing with all his money now?

50% of All US Workers Made Less than $26,000 in 2010
Thursday, 20 October 2011 20:08

American wages Today we get our first look at American wages in 2010 based on payroll taxes reported to the Social Security Administration. David Cay Johnston picks out the most important takeaways, including:

1) Half of all workers made less than $26,364, the median wage in 2010. That means the typical wage is at its lowest level since 1999, after adjusting for inflation.

2) The number of millionaires increased by about 20 percent.

3) The size of the missing workforce is 10 million. The number of working people fell by 5.2 million since 2007. But that's not the entire job deficit, because, based on population growth estimates, 4.5 million more would have joined the workforce between 2007 and 2011. Add it up, and you get a 10-million-worker gap.

What you see in the graph above is that median pay took a nosedive after 2007, effectively wiping out all gains made in the previous eight years. The macro explanation is that the economy shrunk, and middle class jobs disappeared and were replaced with (or outlasted by) lower-paying positions that companies kept on.
http://www.tvnewslies.org/tvnl/index.php/news/economy/21226-50-of-all-us...

...for nothing.

...spotted where OWS set up occupation several days ago. Cannot give reason for police presence and nothing from local news websites nor on local news stations.

Teabaggers likely to join in or act out...

The group of protestors now occupying Lee Park in Charlottesville will be allowed to stay through Friday night. That word came late Tuesday afternoon from City Hall.

Two of Occupy Charlottesville's organizers applied for a permit to keep the group in Lee Park Tuesday afternoon and received approval for the permit from Brian Daly, the Director of Charlottesville Parks and Recreation.

Charlottesville City Spokesperson Ric Barrick said, "That will allow them to stay over night for the next three days and there is the possibility and the right of the parks director to let them stay for an extended period."

City code says anyone without a permit from Charlottesville Parks and Recreation has to leave the property by curfew which is 11 p.m.. The Occupy Charlottesville movement has been camped out in Lee Park since Saturday.

Occupy Charlottesville member Evan Knappenberger said, "We want to follow the spirit of the law which is to keep this place decent and clean and orderly."

The group is a spin off of Occupy Wall Street protesting corporate greed and excess. A handful of tents sit in the park with dozens of people pouring in and out at any given hour.

"I think it's more than just solidarity now. I think we're really starting our own community movement," said another member, Jamie Morgan.

But the group plans to stay and protest for as long as they can, some say months.

Jon Grainger, also of Occupy Charlottesville added, "I think the city has done absolutely everything they can to accommodate us. We really do appreciate that. Things could have gone different ways."

No word at this point if the group will be able to stay for months. They are also talking about bringing in portable toilets to keep the place sanitary.

Charlottesville Park and Recreation Director Brian Daly says that they will provide the group with a contact for those portable toilets and will also assist in "sitting" a unit in the park or near the park.

In addition, the Jefferson Area Tea Party has applied for a similar permit to rally in McGuffy Park on Friday. That permit is now in the mail. The tea party says their rally is not a counter protest to the Occupy Charlottesville camp out.
http://www.nbc29.com/story/15723216/fate-of-occupy-charlottesvilles-camp...

Published on Friday, October 21, 2011 by Black Agenda Report
Somalis Under Relentless Drone Attack as U.S. Tightens Military Grip on Continent
A Black Agenda Radio commentary
by Glen Ford

Scores of Somali civilians have been killed in U.S. drone attacks in the southern region of the country, as Washington tightens its military grip on much of the continent. The current offensive involves thousands of Kenyan troops that are threatening the major Somali city of Kismayo. The American drones are supporting the Kenyan invasion. The drones’ origins are officially secret, but it is known that the U.S. operates drone bases in Ethiopia and Djibouti, which is home to a huge American base.

For all practical purposes, the U.S. has made proxies of Ethiopia and the five member states of the East African Community: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and Rwanda. The Ugandans and Burundians safeguard the airport that is the lifeline for Somalia’s puppet regime in Mogadishu, where the CIA operates a major facility. In September, the militaries of the East African Community held joint exercises with AFRICOM, the U.S. Africa Command........

...Meanwhile, the NATO attack on Libya threatens to set the whole northern tier of Africa ablaze, a pretext for further U.S. and French operations. American penetration of Africa has reached the point that any nation – such as Eritrea – that does not have a military relationship with the United States is marked for regime change. Instead of the pan-Africanist dream of a United States of Africa, we are seeing an Africa under the military thumb of the United States.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/10/21-2

Pepe Escobar: NATO Wanted Gaddafi Dead All Along

Gaddafi at one point was a hero to the Western world, but for the last year Gaddafi was looked at as a villain. There are many reports explaining the reasons why the change of heart from the Western powers. Pepe Escobar, correspondent for the Asia Times, helps us understand what happened and what lies ahead for Libya.
http://www.commondreams.org/video/2011/10/21

Even with a full troop withdrawal, a very small number of military personnel will remain in Baghdad and at U.S. diplomatic facilities to help Iraq with matters such as purchases of American weapons systems, including Abrams tanks and F-16 fighters....
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/10/21-9

It's like obama's new bff, Lindsey Graham, said:

"There is a lot of money to be made...Lot of oil to be produced. Let’s get on the ground...and establish...free market principles."
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/20/2463679/lindsey-graham-says-gop-op...

by a South Korean firm...and a 900 mil barrels of crude in Panama recently...

I hope there is a whole new way of elections by 11/12...b/c so far I am not voting...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu turns 62 years old today.

Elliot Abrams’ Wife: Palestinians are “Devil’s Spawn” and Should Be “Food for Sharks”
By: EdwardTeller Thursday October 20, 2011 10:28 pm

Andrew Sullivan gave this vile person the Michelle Malkin Award nomination for Thursday. He was far too kind.

Here is what Rachel Abrams, wife of the criminal Obama invited to the White House back in January, when he was hoping there was a way to keep Egyptian torture chief Omar Suleiman in control of Egypt when it became obvious Mubarak was toast, wrote at her strange blog in reaction to the Palestinian-Israeil prisoner swap:

He’s free and he’s home in the bosom of his family and his country.

Celebrate, Israel, with all the joyous gratitude that fills your hearts, as we all do along with you.

Then round up his captors, the slaughtering, death-worshiping, innocent-butchering, child-sacrificing savages who dip their hands in blood and use women—those who aren’t strapping bombs to their own devils’ spawn and sending them out to meet their seventy-two virgins by taking the lives of the school-bus-riding, heart-drawing, Transformer-doodling, homework-losing children of Others—and their offspring—those who haven’t already been pimped out by their mothers to the murder god—as shields, hiding behind their burkas and cradles like the unmanned animals they are, and throw them not into your prisons, where they can bide until they’re traded by the thousands for another child of Israel, but into the sea, to float there, food for sharks, stargazers, and whatever other oceanic carnivores God has put there for the purpose.

Ms. Abrams resort to some sort of Prophet-speak here might make a Pentecostal Christian blush. Although she seems to refer to whoever captured Gilad Shalit in her imprecatory rant, the comparison to the ways she assumes Israeli kids are raised to the ways she presumes Palestinian kids grow up seems to be a paean to collective punishment and remorseless race war.

Not only did Obama invite this woman’s husband to the White House to strategize on keeping Egypt a police state, his State Department later awarded a fat contract to an organization her criminal husband sits on the board of – the Middle East MediaResearch Institute – to:

enable MEMRI to expand its efforts to monitor the media, translate materials into ten languages, analyze trends in anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial and glorification, and increase distribution of materials through its website and other outlets....

...funkygal October 20th, 2011 at 11:51 pm «

Elliot was also invited during discussions on Libya. The neocon wanted regime change in Libya. See page 3 if you don’t want to read the whole thing.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/inside-obamas-war-room-2011101...

http://my.firedoglake.com/edwardteller/2011/10/20/elliot-abrams-wife-pal...

CeeCee is this thru what? Text message?

I guess that answers the ? I was feeling too dumb to ask anyone b/c the answer must be somewhere...did the permit go to tonight or thru?

