Yesterday I blogged about the problems confronting the financial
elite seeking to walk the precarious fine line between the breakup of
the EU and maintaining it, and implementing middle-class destroying
financial policies. The fly in the ointment, of course, is information
and its control, i.e., the internet. Once again, The Daily Bell has come forward with a very observant article on this new phase of warfare against the world’s middle class:
“There is no doubt, in my view, that the elites practiced
directed history in the 20th century, setting up wars and economic
catastrophes designed to consolidate world government. But in the 21st
century, with so many understanding and evaluating the mechanisms of the
elites, this is a considerably harder trick to pull off.”
But there is an additional problem for the elite, and I hope you caught it:
Desperate for war, US prepares to blame Iran for false flag attack.
"...it would be far more preferable if the United States could
cite an Iranian provocation as justification for the airstrikes before
launching them. Clearly, the more outrageous, the more deadly, and
the more unprovoked the Iranian action, the better off the United
States would be. Of course, it would be very difficult for the United
States to goad Iran into such a provocation without the rest of the
world recognizing this game, which would then undermine it. (One
method that would have some possibility of success would be to
ratchet up covert regime change efforts in the hope that Tehran would
retaliate overtly, or even semi-overtly, which could then be portrayed
as an unprovoked act of Iranian aggression.) "
-US foreign policy makers in the Fortune 500 funded Brookings Institution's "Which Path to Persia?" report, pages 84-85.
With this in mind, and noting an overt, ongoing series of bold acts of war carried out by the US and Israel inside of Iran,
along with sanctions and planned blockades, also acts of war, the
corporate-financier oligarchs have been confounded by what seems to be
infinite Iranian patience to endure such provocations. US foreign policy
makers have noted for years now that Iran in actuality poses no threat
to US or Israeli national security and their acquiring of nuclear
weapons serves more of a deterrence against future military incursions
against the Islamic Republic by the West, than a means to launch
unprovoked attacks against nations that each possess nuclear deterrents
of apocalyptic scale.
While Iran endures an increasing torrent of
unprovoked attacks, they steadily advance their defensive capabilities
to ward off what seems like an inevitable invasion by the West, who has
already invaded and occupied for years nations to its east and west on
false pretenses, and have for the past year fueled foreign-funded revolutions across the Middle East and North Africa.
Time is on the Iranians' side, as Western attempts to destabilize and
destroy Syria drag on, and an increasing number of people around the
world begin to understand the true source of instability behind the
so-called "Arab Spring."
While behind closed doors US policy
makers admit Iran is driven by self-preservation and protecting the
influence it is steadily gaining throughout the Middle Eastern region it
borders, the message they desperately seek to relate to the public is
one of an irrational apocalyptic theocracy eager to usher in
Armageddon.
The best way to get news is to read actual testimony, reports,
transcripts, and speeches. The worst way is to read headlines, unless
you like to be subjected to distortions and misunderstandings. In
between, one can read news reports and then blogs, comments, and
editorials about news reports.
No matter what one reads, the next step is to think about the matter
and place it in perspective based on important factors, past events,
past news, past communications, history, and so on.
Case in point: the testimony of Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper today. See here for his actual testimony
in written form. Most important is that he said clearly that Iran is
not building nuclear weapons and CIA chief David Petraeus said the same
thing, and the latter said he had met with the head of Mossad to convey
his view. This portion of his testimony was not reported in the Boston Herald
article. Instead, it pieced together two unconnected parts of his
testimony and left the impression that Iran was making enriched uranium
in order to conduct an attack on the U.S.!! See here. This is disgracefully poor reporting and utterly misleading.
Google provides headlines. Many of
these, that I will not cite, are disgraceful too. They leave the
impression that Iran has bolstered its threats unilaterally and
is suddenly more willing to attack the continental U.S. This is not at
all what Clapper said. He said that Iran is "now more willing to conduct
an attack on the United States" in the case of a "real or perceived"
threat by the U.S. to the regime. In other words, an attack on them or a
U.S. threat on them that they considered deadly serious might possibly
be met by their attacks on American soil. That's his opinion, but even
that doesn't get reported accurately. For example, the Washington Post
says, according to Google, "launch terrorist attacks inside the United
States in response to perceived threats from America and its allies..."
Notice that they added the word "terrorist" to Clapper's testimony and
they left out the part about a real threat. This is really pitiful and biased reporting.
“A Nazi and a Drug Lord in Charge of Police in Osh?”
Today Turkish Weekly ran an investigative piece
on the newly appointed chief of police in Osh-Kyrgyzstan. The new
police chief Suyun Omurzakov, who used to be a deputy minister of
interior, has been known as a highly influential drug lord, a leader of
organized criminal groups, and he was the subject of a criminal
investigation in the past:
In October 2009,
the Kyrgyznews.com published an article pointing to a direct link
between the then Osh city deputy chief of police S. Omurzakov and
organized criminal groups engaged into drug trafficking, referring to
this person as one of the most influential drug lords in the south of
Kyrgyzstan.
Another report that investigates the June 2010 events developed by a
coalition of Kyrgyz and Uzbek human right defenders “Oshskaya
Initsiativa” (Osh Initiative) speaks of Omurzakov as a leader of an
organized Kyrgyz criminal group, along with the mayor of Osh Melis
Myrzakmatov, and crime bosses Almanbet Manapiyaev and Kadyr Dusanov
(“Jengo”), etc., who were directly involved into plotting, leading,
financing and participating in anti-Uzbek pogroms and distributing arms
and ammunition among Kyrgyz militia.
Since 2001 Kyrgyzstan has been
hosting the Transit Center at Manas (formerly Manas Air Base) as the
transit point for US military personnel coming and going from
Afghanistan, and pays 200 million for continued use of the facilities.
For years the base has been riddled with scandals and fiascos. Last December Boiling Frogs Post EyeOpener Investigative Report took a closer look at “The Manas Question: Drugs, Revolution & Terrorism on the Road to Afghanistan”:
The passage of the Patriot Act in October 2001 is by now an
all-too-familiar story. The American people, already suffering from the
trauma of 9/11, were pushed into outright panic by the anthrax attacks,
a series of anthrax-laced mailings that killed five, injured 17 and
shut down congress for the first time in modern history. The Act itself
was introduced on a Tuesday and signed into law on Friday, before anyone
had read let alone understood the sweeping changes it would introduce
to American law.
One of those changes were amendments to a little-known and little-used FBI instrument called National Security Letters.
Against whom is the European Union’s so-called “oil embargo on Iran” really aimed at?
This
is an important geo-strategic question. Aside from rejecting the new
E.U. measures against Iran as counter-productive, Tehran has warned the
member states of the European Union that the E.U. oil embargo against
Iran will hurt them and their economies far more than Iran.
Tehran
has thus warned the leaders of the E.U. countries that the new
sanctions are foolish and against their national and bloc interests. But
is this correct? At the end of the day, who will benefit from the chain
of events that are being set into motion?
Are Oil Embargoes against Iran New?
Oil
embargos against Iran are not new. In 1951, the Iranian government of
Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh with the support of the Iranian
Parliament nationalized the Iranian oil industry. As a result of Dr.
Mossadegh’s nationalization program, the British militarily blockaded
the territorial waters and national ports of Iran with the British Royal
Navy and prevented Iran from exporting its oil. They also militarily
prevented Iranian trade. London also froze Iranian assets and started a
campaign to isolate Iran with sanctions. The government of Dr. Mossadegh
was democratic and could not be vilified easily domestically by the
British, so they began to portray Mossadegh as a pawn of the Soviet
Union who would turn Iran into a communist country together with his
Marxist political allies.
The
illegal British naval embargo was followed by regime change in Tehran
via a 1953 Anglo-American engineered coup d’état. The 1953 coup
transformed the Shah of Iran from a constitutional figure head to an
absolute monarch and dictator, like the monarchs of Jordan, Saudi
Arabia, Bahrain, and Qatar. Iran was transformed overnight from a
democratic constitutional monarchy into a dictatorship.
Today,
a militarily imposed oil embargo against Iran is not possible like it
was in the early 1950s. Instead London and Washington use the language
of righteousness and hide behind false pretexts about Iranian nuclear
weapons. Like in the 1950s, the oil embargo against Iran is tied to
regime change. Yet, there are also broader objectives that go beyond the
boundaries of Iran tied to the Washington’s project to impose an oil
embargo against the Iranians.
The unexpectedly quick EU consent to take immediate sanctions against
Iran “coincided” with seizure of Libyan oil terminals. To certain
extent the negative affect of expected oil shortage for European economy
could be minimized in case the utmost is done to boost the Brega and
Ras-Lanuf production capacities till the complete cessation of contacts
with Iran is in force.
The article should have been called “Which was to be demonstrated.”
The facts and trends described here have been foretold a really long
time ago by impartial observers who didn’t just believe the allegations
the main reason for Nato’s actions in Libya was establishment of
democracy.