I guess I am also going to GA tonight after all! Another lost Craigslist sale.

FUCK!!

Cee Cee I was just catching up all day b/c haven't been there since Weds morning, then actually working, and FB page has nothing. Going to Twitter. Please let me know anything you see!!

FUCK!!

Or B. He's calling me back after a while, after checking down there.

CeeCee, are you pranking ppl now too? For shame...

:-P ;-) :-( ??????

I haven't been here in days, I don't think. Mere coincidence that I saw.

Out.

----
CeeCee I sent email if you care to read. Out.

oops double post.

Sorry for the delay. My son's fiancee mentioned to me since she works across the street from the park. She couldn't tell whether the police were there to initiate an action or just to watch over OWS. After visiting news sites with nothing mentioned, I won't know anything further until I talk to her later when she gets home. I'll go visit my email.

...just running away from what I should be doing...

When I was 13... one night I again listened to my radio and a special song... whilst on bed with long hair hanging off bed...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5M_Ttstbgs&f
yes Jefferson A are the pixs so one can PLAY "For What It's Worth..."

Thank U J. ... wherever U *fly*.

BTW My Computer is "illogical" this night, JFI. ;)

Lt. Governor’s visit

To the Editor:
I was truly amazed when such a high-ranking state official as Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom came to Tuolumne County and generously shared his views on how to make our state great again, the absence of city council members and county supervisors was glaringly evident. We do not live in a vacuum and when the Lt. Governor sees the total indifference to his visit by county and city officials one might conclude that we will not be first on his list of counties for which he will go to bat. I personally was embarrassed for our county.

I know that SPI was inaugurating the re-opening of their plant, but being aware that the Lt. Governor was going to be in Sonora for only two hours, it would have made sense for the officials of our county to arrange with SPI to work around the visit so that they could attend. The Lt. Governor’s visit had been announced for a long time so not knowing about it seems a feeble excuse.

The visit was a huge success and the Opera Hall was standing room only. We were so proud to have the Lt. Governor0 visit and were impressed with his knowledge of our problems and difficulties. It was a wonderful day.

Janet Maffei
Sonora

Tired of being
a zombie

To the Editor:
I'm tired of being a zombie. I'm tired of my eyes glazing over bank statements, waning job opportunities, and the issues that face my community. I'm tired of watching unemployment fan the flames of the elder community who have lost their pensions and are now living off the food banks. I'm tired of drug use getting severe because other people are taking desperate measures to go numb (like zombies do) or feed themselves by selling. I'm tired of trying to numb myself from the issues that face my generation because our right to a basic prosperity is threatened.

I am thankful for the community support of Sonora and all the people who realize that Wall Street affects small street. Occupy Sonora doesn't want any more for rent signs in the windows of their small business, and want their kids to grow up with a pride that comes from providing for themselves. That can only come when the dollar is strong.

I know that even in my small Sierra Nevada community, Wall Street steals the tourist dollar from us as Bay Area residents lose their jobs and choose not to spend their summers boating and winters skiing. I realize that even as a zombie, I must do my part. Zombies are not the brainless ones, our lobbyists and Wall Street executives are. As a zombie, I hope that all those who choose to corrupt our capitalist system to make a quick buck will eat each other alive and then they will know what it feels to be the 99 percent. Let's bring brains back to the big banks.

Liz Kelley
Mi-Wuk Village

http://www.uniondemocrat.com/20111021105126/Opinion/Letters/Letters-to-t...

"Obama Pulling Troops From Iraq...." blah, blah, blah.

Submitted by ghettodefender on Fri, 10/21/2011 - 1:37pm.

Even with a full troop withdrawal, a very small number of military personnel will remain in Baghdad and at U.S. diplomatic facilities to help Iraq with matters such as purchases of American weapons systems, including Abrams tanks and F-16 fighters....
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/10/21-9

It's like obama's new bff, Lindsey Graham, said:

"There is a lot of money to be made...Lot of oil to be produced. Let’s get on the ground...and establish...free market principles."
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/20/2463679/lindsey-graham-says-gop-op...

======================================

To the point post, Ghettodefender. The links are appreciated.

---

It's odd to hear callers to radio shows still claiming Obama is going to turn around the social/economic disaster that's strangling this nation. These are the folks who still see Obama as the "Yes, We Can" man of the overly prolonged Democratic Primary and Election of 2008. These folks just cannot even entertain the indicators that Obama is blazing another trail different from the one they elected him to blaze.

The best one can offer to the folks who think that Obama was speaking authentically in 2008 is this: Obama is a psychologically conflicted guy; he wants to assist people and be socially-conscious but he ALSO is a free marketer -- and Obama just does not get the reality that the ENTIRE FREE MARKET IDEOLOGY is antithetical to post-feudal society. This is the ONLY explanation for those who feel deep within that OBAMA is speaking a personal truth. A person can mean what they say (speak their truth) EVEN WHEN UNCONSCIOUSLY CONFLICTED.

The Obama defenders must get this straight: Obama is a Free Market Facilitator, and he shows no sign of giving that up. THAT is square one for anyone trying to figure out where Obama is coming from!

These words by Chancellor Williams, written back in the 1970s, really speak to what is going on now too:

[On a trip to South Africa prior to the 1975 printing of his book The Destruction of Black Civilization, Williams' experience in travelling to South Africa moved him to write these words to describe the behavior of the South African authorities--]

"The unremitting brutality of these whites against the Blacks leaves them [the whites] in a permanent state of fear. They seem to consider every black man not a potential, but an actual threat." [p. 30]

This magnificent insight by Chancellor Williams speaks not only to racist behavior, but also to other distinctions like classism.

And let's not forget the distinction between economic/capitalist predator and prey (the prey being those with resources and those holding the wealth of labor, and those holding the vast consumption potential).

As I read this quote by Williams, I got that this is also the situation with Occupy Wall Street participants being challenged and arrested for no good reason. These OWS folks who are demonstrating are not an actual threat; the police/authorities could just monitor the crowd for problems to ensure things remain peaceable; the police could monitor and make sure no potential problem became an actual problem. But the system is not set up to see The People as The People; the system is set up to protect the Wealthiest from everybody else. Just by BEING everybody else, The People are classified as an actual threat.

Sorry situation.

It's helpful to know who one's 'friends' are....

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405297020375260457664548098745268...

[excerpt]

Earlier this month, hundreds of New Yorkers received an unusual dinner invitation from the Lower East Side People's Federal Credit Union.

The Credit Union, a small lender serving New York's poor, was holding a fund-raiser to celebrate its 25th anniversary. Among the chief sponsors listed on the invitation was Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

Among the honorees: "Occupy Wall Street."

They might as well have asked Marie Antoinette to dig into her purse to support Madame Defarge's knitting business.

Shortly after the invitation was sent out, Goldman withdrew its name from the dinner. It also pulled the plug on its $5,000 funding pledge.

[read more at link]

Part of an interview with Chancellor Williams, covering his research into the destruction of African civilization -- and destruction of the memory of it...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XPxgmbWzIY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KttIBl-rKWI&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJXSRARLxQI&feature=related

Do we work together on even the level of the family unit?

Chancellor Williams addresses the breakdown of our culture from COOPERATION to basicly ANTI-SOCIAL, and the need to RECLAIM the family unit first. He's addressing the situation of African Americans particularly, but I think his observations can help the entire culture.

[I post this in relation to the Occupy events also, because I think his observations have relevence also to the Occupy impetus; to me 'Occupy' looks like a surge of cooperation amongst a 'family' of like-minded people who see the need for change.]

Chancellor Williams talks wise-elder talk that goes deep into our culture as a whole and I see this giving meaning to many levels of our experience...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9qIOI9zlOg&feature=related

Well I'm not sure what happened on Sunday. I posted BTV and all the code is there, but there IS NO POST! I'm wondering if there's a limit on the size of the post? This week was kinda long-ish but not any more so than any other week. This happened once before and I don't recall what the fix was.