Since January 18 information agencies started to broadcast
interesting facts supposedly based on the data initially reported by the
oldest “international” Arabic Asharq Alawsat newspaper, based in London since 1978. It was reported
that a 12000 men strong US ground force supposedly landed in the
vicinity of Marsa el-Brega. The formal pretext — “preserving stability
in the region and security of peaceful population”. The Israeli web
sites added the US infantrymen were transferred from Malta. They said
the actual mission of this relocation was to maintain permanent flow of
Libyan oil to the European markets to be sold at low prices. Though the
US embassy in Malta denies allegations such a transfer of servicemen has
ever taken place.
US troops landed in the eastern oil port city of Brega
It’s noteworthy Marsa el-Brega is one of the core elements of Libyan
oil industry infrastructure, where oil refineries, loading facilities,
and a liquefied gas processing plant are situated. No matter the before
the war population was only 15000 dwellers, the place is a “key point”
of oil industry. One of two acting export terminals is located in Brega.
The second one is in Ras-Lanuf, situated about 70 km from el-Brega.
Thus landing troops in this key location of the shore is the most
logical action for someone who’s interest is to secure Libyan
hydrocarbons uninterrupted flow. If it were population safety it would
have been reasonable to land somewhere more near to big cities.
Boosting cheap oil flows to the market doesn’t look like a mission
impossible. It a beaten path tried in Iraq when it provided the victors
with energy supplies for symbolic prices as one of numerous
compensations for “rescue” from Saddam Hussein. It’s noteworthy the
unexpectedly quick EU consent to take immediate sanctions against Iran
“coincided” with the seizure of Libyan oil terminals. To certain extent
the negative affect of expected oil shortage for European economy could
be minimized in case the utmost is done to boost the Brega and Ras-Lanuf
production capacities till the complete cessation of contacts with Iran
is in force.
First the world was sold imaginary weapons of mass destruction in
Iraq, General Colin Powell, at the United Nations in February 2003,
asserting: “My colleagues, every statement I make today is backed up by
sources, solid sources. These are not assertions. What we're giving you
are facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence.”
Now it seems the world is sold a withdrawal from Iraq which was not
quite what it seemed, as presented by the Panetta-Obama-fest in the
Baghdad, Fort Bragg speeches of just six weeks ago. At Fort Bragg: "The
war in Iraq will soon belong to history …” said the President.
Well, not quite.
In an interesting sleight of hand, the State Department, rather than
the Pentagon, is operating a fleet of surveillance drones over Iraq.
In: “ … the latest example of the State Department’s efforts to take
over the functions in Iraq that the military used to perform.”(i)
Further, the near Vatican City sized US Embassy in Baghdad is
protected by five thousand mercenaries and has a further staff of eleven
thousand, a large number, seemingly in a “military advice” capacity,
training Iraqi forces – a nation that, ironically, nine years ago the US
and UK cited as having a military capability not alone a threat “to the
entire region”, but to the West.
Little noticed has been that the State Department has been operating
drones in Iraq since last year. Additionally when “Embassy” staff
travel, they are escorted by helicopters, frequently with machine gun
toting mercenaries “tethered to the outside.” Another Nisour Square
massacre (176h September 2007) waiting to happen.
The Pentagon-operated drones, it seems, went out by the front door and returned through the State Department back door.
Howard Cohen of Actors and Artists for 9/11 Truth joins us to discuss his forthcoming feature film, “A Violation of Trust.”
Set to star veteran Hollywood actors Ed Asner, Woody Harrelson, Daniel
Sunjata, Michele Phillips, and more, “A Violation of Trust” dramatizes
the first day of a new presidential investigation into 9/11.
Does the term ‘all natural’ really mean anything when it comes to food
labeling? Increasingly, the evidence says absolutely not.
A new lawsuit launched from New York highlights the real lack of
meaning behind the ‘all natural’ marketing stunt, stating that
Frito-Lay’s popular ‘all natural’ snack foods like Tostitos and
SunChips are actually made with genetically modified ingredients.
Chris Sakes leads the suit against the mega snack corporation, filing a
class-action lawsuit that sheds light on the ‘all natural’ labeling
scam.
Shake said that Frito-Lay products are not natural at all, as they contain corn oils and genetically modified
plants. What is this phony ‘all natural’ claims worth? About 10 cents
more than competing brands that do not claim to be all natural, which
contain virtually the same ingredients.
The lawsuit reported that independent testing actually confirmed the
presence of corn and vegetables oils as well as GMOs within the popular
snack brands.
Genetically Modified Ingredients -- Far From Natural
In response, a Frito-Lay spokesman stated that the ‘all natural’
statement on its packaging “complies with all regulatory requirements.”
Of course genetically modified ingredients are quite far from natural. The suit states:
Genetically modified organisms are created artificially in a
laboratory by swapping genetic material across species to exhibit
traits not naturally theirs. Since a reasonable consumer assumes that
seeds created in such a way are not ‘all natural,’ advertising Tostitos
and SunChips as natural is deceptive and likely to mislead a
reasonable consumer.
It is interesting to note that
Frito-Lay is a unit of PepsiCo Inc., a company that was recently hit
with a similarly-large lawsuit. After reportedly finding a mouse in a
Mountain Dew can in 2009, Ronald Ball from Illinois launched a lawsuit
against the soft drink giant. In response, Pepsi Co. stated that the
drink is so acidic the mouse would have disintegrated before he opened it.
As the suit against Frito-Lay gains publicity, it demonstrates just how
deeply GMOs have infiltrated the food supply. Far from natural, it is
time that corporations begin removing these harmful ingredients from
their food products and stop claiming their products to be what they are
not.
More than 90 percent of all soybeans grown in the United States are
genetically modified (GM) for herbicide resistance and are consequently
sprayed with massive quantities of those toxic chemicals. Fully 85
percent of all corn grown in the country is also genetically engineered,
either for herbicide resistance or to produce pesticides within its
tissues. Since farmers sell their corn and soy to large distributors who
mix the product together for processing, this essentially means that 100 percent of non-organic corn and soy products on the US market are GM.
And
since soy and corn derivatives are so ubiquitous in packaged food, the
Grocery Manufacturers of America has estimated that as much as 80 percent of processed food on US shelves contains GM ingredients. This includes breakfast cereals and other products labeled "natural" or "all natural." (http://www.naturalnews.com/033838_breakfast_cereals_GMOs.html)
GM
crops are simply unsafe. They expose people to novel and potentially
dangerous allergens and to higher levels of pesticides. Animals grazing
on GM crops have died from ruptured internal organs. Yet this is the
type of food making up 80 percent of packaged food today, and the only
way to avoid it is to buy organic food or grow your own.
Tip: Foods labeled USDA Organic
do not contain any substantial level of genetically engineered
ingredients, but due to cross-contamination of crops, even organic
products almost always contain trace levels of GMOs.
Source:25 Amazing Facts About Food, authored by Mike
Adams and David Guiterrez. This report reveals surprising things about
where your food comes from and what's really in it! Download the full report (FREE) by clicking here.
Inside, you'll learn 24 more amazing but true facts about foods,
beverages and food ingredients. Instant download of the complete PDF.
All 25 facts are documented and true.
The
Iran situation remains unpredictable as the country considers
suspending oil exports to EU countries. China faces a tough diplomatic
challenge.
Image: Iranian students
hold photos of assassinated nuclear scientist Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan and
his son as they protest at the Imam Khomeini Airport in Tehran Sunday
during the arrival of the team of International Atomic Energy Agency
inspectors. Photo: AFP
Despite these twists and turns, the general direction is clear. The US
and Europe are determined to unseat the current Iranian regime. An oil
embargo, aimed at choking Iran's economic lifeline, has been adopted.
Overall oil embargoes will start in six months whether Iran stops oil
exports to the EU or not.
It's the gamble that will decide the political fate of this major Middle
East oil producer with a population of 60 million. Equally at stake is
the future global geopolitical landscape. China will be deeply involved
in the process, of which it should be under no illusion.
A showdown between the West and Iran will partly be turned into a
West-China showdown, namely whether China should comply with the West's
geopolitical decision. In previous major world political conflicts,
China has sought to avoid direct confrontation with the US and Europe.
The tradeoff is a relatively mild policy from the West toward China. Now
the West has the same expectations of China.
But the Iran issue involves so much of China's interests that no other
previous international conflict is comparable in this regard. Ten
percent of China's oil is imported from Iran, and China cannot stay
aloof from the affair.
While there is no other choice for China, it should have the courage to
drop minor details and focus on the biggest realistic interests of China
on this issue and China's diplomatic principles that need to be
protected most. The former is continuing to import oil from Iran while
the latter is opposing external forces to change a country's regime,
particularly with threats of war.