Anyhoo, y'all can do some reading at blogspot for this week's BTV
http://filthy-rich.blogspot.com/2011/10/brick-teevees-one-demand.html

Guess they've been arresting folks in Occupy Chicago (my friend there hasn't been arrested yet) and they arrested about a dozen in Occupy Cleveland. LAST Sunday I brought them a big bag of fruit and veggies and bread and such but I think they've been thrown out now.
There was a rape there too (which is unfortunate, troublesome, shocking and disgusting). Here's their post on it:

Male, African American, light complected, 5’8 with no facial hair, seen wearing a green hoodie with front pockets. If you have any information regarding this person at Occupy Cleveland on the evenings of Friday October 14th, or Saturday October 15th, please contact Investigator M. Kovach at 216-623-5630 or email mkovach@city.cleveland.oh.us
http://occupycleveland.com/2011/10/19/working-profile-of-leland/
Occupy Cleveland requests that anyone who may have taken photos or video of Occupy Cleveland events on Friday or Saturday please go back and check your cameras and phones for anyone matching the description of “Leland” Photo and Video from the dates mentioned can also be forwarded to M. Kovach if you think they may be of any assistance.
Occupy Cleveland takes the safety and wellbeing of participants very seriously. As a group we are committed to creating a safe space for all occupiers and anyone who takes part in the movement. We believe some of the most effective tools we have are community and education. We are in talks to secure a special education forum and counseling for the Occupy Cleveland community, to address any questions or concerns, provide counseling to those affected, and act as general support for the community. We will be announcing the dates and times of the community education forum as soon as they are confirmed.

THIS JUST IN!
#OccupyCleveland receives new permit for Public Square
Oct 24 2011

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

#OccupyCleveland receives new permit for Public Square

Occupation gaining strength and support, call for volunteers to occupy square 24/7

http://occupycleveland.com/2011/10/24/occupycleveland-receives-new-permi...

So that's my story! How are ya?

I had an entire treatise on this but it became "lost" so I refer you to Chris Hedges "Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle" where he describes the ATOMIZATION of our public life: spending 8 hrs a day in a cubicle then the next 8 hrs in a cubicle of a suburban home where everyone retreats to to watch inane shows like "dancing with the stars" and "American Idol" completely separated from our neighbors next door. Can you even name FIVE of your neighbors? When was the last time you talked to them? Do we even KNOW anything about the people that live within 1000 feet of us? Do we even CARE? As for "the family" cohesion, so many families are dispersed in search of their own "American Dream" they might find a way to gather for Thanksgiving or xmas or a death in the family. Perhaps the OCCUPY movement is hitting on something we all don't have in "modern life": a sense of belonging. Belonging to a group with SHARED GOALS and ASPIRATIONS, what we once used to have in our communities. Instead of rejoicing and sharing with our neighbors and fighting for our collective existence we are reduced to ECONOMIC SLAVERY and the Greeks, Spaniards and so many more understand this QUALITY of LIFE which is in DIRECT OPPOSITION to the Capitalist more-more-more "productivity" realm. Read Chris Hedges "Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle".

Didn't know what to do when your blog was not as usual...(I always think I just don't understand how to activate some link or something) so your link above is much appreciated! Thank you, Filthy Rich!

Don Ameche, and, this Halloween you could pass for him by just adding that mustache he adopted....

Try this movie, "Midnight" -- it has the funniest scenes, the set-up scene and the scene where everyone thinks Don Ameche is crazy, but he's not in on it. I couldn't stop laughing.

http://www.gmfreeze.org/news-releases/165/

[excerpt]

...

Monsanto has repeatedly denied that glyphosate washes off fields in significant amounts, claiming the herbicide binds to soil particles and therefore cannot be leached. [2]

The USGS results confirm warnings from other countries that glyphosate is more mobile in some soils than the biotech corporation is prepared to admit. [3]

The presence of glyphosate and AMPA in surface waters means that drinking water quality and aquatic wildlife may be put at risk. Studies have shown many aquatic species are affected by the herbicide and its breakdown product, and there is growing concern about the safety of the product for human health. [4] In addition the overuse of glyphosate on GM soya, cotton and maize crops is driving an escalation and spread of problem weeds resistant to the weedkiller, meaning even more Roundup has to be used, often in combination with other herbicides, in an attempt to control these new “super” weeds.

The USGS found glyphosate in more than 60% of air and rain sampled at three locations in Mississippi, Iowa and Indiana, with AMPA found in more than 50% of samples, at concentrations up to 9.1ng/cubic metre and 0.49ng/cubic metre respectively. [5] Researchers from the USGS estimate that about 1% of glyphosate sprayed in catchments ended up in surface waters in the four areas where monitoring was conducted in streams and rivers. Concentrations varied between different river systems that formed part of the monitoring programme. The highest median level of glyphosate detected was 5.7μg/litre. [6] This level would not be allowed to enter public supply untreated under the EU Drinking Water Directive.

...

[read more at link]

Since 2002 the State Department relies on Jack Bobo to force GMOs on other countries. Disgusting state of affairs. This is 'diplomacy'? Uh-uh. This is corporate bagmen taking over the State Department!

Some Wikileaks leaks paint a very insidious picture--

http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1339...

Libyan JAMAHARIYA was a method of government by the people via ASSEMBLIES/CONGRESSES similar to the Occupy decision-making methods, but more sophisticated and binding.

Seems to me this is a loss of a COOPERATIVE method of decision-making for people everywhere and especially Africans who need something in line with their many past accomplishments.

Brain cells still firing after reading Chancellor Williams.

After scholar Chancellor Williams, an African American, was in South Africa in the 1960s/70s, he was moved to write that the South African controlling whites "...seem to consider every black man not a potential threat, but an actual threat."

That Chancellor Williams made the distinction between an ACTUAL THREAT and a POTENTIAL THREAT is so relevant and far-reaching.

And that the ONE PERCENT via the police treat the people as an actual threat is typical of the one percent.

Racism is the first rampart of the one percent's ECONOMIC APARTHEID, but it becomes clearer that -- overall -- it IS pure economic apartheid when we see totally non-violent activists -- and now these nurses providing Occupy activists with healthcare in Chicago -- arrested for no reason that concerns the protection of the public good.

If a threat is potential, it should be monitored. If it is actual (like that toxic bomb attack on the non-violent activists), it needs to be addressed.

But what we see in the Economic Apartheid instituted by the one percent ignores or protects the actual threat and contrarily uses REPRESSION and OPPRESSION only against the non-violent potential threat. AMAZING.

Many thanks to Chancellor Williams for his insight, because we need to DISSECT this Obscene Wealth Monster as it lives. We must know our oppressors.

Hope to see more Sederhaveners and their bloggings manyana....

Sleep tight.

"WE" always knew. Now maybe WTP will do something. I need to "brew" haha.
;)

Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Study: It’s True, Bankers Really Do Control the World
by Catherine McLean

WINTERTHUR, Switzerland - Here’s a gift to Occupy Wall Street protesters around the world: you now have scholarly proof that banks control the world.

Researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, also known as ETH, have published a paper that argues just 147 companies account for a large chunk of the total economic value of all the transnational companies around the world. No exact dollar figures, but it’s obviously a vast sum.

Among the top 50 corporations, 45 operate within the financial industry. Barclays PLC is the most powerful, according to the ETH study, followed by such well-known names as JPMorgan Chase & Co., UBS AG, and Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc.

The United States takes home first prize with 24 companies cracking the researchers’ top 50 list, followed by the U.K. with 8, France with 5, Japan with 4, and Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands tying with 2 companies each. Canada has one company in the researchers’ top 50: Sun Life Financial, Inc. secures the 35th spot.
Continue reading at the link.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011
"Horror Hotel": The New Frontier of Junk Food Marketing to Kids
by Anne Landman

Today's teenagers are probably the most savvy generation yet when it comes to filtering out advertising, but that is no worry for junk food and drink companies who steadily deploy stealthier and more sophisticated interactive promotions that specifically target teens and exploit their emotional and developmental vulnerabilities. The newest generation of internet-based junk food promotions uses cutting edge marketing techniques with names like "augmented reality," "virtual environments" and "neuromarketing" -- the use of scientifically-devised digital marketing techniques that trigger teens' subconscious emotional arousal.
Screen grab from 626 Horror Hotel

While few were looking, PepsiCo subsidiary Doritos quietly shifted its target audience from parents to teens. The chip maker now offers a teen-targeted website, "Doritos Late Night Augmented Reality," that gives kids the ability to design a concert experience with a popular band just for themselves. The site lets teens control and manipulate the stage, camera angles and lighting, for example.