The two basic stands are against EU and US policies toward Iran. But
this opposition is inevitable due to the importance of the Iran issue
for China. It is obvious that eventually the resolution of the problem
will come to the point of forcing China to pull back from its stance.
China should consider how to handle it when the time comes. China needs
to prepare to face it squarely once the conflict becomes impossible to
avoid.
WASHINGTON—Within the president’s defense-budget plan is funding for
an intriguing new item: a floating drone base that also could be used as
a launching pad for commandos.
The vessel—called an “afloat forward staging base”—would be a
platform that could be configured to carry and refuel small patrol
boats, helicopters or pilotless aircraft.
Within
the president’s new defense budget plan is funding for an intriguing
new item: a floating drone base that also could be used as a launching
pad for commandos. Nathan Hodge has details on The News Hub.
It would also give the U.S. military the ability to stage a small
strike force offshore—without obtaining a permission slip from another
country for access to a land base.
Details are still emerging, but the project offers insight into how
the Obama administration envisions a military that in some ways is more
lethal even as it contracts.
Plans for the specialized vessel fit neatly with the Obama
administration’s plans to grow special-operations forces, while slimming
down conventional forces such as the Army and Marine Corps.
Senior officials want to provide military commanders with affordable
sea-base options without necessarily sending a big-deck aircraft carrier
and a full complement of escort ships.
A defense official said the floating staging base was more like a
freighter that would be outfitted for different kinds of missions, from
countering mines to launching remotely piloted aircraft. It also could
be used as a platform for launching commando operations.
The official said one option for the ship is a version of the Mobile
Landing Platform, a logistics ship that is being built by General
Dynamics NASSCO, a San Diego-based shipyard owned by General Dynamics Corp. General Dynamics didn’t respond immediately to requests for comment.
As a nuclear weapons’ state, Pakistan faces a number of challenges,
which if unaddressed could cause a severe damage to Pakistan’s
international image as well as to the safety and security of nuclear
weapons of Pakistan.
It is acknowledged secret that Pakistan has a
robust command control system with its weapons kept unassembled and
dispersed at different places with multilayered security arrangements.
As a result potential terrorists would have to toil a lot to obtain
access to those weapons. These are extremely complex challenges and next
to impossible for the terrorists to cross all the thresholds and layers
of security undetected. Thus, the strict security arrangements around
nuclear facilities and lack of nuclear knowledge may hinder terrorists
to steal fissile material and attempt to manufacture a workable nuclear
weapon. In a more plausible scenario it could be that terrorists may
assemble an RDD (radiological dispersal devices) or dirty bombs.1 For
the said purpose, terrorists would need fissile material and a lot of
technical know-how to fabricate such device.
A Case Building Scenario: Threats of Nuclear Sabotage against Pakistan
Immense hype by global media, presence of agents like Raymond Davis and
private forces like Blackwaters and DynCorp in Pakistan are the crucial
reasons to forecast the alarming scenario vis-à-vis security of
Pakistan’s nuclear assets. The literature reveals that US opinion makers
like David Albright, David Sanger, Frederick Kagan and Michael
O’Hanalon, Thomas Ricks and Peter Wonacott has raised the same kind of
queries over the safety and security of Pakistan’s nuclear assets.2 The
following discussion reveals the western efforts and covert agenda by
the different tactics to discard Pakistan’s security arrangements. Thus,
the prospects of filing a case of nuclear material’s theft/transfer or
sabotage against Pakistan could be built.
Global Media Hype over Insecurity of Pakistan’s Nuclear Assets
Osama Bin Laden episode and PNS Mehran attack has added fuel in the
ongoing crisis in Pakistan. The global media started raising questions
about the role of Pakistan in WOT as dual or suspicious. There had been
number of evidences which reveal that global media is creating
sensational hypes to tag Pakistan as rogue state. For instance Mariot
Leslie, who was the director general of Defence and intelligence at the
Foreign Office but is now Britain’s ambassador to NATO said that recent
intelligence indicates that Pakistan is not going in a good direction.