But that's just the tip of the iceberg.

"Teenagers Love to Be Scared"

"No one craves advertising, especially teens, but they do seek out entertainment," the narrator of a video by Doritos' advertising company carefully explains, as he describes new digital marketing techniques and how they are used.

To better target young consumers, Frito-Lay offers teens an immersive online game called "Horror Hotel 626." Users must register with the site, and after so doing may be offered promotions that require them to volunteer personal information like their date of birth, gender, email address, telephone number, or other contact or demographic information. To augment its allure to teens, the website is only open during the nighttime, from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. The site traps viewers in a haunted hotel where they "have to do whatever it takes to get out." While the viewer plays, the site takes over the player's webcam and takes a picture of the user when he or she doesn't expect it, and then shows the photo to the user later on in the game in a scary situation in the hotel. The site also posts the photo on the user's Facebook page. The program tells viewers to call a number to get sstep-by-step instructions on how to get out of the hotel.

Horror Hotel 626 has had over 4 million visits.
Continue reading at the link.

Right on! - Occupy New Haven -

ALEC is at it again: Anti-collective bargaining push gets corporate money transfusion--

http://www.truth-out.org/special-report-out-state-corporate-money-floods...

[excerpt]

...

A Truthout investigation into the political machine defending Kasich and Senate Bill 5, however, reveals how private interests can silently support the controversial legislation through groups like the RGA that funnel corporate cash into state campaigns to promote a broader agenda focused on weakening public-sector unions and privatizing state services.

Money raised across the country is paying for the television advertisements for both sides of Issue 2, mirroring the changing landscape of elections across the country. The Supreme Court's 2010 ruling on Citizens United vs. Federal Elections Commission and subsequent rulings opened the doors for corporations and unions to directly spend unlimited amounts on political advocacy and electioneering, which allowed the now infamous "Super PACs" (political action committee) like Karl Rove's American Crossroads to spend millions on campaign ads benefiting Republican candidates in 2010. Governor Kasich was one such candidate. A former Lehman Brothers banker, Fox News personality and American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) alumni, Kasich's campaign enjoyed support from private interests nationwide.

...

"Senate Bill 5 makes it easier for state services to be privatized," Fazekas told Truthout. "It keeps public employees from being able to come to the table and talk about the privatization of services, even if they could continue to do the job cheaper than a private industry ... Gov. Kasich has already wanted to privatize prisons, the turnpike and the lottery. There is no reason not to believe this trend won't continue."

...

[read more at link]

So Kadahfi is gone. And JAMAHARIYA with him?
Submitted by nora on Tue, 10/25/2011 - 5:47am.

The Butchering of Gaddafi Is America’s Crime

by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

“Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton appeared like ghoulish despots at a Roman Coliseum, reveling in their Libyan gladiators’ butchery.”

Last week the whole world saw, and every decent soul recoiled, at the true face of NATO’s answer to the Arab Spring. An elderly, helpless prisoner struggled to maintain his dignity in a screaming swirl of savages, one of whom thrusts a knife up his rectum. These are Europe and America’s jihadis in the flesh. In a few minutes of joyously recorded bestiality, the rabid pack undid every carefully packaged image of NATO’s “humanitarian” project in North Africa – a horror and revelation indelibly imprinted on the global consciousness by the brutes’ own cell phones.

Nearly eight months of incessant bombing by the air forces of nations that account for 70 percent of the world’s weapons spending, all culminating in the gang-bang slaughter of Moammar Gaddafi, his son Mutassim and his military chief of staff, outside Sirte. The NATO-armed bands then displayed the battered corpses for days in Misurata – the city that had earlier made good on its vow to “purge Black skin” through the massacre and dispersal of 30,000 darker residents of nearby Tawurgha – before disposing of the bodies in an unknown location...

The United Nations Human Rights Office and Amnesty International found themselves compelled to ask for investigations into Gaddafi’s death – as if the immediate circumstances were not excruciatingly apparent to anyone with eyes and ears. Although the same U.S. domination of the UN that enabled NATO’s regime-change operation will ensure that the neocolonial powers escape legal liability for the results, the world still sees the executioners, correctly, as monsters in league with Washington, Paris, London and Riyadh. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, who gave a snarling thumbs down to Gaddafi just days before his death, appeared like ghoulish despots at a Roman Coliseum, reveling in their Libyan gladiators’ butchery. Their hands and gums ooze blood – a lasting impression on decent world opinion......
http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/butchering-gaddafi-america%E2%8...

Qatar admits sending hundreds of troops to support Libya rebels

Qatari chief-of-staff reveals extent of involvment, saying troops were responsible for training, communications and strategy

Qatar has admitted for the first time that it sent hundreds of troops to support the Libyan rebels who overthrew Muammar Gaddafi's regime.

The Gulf state had previously acknowledged only that its air force took part in Nato-led attacks.

The revelation came as Qatar hosted a conference on the post-Gaddafi era that was attended by the leader of Libya's ruling National Transitional Council, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, who described the Qataris as having planned the battles that paved the way for victory.

Abdel-Jalil also said he was asking Nato to extend its mission beyond the end of the month, when it had been due to end, until the end of the year. Help was needed because regime loyalists posed a threat from neighbouring countries, he said....

...Qatar played a key role in galvanising Arab support for the UN security council resolution that mandated Nato to defend Libyan civilians in March. It also delivered weapons and ammunition on a large scale – without any clear legal basis.

There were repeated rumours about and occasional sightings of Qatari special forces in Libya during the war. Until now, however, there had been no official confirmation of actions that were not explicitly authorised by the UN.

The Qatari chief-of-staff, Major-General Hamad bin Ali al-Atiya, said: "We were among them and the numbers of Qataris on ground were hundreds in every region. Training and communications had been in Qatari hands. Qatar … supervised the rebels' plans because they are civilians and did not have enough military experience," AFP quoted him as saying. "We acted as the link between the rebels and Nato forces."

Qatar, whose gas reserves and tiny population make it one of the richest countries in the world, has long pursued an activist foreign policy – promoted by al-Jazeera, the Doha-based satellite TV channel.

But there was still surprise when it sent most of its air force to join Nato's operation and delivered large quantities of what were described as defensive weapons but which included Milan anti-tank missiles to the rebels....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/26/qatar-troops-libya-rebels-su...

It will be interesting to see how much money Qatar will give to the Democrat Party and barack obama specifically. Without WikiLeaks it will be hard to learn. Hopefully, the Rethugs can dig up some dirt.

Farrakhan criticizes Gadhafi's killing

"I know something of the good of Moammar Gadhafi that made me to love him as a brother and to feel a great sense of loss at his assassination," Farrakhan said during a two-hour interview with radio host Cliff Kelly on WVON-AM...

The following year, Gadhafi addressed Nation of Islam members via satellite, callingFarrakhan a "courageous freedom fighter" who galvanized African-Americans at the Million Man March in Washington and Muslims in nations around the world.

During that speech, Gadhafi criticized America for taxing poor people, who the Libyan leader said do not benefit from space exploration or support of "a Hebrew state," a reference to Israel....

Farrakhan acknowledged that Gadhafi had killed people, but he said all other world leaders, including President Barack Obama, are responsible for the deaths of others.

"Did he kill people? Well, hell, did our president kill people? Talk back to me!" Farrakhan said, prompting some of his supporters to say, "Yes," in reply.