He believed that “The UK has deep concerns about the safety and security
of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, and China could play a big role in
stabilizing Pakistan.”3 According to Wikileaks, UK, USA, and France have
raised high concerns that Pakistani nuclear assets may fall into the
hands of terrorists. The leaked documents revealed that in 2008, the US
ambassador to Islamabad, Anne Patterson, cabled to Washington that a
rogue scientist in the Pakistani nuclear programme could gradually
smuggle enough material out to eventually make a weapon for a terrorist
group.4 In another cable released by the Wikileaks, concerns has been
raised that two main sources from which nuclear materials or a weapon
could be obtained are Pakistan and the states of the former Soviet
Union.5
For months now we have been following US naval developments and
deployments in the Arabian Sea, which serve one purpose and one purpose
only - to demonstrate US military strength in the Straits of Hormuz
region and to keep Iranian 'offensive passions' subdued. Yet never has
the US had a total of three aircraft carrier groups in the vicinity,
always topping out at 2 in the Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet, most recently
these being the CVN-70 Vinson and CVN 72 Lincoln,
with a third boat present merely until a rotation in or out of the
theater of operations was complete. That is about to change, and with it
the prevailing price of Brent, which we are confident is about to take a
new step wise price higher as the US makes it all too clear what the
endgame is, because as Naval Today reports, the "US navy to deploy third
carrier group to Persian Gulf", probably the CVN-77 George H.W. Bush
which departed Norfolk two weeks ago according to the most recent naval update, or any other Norfolk-stationed aircraft carrier: there is a wide selection to chose from.
The carrier group based in Norfolk, VA will also include a guided missile cruiser and three guided missile destroyers, reports Interfax.
USS Abraham Lincoln had already entered the Persian Gulf via
the Strait of Hormuz on Jan 22. She is escorted by a guided missile
cruiser and two destroyers (USN), one British and one French warships.
Meanwhile, another US Navy’s carrier strike carrier group headed by USS Carl Vinson is stationed eastward the Strait of Hormuz, in northern part of the Arabian Sea washing southwest coast of Iran.
At present, the US has 15,000-men force deployed in Kuwait, expeditionary marine battalion, and amphibious landing group.
Remember the real reason why Moammar Gadhafi
is dead. He dared to propose and started creating an alternative
currency
to the world reserve U.S. Dollar. The lesson
learned in Libya is now ready for teaching in Iran. Forget all the noise
about
going nuclear, the true message is that the
banksters rule and nation states serve their ultimate masters. The hype
and disinformation
that surrounds the push for war is best
understood by examining the viewpoint of Iranian MP Kazem Jalali. The Tehran Times quotes him in saying,
"The
European Union must be aware that it can never compel
the Islamic Republic to succumb to their will
and undermine the Iranian nation’s determination to achieve glory and
independence, access modern technologies, and
safeguard its rights, through the intensification of the pressure."
"The
European Union is seeking to politicize the atmosphere ahead of nuclear
talks
with Iran and is aware that sanctions on
Iran’s oil exports cannot be implemented since the world is not limited
to
a number of European countries"
Many political commentators
warn that an embargo is an act or war. Chris Floyd provides this observation of the recent oil embargo against Iran.
"This
week, the warlords of the West took yet
another step toward their long-desired war against Iran. (Open war, that
is; their
covert war has been going on for decades --
via subversion, terrorism, and proxies like Saddam Hussein.) On Monday,
the European
Union obediently followed the dictates of its
Washington masters by agreeing to impose an embargo on Iranian oil.
The
embargo bans all new oil contracts with Iran, and cuts off all existing
deals after
July. The embargo is accompanied by a freeze
on all European assets of the Iranian central bank. In imposing these
draconian
measures on a country which is not at war
with any nation, which has not invaded or attacked another nation in
centuries,
and which is developing a nuclear energy
program that is not only entirely legal under international law but is
also subject
to the most stringent international
inspection regime ever seen, the EU is "targeting the economic lifeline
of the regime,"
as one of its diplomats put it, with
admirable candor."
The
most important aspect of the Iranian response
lies in the way that changes oil settlement for delivery and the futile
effect
of the US/Anglo/EU imperialist dictates have
in the marketplace.
Two new audits conducted by the Special Inspector General for Iraq
Reconstruction (SIGIR) have discovered that the United States Department
of Defense (DOD) cannot account for a whopping $2 billion it was given
to fund the reconstruction of Iraq.
To make matters even worse, the DOD is not even providing Iraq with a
complete record of the construction projects funded by the United
States, making the accounting even more difficult, if not impossible.
Back in 2004, Iraq provided $3 billion to the DOD to fund selected
construction projects, but only about one third of those funds have been
tracked according to the inspector general’s “January Quarterly Report
and Semiannual Report” which was released recently and can be located here (along with other reports released by the inspector general).
The DOD claims that they have “internal processes and controls” in
place to track the flow of money, yet they admit the “bulk of the
records are missing,” and claim that they are in the process of
searching for them.
Claiming you have internal controls while $2 billion is missing is
laughable and shows just how ludicrously incompetent our government can
be.
However, there is the very real possibility that this has nothing to
do with incompetence and instead is yet another example of individuals
in government conspiring to cash in.
This very well might be the case given that other documents including
monthly reports which document the expenses have mysteriously gone
missing as well.
Another indicator that this is something more than mere incompetence
is the fact that in June of last year, the New York Federal Reserve refused to disclose details about the billions of dollars the Fed sent to Iraq during the beginning of the invasion.
The inspector general claimed it was not the fault of the New York
Fed but instead the Iraqis since “They haven’t been sufficiently
responsive.”
Furthermore, earlier that month it was reported that $6.6 billion in fresh $100 bills was sent by plane to Iraq and then could not be accounted for by the DOD.
Do you remember the Safe-Cyber instructions they taught you in the
mandatory Computer Ed class (operated by the National Institute of
Standards and Technology)? First you fire up your Secured Computing
Device (SCD) and its hardware token authenticator.
Then you enter the six-digit algorithmically generated password
displayed (a new one flashes every 60 seconds) and are asked to supply
your biometric identifier. You place your thumb on the built-in
fingerprint pad, click, and wait for the Internet connection to begin.
But it doesn’t.
Instead, the screen goes black for a second before the dreaded words
appear: “Malware has been detected on this SCD. As mandated by federal
law, it has been placed in quarantine.” Then the machine shuts down.
This is not just conjecture, but an imminent scenario.
Policies, such as the White House proposed “National
Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace,” which will transform
the character, culture and freedom of the Internet, are already in
place. The 20 cybersecurity-related bills introduced in the Senate in
2011, and the dozen introduced in the House of Representatives, have
wound their way through committees and, according to Senator Harry
Reid, are scheduled to be voted on in the first quarter of 2012. Almost
all of them, with the blessing of the White House, would make the
Department of Homeland Security the overseer of private-sector
networks.
Considering the apocalyptic rhetoric coming from Washington and the
ranks of cybersecurity experts – echoed by media reports that portray
every picayune data breach as Armageddon – it would appear that the
vulnerability of the Internet has been underplayed for many years.
In the Internet’s start-up decades, both industry and government were
committed to establishing an atmosphere of trust that would draw the
public into conducting more and more digital business. Though data
breaches, theft of trade secrets, identity theft and bank robbery have
been a fact of Internet life since its beginnings, there were few laws
requiring disclosure. Banks and credit card firms ate their losses as a
cost of doing business, and the giant corporations kept mum rather than
roil the public. Recently, the pendulum has swung in the other
direction and a raucous alarm has been sounded regarding the great
danger posed by the Internet.
UN nuclear inspectors have started a three-day mission to examine Iran's
atomic activities. Tehran says it's certain the talks - the first in
more than three years - will prove its program's purpose is purely
peaceful. The IAEA visit comes at a time when tensions between Iran and
the West are approaching crisis level. On Monday, EU nations adopted an
unprecedented set of sanctions against the Islamic Republic, which
include a complete embargo on oil supplies from Iran. That comes into
force in July, but Iran is considering an immediate halt of oil sales to
Europe in retaliation. RT discusses the latest development around the
Iranian crisis with Seyed Mohammad Marandi, who's a professor at the
University of Tehran.
When legislators in the US abandoned their support
of SOPA and PIPA in the wake of mass popular protest earlier this
month, many of those who had been mobilized by the legislation–which
would have granted the US government almost total power to block access
to foreign websites accused of so much as linking to copyrighted
material–did not have long to enjoy their “victory.” The very next day
the New Zealand police swooped in
to the million-dollar estate of MegaUpload.com founder Kim Dotcom,
arresting him and three others at the US government’s request for
alleged racketeering, copyright infringement and money laundering. The
Department of Justice is now seeking the MegaUpload CEO’s extradition to the US.
As a warrior for Internet freedom, you helped defeat the Stop Online
Piracy Act, or SOPA by supporting Web black outs by sites like Wikipedia
and by contacting your lawmaker to voice your displeasure. So loud was
your voice that even the president of the United States sided with you in opposing it.
But
don't take a deep sigh of relief because, after all, we're talking
about a merger of Washington, D.C., and Hollywood here, as well as
global interests. After the motion picture industry, its subsidiaries
and all "interested parties" have spent nearly $150 million lobbying for
some sort of Internet-centric "anti-piracy" bill, you should have known
the powers that be would return.