"You have made your president an assassin, that the only value that he has now is that he was responsible for the death of (al-Qaida leader) Osama bin Laden," Farrakhan said, his voice rising. "He was captured without a weapon. He should have been brought to America, put on trial for the American people to see this man. But he was executed so you will never know the real truth."...

"Now, Moammar Gadhafi and his sons lie dead," Farrakhan said. Former Iraqi President "Saddam Hussein and his sons lie dead. Well, what about your sons?

"They're dying in Iraq on the basis of a lie. They're dying in Afghanistan on the basis of a lie. And now (U.S. military) drones are in Pakistan, drones in Somalia, drones in Yemen. When will it stop? America, do you think that you can get away with this?"

Farrakhan said the American media, which he said is controlled by banks, willingly tarnished Gadhafi's image. During a commercial break, he said the media "is bought and paid for."

"You don't have a democracy when you don't have a free press," he told the reporters and photographers in the studio during the break. "You're all slaves, and you love it. So you deserve what you get - the erosion of your democracy. You'll soon be the laughingstock of the world."

Farrakhan also said that America and its allies are "in for a shock" if they think that new governments in Libya, Egypt and other North African and Middle Eastern countries will automatically be pro-U.S.

Instead, he said, the U.S. could find itself with a revolution of its own. He pointed to the Occupy Wall Street movement as evidence of growing unrest in the U.S.

"This is going to happen all over the world," Farrakhan said. "I want you to know that you're through as a world power. Through, through."
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/10/25/128319/farrakhan-criticizes-gadhaf...

...They say things are done for the majority
Don't believe half of what you see
And none of what you hear
It's a lot like what my painter friend Donald said to me
"Stick a fork in their ass and turn them over, they're done"

Traverse City becomes magnet for the homeless
Madonna’s brother tries to avoid frostbite
By Eartha Jane Melzer | 10.21.11 | 10:15 am

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Despite bitter cold weather, homeless people are flocking to Traverse City — including even Anthony Ciccone, brother of Michigan native and pop star Madonna — because of the city’s exceptional network of services for people on the street.

In an interview with Michigan Messenger, Ciccone explained why so many homeless people from throughout the region have flocked to the northern town of about 14,000.

“This is a unique system with the churches here,” Ciccone, 55, said over a roast beef dinner served by volunteers at the Faith Reform Church on Front St. “You won’t find this in too many places.”

The churches in town have collaborated to put on a meal each night that is free and open to anyone in the community. There is a church-run house that provides warmth, showers, laundry, food, computers, telephone and other services for four hours most days, and in the winter the churches take turns hosting people who need a place to sleep. They also provide breakfast.

“This is one of the only places where there is a meal every night,” said Richard Tomey, a street outreach worker for Goodwill Industries. His mission is to help the homeless survive.

In late September, he said, there were several dozen, if not a hundred, homeless people sleeping outdoors in Traverse City.

“The word getting out about Traverse City attracts a lot of people … [from] Ypsilanti, Detroit, Grand Rapids, where they are getting hit real hard and there’s only two type of people on the street, the predators and the victims.”

“They’re coming up here,” Tomey said, “and we are trying to do the best we can.”

Ciccone said he’s been among the city’s homeless for a year and a half since losing a job at his father’s vineyard and winery in Suttons Bay. He said that it annoys him that some people are amused that a person from such a high profile family would end up sleeping, as he does, under the Union St. bridge.

“My family turned their back on me, basically, when I was having a hard time,” he said. “You think I haven’t answered this kind of question a bazillion times — why my sister is a multibazillionarie, and I’m homeless on the street?”

“Never say never,” he said. “This could happen to anybody.”

“I don’t have any income, I’ve got to go collect bottles and cans, do odd jobs.”

Despite the uncommon community effort to help the homeless here, there are gaps, and Ciccone was among several locals who got cold-related injuries last winter.

“They can’t do everything all the time for everybody, they just don’t have the resources,” he said. “These people that run these things are all volunteers, they don’t get paid to do these things.”

In the cold seasons the church shelters usher people out at 8 am and city rules against camping and camp fires make staying warm difficult.

“Where do you go at 8 o’clock on a Sunday morning and you have no money in your pocket?”

If you spend enough time on frozen concrete without proper insulation you will get frostbite, he said. “You have no idea how gruesome it is.”

“You get nerve damage. That’s the milder stage, in the severe stage you have tissue damage, that is when you lose parts of your body.”

“I got frostbite on my feet last winter, Ciccone said. “A friend of mine lost all ten toes. Several have died of hypothermia.”

“You go and find a place to stay warm like the lobby at the jail, or you take a walk to get your feet warm and go to Meijer’s and sit in the lobby there.”

This situation has developed at a time when Gov. Rick Snyder and the Republican-led state legislature have slashed funding for social services and reduced the number of people eligible to continue receiving public assistance. Cuts in local revenue sharing have also forced local municipalities to make deep budget cuts.

As more and more people become ineligible under new rules for government unemployment benefits, food stamps, cash aid and heating assistance, the number of people struggling to stay off the streets is only likely to increase.
http://michiganmessenger.com/53404/traverse-city-becomes-magnet-for-the-...

that the veteran (later a veteran for peace) was hit by the flash canister in Oakland...I read he is in critical condition now...Why does it matter any more than anyone else who it may have ended up hitting? This "thing" reminds me of celebrity obsession maybe? Something like that? I don't know for sure why, I just know it has been on my nerves today...

OccupySF has received reliable word from law enforcement and government officials that a police raid will happen tonight. Please come support OccupySF with your peaceful presence and dance with us innon-violent solidarity to facilitate building strong community in the face of adversity. Bring the love and positive energy!

By ELIZABETH A. HARRIS and COLIN MOYNIHAN

Hundreds of protesters in New York City marched on Wednesday night to show solidarity with protesters in Oakland, Calif., where the police used tear gas to disperse crowds a night earlier. About a dozen demonstrators were arrested in New York, the police said.

Just after 9 p.m., about 500 people left the Occupy Wall Street base in Zuccotti Park and went on a winding march around the financial district and City Hall, accompanied by drummers and a man playing the bagpipes as a helicopter followed overhead.

Less than an hour later, a smaller group of protesters poured into the streets, ignoring orders from police officers to stay on the sidewalk, and began a frantic cat-and-mouse game. More than 250 protesters walked quickly and sometimes ran through the streets of SoHo and the West Village, at one point storming through a movie set on Macdougal Street as groups of police vehicles with lights and sirens pursued them closely. People emerged from bars along the way asking what was going on and offering encouragement.

At one point, a group of protesters carried an orange net, the kind the police have used in similar episodes to block protesters’ movement before arrests.

Chants of “We are the 99 percent!” and “Oakland!” could be heard through the neighborhoods.

“This march is happening because the riot police attacked people in Oakland,” said a young woman who refused to give her name. “It’s something that could have happened to all of us.”

In Oakland on Tuesday, about 100 people were arrested when the police tried to clear protesters from a plaza across from City Hall. One protester there, an Iraq war veteran named Scott Olsen, was struck in the head by a projectile. He was listed in critical condition on Wednesday. The police are investigating.

Around 11 p.m. on Wednesday, the marchers in New York returned to Zuccotti Park, greeted by the shouts and cheers of those who had stayed behind.

“It was successful because we got our point across,” said Shamar Thomas, 25. “That march was for the people in Oakland.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/27/nyregion/occupy-wall-street-march-to-s...

An 11 pic slide show:

northoaklandnow Late-night Occupy Oakland crowd marches jubilantly
through city streets -- our final wrap up of the night: tinyurl.com/3zoz8rt
about 1 hour ago

_ _ _ _ _ _
|

We live in a nation obsessed with the deification of authority figures. Today we worship the troops and the police. We --the general population-- don't call them "baby killers," or "pigs" anymore. You and I, and others here, however, might use these blanket, often unfair, pejorative labels about authority figures. But you and I have nothing but varying degrees of contempt for the entire nature of this society. So for us, any violence used by the state against anyone fighting the corporate/state is simply completely wrong. All resisters are our warrior brothers. All blood shed by our resisting brothers and sisters is of equal value. We don't have a hierarchy. And we don't want a hierarchy.
For the general population, however, the population whose support we are trying to win, a veteran wounded by the inhuman corporate/state is symbolically worth more than the pigs beating the fuck out of a thousand "dirty hippies." In fact, the mere presence of a veteran-- a person who had been willing to fight and die for a corporate/state that we here abhor- at a demonstration against everything he had been once willing to fight for, could be worth more "politically" than massive amounts of violence used against "ordinary" civilians.
The "good" John Kerry throwing his medals away, and speaking publicly about the horrible things that he did in our name, I suspect, was more influential in changing the attitudes of Nixon's "silent majority" than the Kent State shootings.

Pakistani Taliban 'commander killed'
Brother of Maulvi Nazir and three others believed dead after suspected US drone attack in South Waziristan region.........
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/10/2011102781550372200.html

I agree with you...

Off that topic...I was a little sad for the dead grass under the tents in Oakland...I wish they'd let them camp on cement instead...

The question confronting the Occupy Wall Street encampments and their offshoots in scores of cities and towns around the country is quo vadis? Where is it going?

This decentralized, leaderless civic initiative has attracted the persistent attention of the mass media in the past five weeks. Television cameras from all over the world are parked down at Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan, two blocks from Wall Street.

But the mass media is a hungry beast. It needs to be fed regularly. Apart from the daily pressures of making sure the encampments are clean, that food and shelter are available, that relations with the police are quiet, that provocateurs are identified; the campers must anticipate possible police crackdowns, such as that which has just occurred in Oakland, and find ways to rebound.

There are enough national polls showing broader support for the Occupy people than for the Tea Party people. Additional communities are installing their own Occupy sites right down to small towns like Niles, Michigan (pop. 12,000) and Bethel, Alaska where Diane McEachern is occupying the tundra. But, there is trouble ahead.

First, police departments in other cities will be observing the nature and reaction of mass arrests in places like Denver, Chicago and Atlanta. The plutocrats’ first response is always to push police power against the people. The recidivist violations of the ruling class are rarely pursued, yet the rumbles of the lower class are often stifled. With the onset of colder weather and looming police pressure, the protestors need new venues for their demonstrations

Activists need to vary their tactics. I suggest citizens surround the local offices of their Senators and Representatives. The number of Americans fed up with a gridlocked Congress, beset by craven or cowardly, both marinated in corporate campaign cash, can motivate an endless pool of activists who want their voices to be heard.

We know that the Occupy people want to keep their opposition on a general level of informed outrage and not get to the specific policy level. Fine. The 535 people in Congress, who put their shoes on every day like we do, are quite susceptible to a fast rising rumble from the people. They don’t need specifics. They know all about the savagely avaricious corporate paymasters and their swarming lobbyists on Capitol Hill wanting ever more varieties of goodies and less corporate law enforcement. What they need to know is that you’ve got their number and that people are fed up and on the move.

More members of Congress than one might expect, with their finger to the wind, start readjusting their antennas when they sense voter agitation. It is just that for years, there has been nary a breeze from that crucial source, while the corporatists have had their party year after year with their governmental toadies on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Make no mistake; support for the power shift espoused by the 99 percent movement is now only a breeze but a windstorm is coming. The protesters are feeling their way – demonstrating before big banks and closing out their accounts in favor of smaller community banks. Protests in front of the Manhattan mansions of the superrich from the big media and the big hedge funds also make sense.

Each new protest gives the protesters new insights. The protestors are learning how to challenge controlling processes. They are assembling and using their little libraries on site. They are learning the techniques of open, non-violent civil disobedience and building personal stamina. They are learning not to be provoked and thereby win the moral authority struggle which encourages more and more people to join their ranks.

In the Arab Spring of Cairo, Egypt earlier this year, it was said that a million people in Tahrir Square lost their fear of the dictatorship. It can be said that in this “American Autumn,” some 150,000 people have discovered their power and rejected apathy. They have come far in so little time because the soil for their pushback is so fertile, nourished by the revulsion of millions of their countrypersons moving toward standing up and showing up themselves.

This vanguard of larger protests to come is building on the personal stories of desperate but failed attempts to find work; stories of heart-breaking inability to pay for healthcare for themselves or their families’; stories of being defrauded of their pensions, their tax dollars, their savings and their rights. They demand accountability for the culprits who lied, stole and got away with it destroying the economy. And they want Congress to never bailout the Wall Street crooks, swindlers and speculators with taxpayer dollars.

Shining the light of the 99 percenters on the operations base of the corporate supremacists and their Congressional minions in one location after another both empowers and further informs those Americans who are seeing that showing up is half of democracy.

Groucho, of course.
http://downtowntraveler.com/2011/10/09/photos-occupy-wall-street-protest...

Oct. 27th, 1947 "You Bet Your Life," starring Groucho Marx, premiered on ABC Radio.

Was Groucho a Marxist?
By Johnny Reb

Groucho Marxism

...All anarchists endorse the adage that “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely” and are skeptical of all power and hierarchical systems including Church, State, Corporations, the Military and your boss at work. To anarchists all power sources require legitimacy and coercion can only be justified if someone does harm to others or infringes on their freedom.

“No Gods, No Masters”, attributed to the great American anarchist Emma Goldman, is one of their favorite slogans.

Instead of admitting my sympathies toward what I call philosophical anarchism, I often tell people I’m a Marxist-Leninist, following the life stances of Groucho Marx and John Lennon. It’s the sort of response the Great Groucho, who died in 1977 and who was very likely an Anarcho-Socialist, might have said if he were still alive today; although despite the fact he was an avid reader, it’s unlikely that he read Karl Marx or any anarchist philosophers such as Michel Bakunin. However, when in public Groucho persistently sported his trademark beret, which by the way was also a trademark of many of Barcelona anarchists who fought the fascists in the Spanish Civil War.

Groucho was a fan of both James Thurber and the vitriolic social critic H. L. Mencken who clearly influenced his views and opened up his mind, allowing him to venture beyond the hermetically sealed box of cultural norms and biases. In the period of 1920-1940 H. L. Mencken wrote brilliantly with sarcastic wit, all the things that were wrong with American politics and society. In his prolific writings he attacked the profligate greed of the collusion and corruption of Wall Street and Washington that led to the 1929 crash, referring to the ruling conservative plutocracy and wealthy investor class as the “boobocracy”. He wrote that the ruling elites and phony politicians that were so revered in the country were pathological liars whereas those they despised the most were the people who, like Mencken himself, dared to tell the truth. Not much has changed has it? Where are the people like Mencken today who can gain any foothold and platform in our monopolistic corporate controlled conservative media?

The Depression and lingering memories of needless waste and carnage of World War I, a war so horrific it was called “the war to end all wars”, and growing skepticism of capitalism and its failure to provide any semblance of social justice made cultural satire of elites and war mongers, pacifism and leftist views very popular at the time. The anti-war comedy Duck Soup (1933) is arguably the best Marx Brothers movie and early drafts of it that were left out for political reasons were far more scathingly critical than what was eventually released to the public....

...Despite his ironic and at times cavalier comedy, Groucho always held strong political views, supporting left-wing causes during the 1930s. They were the Depression years, the years of the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), harsh economic conditions and the rapid growth of labor, left wing, socialist and communist causes coterminous with the growth of extreme right wing fascism in Spain, Germany and Italy that were all too common in the United States as well, especially among right wing politicians and the business community who feared the growth of working class movements and the new Deal of FDR. Oddly, despite the fact that the FBI held a huge dossier on Groucho Marx, he somehow escaped the hysterical paranoia and clutches of the “red witch hunts” of McCarthyism. He was never called before the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) as were so many of his contemporaries in Hollywood and throughout the American artistic community. Even if you supported labor unions, the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War against fascism or were suspected of belonging to leftist causes like Pete Seeger, Dalton Trumbo and so many others, you were often called to testify and if you refused were often incarcerated and subsequently blacklisted, thereafter unable to secure employment. Ronald Reagan was one of the obsequious reactionary flag waving rat finks who testified before HUAC, fingering many of his friends and colleagues as “Anti-American” (i.e, left wing). The oppression of the McCarthyism era was not a unique phenomenon in the ultra-conservative deeply religious United States. It was a period not unlike the Red Scares of the early 1920s, another period of American jingoism and subsequent state suspension of basic civil liberties and intrusions into the private lives of citizens that followed the Bolshevik Revolution, a time when the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) was founded in reaction to it. During this period the KKK experienced a huge increase in its membership, including many prominent politicians in conjunction with a growing fear by Big Business, conservative oligarchies and wealthy elites that these working class movements might spread to Western capitalist countries. Groucho brilliantly and cynically summed up our culture of hypocrisy, greed, narcissism, hyper-competitiveness and individualism in his famous quip “The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.”