"Although
the proposed treaty's title might suggest that the agreement deals only
with counterfeit physical goods (such as medicines) what little
information has been made available publicly by negotiating governments
about the content of the treaty makes it clear that it will have a far
broader scope and in particular will deal with new tools targeting
'Internet distribution and information technology'", says an assessment
of ACTA by the watchdogs at the Electronic Freedom Foundation.
"ACTA
has several features that raise significant potential concerns for
consumers' privacy and civil liberties for innovation and the free flow
of information on the Internet [regarding] legitimate commerce and for
developing countries' ability to choose policy options that best suit
their domestic priorities and level of economic development," says EFF's
assessment.
As is usually the case with dubious,
rights-stripping legislation, ACTA - which Forbes.com reports was signed
by the U.S. in 2011 and has already been sanctioned as well by Japan,
Switzerland and many European Union nations - has largely been
negotiated in the shadows and, thus, has largely been devoid of
scrutiny... until now.
While the Obama administration was shying
away from SOPA, it has been aggressively pursuing ACTA (full disclosure:
the process was started under the Bush administration). Critics say it
is much more far-reaching than SOPA, bypassing "the sovereign laws of
participating nations" and "forcing ISP's across the globe to act as
internet police," Forbes said.
Police in Oakland, California, have used tear-gas and flash-grenades
as a 2,000-strong Occupy Oakland march turned violent, with some
protesters claiming that rubber bullets were also fired into the crowd.
At least 300 people were arrested.
The demonstrators had attempted to take over vacant buildings to use
as their headquarters, they also broke into City Hall and tried to
occupy a YMCA. Police spokesman Jeff Thomason told media most of the
arrests came around 8 pm local time. Police took many protesters into
custody as they marched through the city's downtown area, with some
entering a YMCA building.
Officials say, at one point protesters
began tearing down perimeter fences around the Henry J. Kaiser
Convention Center, as some attacked police officers, throwing rocks,
bottles and other objects. Police declared an unlawful assembly and used
force, according to the Oakland Tribune newspaper.
While police
were taking people into custody near the YMCA, about 100 officers
surrounded City Hall, while others swept the inside of the building for
protesters who had broken in. Inside the building, protesters burned
flags, broke into an electrical box and damaged several art structures,
according to Oakland Mayor Jean Quan.
“The City of Oakland
welcomes peaceful forms of assembly and freedom of speech, but acts of
violence, property destruction and overnight lodging will not be
tolerated,” the press release by city officials stated. “The
Oakland Police Department is also committed to facilitating peaceful
forms of expression while protecting personal safety and property
through ethical and constitutional policing.”
At the moment, the Occupy crowd in the city’s central square is being monitored by dozens of police officers.
Oakland
has seen one of America’s largest and most vocal Occupy protests, with
thousands of people attending since the demos started in October. Some
300 people have been arrested since then. The Occupy Wall Street
movement started in September in New York and claims to represent the 99
per cent of Americans, who suffer from corporate greed and economic
injustice.
If
you are an American or European citizen, chances are you've never heard
about shengren, minzhu and wenming. If one day you promote them, you
might even be accused of culture treason.
That's because these
are Chinese concepts. They are often conveniently translated as
"philosophers," "democracy" and "civilization." In fact, they are none
of those. They are something else. Something the West lacks in turn. But
that is irritating for most Westerners, so in the past, foreign
concepts were quickly removed from the books and records and, if
possible, from the history of the world, which is a world dominated by
the West. As the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel once
remarked, the East plays no part in the formation of the history of
thought.
But let us step back a bit. Remember what school told us
about the humanities? They are not the sciences! If the humanities were
science, the vocabularies of the world's languages would add up, not
overlap. Does that surprise you?
I estimate that there are over
35,000 Chinese words or phrases that cannot properly be translated into
the English language. Words like yin and yang, kung fu and fengshui. Add
to this another 35,000 Sanskrit terminology, mainly from India and
Buddhism. Words like Buddha, bodhisattva and guru.
In a recent
lecture at Peking University, the renowned linguist Gu Zhengkun
explained that wenming describes a high level of ethics and gentleness
of a people, while the English word "civilization" derives from a city
people's mastery over materials and technology.
The correct
Chinese translation of civilization should be chengshijishu-zhuyi.
Wenming is better, but untranslatable. It has been around for some
thousand years, too, while Europe's notion of "civilization" is a late
18th-century "invention."
Tourists and imperialists do not come
to be taught. They call things the way they call things at home. Then
they realize that the names are not correct.
Source: Giza Death Star
Today Turkish Weekly ran an 