But for Groucho there were no sacred cows (In fact it may have been Groucho who said “sacred cows make the best hamburger”) and his primary targets were the pretensions of the well-to-do, royalty, the military, Religion, Big Business, social climbers and politicians and other bastions of power and privilege....
http://www.skeptic.ca/Groucho_Marxism.htm

(The Hollywood blacklist hearings before the HUAC actually started the same day as Groucho's premiere show.)

For the first time ever, scientists have uncovered the presence of infectious salmon anemia, a deadly virus that has devastated farmed fish in Chile, in wild salmon populations on the West Coast.

This news arrived at a time when the Obama administration is fast-tracking the approval of genetically engineered Atlantic salmon, promoting environmentally destructive corporate aquaculture facilities and pushing the privatization of public trust resources through the controversial “catch shares” program.

Scientists from Simon Fraser University reported at a news conference in Vancouver on October 17 that the virus had been found in 2 of 48 juvenile fish collected as part of a study of sockeye salmon in Rivers Inlet, British Columbia.

“The highly contagious marine influenza virus, Infectious Salmon Anaemia (ISA,) has for the first time been officially reported after being found in the Pacific on B.C.’s central coast,” according to a news release from the scientists.

“Now it threatens both wild salmon and herring,” said biologist Alexandra Morton and Simon Fraser University professor Rick Routledge, whose laboratory led to the discovery of ISA in B.C. salmon smolts.

Morton is calling for removal of Atlantic salmon from B.C. salmon farms. “Loosing a virus as lethal and contagious as ISA into the North Pacific is a cataclysmic biological threat to life,” said Morton. “The European strain of ISA virus can only have come from the Atlantic salmon farms. European strain ISA infected Chile via Atlantic salmon eggs in 2007.”....

...The release of the report exposing the presence of infectious salmon anemia in wild fish on the West Coast couldn’t come at a worse time. The Sacramento River fall chinook salmon run, the driver of West Coast salmon fisheries, is recovering from an unprecedented collapse in 2008 and 2009. Salmon advocates point to a combination of record water exports out of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to agribusiness and southern California, declining water quality and poor ocean conditions as the key factors behind the collapse.

Meanwhile, the Obama and Brown administrations are fast-tracking the Bay Delta Conservation Plan to build a peripheral canal to divert more water to agribusiness and southern California water agencies. Delta residents, fishing groups, Indian Tribes, family farmers and conservation groups oppose the enormously expensive and environmentally destructive peripheral canal or tunnel because it would likely lead to the extinction of Central Valley steelhead, Sacramento River chinook salmon, Delta smelt, longfin smelt, Sacramento splittail and other imperiled species....
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2011/10/deadly-salmon-disease-...

The House version of the Internet Blacklist Bill was released October 26, 2011, with no effort to fix problems that existed in the Senate version. A violation of the First Amendment, it is contrary to official positions of internet freedom and censorship.

“Under the Internet Blacklist Bill -- S.968, formally called the PROTECT IP Act -- the Department of Justice would force search engines, browsers, and service providers to block users' access to websites that have been accused of copyright infringement -- without even giving them a day in court.” (Demand Progress)

The S.968 bill is considered dangerous and short-sighted due to its broad writing that covers a multitude of issues, bringing danger to not only Internet security but is considered a serious threat to free online speech and innovation. The Censorship-galore Department describes it as an attempt to build the Great Firewall of America, requiring service providers to block access to certain websites.

This bill could shut down YouTube, Twitter and many other social websites that bring together the Occupy movements across the nation and world---any user-generated content site where the law can make the sites’ owners legally responsible for the posted content of its users.
Additionally, the bill could shut down music storage lockers and cloud-based products, while its broad-based terminology includes provisions that allow selected websites to be charged with felony charges for streaming unlicensed content---video game play-throughs, coverage of band performances and karaoke videos.

As reported to Tech Dirt the CCIA, CEA and NetCoalition prepared a joint letter to members of Congress who had originally sponsored the bill, saying that on behalf of the technology industry they had never been approached about the bill.

This is ironic, as Protect IP is basically driven by the demands of the entertainment industry. Yet the bill will dramatically reduce jobs, job growth and innovation in the country---something promised by the GOP when they were voted into office and something not yet seen
The House had previously agreed to meet with organizations that represented the tech industry and who would be most affected by Protect IP. However, the House has chosen to rush the bill through this past Wednesday without listening to professional opinions or advice from the tech industry, individuals who feel strongly that the bill is “jobs-destroying,” “innovative-binding,” “and internet-breaking.”
...

Read more: http://digitaljournal.com/article/313463#ixzz1c3zBjItN

fatter U.S. refining margins 27 Oct 2011

Exxon Mobil Corp. said Thursday its third-quarter profit rose 41% to $10.33 billion, or $2.13 a share, from $7.35 billion, or $1.44 a share, in the year-ago period, as the oil major benefitted from higher crude prices. Wall Street analysts expected Exxon to earn $2.12 a share, according to a survey by FactSet Research. Exxon bought back $5 billion in stock in the third quarter and plans to buy back another $5 billion in the fourth quarter.

:)

Submitted by ghettodefender on Wed, 10/26/2011 - 1:59pm.

Qatar admits sending hundreds of troops to support Libya rebels

Qatari chief-of-staff reveals extent of involvment, saying troops were responsible for training, communications and strategy

Qatar has admitted for the first time that it sent hundreds of troops to support the Libyan rebels who overthrew Muammar Gaddafi's regime.

The Gulf state had previously acknowledged only that its air force took part in Nato-led attacks.
...

==================================

Thanks for this post, too.

Obviously, NATO's goals are as far removed from any kitchen table in the USA as one can imagine. (Let alone, that most Americans can't seem to read maps, lest think up imperial landgrabs like this one.)

And is Kissinger a paid consultant to Qatar?

Because there is the stench of Kissinger geopolitick about this.

Where's the Kissinger "dominio effect" verbage these days? Saved for the private consultations?

Have the Qatari rulers been reassured that the future will now guarantee that Qatar will be in on the ground floor for the squeeze put on Egypt and the "Horn of Africa"? Is Qatar looking forward to an African landgrab that will result in the Arab oil nations also becoming the the Arab/African Water Control nations? The combination of the Libyan underground river/aquifer and the Nile -- is this being dangled by Kissinger or those like him, selling Qatar a total wealth and power scenario -- this would not surprise me.

I have to admit it has bothered me all day long

Submitted by Alice on Wed, 10/26/2011 - 10:50pm.

that the veteran (later a veteran for peace) was hit by the flash canister in Oakland...I read he is in critical condition now...Why does it matter any more than anyone else who it may have ended up hitting? This "thing" reminds me of celebrity obsession maybe? Something like that? I don't know for sure why, I just know it has been on my nerves today...

========================

You are empathic. Good for you.

This young man's personal suffering is linked to many other similar examples of suffering that never make the news, so that gives this one incident that much more impact on us.

Events like this one are REPRESENTTIVE of the situation and other examples (many others have sustained injuries/death over time in challenging the Ruling Elite). Because an occurence like this one is representative, and for some fluke timing enter the mass consciousness at once, it can become symbolic or iconic of the many examples like it. Humans rely on symbols for deeper understanding. I think that's part of it.

---

What has gotten to me consistently about this -- an individual like this guy who was brutally and unnecessarily harmed/critically injured -- is that the Ruling Elite is free to send him to occupy foreign lands for securing their corporate imperialistic goals but will not let this same guy come home and occupy a piece of public property. The Ruling Elite's message is: "The People are our pawns and have no rights and no voice whatsoever."

Sad that the police don't get it. Sad that most soldiers don't get it (although this veteran who was injured evidently doubted the validity of current military incursions, and had been against the war even while serving....)

Occupy Wall Street is On the Move, by Ralph Nader

Submitted by Alice on Thu, 10/27/2011 - 2:16pm.

The question confronting the Occupy Wall Street encampments and their offshoots in scores of cities and towns around the country is quo vadis? Where is it going?

This decentralized, leaderless civic initiative has attracted the persistent attention of the mass media in the past five weeks. Television cameras from all over the world are parked down at Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan, two blocks from Wall Street.

But the mass media is a hungry beast. It needs to be fed regularly....

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Always appreciate the Nader posts you make. Thanks, Alice!

I was trying to call Malloy's show tonight because I wanted to point out that the OCCUPY thrust could include targetting the WEAKEST POINTS in the Criminal Ruling Elite's cocoon of protection:

1. A DEMAND for JUSTICE made through an event at the Department of Justice in Washington and events at any of its offices across the nation are needed! Because the DOJ is NOT fully proactive in shutting down the criminality of the Ruling Power Elite.

2. A DEMAND for JUSTICE made at the scene of the crime -- The Federal Reserve which UNILATERALLY INSTITUTED the $2+TRILLIONS extralegal/illegal giveaway to the banks called QE 1 and QE 2 and did so SECRETLY without any authority from Congress. (See the reporting of David DeGraw on this.)

JUSTICE means stopping a cabal of Bankers in their tracks now and not letting the Department of Justice get away with (complicitly?) sleeping through THE SECOND DECADE OF CRIME WAVE in the 21st Century!!!

Am I reading this correctly? Only a $300 savings to each student over TEN YEARS?

I do not think that will get Occupiers off the streets, Mr. President!

Blacklist Bill allows Feds to remove websites from Internet

Submitted by Alice on Fri, 10/28/2011 - 4:34am.

The House version of the Internet Blacklist Bill was released October 26, 2011, with no effort to fix problems that existed in the Senate version. A violation of the First Amendment, it is contrary to official positions of internet freedom and censorship.

“Under the Internet Blacklist Bill -- S.968, formally called the PROTECT IP Act -- the Department of Justice would force search engines, browsers, and service providers to block users' access to websites that have been accused of copyright infringement -- without even giving them a day in court.” (Demand Progress)

The S.968 bill is considered dangerous and short-sighted due to its broad writing that covers a multitude of issues, bringing danger to not only Internet security but is considered a serious threat to free online speech and innovation. The Censorship-galore Department describes it as an attempt to build the Great Firewall of America, requiring service providers to block access to certain websites.

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Halloween every day of the year with the tricks outnumbering the treats.

Chilling.

No more posts like this one even. No more sharing of the quote-able news and their origins via links without what -- a permit or license?

The Overlords already own the corporate news-for-profit. Now they want to make sure the news itself doesn't spread.

Is this the breakdown?: News bad. Only News-for-profit is okay.

Sheesh.

nora on Fri, 10/28/2011 - 7:50am.

I see/sea the invasion and annihilation of our rights darn near daily. :( I am part of the 99%!

Let's not fall for it any more. They are hoping they can continue this war on The People, or else why be growing all that opium in Afghanistan?

Wave away the drugs. Occupy instead!

Here's an historian's view on the problem of so-called street drugs--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyZ_l0l9Pqc&feature=related

I raise my cup to you! And then drink down my juice with it's teaspoon of Vit. C powder!

Domestic energy policy???

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/10/fracking-diesel-fuel-...

[excerpt]

...

More than 32 million gallons of diesel were used from 2005 to 2009 by 12 companies employing fracking in states including Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Colorado, Wyoming, North Dakota, West Virginia and Pennsylvania, among others.

Oil service companies such as Halliburton have maintained that fracking does not affect drinking water....

[read more at link]

Is the Capitalist System against the RIGHT TO WORK? Is the Capitalist System against the RIGHT TO SURVIVE AND THRIVE?

Here Chancellor Williams speaks wisely and to the point -- a FULL EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM for the able-bodied!--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DzXJerbogZk&feature=related

50% increase in one year...

Reasearch labs should be prosecuted for buying stolen animals! And dog fights on the increase -- well, Vicks being made a well-paid hero after his dog fight prosecution must mean nobody feels deterred about dog fighting. Disgusting.

Please help your fury friends stay safe...

http://www.alternet.org/story/152865/pet_theft_up_50_percent_since_last_...

What has gotten to me consistently about this -- an individual like this guy who was brutally and unnecessarily harmed/critically injured -- is that the Ruling Elite is free to send him to occupy foreign lands for securing their corporate imperialistic goals but will not let this same guy come home and occupy a piece of public property. The Ruling Elite's message is: "The People are our pawns and have no rights and no voice whatsoever."
Alice-- I think that this guy's suffering is...
Submitted by nora on Fri, 10/28/2011 - 10:11am.

"...We were taking the black young men who had been crippled by our society and sending them eight thousand miles away to guarantee liberties in Southeast Asia which they had not found in southwest Georgia and East Harlem. So we have been repeatedly faced with the cruel irony of watching Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been unable to seat them together in the same schools. So we watch them in brutal solidarity burning the huts of a poor village, but we realize that they would never live on the same block in Detroit. I could not be silent in the face of such cruel manipulation of the poor."
Beyond Vietnam

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qE4Y0asui3I
(Spanos, the bastard owner of my Chargers, and Bush's #1 Pioneer.)

Days before the police riot--

Governor Brown Vetoes Warrant Protection for Cell Phones
For the past six months, EFF has strongly supported SB 914, a bill recently passed by the California state legislature that would require police officers to get a warrant before searching through an arrested suspect’s cell phone.

Last month, the bill received overwhelming support from both Democrats and Republicans, passing the California State Assembly 70-0 and then the State Senate, 32-4. Despite such strong bipartisan support, Governor Brown disappointingly vetoed the bill (PDF) yesterday.

SB 914, written in response to the California Supreme Court decision in People v. Diaz, upheld basic constitutional principles. It just maintained Fourth Amendment protection to the contents of cell phones, requiring officers to show a judge there is probable cause that the phone has evidence of a crime before it is searched incident to arrest.

The bill was strongly opposed by law enforcement groups, yet SB 914’s effect on the police’s ability to do its job would be almost non-existent. As we pointed out in May, “cell phones pose no danger to the police, the threat of destruction of evidence can be easily remedied through simple preservation methods, and many arrests do not result in criminal prosecution at all.”

Privacy rights, however, will now take a major hit thanks to Gov. Brown’s veto.

As we warned when the bill was up for a vote, “Without SB 914, officers can use a pretextual arrest to casually browse the data on a person's cell phone for any reason.......
https://www.baycitizen.org/blogs/citizen/governor-brown-vetoes-warrant-p...

Oakland's former mayor doesn't seem to have much to say about police violence.
Just another obama--

Governor Brown To Seek Sweeping Pension Cuts

Gov. Jerry Brown will propose sweeping rollbacks to public employee pension benefits in California, including raising the retirement age to 67 for new employees who are not public safety workers and requiring state and local employees to pay more toward their retirement and health care, according to a draft of the plan obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press.

The governor will also propose Thursday a mandatory “hybrid” system in which future retirees would get their retirement from a guaranteed benefit and a 401(k)-style plan subject to market whims. For employees with at least 30 years of service, retirement benefits would aim to replace about 75 percent of an employee’s salary through retirement funds and Social Security, according to the draft..........
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2011/10/26/governor-brown-to-seek-sweep...

thanks

;)

... this is not my CA! eye-roll There are PLANS!