From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Tue Jan 4 10:36:23 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2005 10:36:23 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Tarnishing the Golden Dream Message-ID: <20050104183623.54597.qmail@web13602.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=1498&IssueNum=82 TARNISHING THE DREAM The Bush administration is intensifying its assault on Southern California?s environmental legacy. Here are the 10 worst attacks of 2004 President George W. Bush might not like California ? give us back the $9 billion Enron et al. looted from us, please ? but we can?t take any comfort in not voting for him. His environmental record proves he can do more than irritate California; he can hammer us. Even during the feel-good talk of the 2004 election year, the man mainstream eco-groups have dubbed the ?worst environmental president in history? tore at California?s web of environmental protections, for decades the most progressive in the country, as though they barred the door to the church. ?He?s relishing his legacy, rather than ashamed of it. Much to our chagrin, and much to industry?s and polluters? delight,? says Rob Perks, spokesman at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), which puts out the Bush Report monitoring a juggernaut of deregulation that has changed over 350 rules since 2001. ?You would think that would change with a second term, that he would be free to stop thinking about the political favors, but he?s worse now. He?s saying, ?I don?t have to worry about pissing off any of those hunters or fishermen who voted for me, I can just go ahead and please my buddies in industry.?? With a smidge of new power in Congress, we can look forward to new Republican assays against the Endangered Species Act, as well as continued efforts to gut the nation?s top health legislation, the Clean Air and Clean Water acts, plus a slew of anti-environmental judicial appointments. California will weather the deregulation in better shape than most other states in the union. But not because of Bush. To wit, here are the 10 worst federal assaults on Southern California?s environment from 2004: 1. Dented L.A.?s Fleet Rules. L.A.?s South Coast Air Quality Management District made a rule a few years back that the city?s fleet vehicles, like trash trucks and transit buses, must run on clean fuels like natural gas. The Bush administration threw its weight behind big oil and big engine (the Engine Manufacturer?s Association) when they took the SCAQMD all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and won a 2004 ruling saying the rules were illegal in some cases. The rules are still in effect, but this was a big victory for diesel polluters, which one study found to be the source of 71 percent of the region?s cancer risk. 2. Stopped Cleanup of Rocketdyne. The Boeing-owned Rocketdyne facility in the Santa Susana Mountains above Simi Valley is one of the most critically polluted sites in the country, saturated with defense-contractor goo from perchlorate to radionuclides and linked to a high rate of cancer in the surrounding communities. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finally issued cleanup parameters for Rocketdyne under its Superfund program, but Bush?s Department of Energy almost immediately ruled in 2004 that it would protect Boeing and ignore them, forcing L.A. city and county to sue. 3. Limited Critical Habitat. Bush absolutely loathes the Endangered Species Act (ESA), and has not voluntarily listed one species since taking office (Clinton and Bush I listed about 500), wants to delist wolves and grizzlies, besides cutting $10 million of its enforcement funds. In Southern California, Bushies have cut critical habitat ? a designated protected zone for ESA-listed species ? for local salmon and steelhead runs by 90 percent. Habitats for the arroyo toad, tiger salamander, red-legged frog and other SoCal critters were similarly erased to make way for raw urban sprawl. 4. Unleashed the Military. In 2004, the Pentagon freed the military from having to abide by either the ESA or the Marine Mammal Protection Act, the primary protector of whales, dolphins, etc., out at sea or on the 28 million acres of land under military control, allowing a spate of building and live-fire carnage in places like Camp Pendleton, Fort Irwin, and Point Mugu. Next up for 2005: a military assault on the Clean Air Act and toxic waste disposal rules. Look for more Rocketdyne-like military waste (depleted uranium ammunition, anyone?) in your neighborhood soon. 5. Poisoned the Well. In April 2004, the National Academy of Sciences recommended setting standards for drinking water contamination by perchlorate, pesticides, atrazine, etc. The new EPA quickly snuffed them, saying they?d be reconsidered in 2009 ? when Bush is gone. In related news, the Pentagon refused to accept EPA findings that defense contractors were the source of perchlorate and other drinking water contaminants. These toxins are in our drinking water. The Colorado River and L.A. aquifers are suffused with perchlorate. You are drinking it right now. 6. Slashed the Forests. The Bush Department of Agriculture used the suppression of wildfires like those in the Angeles National Forest in 2003 as an excuse to quadruple logging in national forests over the last three years, and pro-timber Ag Undersecretary Mark Rey announced in 2004 the cut would double again, targeting marketable old growth trees over those which would actually reduce wildfire. Bush succeeded in 2004 in killing the Clinton moratorium on building roads into roadless areas of the national forests ? which Bush had pledged to uphold. Worst of all, in December the administration announced a complete revamp of forestry rules, relaxing the ?look before you log? environmental reviews and wildlife protections added in 1976. These new rules help lock out environmental groups from holding up the cut in court. 7. Exported the Water. Sidestepping environmentalists, both of California?s U.S. senators, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Bush?s federal fisheries managers allegedly ignored biological studies, and in early 2004 cleared massive new exports of water from Northern California to Southern California, threatening salmon and steelhead runs in order to distribute new 25-40-year contracts to agribusiness and city development. 8. Brandished the Drills. In early 2004, the Bushies proposed opening 140,000 acres of the Los Padres National Forest to oil and gas development. On the upside: Two bills pending in Congress would protect the Los Padres, and there is massive resistance to the Bush proposal. 9. Looked at the Oceans ? but Only Looked. An early 2004 report by the Pew Oceans Commission was echoed exactly by a report from the Bush-appointed U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, which read: ?The oceans are in trouble. Our coasts are in trouble. Our marine resources are in trouble ? all, perhaps, in serious trouble.? In response, Bush signed an executive order in December to launch the Committee on Ocean Policy. He would not, however, fund the committee, and has decided to consult the experts in industry on how to find a market solution. Which sounds like the oceans will be in worse shape by the time he stalls four more years. 10. Pulled EPA off the Job. Wonder why Christie Todd Whitman quit the EPA? During Bush?s first three years, the NRDC reports there was a 75 percent decrease in federal lawsuits against polluters, and a 57 percent decline in civil penalties and fines. Superfund listings ceased altogether. In July 2004, a new report by Knight-Ridder newspapers showed that federal enforcement of air pollution regulations at oil refineries, in particular, had dropped off as much as 50 percent. The South Bay can get ready for dirtier air. Just to make it clear that Bush?s hostility wasn?t only California?s opinion: In February, 63 scientists ? including 20 Nobel laureates and 19 recipients of the National Medal of Science ? released a statement accusing the Bush administration of ?deliberately and systematically? distorting scientific facts and misleading the public in order to further its own partisan political objectives. Welcome to the world of George W. Bush, your environmental president. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? The all-new My Yahoo! ? What will yours do? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Tue Jan 4 12:00:28 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2005 12:00:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Electric Auto Association Funds CalCars' PRIUS+ Plug-in Hybrid Message-ID: <20050104200029.56819.qmail@web13624.mail.yahoo.com> Here's the text of the announcement (also available at http://www.eaaev.org/ December 15, 2004 EAA Funds CalCars' PRIUS+ Plug-In Hybrid Project The Electric Auto Association has voted to support the California Cars Initiative (CalCars), contributing funds and urging its members to join the effort to make "plug-in hybrid electric vehicles" (PHEVs) available to drivers worldwide. The EAA declared its financial support in the form of a multi-phase research and development grant to CalCars' unique PRIUS+ project. "Our first installment represents a substantial and unprecedented expenditure for our group," said EAA Treasurer Gabrielle Adelman. CalCars' PRIUS+ project converts '04-05 Priuses into PHEVs, doubling the Prius' 50 mpg performance. "The goal is to demonstrate the technology and encourage automakers to build PHEVs. The first PRIUS+ prototype is now being tested in the San Francisco Bay Area," said Felix Kramer, CalCars Founder. Ron Freund, EAA Chairman, explained why the EAA departed from its usual focus on electric-only vehicles (EVs). "PHEVs are inspired. They're a cost-effective way to combine existing technologies bringing the benefits of battery electric technology to market. Adding bigger batteries to conventional hybrid cars gives drivers the opportunity to do most of their everyday driving electrically - with zero pollution. Drivers benefit from the option to recharge every night and start every day 'topped off'. And if it's not convenient to plug in, the hybrid's gasoline engine can take charge and act like a conventional hybrid - propelling the car and recharging the batteries. Finally, mass production of PHEVs will reduce the cost of batteries and other EV components, paving the way to bring pure EVs back into the marketplace," said Freund. "EAA members have been key participants in meetings, online discussions and garage-level engineering, design, and construction of the first PRIUS+ prototype. At EAA EVents all over North America, we always get queries from the public asking about when and how they can purchase an EV or PHEV. So we wanted to step forward to publicly and financially support this excellent project. Others, who are in a position to do so, should look into this project and consider a tax-deductible personal contribution to help speed progress", said Kim Rogers, EAA Education Program Manager. Details of the project can be found at www.priusplus.org, which includes pointers to the "open source"-style online group where the latest technical developments are discussed. Currently, DaimlerChrysler's Sprinter commercial van is the only PHEV under development by a major automaker, but a number of PHEVs have been built at universities and by small companies. About the EAA Founded in 1967, the EAA is a non-profit organization of volunteers dedicated to the promotion of electric-drive technology and to the support of owners of electric vehicles. Its worldwide membership is a source of knowledge and expertise about electric-drive technology. The EAA seeks to educate the public about the progress and benefits of electric-drive technology by organizing and participating in forums, meetings, and public events. The EAA also offers technical information and support to people who wish to convert gasoline-powered vehicles to electric power. In recent years, the EAA has established funds to maintain public EV charger stations. More information about the EAA is available at www.eaaev.org . About CalCars Founded in 2002, CalCars is a non-profit advocacy/technology development group. CalCars is comprised of volunteer entrepreneurs, environmentalists, engineers and others working together to spur adoption of efficient, non-polluting automotive technologies. CalCars promotes PHEVs for energy independence and reduced greenhouse gases. More information about CalCars is available at www.calcars.org Contact Info: Ron Freund, EAA Chairman, chairman at eaaev.org CalCars/PRIUS+ www.calcars.org, www.priusplus.org Felix Kramer, fkramer at calcars.org -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- Felix Kramer fkramer at calcars.org Founder California Cars Initiative http://www.calcars.org Moderator PRIUS+ PHEV Conversion Group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/priusplus/ PO Box 61222 Palo Alto, CA 94306 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Take Yahoo! Mail with you! Get it on your mobile phone. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Tue Jan 4 13:02:31 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2005 13:02:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Ex-EPA Head Whitman Recounts Frustrations with Right Wing Ideologues Message-ID: <20050104210231.7031.qmail@web13625.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/ Ex-EPA Head Whitman Recounts Frustrations with Right Wing Ideologues Christine Todd Whitman, who served as President Bush's administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency until she resigned under strained circumstances in June, 2003, has written a memoir that looks unkindly at the enormous influence of far-right advocates in the Administration. To be published by Penguin Books at the end of this month, "It's My Party Too: The Battle for the Heart of the GOP and the Future of America," asserts that in revving up his base for the November election, Mr. Bush "missed an opportunity to significantly broaden his support in the most populous areas of the country," i.e. the blue states. [1] "The Karl Rove strategy to focus so rigorously on the narrow conservative base won the day," Whitman writes, "but we must ask at what price to governing and at what risk to the future of the party." When president-elect Bush offered her the job as head of the EPA, says Whitman, she felt certain that he wanted her to build a strong environmental legacy. This was reinforced after a meeting with Karl Rove, Bush's master strategist. "I took Rove to mean that the work I would do in building a strong record on the environment would help the president to build on his base by attracting moderate swing voters." [2] But "As it turned out," she continues, "I don't seem to have understood Karl correctly," as she goes on to describe the countless frustrations in dealing with what she calls the "anti-regulatory lobbyists and extreme anti-government ideologues" that she indicates hold too much influence in the party. "A clear and present danger Republicans face today is that the party will now move so far to the right that it ends up alienating centrist voters and marginalizing itself," she writes. [3] Ms. Whitman's book tour will take her to New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Illinois, Washington, DC, and California. As the Washington Post noted last weekend: "Not a red state in the bunch." ### SOURCES: [1] Washington Post, Jan. 2, 2005. [2] Ibid. [3] Associated Press, Dec. 19, 2004. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Meet the all-new My Yahoo! ? Try it today! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Tue Jan 4 18:27:22 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Tue, 4 Jan 2005 18:27:22 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: NEUTRALIZERS Message-ID: > NEUTRALIZERS are people who distract patriots from > defending > freedom. > AMONG MANY OTHER TACTICS, > they do this by: > 1. Deceiving patriots into supporting hoaxes. > 2. Dividing patriots into fighting each other by > creating > strife among patriots > 3. Deceiving patriots into creating class struggle by > promoting > ethnic hatred. > 4. Attempting to waste the time of patriots, by forcing > them to > respond to personal attacks. > 5. Using multiple aliases to create the appearance that > there > is someone, who believes them to be credible. > 6. ABOVE ALL: Accusing the most effective patriots of > being > false opposition. > THE GOLDEN RULE OF DISINFORMERS: > Always accuse your adversary of whatever is true about > yourself. > IT WILL BE QUITE CLEAR WHO IT IS, THAT DOES THESE > THINGS, > IF YOU JUST THINK ABOUT IT. > > Any person; who does ALL of the above is certain to be a > NEUTRALIZER. > > > To read THE NEUTRALIZERS by Robert Welch, > > VISIT: > http://www.jbs.org/visitor/focus/refute/neutralizers.htm > > There is a presence, on the internet, > > of persons who attempt to distract patriots away from > defending > liberty, by seducing them into supporting all sorts of > silly hoaxes; > which would ultimately, waste resources, > > make them appear to be foolish, > > and cause them to lose credibility. > > This includes claims that the vapor trails; that jets > always leave, > are a > plot to poison us. > This includes claims that the stickers, placed on the > back of road > signs by > manufacturer's , are some sort of trail blazing for a > future enemy > army. > This even includes a propaganda blitz to BAN WATER, > by using its scary sounding chemical name: Dihydrogen > Monoxide > > At the first glance we might be tempted to assume that > it is merely > madness, > that there are those among us who are telling people > that the > clouds, > and the street signs, are out to get us, > or that we should ban Dihydrogen Monoxide (which is also > know as > water) > > A PATRIOT, > WHO DOES NOT FALL FOR ANY OF THIS NONSENSE, > will be distracted from defending freedom, > by having to waste all of his time responding to > personal attacks. > > To paraphrase Shakespeare > "Me thinks there is a method in their madness". > > The REALLY interesting thing to notice, if HOW MANY of > the "experts"; > who help to propagate these outlandish fantasies ARE > PAST OR > PRESENT FEDERAL EMPLOYEES. > > One of these disinformers lives in a shipping container, > in a very rural area of Owen County, Indiana. > He heats his shipping container with firewood. > Who pays for his computer upkeep, accessories, > or Internet Service Provider fees? > > If you will study the tactics used by the FBI COINTELPRO > program. > THEN you will recognize FBI COINTELPRO immediately. > > Visit: > > > http://bcn.boulder.co.us/environment/vail/ifanagentknocks.html > > Take note of the following paragraph: > > "The FBI COINTELPRO program was initiated in 1956. Its > purpose, as > described later by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, was "to > expose, > disrupt, > misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize > activities" of those > individuals and organizations whose ideas or goals he > opposed. > Tactics > included: falsely labeling individuals as informants; > infiltrating > groups > with persons instructed to disrupt the group; sending > anonymous or > forged > letters designed to promote strife between groups; > initiating > politically > motivated IRS investigations; carrying out burglaries of > offices and > unlawful wiretaps; and disseminating to other government > agencies > and to > the media unlawfully obtained derogatory information on > individuals > and > groups." > > If you understand the meaning of the tactic > "to expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise > neutralize > activities" > you will understand that the person who is most likely > of being a > Fed, > is the one who involves patriots in activities that have > no effect > on those > who are building tyranny, and activities that will > destroy the > credibility of the patriots. > > Those who are building tyranny would love to convince > people that > we are all a bunch of paranoid nuts, > so that we will we unable to warn people about the > building of > tyranny. > > Those who are building tyranny > would be more capable of convincing people that we are > paranoid nuts, if they could convince a segment of the > patriots to > run > around telling people that the clouds, and the street > signs, > are out to get us, > or that we should ban water. > > If you understand the meaning of the tactic > "infiltrating groups with persons instructed to disrupt > the group; > sending anonymous or forged letters designed to promote > strife > between > groups" > OR OF: > "disseminating to other government agencies and to > the media unlawfully obtained derogatory information on > individuals > and > groups." > THEN you will know that a campaign of personal attacks > on the real patriots is a part of the FBI COINTELPRO > program. > > If you understand the meaning of the tactic of > falsely labeling individuals as informants > THEN you will know that the person; > who is most likely to be a fed, > is the one who calls the real patriot a fed. > It is a common tactic of FBI COINTELPRO to try to > be THE FIRST ONE MAKE THE ACCUSATION. > THE GOLDEN RULE OF DISINFORMERS: > Always accuse your adversary of whatever is true about > yourself. > > > > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Wed Jan 5 13:59:32 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 13:59:32 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Mark Morford: Resolutions For The Damned Message-ID: <20050105215933.65451.qmail@web13621.mail.yahoo.com> ===== Mark Morford's Notes & Errata ===== SFGate.com - January 5, 2005 --------------------------------- Resolutions For The Damned A new year, a Bush-gutted, storm-ravaged world and you in need of some juicy, heartfelt pledges By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist This is the year. No, really. This is the it. This is the year you resolve to let it all hang out and lick the fingertips of the divine and stop holding back and stop quivering with unchecked anticipation/dread as you realize that, if you care a whit for self-definition and spiritual nuance and hot wet intelligence and deep karmic color in this tsunami-hammered, Bush-ravaged world, you are desperately needed right now. It's true. Alas, many are dejected. Many of the blue or Democratic or progressive or open-minded persuasion are understandably heading into 2005 feeling a bit out of sorts, depressed and bitter and angry and still just a little appalled at the apparent widespread fear-induced ignorance of a country that somehow re-elected the worst president in U.S. history. Yes, still. Well, buck up, jacko. It could be worse. You could be Michael Jackson. Or Janet Jackson. Or Tito. You could be Anne Coulter or Bill O'Reilly or Trent Lott, people whose souls have become so infested with rat dung that their third eye is brown. See? Feel better already .... (click here to read the rest) (Full URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2005/01/05/notes010505.DTL&nl=fix ) --------------------------------- Have a lovely day ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? The all-new My Yahoo! ? What will yours do? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Wed Jan 5 14:09:25 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 14:09:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] We Write More Bizzare Laws Than Your State Does Message-ID: <20050105220925.23697.qmail@web13601.mail.yahoo.com> I was reading about the laws that go into effect after the change of the year. This was listed as one of them. Too bad it will not be enforced till 2012. This is just plan bizarre. I wish I was up on the arguments heard for why it will take seven years to knock-off force feeding. IBB http://www.wag.co.za/News/JULOCT/Schwarzenegger%20Terminates%20Form%20of%20Animal%20Cruelty.htm SACRAMENTO, Calif., Sept. 29 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Demonstrating he truly cares about the welfare of animals, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today signed SB 1520 into law, a bill that bans the force feeding of ducks and geese in the production of foie gras. The bill also bans the sale of the product when made from force fed birds, both provisions taking effect in California in the year 2012. SB 1520 was authored by Senate President Pro Tem John Burton, who took on the legislation because he felt that, "Cramming food down a duck's throat to make a gourmet item known as foie gras is not only unnecessary, it's inhumane." The bill was supported by more than a dozen top celebrities including Martin Sheen, Sir Paul McCartney, Kim Bassinger, Alicia Silverstone and Mary Tyler Moore. It also was supported by a broad coalition of animal protection groups, including the sponsors: the Association of Veterinarians for Animal Rights, Farm Sanctuary, Los Angeles Lawyers for Animals and Viva!USA. Animal advocates hailed SB 1520 as a major victory for the ducks and geese. Approximately 20,000 ducks are force fed and slaughtered every year by Sonoma Foie Gras, the sole California producer of foie gras. Moreover, the legislation is considered historic in the protection of animals, as it is one of a few times that a state has banned an inherently cruel factory farming practice. Foie gras is produced by force feeding ducks or geese large amounts of food so that their livers swell to up to 10 times normal size. A pipe is shoved down the bird's esophagus and food is forced into the stomach. The process is repeated two or three times daily for two to three weeks until the birds develop fatty liver disease. The birds are then slaughtered to produce foie gras. In signing the bill, Schwarzenegger took a significant step in demonstrating his commitment to animal welfare. Burton also showed he's a true friend of the animals by shepherding the bill through the Legislature. The only other foie gras farm in the United States is located in New York, and legislation is pending in that state to ban the practice. Several other countries, including Israel, Germany, the United Kingdom, Switzerland and the majority of provinces in Austria, have already banned force feeding to produce foie gras. http://www.usnewswire.com/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - You care about security. So do we. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Wed Jan 5 23:00:42 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 23:00:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Union of Concerned Scientists' President Interviewed Message-ID: <20050106070042.36165.qmail@web13604.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2005/01/05/weeks-knobloch/?source=daily Political ScienceAn interview with Kevin Knobloch, president of the Union of Concerned ScientistsBy Jennifer Weeks 05 Jan 2005 The Bush administration is gearing up to push for second-term priorities -- including an energy bill, power-plant emissions legislation, and amendments to the Endangered Species Act -- under a cloud of accusations that it has manipulated federal scientific research on these and other issues to support its agenda. These arguments have been voiced most prominently by the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonpartisan advocacy organization that issued a statement in 2004 charging the White House with "[m]isrepresenting and suppressing scientific knowledge for political purposes." To date, the UCS statement has been signed by more than 5,000 scientists, including 48 Nobel laureates. UCS issued reports in February and July of last year that documented dozens of cases of alleged tampering with science, including many involving environmental policy decisions. Before the presidential election, the Bush campaign and White House representatives dismissed these assertions -- and the fact that a number of prominent scientists publicly endorsed the Kerry-Edwards ticket -- as partisan politics. But debates about science show no sign of fading in the wake of the elections. Notably, in mid-November the National Academy of Sciences issued a report criticizing the use of litmus tests in filling scientific advisory committees. UCS President Kevin Knobloch is well-positioned to weigh in on the debate about politics and scientific integrity. Knobloch began his career as a journalist, then spent six years as a legislative staffer for former Sen. Timothy Wirth (D-Colo.) and former Rep. Ted Weiss (D-N.Y.). He was UCS's legislative director for arms control and national security from 1989 to 1992, at the height of the controversy over whether a Star Wars missile defense system would work. After earning a master's degree in public administration from Harvard, Knobloch served as director of conservation programs for the Appalachian Mountain Club before returning to UCS in 2000 and taking the helm as president in 2003. Grist traveled to UCS headquarters in Cambridge, Mass., to speak with Knobloch about the next phase of the scientific-integrity debate and how nonscientists can get involved. UCS's July 2004 report refers to scientists feeling that they are being asked to violate the "ethical code of science." Can you unpack that term? It speaks to scientists' obligation to report the findings of their research in an objective and unbiased manner, and for them to allow peers to examine and question their methodology -- the whole culture of peer review and publishing your results. The code of ethics is violated when scientists can't publish their results, or are prohibited from speaking at conferences, or are barred from making sure that decision makers have unvarnished access to what the best and the latest science has to say, even if the results are conflicting. After the elections, White House Science Adviser John Marburger said that UCS and other critics, such as scientists who endorsed Kerry, risked undermining public support for science. His exact words were, "[I]f we're not careful, the scientific community can become estranged from the rest of society and what it cares about." What's your response to that? It's regrettable that the White House science adviser would say something like this. The reality is that the science community was backed into a corner and had no choice but to speak up. This is not about the science community becoming political. This has everything to do with the fact that people who had the responsibility for protecting the integrity of science and of scientists in the federal government turned a blind eye and failed to do their jobs. We've been very clear that this is not about public policy. As an organization, UCS does disagree with the Bush administration on a range of policies, but when we agree, we like to say so. While the Bush administration has had a dismal record on environmental protection, they have done a terrific job on cleaning up diesel pollutants, and that's something that we applaud. But on the question of science, we have seen this administration systematically block decision makers from having unadulterated, unvarnished access to what the research has to say, and that's just unacceptable. UCS stood up and put a spotlight on this issue in a nonpartisan way -- there are Republicans on Capitol Hill who are as alarmed as we are at what's happening -- but now there are veiled threats and some not-so-veiled threats of retribution against the science community. Is that how you interpret what Marburger said? Many scientists are interpreting it as a threat and are extremely unhappy that a scientist of his ability and reputation would choose to go down such a destructive path. What was worse was a statement by former Rep. Bob Walker, who is now a Washington lobbyist and has been deployed to speak for John Marburger and the White House. [Author's note: Walker, former Republican representative from Pennsylvania and chair of the House Science Committee, is now chair of Wexler & Walker Public Policy Associates.] At a forum sponsored by the American Association for the Advancement of Science on Sept. 30, Walker said, "Science does itself a disservice when it mixes with politics in a way that can engender a pushback in the future." We view that as a threat, and UCS will be spotlighting issues as they arise, and continuing to work with the science community, the professional societies, the National Academy of Sciences, and sympathetic leadership on Capitol Hill and in the agencies. Former White House Science Adviser Neal Lane says that scientists originally asked UCS to get involved in assessing and addressing what was going on with science and the federal government. How did that happen? We had been hearing throughout 2002 and 2003 from both government scientists and scientists outside the agencies who were alarmed. Many of these issues broke in the media -- sometimes in Science or Nature or the trade press, sometimes they would make it into The New York Times or The Washington Post, but always as individual cases. So we started to pay increasing attention, and leading scientists across the country started to contact us and ask us to look into it. Did any of them suggest that it was a systemic effort on the part of the White House? A number of them felt that it might be, but we weren't sure we could draw that conclusion. We pulled together a group of leading scientists in September [2003], and it was clear that the alarm level was very high. So we decided to do two things: first, attempt to organize scientists around a statement, which does charge systemic abuse -- that is to say, widespread and, in key agencies, a very deliberate, top-down attempt to muffle, censor, and misrepresent science. A number of the original 64 signers, including Nobel laureates and National Medal of Science winners, had extensive input in shaping that statement. We also hired an investigative reporter and science writer named Seth Shulman, who talked to scientists involved in these episodes, uncovered primary documents, and wrote the report that we issued back in February [2004], which identified almost 30 cases of abuse. And then in July, we came out with a new round of signatures and cases. What steps would UCS like to see the Bush administration take to address the concerns that you've raised? Well, certainly an expression from the president that the integrity of science is an absolute priority. We have not had that, even as we have charged his administration with systemic abuse of science. Has the president responded at all to these charges, or has it all been delegated to Marburger? The president has not directly responded. When we had our first press conference, Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, was asked about it in his daily briefing and he gave a rote response that the administration cared about science. More recently, the White House has deployed Bob Walker, which we think is regrettable. We would like the administration to address these concerns directly, investigate the charges, and protect scientists in the federal government. [Reps.] Sherry Boehlert [R-N.Y.] and Rush Holt [D-N.J.] have proposed restoring Congress's independent ability to conduct science analysis. [Author's note: The congressional Office of Technology Assessment was abolished in 1995, ostensibly as a cost-cutting measure.] Many scientists in the federal government do not have whistleblower-status protection, so we have proposed that when scientists feel their work is being suppressed, misrepresented, or chilled, they should be able to file a complaint with a science ombudsperson in their agency and get job protection. The ombudsperson would then investigate the charges and make a recommendation to the secretary. Have you seen a lot of scientists in senior research positions leaving? Are you surprised that there haven't been more public resignations? This is not a partisan issue, but Sens. Kerry and Edwards spoke to this issue on the stump and pledged to restore the integrity of science in government, so I think a lot of scientists were waiting to see the outcome of the elections. The other thing is that when scientists stick their heads out of the foxhole and say that there are abuses going on, they do so at great risk of the kind of threats that we're seeing today. It also makes it hard for them to get their next job unless they've already won their Nobel, even though they're being courageous and desperately trying to do the right thing. That is why a number of the folks that we spoke to chose to speak off the record. It's clear that they don't feel protected within the government. We are very worried that there will be a major exodus of scientists now. We'd like to prevent it, and that's why we're working to develop proposals for protecting government scientists. It can take decades to build up a world-class science institution like the National Institutes of Health or the Centers for Disease Control [and Prevention], and in a few years you can decimate that capacity. What's the role for nonscientists in this discussion? There's a very important role for nonscientists who support the use of sound science in policy making. Virtually every case we've talked about in our investigation has real human impacts. Take the story about EPA's research into the toxicity of mercury. At the same time that the White House was proposing a weak rule to clean up mercury from power-plant emissions and had crippled the new-source review program that required power plants to have state-of-the-art pollution cleanup equipment, EPA was preparing to release a study showing that 8 percent of women of childbearing age had sufficient mercury in their bloodstream to harm their as-yet-unborn children should they become pregnant. And before EPA could release that study, the Office of Management and Budget said, "Excuse me, but we need to review that," and then the study disappeared. They sat on it for months on end, and it was only when someone at EPA leaked that research to The Wall Street Journal that it saw the light of day. Citizens don't have to be scientists or medical professionals or engineers to pay attention when these stories surface and understand the link to their lives -- and then make sure that their members of Congress and the president and their communities know about it. What issues should environmentalists watch most closely in the coming months for scientific accuracy? Certainly, global climate change is one. You have the strongest consensus we have seen in the science community about global climate change since the conclusion that tobacco caused lung cancer. The vast majority of scientists who study the issue agree that global climate change is already under way, that burning fossil fuels is the primary driver, and that if we do nothing about it, we're facing some very dire consequences. This administration has actively sought to insert uncertainty where there is none or very little, aided and abetted by some of the biggest climate polluters. There are many endangered species cases in our reports. Implementation of the Endangered Species Act is controversial enough without deliberate elimination or suppression of what scientists are finding in their field studies. Toxics, like mercury and lead, are another issue that bears directly on people's lives and where the science should be beyond reproach. With stronger Republican majorities in Congress and the administration claiming a mandate, do you see prospects for positive action on this issue over the next four years? Congressional leaders from both sides of the aisle and many within the administration want to protect the government's scientific capability for the benefit of the public, and are deeply unhappy with the damage done during the last four years. We need to collectively take a deep breath and work to restore the confidence of scientists and elected officials alike. UCS would much rather be working to prevent nuclear terrorism, or to convince our government to be more proactive on reducing greenhouse gases, but everything else we're working for is at risk if the individuals who are trying to undercut science succeed. My hope is that people in government will do the right thing and won't attempt to smear this as partisan politics. It's about as nonpartisan as you can get, and we can work together on solutions. - - - - - - - - - - Jennifer Weeks is a Massachusetts writer specializing in environment and energy issues. Her recent articles have appeared in the Boston Globe Magazine, E Magazine, and BioCycle. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Easier than ever with enhanced search. Learn more. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Wed Jan 5 23:05:50 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Wed, 5 Jan 2005 23:05:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] CLEANWATCH for January 5, 2005 Message-ID: <20050106070550.9622.qmail@web13606.mail.yahoo.com> If you are having trouble reading this page, you may view the current issue by clicking here HOME SERVICES REPORTS NEWS E-LETTER STOCKS ABOUT Search CE News: [input] [input] CE|free reports! Summary | Download CE|investor Click here to see stock prices and more for leading clean-tech companies. CE|sponsors January 5, 2004 CLEANWATCH The Free e-Letter on Clean Technology Welcome to CLEANWATCH. Each issue offers the latest news, events, and other resources on clean energy, transportation, water, and materials. :: Special Offer CLEANWATCH Subscribers - Save $250! Please join us February 2-3, 2005 at the Lodge at Rancho Mirage in Palm Springs for the Clean-Tech Investor Summit. CLEANWATCH subscribers can redeem a special $250 discount off the regular registration fee. To receive the discount, contact Cathy Fenn, IBF's Registrar, at 516-765-9005 x 21, or cathy at ibfconferences.com. Be sure to mention "Clean Edge." :: CE|Views The Art of the Long View , by Clint Wilder Too many federal policies still treat clean energy as a long-term R & D project, rather than an urgent concern whose immediate growth is critical to our economy, environment, and national security. :: In the News Solectria and Azure Dynamics Announce Merger Agreement Clean Edge News Azure Dynamics Corp., a developer of hybrid electric drive trains for commercial vehicles, has agreed to purchase all outstanding shares of Solectria Corp., a supplier of hybrid electric power train and components to the US military and builder of parallel hybrid electric systems for commercial vehicles. New Desalination Technology Taps Waste Heat from Power Plants Clean Edge News University of Florida researchers have developed a desalination technology that can tap waste heat from electrical power plants as its main source of energy, an advance that could significantly reduce the cost of desalination in some parts of the world. US Degradable Plastics Demand to Reach 370 Million Pounds in 2008 Clean Edge News Degradable plastic demand in the US is projected to grow 13.7 percent annually to 370 million pounds in 2008, valued at $490 million, according to a new report by the Freedonia Group. Sharp to Expand Solar Cell Production Output to 400 MW Annually, the World's Highest Clean Edge News Sharp Corp. will bolster its solar cell production lines at its Katsuragi Plant in Nara Prefecture to cope with burgeoning demand both in Japan and internationally, expanding annual production output to 400 MW per year. DaimlerChrysler, GM Partner on Hybrid Technology Clean Edge News DaimlerChrysler AG and General Motors Corporation have announced a cooperative effort that will advance the state of hybrid technology to benefit their customers, and the environment. New Report Shows Solar Panels Can Save Homeowners, Ratepayers Money Clean Edge News Contrasting the commonly held belief that solar panels are too expensive for the average homeowner, a new Environment California Research & Policy Center report quantifies the economic benefits of installing solar photovoltaic (PV) systems on California homes. Major Corporations Announce Renewable Energy Purchases Clean Edge News The World Resources Institute and members of its Green Power Market Development Group have announced 62 megawatts of new renewable energy purchases and projects. Research Forecasts Billion Dollar Supply Chain for Automotive Fuel Cell Industry Clean Edge News When is a supply chain not a supply chain? When the industry it serves doesn't yet exist. That's the case with automotive fuel cells. [input] :: Tell a Colleague About Clean Edge Your Name: [input] Your E-mail: [input] Colleague's E-mail(s): Separate each address with a comma (,) [input] [input] HOME SERVICES REPORTS NEWS E-LETTER STOCKS ABOUT Copyright 2004, Clean Edge Inc. | privacy policy | Click here to unsubscribe ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - now with 250MB free storage. Learn more. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Thu Jan 6 00:12:34 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2005 00:12:34 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Stone Age Cultures Survive Tsunami Waves Message-ID: <20050106081234.42574.qmail@web13604.mail.yahoo.com> Stone Age cultures survive tsunami waves Indian islanders apparently heeded ancient lore PORT BLAIR, India - Two days after a tsunami thrashed the island where his ancestors have lived for tens of thousands of years, a lone tribesman stood naked on the beach and looked up at a hovering coast guard helicopter. Continues.........http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6786476/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - now with 250MB free storage. Learn more. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Thu Jan 6 14:03:34 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2005 14:03:34 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Battle Looms Again Over Drilling Alaska Wildlife Refuge Message-ID: <20050106220334.17359.qmail@web13607.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.bushgreenwatch.org Battle Looms Again Over Drilling Alaska Wildlife Refuge With Republicans having added four seats to increase their Senate majority to 55, the battle over drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) is high on the agenda once again. Rather than including ANWR as part of an energy bill, pro-drilling forces are expected to attempt to insert ANWR into a budget resolution. This is because an energy bill can be filibustered, with 60 votes required to end the filibuster, while a budget resolution requires only a simple majority, and cannot be filibustered. The GOP sought to use this tactic in 2003, but lost by a 52-48 vote. Criticizing the tactic, Kristin Cummings, senior Alaska Lands Advocate at the National Wildlife Federation, calls the move a backdoor attempt to write legislation, pointing out that the energy bill has no place in a budget resolution. "It's not a revenue raising mechanism," says Cummings. "It needs to be in a forum where it can be openly debated on its merits." As Athan Manuel, director of U.S. PIRG's Arctic Wilderness Campaign, told BushGreenwatch, "Including the arctic refuge in the budget shows how desperate drilling proponents are to open this wilderness and hide it from the American public." The Bush Administration touts drilling ANWR as a way to reduce dependence on imported oil. Opponents point out that it will take as long as 10 years before any ANWR oil could reach the market, and even then it would provide at best a six-months' supply. Defenders of Wildlife notes that a mere one-mile-per-gallon increase in fuel efficiency would save half-a-million barrels of oil per day--but drilling advocates show so sign of supporting such a measure. [1] Three Senate Democrats--Mary Landrieu (LA), Daniel Akada (HI) and Daniel Inouye (HI)--voted in favor of drilling ANWR in the last Senate vote, in 2003. Eight Republicans opposed it. They include Sens. Peter Fitzgerald (R-IL), Susan Collins (R-ME), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Mike DeWine (R-OH), Lincoln Chafee (R-RI), John McCain (R-AZ), Norm Coleman (R-MN), Gordon Smith (R-OR). Polls by both Democrat and Republican organizations find Americans opposed to drilling ANWR by a two-to-one margin. [2] Signs of waning corporate support may be sprouting, with the announcement yesterday that ConocoPhillips, the largest oil company in Alaska, is withdrawing from Arctic Power, and is no longer actively advocating drilling in the region. [3] Arctic Power is a lobbying group that focuses solely on opening the coastal plain of the Arctic Natioanl Wildlife Refuge for drilling. BP, also one of the largest operators in Alaska, withdrew from Arctic Power in November 2002. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - You care about security. So do we. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Fri Jan 7 12:48:09 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Fri, 7 Jan 2005 12:48:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Talk of oil decline moving into mainstream Message-ID: <20050107204810.32314.qmail@web13622.mail.yahoo.com> Talk of oil decline moving into mainstream By ONN staffer YELLOW SPRINGS, Ohio -- Until about five months ago, Mel Hutto had never heard of "peak oil," the belief that global oil production will decline and never return to the levels that have nourished American lifestyles. Now the 66-year-old retired business consultant says he will change his lifestyle and campaign in his hometown of Bellingham, Wash., about the need to reduce reliance on oil. "We're going to be without oil. The whole industrial culture will at some point start breaking down," said Hutto, who, out of curiosity attended a conference on the topic in this southwest Ohio town. "I tried to think this wasn't real and wasn't really going to happen." Talk of peak oil is moving from obscure energy workshops and technical journals into the social consciousness via books, National Geographic and other magazines and college curriculum. "It's beginning to move more to the mainstream of public discussions," said Frank Laird, associate professor of technology and public policy at the University of Denver's Graduate School of International Studies. "There is a lot of unease about oil and energy." The notion began in the 1950s when geophysicist M. King Hubbert predicted that global oil production would peak between 1990 and 2000. The prediction _ based on production profiles and estimates of oil reserves _ was largely confined to scientific circles. Paul Thiers, assistant professor of political science at Washington State University Vancouver, has added the topic to his natural resources class. He said the fighting in Iraq and rising gasoline prices are generating interest in the subject. The world uses about 80 million barrels of oil a day, and consumption continues to increase. U.S. consumption alone is expected to grow nearly 50 percent in the next 20 years. How soon production will begin to decline is dividing oil experts. Some believe it is imminent. They say discoveries of oil have slowed and that there is little left to be found. Others believe oil will be abundant for at least several decades and that new technologies to extract oil will help ensure plentiful supplies for a long time. "I can't deny it's coming. What I do deny is it's around the corner. It's not peaking," said Robert Ebel, a petroleum geologist and head of the energy program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank. Ebel said consumers will switch to other forms of fuel before oil shortages occur. But Matthew Simmons, who has been researching oil depletion and peak oil for 10 years, said the peak might already have occurred. "We don't have the data to say it will happen in five years or it happened last year," said Simmons, president of the Houston energy-investment advisory bank Simmons and Company. "It might be two or three years or it might be seven." About 200 people in November attended what was billed as the first national conference for laymen on peak oil. The session was held in Yellow Springs, a liberal-leaning village and home to Antioch College, which has a history of social activism and civil disobedience. The main speaker, Richard Heinberg, believes oil production will peak within five years. Once production begins to decline, the oil-reliant U.S. economy will begin to shrink, and transportation, power and other oil-dependent products and services will become much more expensive, he said in an interview. "It means the undermining of the whole way of suburban life that has been developed in America," said Heinberg, who wrote "The Party's Over," a book describing the imminence of peak oil. The conference was hosted by Community Service Inc., a Yellow Springs group founded in 1940 and dedicated to developing a nation where the population is distributed in small self-sustaining communities. Pat Murphy, executive director, believes a decline in oil production will force Americans to abandon gas-guzzling cars, long commutes to work and their large homes in the suburbs. He sees the suburbs being replaced by small, self-sufficient communities _ many in the country _ that use alternate energy sources and grow their own food. "We can't ship Caesar salads from California to Canada any longer," he said. Some people who attended the conference are acting on their fears. Jifunza Right-Carter, a Chicago physician, has purchased 40 acres of land outside of the city to use alternate energy sources such as solar and wind power and to hold classes for people interested in ways to reduce reliance on oil. "It's not something that we just have to throw up our hands and say we're doomed," Right-Carter said. Hutto said he intends to try to establish a community of between 100 and 200 people devoted to using alternate forms of energy and growing their own food. "My life is going to be very different than I planned it," he said. "It really is a historic conference. I think we're going to look back at this little event in Yellow Springs, Ohio, as a starting point." Original article : http://www.onnnews.com/Global/story.asp?S=2763307&nav=Ls19Lsgn ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Easier than ever with enhanced search. Learn more. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Fri Jan 7 13:25:11 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Fri, 7 Jan 2005 13:25:11 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fwd: Mark Morford: Do SUVs Make You Stupid? Message-ID: <20050107212511.96288.qmail@web13609.mail.yahoo.com> ===== Mark Morford's Notes & Errata ===== SFGate.com - January 7, 2005 --------------------------------- Do SUVs Make You Stupid? Pointless, dangerous and vain as ever, land tanks still sell millions. Only one explanation possible By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist Maybe stupid is too strong a word. Maybe it's more like willful ignorance. More like intentional blindness. More like a calm and conscious denial in the face of a staggering stack of overwhelming facts that if you looked at for even one minute would prove that the land tanks are some of the most overrated and silly and harmful and utterly pointless vehicles on the planet. OK, maybe stupid is the right word. Because there really is no other explanation for the still-roaring success of the land tank. Still no other explanation for their bizarre popularity, for the fact that, according to the Census Bureau and despite California's legendary rep for organics and environmentalism and concerns of health and body and air, our fine and heavily Schwarzenneggered state leads the nation in new registrations for SUVs .... (click here to read the rest) (Full URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2005/01/07/notes010705.DTL&nl=fix ) --------------------------------- All contents (tm) (c) 2005 SF Gate Have a lovely day ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? The all-new My Yahoo! ? What will yours do? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Fri Jan 7 14:29:20 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Fri, 7 Jan 2005 14:29:20 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] From Moveon-1 click action to thank them-1 click action from commoncause-tell DeLay to step down Message-ID: <20050107222920.86294.qmail@web13607.mail.yahoo.com> Subject: Thank them Dear Friend: Remember Fahrenheit 911 when no senator would object to the certification of the Florida vote? Not this year. Sen. Barbara Boxer joined the objection to voting irregularities in Ohio and the new Democratic Leader Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada stood with her. This forced the House and Senate to hold two hours of debate on the integrity of voting in our country -- hopefully beginning some real reform. Thousands of people are sending thank you letters to Sen. Boxer and Sen. Reid. Join me in signing the thank you letter at: http://www.moveonpac.org/boxer_reid/ ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - 250MB free storage. Do more. Manage less. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Fri Jan 7 20:36:16 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Fri, 7 Jan 2005 20:36:16 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] StoptheWall.org in a Week... Message-ID: <20050108043616.94224.qmail@web13608.mail.yahoo.com> www.stopthewall.org THE GRASSROOTS PALESTINIAN ANTI-APARTHEID WALL CAMPAIGN WEEKLY E-NEWSLETTER StoptheWall.org in a Week from the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign Jan 6, 2005 Settlement Expansion in Jayyus, More Destruction by the Wall in Deir Ballut: "Disengagement" as the Latest Phase of Israeli Apartheid and Occupation Latest News In Deir Ballut: Occupation Forces Distribute New Maps for the Apartheid Wall's Path and Begin Bulldozing for the Wall's Construction on Village Lands On December 14, 2004, Occupation Forces began bulldozing and destroying lands in Deir Ballut village, located in the western part of Salfit District, in preparation for the completion of the Apartheid Wall's construction in the central West Bank. [MORE] In Jayyus, Destruction of Land and Uprooting of Trees Lays the Foundation for a New Settlement on Village Land Isolated by the Wall Above: An Occupation bulldozer uprooting olive trees in order to build the new settlement of ?Nofei Zufim? on land isolated from the village of Jayyus behind the Apartheid Wall. On December 10, 2004, Occupation Forces began bulldozing and uprooting trees in a wide swath of land in the western part of Jayyus, a village located in the Qalqiliya district. The destruction of land and trees by the Occupation Forces is to build a new settlement on these village lands, which have been isolated by the Apartheid Wall. Taken altogether, the building of this settlement on these isolated lands comprises a new step toward the final and complete annexation and control of all the village?s lands isolated behind the Wall. The Apartheid Wall, together with these settlements and whatever further settlement development may be planned, will form the final stage of isolation for the villagers? lands. [MORE] Community Voices On January 4, 2005: Mobilization in Jayyus against the Destruction of Village Land and the Next Phase of Israel's Colonial Apartheid Policies The people of Jayyus and the Jayyus popular committee of the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign called for a day of action on January 4, 2005, against the destruction of their land and the next phase of Israel?s colonial apartheid policies. This new phase has been initiated by the construction of new settlements, settlers-only roads, and Israeli industrial zones on Palestinian lands isolated by the Apartheid Wall and is a further proof of Israel?s intention to confiscate these lands, ghettoizing the Palestinian population behind the Wall as a permanent border. [MORE] Analysis / Features Trapped Like Mice: Palestinians Under the New Israeli "Disengagement Plan"Away from international attention, the destiny being prepared for the Palestinian people is showing its true face more clearly than ever before with the new Israeli plans presented to the public in the past few months. The Apartheid Wall, with its horrendous effects on Palestinian life and land, does not stand alone, but is today merging with the longstanding Israeli settlement policy and the creation of Jewish-only infrastructure into a comprehensive scheme for colonial domination and conquest. [MORE] West Bank Apartheid: Israeli Settlement Expansion in Jayyus Possibly this will be the fate of Jayyus: the independent farmers of Jayyus who have tilled the land for at least nine generations will come to be a dependent industrial workforce under the control of Occupation forces, on what used to be their land. [MORE] Maps Two new maps clearly illustrate the latest stages of Israeli Apartheid: the first, "Facilitating Disengagement - Israel's West Bank Road Plan - 2004," shows the system of settlers-only by-pass roads and bridges that merges with the expansion of settlements and the Apartheid Wall to completely fragment and destroy Palestinian life in the Occupied West Bank; the second, "The Wall and Proposed Israeli Unilateral Disengagement - December 2004," illustrates precisely how the "Disengagement Plan" is in fact a plan to further seal off all Palestinian areas of the Occupied West Bank as uninhabitable Bantustans. World Social Forum: Porto Allegre, January 26-31, 2005 Together at the WSF 2005: For Land, Justice and Liberation in Palestine and the Syrian Golan Heights! OPGAI-United in Struggle! ?United in Struggle ? The Occupied Palestine and Syrian Golan Heights Advocacy Initiative? (OPGAI) is a common platform for NGOs working in the West Bank and the Golan Heights to coordinate their activities for the World Social Forum 2005 and beyond. As activists living under Israeli Military Occupation and Apartheid we believe that it is time to join our efforts to further strengthen our struggle and to present our cause united to the world. [MORE] Worldwide Activism In Egypt, Palestine Solidarity and Anti-Globalization Activists Stage a Solidarity March to Gaza and Protest against Normalization with the Occupation Two separate sets of protests in Egypt by Palestine solidarity activists showed the strength of the grassroots movement against Israeli Occupation and Apartheid. [MORE] Anti-War Assembly in Hyderabad: International Boycott and Sanctions against Apartheid Israel! Solidarity with the Resistance in Iraq and Palestine! On December 17-19, 2004, approximately 400 representatives from a broad range of over 120 Indian progressive political parties, social movements, Muslim and other religious organizations, as well as women's, youth, student, and dalit organizations met in Hyderabad, India for an anti-war assembly. They were joined by delegates from resistance movements in Iraq and Palestine, as well as delegates representing various anti-war and anti-occupation coalitions from around the world. [MORE] German Coordination to "Stop the Wall in Palestine" Sponsors Speaking Tour by Jamal Juma' and Issues Call for Concrete Actions Against Israel's Crimes >From the 13th to the 17th of December Jamal Juma?, coordinator of the Palestinian Grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign, took part in a major speaking tour that included many cities in Germany. The tour was organized by Germany?s National Coordination to ?Stop the Wall in Palestine,? a group that was formed in June 2004 after Germany?s biggest conference on Palestine since the beginning of the al-Aqsa Intifada. [MORE] In Jordan: Unions and Political Groups Stage a Campaign against the Apartheid Wall and Denounce Normalization with the Occupation In early December, a group of Jordanian political parties, unions, and civil groups joined together in a campaign to pressure the government to scrap its 10-year-old peace treaty with Apartheid Israel. The demand is part of the group?s campaign against the Apartheid Wall. [MORE] Coming Soon to www.stopthewall.org: New Website Section: The Call for Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions against Israeli Occupation and Apartheid! The Call for Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions against Israeli Occupation and Apartheid is the call issued by the Palestinian Grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign, which represents a number of major Palestinian civil society organizations and over 60 regional popular committees The main goals of the Call for Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions are: To reveal to the world the true nature of Israel?s apartheid practices To give human rights a real value by making Israel accountable and forcing it to pay a price for its crimes To reveal and highlight the responsibility of the international community in supporting Israeli Apartheid Above all, to end international support for Israeli Occupation and Apartheid, since apartheid can never survive without external assistance This new section of www.stopthewall.org will feature valuable resources for activists around the world involved in or wanting to start boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaigns against Israeli Occupation and Apartheid, including: Activist resources for the global anti-apartheid movement An extensive bibliography on the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa and on historical and strategic connections between apartheid in South Africa and in Israel Frequently asked questions about boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaigns A downloadable fact sheet with information on the Call for Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions against Israeli Occupation and Apartheid Information on how to join the international movement to isolate Israeli Apartheid and Occupation, and to establish boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaigns in your community Be sure to watch the site for this important new section, and to read and use other recent additions to www.stopthewall.org including the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign's latest Fact Sheet, ?Apartheid in Palestine?Definition, History up to the Wall, and Tool for Mobilization.? Keep checking back for other important daily updates at www.stopthewall.org. StopTheWall.org Visit the Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign web site. --------------------------------- Powered by List Builder ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Meet the all-new My Yahoo! ? Try it today! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca Sat Jan 8 12:12:14 2005 From: shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca (shadowgroup-l at lists.resist.ca) Date: Sat, 8 Jan 2005 12:12:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] (AP) U.S. Gave $1B in Faith-Based Funds in 2003 Message-ID: <20050108201214.39719.qmail@web13622.mail.yahoo.com> http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=379337&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312 U.S. Gave $1B in Faith-Based Funds in 2003 White House Says U.S. Gave $1 Billion to Faith-Based Groups in 2003; Some Surprised to Be on List WASHINGTON Jan 2, 2005 ? The government gave more than $1 billion in 2003 to organizations it considers "faith-based," with some going to programs where prayer and spiritual guidance are central and some to organizations that do not consider themselves religious at all. Many of these groups have entirely secular missions and some organizations were surprised to find their names on a list of faith-based groups provided to The Associated Press by the White House. "Someone has obviously designated us a faith-based organization, but we don't recognize ourselves as that," said Stacey Denaux, executive director of Crisis Ministries, a homeless shelter and soup kitchen in Charleston, S.C. Other grant recipients are religious, offering social service programs that the government may have deemed too religious to receive money before President Bush took office. Visitors to TMM Family Services in Tucson, Ariz., which received $25,000 for housing counseling, are greeted by a picture of Jesus and quotes from the Bible. "We believe that people being connected to the faith of their choice is important to them having a productive life," said Don Strauch, an ordained minister and executive director of the group, which offers a variety of social services. "Just because we take government money doesn't mean we back down on that philosophy." All told, faith-based organizations were awarded $1.17 billion in 2003. That is about 8 percent of the $14.5 billion spent on social programs in five federal departments for which faith-based groups may have qualified. White House officials expect the total to grow. The list of 2003 grant recipients provided to AP is the first detailed tally of the dollars behind this "faith-based initiative." Elected with strong support of religious conservatives, Bush came to office promising to open government's checkbook to religious groups that provide social services. Often, Bush says, religious groups do a better job serving the poor. Civil libertarians fear the government will wind up paying for worship, eroding the constitutional separation between church and state. Jim Towey, who directs the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, said the Bush administration has been clear that "government money is not to fund religious activities." "This is a culture change in the way government provides social services," he said. "There's always going to be a very delicate balance." In the past, government has refrained from giving money directly to religious groups, but has required that they set up independent, secular organizations to get taxpayer dollars. Bush tried to get Congress to change that. Congress refused, so he unilaterally put many of his changes into effect. To entice religious groups to apply for grants, the White House hosted several conferences explaining the relaxed rules and put out a book listing programs they might want to apply for. "We feel much more at ease," said Louis Wonderly, past president of the Luther House Foundation of Southern Chester County, Pa. The group was awarded $10.3 million to build an apartment building for low-income older people. "We won't have to say, `Oh my goodness, is it terrible to have a cross hanging on a bulletin board?'" Wonderly said. It is unclear how much religion is too much religion when government money is involved. The courts have issued mixed rulings. The administration says a group getting federal money can sponsor worship and other religious activities as long as they are separated by time and location from activities paid by the government. In New Haven, Conn., Women in Search of Health Education and Spirituality got almost $500,000 to help AIDS patients who are just out of drug treatment. Each session begins with a daily affirmation, where each participant chooses something to read, religious or secular. The program's director, Patricia Lafayette, says a spiritual connection is emphasized. "Generally, that's the key to recovery," she said. "We pray anytime someone asks," added Joyce Poole, director of the AIDS Interfaith Network, which sponsors the program. "Some clients walk in and say they need a prayer and a hug and we stop whatever we're doing for them." At the federal penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kan., Life Connections got more than $50,000 to help inmates who are about to be freed and who volunteer to participate and pick one of six religious programs to follow. Activities include a two-week spiritual retreat and six weeks of intense religious study. The White House declined comment on whether these particular programs were appropriate. The grants on the White House list were not specifically targeted to religious organizations. Rather, the list includes all groups believed to be faith-based that won competitive federal grants open to all applicants. Specifically, it includes recipients of competitive grants administered by five federal departments: Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Education, Labor and Justice. Not included are the billions sent to the states for distribution. An AP analysis of the $1.17 billion and nearly 150 interviews in 30 states with grant recipients found: Many are well-established, large social service providers that have received federal money for decades. More than 80 percent of recipients at HHS had received federal money before. At HUD, the figure was 93 percent. Two programs account for half of the $1.17 billion total: A HUD program known as Section 202 that builds housing for low-income poor people, and Head Start, a large preschool program for poor children. Both of them are dominated by longtime grant recipients that able to handle large amounts of money not the small church groups sometimes evoked by the White House. Many organizations insist they do not belong on a list of "faith-based organizations," even though they may have religious roots. Some have no connection at all to religion, such as You Gotta Believe!, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based group that finds permanent homes for teenagers in foster care. The name is not intended to invoke a belief in God, but the belief that there is a home somewhere for every child. White House officials said the list included groups which had identified themselves as faith-based and groups which officials thought religious based on their names. More common: groups with a religious perspective that steer clear of prostelitization. "We intentionally avoid references to God and his works in our educational material so that no one will feel intimidated or avoid our services because they're of a different religion," said Sue Ortiz, a home ownership counselor at Inner City Christian Federation in Grand Rapids, Mich., which got $65,000 in 2003 and $150,000 in 2004. But religion inspires their work, she said: "We do what we do because of God's love." On the Net: State-by-state lists of grant recipients available at: White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives: Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Meet the all-new My Yahoo! ? Try it today! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 17:56:14 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:56:14 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Running low on bullets Message-ID: Yahoo News! (The USG/BATF made it so dang tough for American ammo and ordinance manufacturers to do business, these companies were quickly bankrupted courtesy of cumbersome legislation. This made it nearly impossible for these companies to sell ammo to the general public. So, they ran for the hills. They couldn't survive on governmental contracts alone. Now, the USG is crying boo hoo over their lack of ammunition. Heck, they can't have it both ways.) US seeks to buy ammunition from Taiwan as stocks run low after Iraq: report Thu Jan 6, 9:15 AM ET Politics - AFP TAIPEI (AFP) - The United States is planning to buy hundreds of millions of bullets from Taiwan in the first such deal as its supplies are running low after wars in Afghanistan (news - web sites) and Iraq (news - web sites), a report said. Citing Taiwanese military sources, the United Evening News said Washington had made the request to acquire some 300 million 5.56-millimeter bullets for rifles for an estimated two billion Taiwan dollars (62.5 million US). The deal was yet to be finalized pending price negotiations, it said. An unnamed general quoted by the paper said it would be the first time for Washington, Taiwan's leading arms supplier, to acquire arms from the island. In line with its usual practice, Taiwan's defense ministry declined to comment on the report. Taiwan produces some 400 million such bullets annually, according to the paper. It added most rifle bullets were manufactured by an arsenal in southern Kaohsiung which has storage problems due to declining demand in the absence of any military conflict across the Taiwan Strait. The paper also said Taiwan had exported T-91 rifles to several countries in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Eastern Europe. Washington Wednesday agreed to sell air-to-ground Hellfire missiles worth 50 million US dollars to Taiwan to help the island defend itself against threats from rival China. "The US Army has executed a letter of agreement with Taiwan, setting the stage for the sale of more than 400 AGM-114M blast-fragmentation Hellfire rounds under a foreign military sales contract," US defense giant Lockheed Martin Corporation said. It would take the company about six months to make the Hellfire missiles ordered by Taiwan. The missiles will be mounted on Taiwan's Super Cobra AH-1W attack and OH-58D Kiowa Warrior scout helicopters. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 17:59:09 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:59:09 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Deputy sheriff charged in child prostitution Message-ID: Deputy sheriff charged in child prostitution By COLIN McDONALD of the Missoulian A Powell County deputy sheriff has been charged with aggravated promotion of prostitution involving a child. A criminal complaint filed Tuesday against William Henry alleges that he promoted the prostitution of a young male from 2002 to 2004. The complaint was filed by Powell County Attorney Christopher Miller. Henry is being held in jail on a $250,000 cash bond. Powell County Sheriff Scott Howard said he learned of the matter after a disclosure was made by the alleged victim. The investigation is being handled by the Montana Department of Justice's Division of Criminal Investigation. "There is no way we can conduct the investigation," Howard said Friday. "It would just be a conflict." Henry, 40, of Garrison, has been suspended without pay pending resolution of the charges against him. "It's not a closed book," Howard said. "I do foresee more charges coming down." At this time, the investigation is focused on Henry and does not involve the sheriff's department, Howard said. Henry has served as a deputy for Powell County since May 2000, according to Howard. Before becoming a deputy, Henry worked at the Montana State Prison in Deer Lodge as a guard. The case will be prosecuted by state Chief Criminal Counsel John Connor. Henry has not yet entered a plea. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright ? 2005 Missoulian -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:01:01 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:01:01 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: South Korea claims world's smartest robot Message-ID: South Korea claims world's smartest robot Agence France-Presse Seoul, January 6, 2005|18:57 IST Advertisement 0.gif" width="1" height="3"> South Korean scientists said on Thursday they had developed the world's smartest robot able to think and learn like a human. Unveiling their creation, they said the robot that looks like a small teenager wearing a blue and grey space suit was the first wireless network-based human-like robot. It can become wiser through learning because unlike other robots, the device is linked with an outside computer through a high-speed wireless telecom network, and is able to exchange information with the server and respond quickly to real-life environments. "This is the first network-based humanoid in the world," said You Bum-Jae of the state-financed Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), introducing the 150-centimetre -high robot weighing 67 kilogrammes. "We developed this humanoid focusing on intelligence capability by taking advantage of networking technology in which South Korea is strong," he said. Unlike already-developed humanoids whose intelligence capabilities are largely fixed with built-in circuits, the network-based humanoid relies on its outside server whose capacity can be expanded easily. Equipped with visual and force sensors, the new robot detects movements and speech, then sends the data to the server for processing and receives directions allowing it to interact with people and the environment. At the unveiling here, the robot replied to New Year greetings from a TV commentator and shook hands with him. It can recognize its master, detect and analyse visual and audio signals, and people's movements. Printed From -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: htlogo.gif Type: image/gif Size: 621 bytes Desc: not available URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:03:33 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:03:33 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Dangers of questioning government actions Message-ID: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-0501060112jan06,0,5603781.column Dangers of questioning government actions Don Wycliff , Tribune, January 6, 2005 It has been almost a month since he died and I haven't been able to get Gary Webb out of my mind. You remember Gary Webb, don't you? He's the investigative reporter who in 1996 produced a series of stories for the San Jose Mercury News called "Dark Alliance," on the connections between the Central Intelligence Agency and the Nicaraguan contras, the right-wing opposition to the leftist Sandinista regime in that Central American nation. The series' most explosive charge was that a contra-connected drug gang helped fuel the crack epidemic of the 1980s in this country by bringing in large supplies of Colombian cocaine and selling them to black street gangs in Los Angeles, all with the knowledge and, to some extent, the protection of the CIA. Webb's series, and that allegation especially, touched off a firestorm of criticism in both the government and the media. Not only did the CIA deny his allegations, but three high temples of the American establishment--The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post--all joined in knocking down Webb's stories. Eventually, even his own editor at the Mercury News effectively disavowed him and the series. Gary Webb himself became radioactive within the newspaper industry and went to work in California state government. When he died last month at age 49, ostensibly of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, he was jobless and, apparently, hopeless. I have a confession to make: I still think Gary Webb had it mostly right. I think he got the treatment that always comes to those who dare question aloud the bona fides of the establishment: First he got misrepresented--his suggestion that the CIA tolerated the contras' cocaine trading became an allegation that the agency itself was involved in the drug trade. Then he was ridiculed as a conspiracy-monger--joked one commentator, Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post, "Oliver Stone, check your voice mail." In the end, Webb was rendered untouchable. I know that I risk being marked down as something of a nut for saying I think Webb was fundamentally right. As my friend and former Commentary page columnist Salim Muwakkil said in one of his pieces on this issue: "To connect the CIA with crack--a drug with race-specific overtones--is considered a mere variation of the old theme of black genocide and is thus deemed irrational in mainstream discourse." But try thinking of it from a black American's point of view. The CIA was tasked with helping the contras, a group President Ronald Reagan had declared the moral equivalent of America's founding fathers. So intent was the Reagan-Bush administration on assuring the survival and success of the contras that it attempted an illegal bargain with the hated mullahs of Iran in order to benefit the Nicaraguans. Now, you're a CIA agent who must decide whether to blow the whistle on some of your charges for supplementing their budget by trading in cocaine on the side--or just turn your head and not "see" anything. Between the contras, beloved of the president, and some black gangsters in L.A. (we won't talk about the zoned-out, zonked-out end users), who is the more expendable? I am reminded here of the climactic chapters of Ralph Ellison's "Invisible Man," in which a seething Harlem goes up in flames. It happens not because of anything the protagonist and his cherished "Brotherhood" do. It happens because the leadership of the Brotherhood elects to do nothing, to cease expending any energy at all on Harlem and its problems. Who is the more expendable? I think Gary Webb had it figured out just right. ---------- Don Wycliff is the Tribune's public editor. He listens to readers' concerns and questions about the paper's coverage and writes weekly about current issues in journalism. His e-mail address is dwycliff at tribune.com. The views expressed are his own. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A TIME ON THIS PLANET WHERE SO FEW WILL DO SO MUCH FOR SO MANY "The practice of discernment is part of higher consciousness. Discernment is not just a step up from judgement. In life's curriculum, it is the opposite of judgement. Through judgement a man reveals what he needs to confront and learn. Through discernment, one reveals what he has mastered." Quote from: Love Without End, by Glenda Green ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:04:39 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:04:39 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Alberto Gonzales Has Blood on His Hands Message-ID: Also see below: Gonzales's Clemency Memos Criticized . Go to Original Alberto Gonzales Has Blood on His Hands The Minneapolis Star Tribune | Editorial Thursday 06 January 2005 When the White House announced in November that Attorney General John Ashcroft would depart and be replaced by presidential counsel Alberto Gonzales, it was a good news-bad news sort of day: good news that Ashcroft, enemy of the Bill of Rights in this war-on-terror era, would be departing; bad news that he would be replaced by Gonzales, enemy of the rights of prisoners of war and architect of policies that led to the abuses at Guantanamo Bay and Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. Since November, the bad news has gotten large amounts worse as horrific abuses of prisoners have been documented, especially by the American Civil Liberties Union and documents it forced into the public domain. Which leaves us to ask: Why in the world should the United States be saddled with an attorney general who, from the White House, framed cockamamie legal policies that sought to make it permissible for American forces to commit war crimes? Indeed, when Gonzales comes before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, the committee must challenge him to explain fully both his role in authorizing torture and his rationale for doing so. If the answers aren't satisfactory, and it is impossible to imagine how they could be, then the full Senate should reject his nomination and tell President Bush to pick someone else. At the height of the Abu Ghraib scandal, someone leaked to Newsweek a memorandum Gonzales authored in January 2002 which argued that the war on terror had "rendered obsolete" the Geneva Conventions prohibiting torture and abuse of prisoners of war. The conventions, he said, did not apply to enemy combatants captured in Afghanistan. Gonzales also was a principal architect of Bush's order authorizing the secret trial of combatants from Afghanistan by military tribunal. Only within the last few days has it become known just how key a role Gonzales played in the formation of a notorious Department of Justice memo issued in August 2002. That memo defined torture quite narrowly -- it said that only physical pain "of an intensity akin to that which accompanies serious physical injury such as death or organ failure" amounted to torture. It also said the president had inherent authority to authorize use of extreme means of interrogation on detainees suspected of terrorist activities. Gonzales asked for the memo and discussed draft language with its author. Small wonder that, according to a "senior administration official" interviewed by the New York Times, the memo hewed closely to views already held by senior White House officials. That memo, by the way, was rescinded by the Justice Department last week (a bit of tidying before Gonzales' confirmation hearing) and replaced with a new one that explicitly rejects the reasoning put forward in the first. Gonzales has a great deal to answer for. He contributed substantially to prisoner abuses that brought the United States into worldwide disrepute and sullied its record for valuing human rights. If the Judiciary Committee should find his answers evasive or uncompelling, he doesn't deserve to be attorney general of this nation. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- <>Go to Original Gonzales's Clemency Memos Criticized By R. Jeffrey Smith The Washington Post Thursday 06 January 2005 Crucial facts were missing, lawyers say. In 1995, a one-eyed drifter named Henry Lee Lucas was headed for execution by injection in a Texas prison for the murder of an unnamed woman, one of hundreds he confessed to killing in a crime spree lasting more than a decade. The task of recommending whether then-Gov. George W. Bush should grant a reprieve or commute Lucas's death sentence fell to Alberto R. Gonzales, Bush's counsel. In a memo to Bush dated March 13, 1995, Gonzales marshaled a case for Lucas's guilt. He noted that Lucas had given a sheriff a drawing of the victim, and attached a record of Lucas's eight other Texas murder convictions, each of which led to lengthy or life prison sentences. Left out of Gonzales's summary was any mention of a 1986 investigation by the Texas attorney general's office that concluded that Lucas had not killed the woman, and that he had falsely confessed to numerous killings in an effort to undermine the veracity of his confessions to the crimes he did commit. While the six-page memo factually summarizes Lucas's court appeals, "it does not really address in any way . . . all the questions that were raised about his guilt," said Jim Mattox, the Texas attorney general from 1983 to 1991, who instigated an investigation of police conduct in the case. He said that if the memo had been prepared for him, he would have chastised the author "for allowing me to make a decision on partial information." Senate hearings today on Gonzales's nomination to become the next U.S. attorney general are expected to focus on his work as White House counsel. But his memos for Bush on Texas clemency matters illustrate how Gonzales approached another momentous task: endorsing the taking of a life. Several other attorneys for convicts executed in Texas during Bush's tenure -- who recently reviewed the memos for the first time at the request of The Washington Post -- complained that Gonzales provided unfair or incomplete summaries of evidence and mitigating circumstances. They said the missing information might have influenced Bush's decisions had he been aware of it. Jim Marcus, an attorney for convicted murderer Kenneth Ray Ransom, said, for example, that Gonzales's memo does not correctly state the basis for the clemency request he filed in 1997. "Had I known that the 40-page petition I filed would be boiled down to one slipshod sentence in Mr. Gonzales's memo, I would simply have filed a one-sentence petition," he said. White House spokesman Brian R. Besanceney said in response to the complaints yesterday that Gonzales and his colleagues in the Texas counsel's office "treated each clemency petition with careful scrutiny and sensitivity." He also said the summaries Gonzales prepared represented "a small fraction of the information provided to the governor" and sought only to document "the governor's final decision" rather than recommend a course of action. Pete Wassdorf, head of the general counsel's office for the Texas attorney general, who served as Gonzales's deputy at the time, also said additional information about some of the cases was provided to Bush in other documents. But only a few of the 62 clemency memos Gonzales prepared for Bush between January 1995 and November 1997 make any reference to additional documentation. The Gonzales memos were first released to journalist Alan Berlow, who wrote about them in the Atlantic Monthly magazine, and later provided to The Post by the Texas archives. Gonzales's staff in the Texas counsel's office drafted the memos. He edited and approved about one every two months during the first three years of Bush's governorship. Gonzales acted under a provision of the state constitution that required him to "review and make recommendations on applications for pardons, commutations and reprieves." Each of the memos included a line at the end where Bush could check off "deny" or "grant." Most were three to four pages long, although one -- for female ax-murderer Karla Faye Tucker, who gained wide attention by embracing Christianity in prison -- included a letter and videotape from Tucker to Bush. Gonzales's habit in the memos was to present what he listed as a "brief summary of the facts," followed by a family and personal history of the convict, a tally of other crimes, a summary of litigation and a one-paragraph conclusion. In some cases, Gonzales said, "we feel that nothing will be gained by granting a 30-day reprieve" or "no compelling legal or factual reasons support" commutation of the death sentence. But in other instances, when no clemency petition had been made, it had already been denied by the state board of pardons, or the defendant did not have a lawyer, Gonzales expressed no opinion about guilt or innocence; he merely predicted that the convict "will be executed on the scheduled date," and left room for Bush's check mark. In the case of David Herman, who was executed in 1997 a few days after an attempted suicide, Herman's lawyer, Jack Strickland, said that Gonzales's memo was "a skeletal attempt to brief Bush on a complex case." He said Gonzales had not given adequate attention to whether Herman was mentally competent, a requirement for executions. Strickland, who both prosecuted and defended death penalty cases, said actions by Gonzales and Bush left a wide impression that "it was a waste of paper" to request a commutation. Greg Wiercioch, another Texas defense attorney, said in an interview that for two of his death row clients, appellate courts granted stays of execution or ordered additional evidentiary hearings after Gonzales declared in his memos that the case had no worthy pending legal issues. Bush did eventually commute Lucas's death sentence to life imprisonment -- the only commutation during his five-year tenure -- after Mattox pressed the issue publicly during a 1998 campaign for reelection as attorney general on the Democratic ticket. Gonzales legally witnessed Bush's written "proclamation." "I take every death-penalty case seriously and review each case carefully," Bush said at a news conference on the day of his decision. The Alliance for Justice, a coalition of 70 civil rights and other organizations, charged in a statement released yesterday that "the deficiencies in Gonzales' memoranda may have played a role in Bush's failure to grant clemency." They said his record on the issue, along with policies he embraced on the detention of prisoners in the war on terrorism, raised questions about "whether he can properly serve as the nation's chief law enforcement officer." Besides the sole commutation, Bush granted a single 30-day death penalty reprieve, in a case that arose after Bush had appointed Gonzales to the Texas Supreme Court. In non-death-penalty cases, Bush granted 19 of the 149 pardons "for innocence" or compassion that were urged by the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, an official review body for such requests. Scholars at the University of Pittsburgh have said that was the lowest number by any Texas governor since the 1940s. ------- Research editor Lucy Shackelford and researcher Karl Evanzz contributed to this report. ------- Jump to today's TO Features Today's TO Features -------------- FOCUS: Star Tribune | Alberto Gonzales Has Blood on His Hands Boxer to Stand with Conyers -------------- Will Pitt: FYI t r u t h o u t Home ? Copyright 2005 by TruthOut.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:05:26 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:05:26 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Man Charged Under Patriot Act Message-ID: rense.com Man Charged Under Patriot Act - Feds Admit Not A Terrorist! Wayne Perry Associated Press 1-5-5 NEWARK, N.J. -- A man charged with temporarily blinding the pilot and co-pilot of an airplane with a laser beam claims he was simply using the device to look at stars with his 7-year-old daughter. Federal authorities on Tuesday used the Patriot Act to charge David Banach, 38, with interfering with the operator of a mass transportation vehicle and making false statements to the FBI. He is the first person arrested after a recent rash of reports around the nation of lasers being beamed at airplanes. If convicted, Banach could be sentenced to 25 years in prison and fined $500,000. The FBI acknowledged the incident had no connection to terrorism but called Banach's actions "foolhardy and negligent." Banach, of suburban Parsippany, admitted to federal agents that he pointed the light beam at a jet and a helicopter over his home near Teterboro Airport last week, authorities said. Initially, he claimed his daughter aimed the device at the helicopter, they said. Banach's lawyer said his statements were given during several hours of questioning without an attorney present and that he was being harshly prosecuted because authorities were eager for an arrest. "My client is in some ways a sacrificial lamb," attorney Gina Mendola-Longarzo said. "A message is being sent." The jet, a chartered Cessna Citation, was landing Dec. 29 with six people aboard when a green light beam struck the windshield three times at about 3,000 feet, according to court documents. The pilot and co-pilot were temporarily blinded but were able to land the plane safely. Two days later, a Port Authority police helicopter trying to pinpoint the origin of the beam was hit by a laser. A copter crew member then shined a spotlight on the house where the beam had originated so that officers on the ground could go there. Soon afterward, FBI agents came to Banach's house, authorities said. Mendola-Longarzo said her client was simply using the hand-held device to look at stars with his daughter on the family's deck. She said Banach bought the device on the Internet for $100 for his job testing fiber-optic cable. "He wasn't trying to harm any person, any aircraft or anything like that," she said. Joseph Billy, agent in charge of the FBI's Newark bureau, said Banach's actions endangered not only the jet's crew and passengers but also "countless innocent civilians on the ground in this densely populated area." Banach, who was released on $100,000 bail, is charged only in connection with the jet. According to the FBI, the Patriot Act does not describe helicopters as "mass transportation vehicles." Similar incidents have been reported in Colorado Springs, Colo., Cleveland, Washington, Houston and Medford, Ore., raising fears that the light beams could temporarily blind cockpit crews and lead to accidents. Last month, the FBI and the Homeland Security Department sent a memo to law enforcement agencies saying there is evidence that terrorists have explored using lasers as weapons. But federal officials have said there is no evidence any the current incidents were part of a terrorist plot. Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. http://timesunion.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:06:35 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:06:35 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Man Made Message-ID: I had instantly ruled out man's hand in the Asian Quakes and Tsunamis...until I observed Eagleberger yesterday on NBC chortling about the propaganda benefits (to the United States) regarding the catastrophe....) FYI **For those that still don't believe the Asian quake was intentional. --Andy http://www.rense.com/political/weapons/earthqk.htm Human Engineered Earthquakes by Ray Bilger Let's now explore what has been, and what is being done in the area of geophysical manipulations. The primary focus here will be human-induced earthquakes, as this is a main area of Elite interest. This is, of course, because earthquakes are so profound and have the most dramatic effects for purposes of controlling populations. Most people may never comprehend the fact that human beings have the capability to produce such things, or that humans would ever do such things to each other. So, when an earthquake occurs, very few would ever even think of asking, "Was that natural or man-made?" Actually, now that we have progressed into a higher level of activity with respect to Earth Changes, it becomes increasingly more difficult to know which is which. In some places the ground seems to be shaking all the time! As you will recall, in Part V of this series, we mentioned Nicola Tesla's 'Controlled Earthquakes of 1935,' labelled by Tesla as "the art of telegeodynamics." Tesla was able to cause "rhythmical vibrations to pass through the Earth with almost no loss of energy," and he could "convey these mechanical effects to the greatest terrestrial distances and produce all kinds of unique effects." The author has little information on developments over the forty years following 1935, yet something must have been happening because, as mentioned in Part IX of this series, a Senate sub-committee hearing, chaired by Senator Claiborne Pell, stated that: "We need a treaty now...before the military leaders of the world start directing storms, manipulating climates and inducing earthquakes against their enemies." Senator Pell would not have spoken these words in 1975 about inducing earthquakes unless he had some knowledge that such technology existed. Also, reported in Part IX of this series, on December 10, 1976, the General Assembly of the United Nations approved the 'Convention of the Prohibition of Military or any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques,' and issued a report. Again, such a report would not have been issued if there were not technology in place capable of environmental modification, including the ability to induce earthquakes. The June 5, 1977, New York Times described the great earthquake which destroyed Tangshan, China on July 28, 1976, and killed over 650,000 people. Just before the first tremor at 3:42 am, the sky lit up like daylight. The multi-hued lights, mainly white and red, were seen up to 200 miles away. Leaves on many trees were burned to a crisp and growing vegetables were scorched on one side, as if by a fireball. Some investigators believe these electrical effects were associated with electromagnetic plasma and ball lightning and the strange array of flashes which result from Tesla-style technology and /or HAARP-like transmissions. Was this brilliant flash of colored light what Tesla was talking about in 1935 when he mentioned "all kinds of unique effects?"? Was this earthquake just a test of the system, conducted on the unsuspecting people of China? It certainly does not appear that it was a natural earthquake. In January of 1978, Dr. Andrija Puharich, MD, LL.D, issued a detailed research paper entitled 'Global Magnetic Warfare - A Layman's View of Certain Artificially Induced Unusual Effects on The Planet Earth During 1976 and 1977.' In his paper, Dr. Puharich stated, "Of the many great earthquakes of 1976, there is one that demands special attention - the July 28, 1976 Tangshan, China earthquake." The January 1978 edition of Specula magazine ran an article which described an incredibly profound phenomenon that could be produced within the Earth by what is called the 'Tesla Effect.' According to the article, electromagnetic signals of certain frequencies can be transmitted through the Earth to form standing waves in the Earth itself. In certain cases, coherence to this standing wave can be induced wherein a fraction of the vast, surging electromagnetic current of the Earth itself feeds into and augments the induced standing wave. In other words, "much more energy is now present in the standing wave that the ...amount being fed in from the Earth's surface." By interferometer techniques, giant standing waves can be combined to produce a focused beam of very great energy. This can the be used to produce earthquakes induced at distant aiming points. It might be good to go back and re-read the above paragraph a couple of times. This is one of the things which greatly concerned Mr. Tesla, because this is exactly the type of thing that could easily get out of control once it begins vibrating within the Earth and could actually cause the Earth to VIBRATE TO PIECES. Could the use of this technique have been responsible for the great earthquake in Tangshan, China in 1976? One source, Dr. Peter Beter, has stated that, by 1977, the Russians had placed fission-fusion-fission Superbombs in certain deep undersea trenches around the Phillipines. The source believes that the Phillipines are in the position of a 'keystone' within the giant Pacific Tectonic Plate. Russia had already been setting off lower yield undersea weapons in other areas around the Pacific Ocean causing strong earthquakes. Dr. Beter believes the intention was/is to relieve tensions all around the Pacific plate, except the Phillipines where stresses would build to tremendous levels. Then, at a certain point, the bombs around the Phillipines will be set off. It is expected that this will cause incredible earthquakes and tidal waves and ultimately devastate the American West Coast. Volcanoes erupting in the Phillipines are an indication that stresses are building in the area. (Readers need to understand that earthquakes and volcanoes are intimately connected and work hand in hand, with the one sometimes triggering the other, and sometimes the reverse. An earthquake can open vents deep in the Earth which allow lava to flow up. In other cases, the stresses driving volcanic activity can also cause earthquakes. The January 30, 1981 edition of the Washington Post reported that in 1979 there were 56 significant earthquakes in the world, and that by 1980 the annual figure was up to 71. Coincidentally, in 1980 there was an increase in ELF transmissions by both Russia and the United States. In 1981, Lt. Col. Thomas Bearden, a nuclear engineer and the leading Tesla researcher in the U.S., gave a very interesting lecture before the U.S. Psychotronics Association. In part of his talk he was speaking about the standing waves produced by Tesla Magnifying Transmitters that were also discussed in Specula magazine in 1978. He was, in essence, describing how HAARP works. Mr. Bearden stated in part, Then, what you do is change the frequency. If you change the frequency one way (by dephasing it), you dump the energy up in the atmosphere beyond the point on the other side of the Earth that you focused upon. As you start ionizing the air, you can change the weather flow patterns, the jet stream, etc.. If you dump it gradually, real gradually, you influence the heck out of the weather. It's a great weather machine. If you dump it sharply, you won?t get the little ionization like that. You will get flashes and fireballs (plasma) that will come down to the surface of the Earth. You can cause enormous weather changes over entire regions by playing that thing back and forth. Mr. Bearden almost makes it sound like some kind of weather machine toy that's fun to operate. But it also sounds like Tangshan, China, on July 28, 1976. "If ignorance is truly bliss, then why do so many Americans need Prozac?" http://www.newscientist.com/ * http://educate-yourself.org/ * http://www.joevialls.co.uk/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:07:37 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:07:37 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: arrest of Christians? Message-ID: Wednesday, January 5, 2005 TESTING THE FAITH U.S. attorneys complicit in arrest of Christians? Source says homosexual government lawyers advised Philadelphia police at 'OutFest' event Posted: January 5, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Ron Strom ? 2005 WorldNetDaily.com Homosexual attorneys from the U.S. Justice Department Civil Rights Division not only attended a large homosexual event in Philadelphia last year, but they advised police on the scene who arrested 11 Christian protesters, says a source within the agency. According to the Justice Department employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, a number of agency attorneys from Washington, D.C., attended the October "OutFest" event, and, he says, they therefore are not likely to take up the cause of the five criminally charged Christians who believe Philadelphia officials violated their civil rights. As WorldNetDaily reported, on Oct. 10, the group was "preaching God's Word" to a crowd of people attending the Philadelphia event and displaying banners with biblical messages. After a confrontation with a group called the Pink Angels, described by protesters as "a militant mob of homosexuals," the 11 Christians were arrested and spent a night in jail. Eight charges were filed: criminal conspiracy, possession of instruments of crime, reckless endangerment of another person, ethnic intimidation, riot, failure to disperse, disorderly conduct and obstructing highways. None of the Pink Angels was cited or arrested. After a preliminary hearing in December, Judge William Austin Meehan ordered four of the Christians to stand trial on three felony and five misdemeanor charges. If convicted, they could get a maximum of 47 years in prison. One female teenage protester faces charges in the juvenile justice system. "Some of the lawyers in [the Civil Rights Division] participated in the gay-rights march," the source told WND, referring to the OutFest event. "They participate in those kinds of marches." Because of that participation, the source thought there would be a "conflict" with the homosexual attorneys, saying they would not be too eager to help the Christians who protested at OutFest. The Justice source said he estimated between 10 and 11 percent of the attorneys in the Civil Rights Division are homosexual. He said he believes the protesters were charged with ethic intimidation "at the recommendation of some of our attorneys who were at the march." Continued the Justice employee: "They advised the police as witnesses, not as legal counsel, but as witnesses who may have observed what happened." Supporters of the defendants, known as "the Philadelphia 5," have encouraged concerned Americans to contact the Department of Justice to urge officials there to take action against the city of Philadelphia for allegedly violating the civil rights of the protesters. A notice on the Repent America website states, "Encourage the U.S. Department of Justice to get involved by contacting Chief Albert Moskowitz in the Criminal Section of the Civil Rights Division at 202-514-4540, and Chief Shanetta Brown-Cutlar in Special Litigation at 202-514-6255." A general e-mail address is listed on the department's website for contacting the agency. The Justice Department source said some attorneys there have tried to get more homosexual lawyers into the agency. "The attorneys who are gay here are trying to encourage more diversity," he said. "But there's no quote or anything." Brian Fahling, senior trial attorney for the American Family Association's Center for Law & Policy, is representing the Christian defendants. He was not surprised that Department of Justice attorneys may have attended OutFest. "Actually, that wouldn't surprise me because they're not all political appointments," he told WND. "There would be some who would be career civil servants from the Clinton administration." Fahling said it was "always a possibility" that the sexual orientation of Justice attorneys could bias them against the Philadelphia 5. Even so, the attorney believes if enough public pressure is put on the Department of Justice, officials there will take action against the city of Philadelphia. "With a sufficient amount of pressure, something will happen," he said. "We're going to continue to press in that direction." Fahling said it was "mind-numbing" that his clients potentially could be facing 47 years in jail. "It's clear that the facts don't matter . in Philadelphia," he said, "so there's going to have to be outside intervention" from the Justice Department. Fahling said that at the preliminary hearing in December, the Philadelphia city prosecutor in the case, Charles Ehrlich, attacked the defendants as "hateful" and referred to preaching the Bible as "fighting words," a characterization, the law group says, with which Judge Meehan agreed. Charges were dropped against six of the 11 Christians, apparently because they were not seen quoting Scripture on the videotape. The ethnic intimidation charge stems from Pennsylvania's "hate crimes" law - to which the newest "victim" category of "sexual orientation" was recently added. A video of the arrest, provided by the Center for Law & Policy can be seen here [Windows Media]. Related stories: Philadelphia accused of 'abuse of power' Prosecutor: Bible is 'fighting words' City will prosecute Christian protesters 'Philadelphia 11' fighting back 11 Christians arrested at homosexual event Ron Strom is a news editor for WorldNetDaily.com. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:08:29 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:08:29 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Eli Lilly knew Prozac had 1200% higher suicide rate than otherantidepressants Message-ID: http://www.newstarget.com/003086.html Wednesday, January 05, 2005 commentary: Eli Lilly knew Prozac had 1200% higher suicide rate than other antidepressants It's yet another example of the widespread negligent actions committed by Big Pharma in the quest for profits. It's not just Vioxx, Bextra or Celebrex. Now the truth is finally starting to come out on antidepressant drugs like Prozac. And what is the truth? That drug makers like Eli Lilly not only knew their star drugs were more dangerous than alternatives, but that they actively sought to suppress the release of that information in order to protect profits. What we are witnessing today is the beginning of the end of an era: the days of the Big Pharma con in which direct-to-consumer advertising pushed a drug industry to unprecedented levels of corporate greed. Of course, Eli Lilly denies everything. It's the same story talking to Merck. All these companies claim to be actually protecting the public health and working for the common good. Yet they continue to sell drugs with questionable safety records that are only now coming to light. And in none of these cases did these companies produce these documents on their own. In every case, they were "caught" by other people or organizations such as the British Medical Journal, which has gone public with these documents on Prozac. If all this sounds familiar, it is: Big Tobacco used the same stonewalling efforts in its ongoing denials that cigarettes were harmful to health (or even addictive, if you can believe that). Today, Big Pharma looks a whole lot like Big Tobacco: corporate greed, massive cover-ups, and hundreds of thousands of people dying each year from the use of their products. One more thing: there are still tens of thousands of brainwashed physicians willing to prescribe all these dangerous drugs to you. And if the brainwashing wasn't enough, the kickbacks certainly are. Recommended reading: "On the Take" by Jerome Kassirer, M.D. If you want to know the truth about how drug companies literally bribe doctors into peddling their drugs, read this book. It's authored by the former editor-in-chief of the British Medical Journal. Finally, I want to mention that I warned people about the suicide risk of Prozac back in 1998. Back then, the idea that antidepressant drugs could cause suicides was considered ludicrous. It was fringe information, almost conspiracy theory stuff. Today, we're learning it's 100% true. And if you don't believe me, just ask the parents of all the children killed at the Colombine high school massacre in Colorado: their killers were on antidepressant drugs. Getting the picture yet? Printable version of this article See more articles on: Prozac Eli Lilly suicide Receive Google news alerts on: Prozac Eli Lilly suicide Overview: a.. An internal document purportedly from Eli Lilly and Co. made public Monday appears to show that the drug maker had data more than 15 years ago showing that patients on its antidepressant Prozac were far more likely to attempt suicide and show hostility than were patients on other antidepressants and that the company attempted to minimize public awareness of the side effects. b.. The document was provided to CNN by the office of Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-New York, who has called for tightening FDA regulations on drug safety. c.. "The case demonstrates the need for Congress to mandate the complete disclosure of all clinical studies for FDA-approved drugs so that patients and their doctors, not the drug companies, decide whether the benefits of taking a certain medicine outweigh the risks," he said. d.. The 1988 document indicated that 3.7 percent of patients attempted suicide while on the blockbuster drug, a rate more than 12 times that cited for any of four other commonly used antidepressants. e.. The document, which cited clinical trials of 14,198 patients on fluoxetine -- the generic name for Prozac -- also stated that 2.3 percent of users suffered psychotic depression while on the drug, more than double the next-highest rate of patients using another antidepressant. f.. In the paper, titled "Activation and sedation in fluoxetine clinical trials," the authors said that the drug may produce nervousness, anxiety, agitation or insomnia in 19 percent of patients, and sedation in 13 percent of patients. g.. Its editors said the documents had been reported missing from a 10-year-old murder case, and that they had sent them to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for review. h.. A spokesman for Lilly said his company was expecting the release of the purported internal documents, but that he could not comment on them until he had seen them. Source: http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/01/03/prozac.documents/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Related Articles: The real reason why the U.S. health care system is a national disaster... Massive medical fraud exposed! Pharmaceutical companies bribe doctors to write prescriptions (and doctors take the money!)... Medical fraud! Details on how the FDA still allows HRT drugs to be prescribed, even after they've been proven to be dangerous! Must read report: if prescription drugs are so good, where are all the healthy drug takers? Corruption revealed! Much of modern medicine is actually based on lack of ethics, insider deals, public lies, scientific fraud and drug money... The top ten things you'd be able to do if you didn't live under a system of health oppression masquerading as modern medicine Drug companies turn potent medications into candy and hand them out with half-naked girls to create new product buzz... -------------------------------------------------------------------------- About the author: Author Mike Adams is a holistic nutritionist with over 4,000 hours of study on nutrition, wellness, food toxicology and the true causes of disease and health. He is well versed on nutritional and lifestyle therapies for weight loss and disease prevention / reversal. View Adams' health statistics showing LDL cholesterol of 67 and outstanding blood chemistry. Adams uses no prescription drugs whatsoever and relies exclusively on natural health, nutrition and exercise to achieve optimum health. Adams' books include the Seven Laws of Nutrition, The Five Soft Drink Monsters and Superfoods For Optimum Health. In his spare time, Adams engages in pilates, cycling, strength training, gymnastics and comedy improv training. In the technology industry, Adams is president and CEO of a well known email marketing software company. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A TIME ON THIS PLANET WHERE SO FEW WILL DO SO MUCH FOR SO MANY "The practice of discernment is part of higher consciousness. Discernment is not just a step up from judgement. In life's curriculum, it is the opposite of judgement. Through judgement a man reveals what he needs to confront and learn. Through discernment, one reveals what he has mastered." Quote from: Love Without End, by Glenda Green ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 12052004.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 18083 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: AdamsFront45TopHalfBW80.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 2236 bytes Desc: not available URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:19:14 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:19:14 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: IS US HELPING TO ESTABLISH COMMUNISM IN IRAQ? Message-ID: FYI The same people destroying America, The Banksters, are the same ones funding Communism and as far back as 1917 in Russia! -- Bill Molonlabe Email News List Molonlabe at charter.net The Bald Eagle, The Bird of Freedom Glides , gazing, calm and sure! IS US HELPING TO ESTABLISH COMMUNISM IN IRAQ? http://www.newswithviews.com/NWVexclusive/exclusive69.htm>http://www.news withviews.com/NWVexclusive/exclusive69.htm January 3, 2005 The Associated Press carried a story December 18, 2004 regarding the escalating violence in Mosul and the coming elections in Iraq. Buried in the article was the following comment: "Although the election campaign officially kicked off Wednesday, so far only the Iraqi Communist Party - which is part of the U.S.-installed interim government - was known to have had a public gathering." Several individuals contacted NWVs about this and expressed their outrage that our soldiers are being sent to die in a foreign country to establish communism. Hank Goller is a Viet Nam veteran who commented, "It's not bad enough that Bush invaded a foreign country without a formal declaration of war built on a mountain of lies, but now we find out our fighting brothers are dying to install communism? This whole (expletive) government is rotten beyond redemption." (search) Cliff (last name withheld by request) served in the first Gulf War under Bush, Sr. and was "appalled" not only because "America got sucked into this war based on a bunch of lies," but knowing his fellow soldiers were over there away from their families and getting shot and killed to set up communism "frosts my windows right up." He added, "It's not the responsibility of the United States to set up any government in a foreign country nor are their elections any of our business. This whole thing has gotten totally out of hand." Historically, 'nation building' has never been successful and the general consensus is that no matter how much money or bodies President Bush ships to Afghanistan and Iraq, failure will be the end result. "Nation-building is thus grossly unsuitable as a tool to combat terrorism, or the religious fundamentalism that drives it. An America that takes on the task of rebuilding the many failed or failing nations around the world will drive itself into bankruptcy and will find itself struggling against the same insecurity and combating the same forces that it encountered on 9/11," said Subodh Atal. Atal is the author of a recent Cato Institute Foreign Policy Briefing, "At a Crossroads in Afghanistan: Should the United States be Nation-Building?" He also went on to say on November 23, 2003, "Rumsfeld's candid comments suggest that some in the administration have doubts about whether the terrorist threat can be neutralized by billions of dollars in foreign aid. President Bush should be equally candid with the American people. He should explain that we won't be able to bribe away international terrorism, and he should refuse to authorize any more resources for counter-productive nation-building." In a July 11, 2004 commentary, Morton Abramowitz and Heather Hurlburt pointed out in a Washington Post article, July 11, 2004, the following: "No fewer than nine times over the past decade, Western powers have deployed noble rhetoric, soldiers and taxpayer dollars in the service of nation-building. And no fewer than nine times, they have, to one degree or another, failed to build stable, self-sustaining nations." There is no authorization in Art. 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution for foreign aid or money from the people's treasury to be used for building new schools, roads, towns, airports and other facilities in any foreign country. The cost of the war in Iraq is currently running $5.4 billion dollars a day. There is no money in the U.S. Treasury so the money being spent will have to be borrowed from the privately owned Federal Reserve and added to the growing national debt. Jeri Lynn Ball, author of Masters of Seduction and Time Bomb, sets forth the following in her opinion as the reason behind these endless conflicts and the "war on terrorism": "The definition of the term: "War of National Liberation": To achieve its goals of constant expansion and ultimate world domination, the Soviet Union has worked to "incite" and arm 'liberation wars,' guerrilla movements, [and] subversion" in the West. Again, the CFR-dominated Clinton/Bush Administrations and the Communist Chinese have cooperated in this massive effort to attack and destroy the Western way of life. Ray S. Cline and Yonah Alexander write, "A succession of major victories in regional 'liberation' conflicts would in time change the balance of power irreversibly, presaging Communist triumph in the end." "Warmongering Communist criminals, who have waged a war of aggression against the West and who aim to achieve world domination, pose as the law-abiding, peace-loving liberators of mankind. Martin Ebon says that Vladimir Bukovski left the USSR in 1976 to live in England. Bukovski quoted Lenin as saying: "As an ultimate objective, peace simply means Communist world control..." Bukovski explained further: "We must at the same time bear in mind that wars are the 'inevitable consequence of the clash of imperialist interests under capitalism,' and therefore they will continue to be inevitable as long as capitalism exists. The only way to save humanity from the evil of wars, then, is to 'liberate' it from the 'chains of capitalism.'" In the Communist view, the world can only be liberated from "evil of wars" through "just wars." Lyons observes that the Communists "always specifiy support for 'just' wars, so-called wars of liberation - in fact, those "conflicts" instigated or sanctioned by Communists. Khrushechev stated: "The communists fully support just wars." "On April 5, 2003, President Bush spoke about the war in Iraq and the advance of American and coalition forces. Just as the infamous Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev reaffirmed Communist support for "just" wars, so President Bush said, "By our actions...we serve a...just cause." Carrying forward Lenin's and Stalin's program for Communist global control, the Bush Administration and its Russian and Chinese Communist allies seek to "liberate" humanity from the "chains of capitalism." Like Stalin, they aim to conduct their war on various "fronts" and, now, upon entering the "second phase" of this war, they plan to arm and incite "liberation wars" for humanity in other countries. "On March 10, 1939, Stalin said, "...we shall be in a position to move from the first phase of Communism to the second phase. To do this, there must be an indomitable desire to go forward and a readiness to make sacrifices." Following Lenin's lead, Stalin armed and incited "wars of national liberation." On April 30, 2002, President Bush said, "...America has...accepted a great challenge in the world: to wage a relentless and systematic campaign against global terror...We are in for a long and difficult war. It will be conducted on many fronts. In the first phase of our military operation, American and coalition forces - have liberated - the people of Afghanistan from a barbaric regime...We have entered the next phase of the war." On April 3, 2003, Mr. Bush echoed Stalin's call for "a readiness to make sacrifices" when he said, "These are sacrifices in a high calling..." The fact that the U.S. government is financing the establishment of communism in Iraq is sure to cause even more controversy in the future. *COPYRIGHT NOTICE** In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.[Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:20:37 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:20:37 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Human Hand Behind Message-ID: http://stevequayle.com/News.alert/04_Cosmic/041230.human.hand.EQ.html Human Hand Behind Earthquake and Tsunami? It is Time for Indian Navy to Investigate! December 29, 2004 Balaji Reddy, Special Correspondent India Daily Was this an earthquake creation experiment that ran out of control? Many countries are working on methods of creating massive earthquakes as means to defeat the enemy. The technologically advanced countries are working on this project. If an earthquake and Tsunami can be created artificially and directed to a specific enemy, it can literally create havoc to the enemy. Weather control, controlling tectonic plate movements, electromagnetic wave simulated weaponry are all on the table of many countries. The planetary alignment can cause many earthquakes all around the world of magnitude the modern mankind has never seen before. Many all around the world are puzzled with the fact that Tsunamis never happen in South Asia. Also is perplexing is the fact that Tsunamis traveled 1000 miles at a speed of 500 miles an hour and smashed the coastal lines of South and South east Asia where Tsunamis do not happen. There are technologies on the research table that is used to create electromagnetic effects to release the gravitational effects which can cause this kind massive earth movements. Another astonishing feature of this earthquake and Tsunami is the amount by which the Kar Nicobar Islands have displaced. The level of devastation simulates 10 or higher Richter scale earthquake. Was this a show down by a country to show the region what havoc can be created? We do not have the answers to this. We know many courtiers including India are working on anti-gravity lifters and devices. No matter what, it can be an experiment that went out of control. If it is not, that is the best news. But given the level of devastation and given the fact India is a regional power in South Asia, Indian Navy has the obligation to investigate and tell the world what they found. http://216.132.172.240/indiadaily/editorial/12-29a-04.asp -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:20:10 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:20:10 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Secret Meeting, Clear Mission: 'Rescue' U.N. Message-ID: January 3, 2005 Secret Meeting, Clear Mission: 'Rescue' U.N. By WARREN HOGE http://tinyurl.com/4wpe6 UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 2 - The meeting of veteran foreign policy experts in a Manhattan apartment one recent Sunday was held in strict secrecy. The guest of honor arrived without his usual retinue of aides. The mission, in the words of one participant, was clear: "to save Kofi and rescue the U.N." At the gathering, Secretary General Kofi Annan listened quietly to three and a half hours of bluntly worded counsel Mr. Annan many workers said privately that his office protected high-level officials accused of misconduct. The United Nations faced charges of corruption in the oil-for-food program in Iraq, evidence that blue-helmeted peacekeepers in Congo had run prostitution rings and raped women and teenage girls... The meeting was held in the apartment of Richard C. Holbrooke, a United States ambassador to the United Nations under President Clinton. "The intention was to keep it confidential," Mr. Holbrooke said. believe that the U.N. cannot succeed if it is in open dispute and constant friction with its founding nation, its host nation and its largest contributor nation." "The U.N., without the U.S. behind it, is a failed institution," he said. "He sat in silence and made no effort to defend himself," the participant said. "Everyone I talked to, including the White House, said that if Kofi was going to go, it was going to be by the hand of the Volcker report, not by the hand of the Bush administration," the official said. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company http://tinyurl.com/4wpe6 or http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/03/international/03nations.html?th=&oref=login&pagewanted=print&position= -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:22:38 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:22:38 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: What We Now Know Message-ID: From: What We Now Know > What We Now Know Week of 1/3/05 IN THIS ISSUE Imagining the Unimaginable Cell Phones to Flowers Mr. X: Back in Iraq Puritan Past, Puritan Future: Reader Feedback ********************************************** IMAGINING THE UNIMAGINABLE In what might have been exceptional foresight, Japanese priests named 2004 "the year of disaster." Indeed, it was heralded on December 26, 2003 when a large earthquake in Iran destroyed the city of Bam, killing 30,000 and leaving around 70,000 homeless; to the day one year before the cataclysmic undersea earthquake in Sumatra. Let's take a look at 2004. More than 52 tornadoes struck Illinois and other Midwest states, devastating Utica, IL and killing 8 people in the basement of the Millstone Tavern. The NASA Ames Research Center found that bug populations that have multiplied unchecked due to extremely mild winters have devoured huge swathes of forest in western Canada and Alaska since 1995. The damage had gone unnoticed because the region is largely uninhabited and not harvested for timber. An exceptionally strong monsoon flooding in India, Nepal, and Bangladesh left 15 million homeless. Six hurricanes struck the U.S., drove Floridians out of their homes and left 350,000 people without power for days. Charley was deemed the second costliest hurricane on record. Jeanne delivered a hard blow to already poverty-stricken Haiti, and the Philippines saw the worst storm season in 13 years. Unprecedented numbers of locusts ravaged Africa and made it as far north as Portugal and the Canary Islands. According to the UN Food and Agric ulture Organization, one ton of locusts can eat as much as 10 elephants or 2,500 people in one day. The San Andreas Fault ruptured near Parkfield, CA, producing an earthquake of 6.0 on the Richter scale. Mt. St. Helens was spewing huge clouds of steam. A record ten typhoons hit Japan, killing more than 100 people and causing estimated $6.7 billion damage. Typhoon Tokage, the deadliest to hit Japan in over two decades, produced a wave eight stories high and was followed three days later by the deadliest earthquake in one decade, which destroyed more than 6,000 buildings and caused more than 1,000 landslides. And, to top it off, On December 26, a 9.0 earthquake shook Sumatra, causing a tsunami that devastated the shore lines of 12 countries in the Indian Ocean and, at last count, had killed over 140,000 people from 37 different nations (and counting). Are there more such cataclysmic events waiting to happen? Unfortunately, yes. Consider, for instance, a warning that was issued by a group of researchers at University College London in 1999. There is a strong possibility, the scientists warned, that the Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma, one of the Canary islands off the North African coast, could erupt with such force that it would virtually split the island in two. That would cause a tsunami in the Atlantic Ocean of such force that tidal waves up to 160 feet high would strike the North American East Coast, destroying large parts of Boston, New York, and Miami. "Following an eruption in 1949, scientists found a fracture running through the western side of the volcano," states an article in last week's Republican. "The land mass-a half trillion tons of rock-appeared to have slipped 13 feet toward the sea during the eruption, but friction apparently stopped the slide." A new eruption, warns the team from University College London, could cause the entire land mass to slide into the sea, creating the feared mega-tsunami. J. Michael Rhodes, a volcanologist at University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is skeptical. He says there is no way to predict if and when such a landslide will occur-and what effect it would have. "[It] really depends on how big the landslide is and how rapidly it moves. It also depends on whether the land slides all at once or whether it goes in pieces. And there is no way of knowing that," he told the Republican. Then there is America's pending super-volcano in Yellowstone National Park. In 2004, it showed an alarming rise in sulfuric gases and water temperature, killing fish and wildlife and causing park rangers to close some sites to tourism. When (note, we didn't say "if") a mega-eruption happens, say scientists such as Bill McGuire, professor of geohazards at the Benfield Greig Hazard Research Centre at University College London, "the explosion would be the loudest noise heard by man for 75,000 years." Falling ash, lava flows and the sheer blow of the eruption would eradicate all life within a radius of a thousand kilometers, according to McGuire. Or in the New Madrid zone, for example. This earthquake-prone fault runs through parts of Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee and Arkansas. The three earthquakes-each an estimated 8.0 or higher on the Richter scale-that occurred in 1811 and 1812 near New Madrid, MO are among the Great Earthquakes of known history and affected the topography more than any other earthquake in North America. Large pieces of land sank into the earth, new lakes were formed, the course of the Mississippi river was changed. so strong were the quakes that they reportedly rung church bells in New England. Casualties were few, however, since at that time, the Mississippi river valley was sparsely settled. A similar earthquake today would cost hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of lives. Then there is the fault associated with the meeting of the African and European tectonic plates that run through the British island of Gibraltar. Some earth scientists forecast that this is the one most likely to go, triggering a massive tsunami that would devastate the coast of Portugal-as it did in 1755 when an estimated 100,000 people were killed by the disaster. A recent NY Times editorial titled "The Year the Earth Fought Back" compares 2004 to 1906, a year of major earthquakes-including the "Great San Francisco Earthquakes"-volcano eruptions and other natural disasters around the world. "Given these cascades of disasters past and present," wonders author Simon Winchester, ".might there be some kind of butterfly effect, latent and deadly, lying out in the seismic world?" He speculates that "the movement among the world's tectonic plates may be one part of [an] enormous dynamic system, with effects of one plate's shifting more likely than not to spread far, far away, quite possibly clear across the surface of the globe." What to do? First and probably most important, don't take Mother Nature for granted. No amount of modernity can tame the earth. If you live in an area that has been devastated in the past, or that is at risk, take what steps you can to be prepared-including keeping a stash of long-lived food and try to secure a source of clean water (or, the water purification materials need to create same). Then go about your business. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:25:19 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:25:19 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Single government ID moves closer to reality Message-ID: Single government ID moves closer to reality Christopher Lee Washington Post Dec. 30, 2004 03:25 PM WASHINGTON - Federal officials are developing government-wide identification card standards for federal employees and contractors to prevent terrorists, criminals and other unauthorized people from getting into government buildings and computer systems. The effort, known as the Personal Identity Verification Project, stems from a homeland security-related presidential directive and is being managed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a Commerce Department agency. In his Aug. 27 directive, President Bush said that "wide variations in the quality and security of forms of identification used to gain access to secure federal and other facilities where there is potential for terrorist attacks need to be eliminated." Bush called for the development of "secure and reliable forms of identification" for federal workers and contract employees. To that end, federal officials want to replace the existing piecemeal system of agency-level ID cards with "smart cards" that are hard to counterfeit, resistant to tampering and difficult to use by anyone other than the rightful card-holder if lost or stolen. The new generation of ID cards must be able to digitally store biometric data such as facial photographs and fingerprint images, bear contact and contactless interfaces, and allow the encryption of data that can be used to electronically verify the user's identity, according to NIST draft standards. Such cards will be required for all federal employees, including members of the military, as well as for employees of private organizations and state and local governments who regularly require access to federally controlled facilities and computer systems. That 's a universe of more than 2 million people, said Curt Barker, the project manager at NIST. Barker said the new standards will include tougher background check requirements before many recipients can get their agency ID card. Access to particularly sensitive offices or systems still will require higher clearance, he said. "There's wide variations in the quality and security of the forms of identification that people use to get access to federal facilities," he said. "... To be completely foolproof will be extraordinarily difficult, but we can raise the risk for the terrorist or other person who wants to fraudulently enter a facility and make it a little bit more difficult for them to get in." The common standard also will enable many employees who shuttle between departments to enter different buildings with one card. NIST, which has spent about $1 million on the project so far, expects to complete the new standards by late February. Employees could start using the new cards as early as fall 2005, Barker said. Several departments, notably defense, transportation and interior, began developing more secure, high-tech ID cards long before Bush issued the directive, he said. The trend ultimately could affect private sector workers, as well. Experts say the federal government's adoption of tighter ID card standards could spur more private businesses to follow suit. Some federal employees have concerns about the new cards. Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents more than 150,000 federal workers in 30 agencies, said the proposed standard would permit agencies to print employees' pay grade and rank on the new cards, which many workers would consider an invasion of privacy. "For example, an agency might seize upon this technology as a means to track employees as they move throughout a building," Kelley said in written comments to NIST last week. "That is troubling, standing alone. It would be particularly objectionable if the agency tried to track visits to particular sites such as the union office, Employee Assistance Program offices and the inspector general's office." NIST has gathered comments on the draft standard from more than 500 entities and individuals but has not made them public. The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule. - H.L. Mencken - The Philosophy of Liberty: http://www.isil.org/resources/introduction.swf The Western Libertarian Alliance next newspaper edition due out January 2005 Previous edition online at: www.westernlibertarian.org The "L" Factor Reformatted and upgraded pages due January 2005 for the 2005 and 2006 local and state elections www.theLfactor.org The Year's Number One Freedom Event Manchester NH - June 24 - 26, 2005 Phoenix AZ - October 14 - 16, 2005 www.freedomsummit.com Declare Your Independence with Ernest Hancock FULL ARCHIVE AT http://www.ernesthancock.com/archive & Producer - 1010 KXXT Mob 602-717-5900 / Bus. 602-254-5001 ernesthancock at 1010kxxt.com Charles Goyette Show www.charlesgoyette.com Paragon Realty's Donna Hancock Free and Full access to the MLS (Multiple Listing Service) at www.donnahancock.com The Saturday Morning Arizona Breakfast Club In their 36th season Coco's Restaurant - Saturdays 8am - 10am 4514 E Cactus Rd. (W of Tatum) Doors open at 7:30am RSVP 602-717-5900 - Details at: www.azbreakfastclub.org -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:21:33 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:21:33 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: Yanukovich Election Organizer Dead - 'Suicide' Message-ID: Pure Bolshevism... http://www.rense.com/general61/kap.htm Yanukovich Election Organizer Dead - 'Suicide' Pravda.ru 1-4-5 Georgy Kirpa, the Ukrainian Transport Minister, was found dead in his country-house on the outskirts of Kiev on December 27th. The reason of the minister's death is not known, although the police believe that Kirpa was one of the most important figures in Viktor Yanukovich's election campaign. He supposedly knew, where the money was coming from. Officials of the Ukrainian Transport Ministry knew about the money, which was assigned for the construction of a large bridge in Kiev. The money was transferred, but the construction did not start - the funds were supposedly spent on Viktor Yanukovich's election campaign, the Vremya Novostei newspaper wrote. It was Georgy Kirpa, who organized a trip of Donetsk miners to Kiev - the trip was timed to the second election round. Train conductor Oksana said that the train car was filled with boxes of vodka for miners: "Someone intentionally wanted to make them drink," said she. The workers said in their turn that each of them had been paid 200 hryvnas (a little less than $40) for their trip to Kiev. Ivan Sali, a high-ranking official from the Transport Ministry said that Georgy Kirpa's death could be connected with the embezzlement of state funds, which Kirpa was in charge of. Deputy Yuri Lutsenko stated yesterday that Georgy Kirpa wired $130 million of advance payment for the construction of the bridge across the Dnepr River. It was also said that Kirpa and Prime Minister Yanukovich, fraudulently organized a private railway company. According to the official version, Georgy Kirpa committed suicide. Police officers found a gun near the minister's body in his country house. It is also known that the minister's wife left the house several hours before the crime, and the official talked to an unknown person on the telephone. Investigators do not exclude that Georgy Kirpa has been assassinated. It is worth mentioning that a priest visited the minister's country-house for the burial service, although the Orthodox religion bans such services for suicides. Nikolai Tomenko, a deputy of the Ukrainian parliament said that such incidents may repeat in the future "when those aware of the government's illegal activities, the presidential election fraud in particular, suddenly disappear." Tomenko is certain that the minister has been murdered: "I think that Kirpa as a witness could have told the authorities a lot," the deputy said. http://english.pravda.ru/accidents/21/96/383/14777_kirpa.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From deano700 at msn.com Sun Jan 9 18:25:58 2005 From: deano700 at msn.com (Dean HICKAM) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 18:25:58 -0800 Subject: [Shadow_Group] Fw: How Afghan heroin leaves a trail of ruined lives on its longjourney to the west Message-ID: Source: The Guardian - UK http://www.guardian.co.uk/ How Afghan heroin leaves a trail of ruined lives on its long journey to the west http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1382292,00.html Declan Walsh in Quetta Monday January 3, 2005 The muezzin's call to prayer rings out across Quetta, the mountain-ringed capital of Balochistan province in Pakistan's south-west. Rickshaws course through the narrow streets, weaving around bearded men and shawl-covered women. But hidden beneath the bustle lies a wretched second city. Step over a wall, slide down an embankment and tread carefully along a slime-covered path and you are in Habib Nalah - a shadow world of heroin addiction fuelled by the opium boom across the nearby Afghan border. More than 500 men, from teenagers to grandfathers, are gathered at the edge of a giant drain that snakes through central Quetta. The scene has a nightmarish quality. Black sewage water oozes down the middle and dried excrement litters the path that runs alongside. A suffocating stench clogs the air. Clusters of addicts hunker by the stream, under a line of gloomy pillars supporting the shops overhead. They are "chasing the dragon": delicately burning brown heroin powder on foil paper, sucking the pungent fumes with a pipe, then slouching backwards, eyes rolling. In one corner a moaning man is crouched in a ball, head gripped in his hands. Whether immersed in a personal heaven or hell, it is hard to tell. Another begs money for treatment. "Just one last chance," pleads Muhammad Daud, 22. "Otherwise, just shoot me now." Record crop Most of this year's bumper opium crop from Afghanistan - worth a record $2.8bn (?1.45bn) - will find its way to lucrative European markets. Peddled on back streets from Manchester to Moscow, it will cause more than 10,000 deaths, according to a recent report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Advertiser links Winsor Pilates - Official Site Reach physical and mental health while sculpting your body... winsorpilates.com Core Secrets by Brooke and Gunnar Learn the moves that help Brooke Burke get results and keep... coresecrets.com Train at Home for Fitness Career Earn your diploma in our nationally accredited fitness... pcdi.edu But as the drugs pass along age-old smuggling routes, some spill over into local markets, with devastating consequences. Pakistan has about 500,000 chronic heroin addicts; Iran has 1 million, according to the UN. The problem was born of the 1980s opium boom. Now it appears unstoppable. Junkies from across Pakistan flock to Quetta, 60 miles south of the lawless border. Here heroin costs just 70 rupees (60p) for a sachet, and the supply is abundant. Muhammad Jawaid arrived from Multan, 500 miles to the south, seven months ago. Once a painter, he now collects rubbish to feed his habit. "At home it costs 200 rupees for a sachet," he says. "Still, I want to go back. But I can't." Habib Nalah's heroin dens have an air of permanency. Sheets strung between the pillars divide the drain into compartments. Ragged posters of Indian film stars are pinned to the greasy walls. Vendors sell sweet tea, matches and tranquilisers. A whiff of hashish drifts through the air. The addicts wash under a leaking water pipe. The "saqis" hover nearby. These are the dealers who divide up the heroin smuggled from Afghan refugee camps. They also mediate disputes, bribe police and maintain social order. When an addict dies a saqi pays four men one sachet each to haul the body up to the street. Up to 800 addicts live here during the summer season, says Aftab Ali, a courageous social worker known by all the addicts. There are no age limits. One compartment has grandfathers with whiskery beards and kindly smiles. The next has a teenage boy. Nassir, a grubby-fingered 15-year-old, says his mother carried him here nine years ago. Now she is dead, Nassir has become an addict, and Habib Nalah is home. "My brother has given up, but not me," he shrugs. "Can you give me some change?" The flood of Afghan opium has swamped Pakistani security forces. Breaking the supply pipeline is near impossible, says Brig Anwar ul Haq, head of the Anti-Narcotics Force for Balochistan province. Smugglers flit across the long, leaky desert border using ancient wiles and modern technology. Donkeys, camels and heavily armed convoys carry the drugs. The criminals outfox border surveillance with satellite phones and, if necessary, shoot their way out of trouble with rifles and rockets. "They are highly mobile and technically advanced," he says. In 2004 the Balochistan force confiscated seven tonnes of morphine and 157kg (346lb) of heroin. In contrast, Afghanistan's opium harvest was estimated at 4,200 tonnes, and the traffickers earned $2.2bn. One problem is the lack of cooperation between security forces. "Until intelligence is shared across the border we are always in a reactive mode," says Brig Anwar. Bribery is another weakness, admits Shoukat Haider Changezi, chief of the Levies, a tribal-based rural police force. "An officer earns 3,500 rupees. Then his cousin, who is from the same tribe, offers him 10 times as much to turn a blind eye. It's a fortune," he says. The best heroin - known as "rose quality" - is re-exported from smuggling ports on the Arabian sea, or spirited across the border into Iran. The lower-grade drug is sold locally. HIV infection Soaring HIV rates linked to increasing needle use is the latest worry for authorities in Karachi, Lahore and smaller cities. In Habib Nalah most addicts still "chase the dragon", but say they want to stop. The lucky ones make it to the Milo Shaheed Trust, one of five rehab centres in Quetta. The "cold turkey" treatment is tough - three months of forced withdrawal with only multi-vitamins as a substitute - and the relapse rate is 75%. Abdul Rehman is in rehab for the 15th time. A junkie since 1978, he checked in 70 days ago. "This is my last chance," he says. Muhammad Zia, 26, came from Ghazni in central Afghanistan. "A friend introduced me to heroin five years ago. He said it's like entering paradise. But believe me, I have gone through hell," he says. Mr Zia came to Quetta after his father expelled him from home. He knew dozens of other addicts, he says. "There are many people with the same problem, even women, in Ghazni. They just stay in their houses and smoke, smoke, smoke." For some, though, there is no last chance. The following day Mr Ali, the social worker, carries the body of Mohsin Ali to a local mosque to be washed before burial. The 28-year-old Afghan refugee died earlier in the morning, four days after entering the Milo Shaheed centre. "He had been eating and smoking opium for years. Yesterday he became very sick with swollen lungs," says Mr Aftab, carefully pulling the blue gown off the corpse. "We called the doctor to come and help. But it was too late." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From italysbadboy at yahoo.com Sun Jan 9 21:14:56 2005 From: italysbadboy at yahoo.com (ItalysBadBoy) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 21:14:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] National Endowment for Death Squads? The AFL-CIO and the NED Message-ID: <20050110051456.20941.qmail@web13604.mail.yahoo.com> National Endowment for Death Squads? The AFL-CIO and the NED Published: Thursday, December 30, 2004Bylined to: http://VHeadline.com Reporters National Endowment for Death Squads? The AFL-CIO and the NED US journalist Jon Quaccia writes: Few tax payers familiar with the National Endowment for Democracy, a publicly funded yet privately owned organization operating in at least forty countries. NED's mission? To help the United States set up capitalist economies around the world, backed by regimes that are friendly to US big business. With no interference from the public or congress, the NED is free to accomplish its goals by manipulating and buying elections, starting political as well as economic turmoil, funding counter-insurgency material to right-wing groups, and using other tactics that would be considered illegal in the United States. Equally disturbing, yet more surprising, is the role that leaders of the U.S. labor federation, the AFL-CIO, play in carrying out the NED's dirty work. The AFL-CIO's Solidarity Center is at work in twenty-eight countries, discouraging radical organizing among workers and promoting privatization by assisting unions and labor groups that support private enterprise. A glimpse into this NED constituent's predecessor organization shows a history of collusion with Central Intelligence Agency terrorism since the early sixties. The AFL-CIO Solidarity Center's predecessor, the American Institute for Free Labor Development (AIFLD), was one of the four government-funded labor institutes created during the cold war to prevent foreign countries from establishing independent economic systems. AIFLD was instrumental in the overthrow of democratically elected leftist governments in Guyana in 1963, Brazil in 1964, the Dominican Republic in 1965, and Chile in 1973. By the late 1970s, the CIA was exposed for its sabotage of governments and labor movements around the world. Corrupt dictatorships in Central America, backed by local death squads armed and trained by the CIA, massacred hundreds of thousands of peasants during popular insurgencies in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala. With these scandals fresh in the public's mind, the Reagan Administration created the National Endowment for Democracy in 1983 to take care of its unfinished business. As an NED founder, Allen Weinstein, stated in 1991, "A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA." Some of the NED's political accomplishments include the successful manipulation of elections in Nicaragua in 1990 and Mongolia in 1996, and the overthrow of democratically elected candidates in Bulgaria in 1990 and Albania in 1991-2. By indirectly contributing "soft money" to the campaigns of candidates friendly to U.S. business, the NED is able to successfully buy elections in poor countries with only a few hundred thousand dollars. With a 2004 budget of $40 million, and a 2005 budget of $80 million requested by President Bush, the NED will be capable of buying quite a few elections in the coming years. >From 1983 to 1994, the NED was funded exclusively by congress, at which point it began accepting private donations. These sources include several oil companies and defense contractors-Chevron, Exxon Mobil, Texaco and Enron among its 2001 contributors. Its funding is a very controversial subject, and its opponents frequently cite the inherent contradiction of a publicly funded organization charged with executing foreign policy, while remaining exempt from nearly all political and administrative controls. Octopus Arms: The NED works through multiple constituencies: The International Republican Institute, The National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, the Center for International Private Enterprise, the Free Trade Union Institute, and American Center for International Labor Solidarity (ACILS), better known as the Solidarity Center. Among its strongest U.S. supporters is the Heritage Foundation, a right wing think tank which has been very influential in policy issues. Each constituent is given almost five million dollars, which they issue as grants to organizations or political parties all over the world. The remainder of the NED's budget is also given out as grants. In her study of the NED, Barbara Conry, associate policy analyst for the free-market advocacy CATO Institute, states: "NED, which has a history of corruption and financial mismanagement, is superfluous as best and often destructive. Through the Endowment, the American taxpayer has paid for special-interest groups to harass the duly elected governments of friendly countries, interfere in foreign elections, and foster the corruption of democratic movements..." The National Endowment for Democracy and its constituents call their actions "supporting democracy," but the governments and movements they target know them as "destabilization." One Empire, one development model: US business could not destabilize or overthrow as many foreign governments as it does without the cover and aid of conservative, "old-guard" unions and labor groups who disorient, counter, and generally undermine radical unions and militant labor leaders. Union leaders, in turn, couldn't enjoy six figure salaries without an approval of capitalism, without seeing labor and business along with government as "partners" in political and economic development. On September 11, 1973, Chilean President Salvador Allende, along with thousands of Chilean workers, students and political activists were killed in a particularly bloody military coup that ended a brief experiment in democratic socialism. It was the culmination of a campaign by the Nixon Administration, working covertly with ITT, Kennecott Cooper, and other US multinational corporations to destroy the Chilean economy and punish Allende for nationalizing industries in which US corporations held major stakes. The goal, in Nixon's unforgettable words, was to "make the economy scream." While no direct link exists between the AIFLD and the CIA's actions in Chile, the AIFLD's program was synchronized closely with the CIA's plan to create social unrest by sowing divisions within the labor movement and financing middle-class and professional organizations leading the opposition to Allende's populist program. Unable to divide and weaken Chile's largest labor federation, the one-million-member, communist led, Central Unica de Trabajadores (CUT), the AIFLD channeled millions of dollars into right-wing unions and political parties that opposed CUT and Allende's socialist agenda as a whole. In the fall of 1973, widespread social unrest and a paralyzed economy provided the pretext for General Pinochet's violent coup, and justification for his seventeen-year dictatorship. Pinochet saw all unions, not just leftist, as the enemy, and one of his first acts after seizing power was to outlaw CUT. In the months that followed September 11th, hundreds of trade unionists, including some who had worked with AIFLD, were rounded up, many never to be heard from again. >From 1971 until the mid-eighties, the AFL-CIO, despite its pledge never to support government controlled unions, financed and supported the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU), with full knowledge of the government's penetration. A government puppet, the FKTU's activities were restricted by law, leaving it no real power. In the late seventies, U.S. religious and human rights organizations began calling attention to the appalling treatment of South Korean workers. They were particularly concerned with the brutality directed at young women laborers in the textile and garment industry, and the lack of response by the FKTU. Rather than denouncing the repression in South Korea, or severing its ties with the FKTU, the AFL-CIO tried to whitewash the violence, blaming it on "differing ethnic standards of Koreans," amongst other things. When Korean industrial workers finally organized the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions as an alternative to the FKTU, it wasn't officially recognized by the AFL-CIO until 1997. Just recently, pilots represented by KCTU protested its government's decision to deploy 3,000 troops to Iraq by refusing to transport any troops or equipment there, and engaged in street demonstrations against the war. ACILS: Reforming Or Restructuring? In 1995, John Sweeney was elected AFL-CIO president with the support of a broad coalition of union leaders who broke with the former president, Lane Kirkland, over foreign policy. In particular, they disagreed with the AIFLD's support for US policy in Central America and hoped to get rid of what they believed was a cold war relic, a pro-corporate anti-communist extension of the McCarthyism still dominating US foreign policy. Two years after taking office, Sweeney reorganized the four labor foreign policy institutes into a single organization, the American Center for International Labor Solidarity (ACILS), better known as the Solidarity Center. Although the Solidarity Center has retained a few staff members from its predecessor labor institutes, it claims to represent a fresh start at building a stronger labor movement abroad by focusing on solidarity rather than intervention. Some of the Solidarity Center's goals in the past six years include facilitating an organizing campaign in Honduras that led to a viable maquila union in the free trade zone, helping set the stage for a labor law reform campaign in Ecuador by working with Bonita banana workers, and playing a crucial role in convincing a GAP supplier to finance the reopening of a plant shut down due to union activity. While many union leaders are hopeful about the reforms in U.S. labor's foreign policy, as well as its accomplishments to date, a great deal of skepticism remains. Much of this skepticism revolves around the Solidarity Center's funding; three quarters of its $18 million budget still comes from government sources. It receives annual grants from the State Department, the Agency for International Development, the Labor Department, and the NED. Requests for a complete list of donors, including private foundations, and the amount of their contributions have been repeatedly denied by the AFL-CIO. While Congress no longer dictates the Center's policies, a lack of independent funding makes a truly autonomous global labor movement impossible. Meddling in Venezuela: Critics also point to the Solidarity Center's recent operations in Venezuela, which they feel are dangerously reminiscent of the AIFLD's actions in Chile. In Venezuela, the world's fifth largest oil producer, the Solidarity Center funds a corrupt union amalgam, the Confederation of Venezuelan Workers (CTV). CTV organizes destabilizing strikes and works with oil company management, the Catholic Church, and right-wing military officers to create opposition to the populist elected president Hugo Chavez. How the Center's largest, US$150,000 contribution to the CTV was spent is unclear. Stan Gacek, assistant director for the AFL-CIO's International Affairs Department, says it was for internal union elections, but the CTV's Institute director, Jesus Urbieta, says the money was used for conducting training courses. In 2001 the Solidarity Center invited CTV leader Carlos Ortega to Washington, to discuss strategies to oust Chavez with US government officials and representatives of the US State Department. A series of widespread strikes orchestrated by the CTV paved the way for an insurrection on April 11th, 2002, that killed over a dozen citizens and injured hundreds more. Pedro Carmona, a pro-US businessman, was selected to run the country. He immediately dissolved the National Assembly, but only two days later Chavez was swept back into power by the military and a flood of support from working people and the poor, much to the shame of the Solidarity Center, the US State Department and the White House. Not surprisingly, the NED tripled its annual Venezuela budget to almost $900,000 in the weeks and months leading up to the attempted coup. While the CTV was disbanded after the attempted coup and replaced by the leftist Unione Nationale Trajabadores, Chavez's opposition hasn't given up. The NED is currently handing out grants totaling more than a million dollars to organizations it feels can be useful in getting rid of Chavez. From September 2002 to March 2004, the Endowment contributed $116,000 to the Solidarity Center every three months for this purpose. Between September 2003 and September 2004, Sumate ... a Venezuelan company that worked to organize a referendum to recall President Chavez ... was granted over US$50,000 from the NED. Sumate released a poll just before the vote claiming Chavez was sure to lose. To the chagrin of Sumate and the NED, Chavez won 59% of the vote. Iraq and Beyond: On November 6, 2003, President Bush gave a speech commemorating the NED on its 20th anniversary, and placing it at the center of the "democratization" of Iraq. For the Bush Administration, the NED and the Solidarity Center, democratization is synonymous with privatization, as is evidenced in their attempts to hold the largest state liquidation sale since the collapse of the Soviet Union. A key strategic aim of US imperialism in the Middle East is to break state control over oil production and reserves and open them up to the direct control of US-based energy conglomerates. The first act of L. Paul Bremer, who led the US occupation of Iraq from May 2, 2003 until his early departure on June 28, 2004, was to fire 500,000 state workers including teachers, doctors, nurses, publishers and printers. Next he opened Iraq's borders to unrestricted imports, declaring it "open for business." Enacting a radical set of laws unprecedented in their generosity to multinational corporations, Bremer allowed foreign companies to own 100 percent of Iraqi assets outside the natural resource sector, and to take all of these profits out of the country tax free with no obligation to reinvest in Iraq. The only remnant from Saddam Hussein's economic policy was-a law restricting trade unions and collective bargaining! Rather than creating an economic boom, these policies instead fueled a resistance that has ultimately made reconstruction impossible. Labor relations reached a bloody peak under Bremer's occupation; faced with job loss, workers feared starvation, and managers in turn feared their workers, making privatization far more complicated than the Bush Administration anticipated. Violent protests have kept investors out, and forced Bremer to abandon many of his central economic policies. Several state companies have been offered up for lease, and thousands of the state workers fired by Bremer have been rehired. Nonetheless, the Bush administration's plans to "democratize" Iraq are still underway. In January, 2004, Bush requested to double the NED's Middle East budget, putting it at US$40 million. According to Abd al-Wahhab al Kabsi, the NED's program officer for the Middle East, the NED's involvement is "expanding and we expect it to continue to expand." In the months before the Bush administration invaded Iraq, the AFL-CIO for the first time in its history openly challenged a US decision to go to war. However, once the invasion began, AFL-CIO president John Sweeney shifted his antiwar stance, declaring that the federation would "support fully" the Bush administration's war goals. Within two days of Bush's request for an increased NED budget in the Middle East, Sweeney said that "training and other kinds of support from the international trade union movement should be encouraged" in Iraq. Since then, he has applied for US$3-5 million in grants from the NED. The money will be used to counter independent labor organizing by leftist groups like Union of the Unemployed in Iraq (UUI), which has sponsored and supported strikes and demonstrations for jobs and against US occupation. The NED and Solidarity Center have chosen to support the General Federation of Trade Unions in Iraq, a discredited Ba'athist union formation sitting on the US appointed Iraqi Governing Council. According to the UUI, its history "is as gloomy and bloody as the history of the Ba'athist regime." The Reform Movement: Given the Solidarity Center's actions in Venezuela and Iraq, many unionists are concerned about its true motives, and what it is doing around the world in its more covert operations. Over the past four years, labor councils and grassroots labor activists on the West Coast have been pressing AFL-CIO leadership to come clean about its past and set a more honorable course for the future by opening its archives, which include material from the Reagan era that remains off-limits to researchers. They also wish to create a truth commission to analyze and publicize the contents. Resolutions passed in 2000 by the San Francisco and South Bay labor councils in California, and in 2001 by the Washington State AFL-CIO, asked the federation to renounce what it did in Chile, the Philippines, and other places in the name of labor, and allow union members and independent researchers to make a full accounting of the past. In 2002 the South bay AFL-CIO Labor Council submitted its "Clear the Air" resolution to the two million member (with over one sixth of the AFL-CIO's members) California Federation of Labor. The resolution was withdrawn in favor of a substitute resolution, submitted by the Federation leadership, which simply asked the AFL-CIO to meet with the California Federation and its affiliates to open a dialogue about its government-funded foreign affairs activities, both past and present, and to affirm a policy of genuine global solidarity in pursuit of economic and social justice. It was clearly understood that if the meeting failed to resolve the issues, the leadership of the Federation would fall back to support the "Clear the Air" resolution. In March, 2004 the California Federation of Teachers unanimously passed a resolution at its annual convention calling for the AFL-CIO to accept no government funding for its work in Iraq and elsewhere, claiming this would be the first step in achieving true global solidarity. That resolution was submitted to the July 13-14, 2004 Convention of the California Federation of Labor. It took 15 months to organize the meeting on foreign policy called for in the resolution passed by the California Federation in 2002. Not satisfied by the October 2003 meeting, the Plumbers Local 393 and the Labor Councils of the South Bay, San Francisco and Monterey Bay passed a resolution for "Unity and Trust among Workers Worldwide," and submitted it to the California Federation of Labor 2004 convention. The "Unity and Trust" resolution and the CFT resolution were combined by the convention's resolutions committee to become a more strongly worded version of the 2002 "Clear the Air" resolution. The new resolution, passed unanimously by the convention delegates, urges the AFL-CIO to "exercise extreme caution in seeking or accepting funding from the US government, its agencies and any other institutions which it funds such as the NED for its work in Iraq or elsewhere, and to accept these funds only to further the goals of honest international labor solidarity, not to pursue the policies of Corporate America and the United States government." Fred Hirsch, vice president of Plumbers and Fitters Local 393 in San Jose, played an important role in getting both resolutions before the Federation. "We expect tremendous resistance from the AFL-CIO to having their power base removed, and being forced to seek more funds from their affiliates, rather than the government," says Hirsch. "This will also force them to be more accountable to their affiliates by giving them total freedom of information on their actions abroad." Resisting Disclosure: Unfortunately, the AFL-CIO archives remain firmly closed. Under the archives rules, documents can only be released twenty years after their creation, which means that material about controversial AFL-CIO activities during the eighties, such as support for the Nicaraguan contras and cooperation with US-backed counterinsurgencies in El Salvador and the Philippines, remains classified. According to Michael Merill, director of the archives, there is no consistent policy on what to do when someone wants to open the books sooner. Any request to shorten the twenty-year waiting period, he added, would have to be approved by the senior leadership of the AFL-CIO. It is highly unlikely that this will occur without a great deal of pressure from the AFL-CIO's constituents. Since Sweeney and several members of his executive council were board members of the AIFLD and the other institutes, they are likely to be uncomfortable with an open record. This also applies to the Solidarity Center's current head, Harry Kamberis, a former US State Department employee who worked with the Asian American Free Labor Institute (AAFLI), the AIFLD counterpart for Asia, while the institutes were known to be in collusion with the CIA. His endeavors with AAFLI include donating six million dollars to a corrupt labor federation allied with right-wing death squads in the Philippines throughout the eighties. In order to put pressure on the AFL-CIO, it is important for resolutions like the "Unity and Trust" to be passed in locals, then moved to statewide labor federations, and eventually, national and international affiliates of the AFL-CIO. While the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), who passed anti-war resolutions at their national conventions in late June, are already having an impact on the AFL-CIO's executive council, it is unlikely to open the books or significantly change its policies without pressure from a larger portion of its affiliates. "To counter corporate globalization, we need labor globalization," says Hirsch. "But we can't embark on a path of genuine solidarity, nor can labor unions overseas trust us, until we own up to the past and divorce ourselves from those actions and the government funding which made us a pawn of US foreign policy." This article by Jon Quaccia was originally published at http://Alia2.net ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Find what you need with new enhanced search. Learn more. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From italysbadboy at yahoo.com Sun Jan 9 22:58:15 2005 From: italysbadboy at yahoo.com (ItalysBadBoy) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 22:58:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] Protest UPS Supplier of HLS - New York City Message-ID: <20050110065815.60308.qmail@web13602.mail.yahoo.com> ****Cross Post Freely**** NEW YORK CITY WEEKEND OF ACTION PROTEST: Friday, January 7, 2005 Time: 4:30 PM Meet at: UPS, Union Square, 11 E. 14th St., NY, NY Saturday Time & Location: to be announced On Friday, January 7th and Saturday, January 8th, please call and send polite letters to UPS asking them to stop supplying the Puppy Killers at Huntingdon Life Sciences through their UPS Supply Chain Solutions Company: UPS Corporate Headquarters 55 Glenlake Parkway, NE Atlanta , GA 30328 Domestic Services: 1-800-PICK-UPS (742-5877) Intl. Export / Import Services: 1-800-782-7892 Internet Shipping Tech Support: 1-877-289-6418 United Parcel Service, Inc. Attention: Investor Relations 55 Glenlake Parkway N.E. Atlanta, GA 30328 New York Offices: UPS Supply Chain Solutions 47 West Street - Third Floor New York, New York, 10006 Phone: 212-514-8860 Fax: 212-514-8843 UPS Supply Chain Solutions 211 East 43rd Street - Room 301 New York, New York, 10022 Phone: 212-682-3597 Fax: 212-682-3770 UPS Supply Chain Solutions 287-303 West 10th Street 160 Charles Street (UPS SCS Mailing Address) New York, New York, 10014 Phone: 646-486-1769 Fax: 646-486-2296 Win Animal Rights For more information contact: centcom at war-online.org or call: 646-267-9934 Or visit the Win Animal Rights/W.A.R. website at: http://war-online.org ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - Easier than ever with enhanced search. Learn more. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From italysbadboy at yahoo.com Sun Jan 9 23:04:53 2005 From: italysbadboy at yahoo.com (ItalysBadBoy) Date: Sun, 9 Jan 2005 23:04:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: [Shadow_Group] In the Clearing Stands a Boxer... a letter from Michael Moore Message-ID: <20050110070453.51783.qmail@web13623.mail.yahoo.com> January 7, 2005 Dear Friends, Something historic happened yesterday. For the first time since 1877 a member of the House and a member of the Senate stood up together to object to the outcome of a presidential election. This is the first step on a necessary road toward making sure that everyone is allowed to vote and that every vote is counted (something we did not see in 2000 or 2004) so the next time around ALL of us can be confident, when the election results come in, that they reflect the will of the people, not the whim of mechanical error and human obstruction. Unlike 2000, when the black members of Congress were told to sit down and shut up, this time a senator had the courage to stand with them, as the law requires, to force Congress to go back to their separate chambers to discuss and debate the issues surrounding the vote count. Senator Barbara Boxer rose to the occasion and stood with Ohio Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones and 29 other Representatives "to cast the light of truth on a flawed system which must be fixed now." The ensuing debate, at times, became a debate over me and all of you and the fact that we would dare make the attempt to protect our democracy. I was blown away when Representative Maxine Waters took to the floor and said, "Mr. Speaker and members, I dedicate my objection to Ohio's electoral votes to Mr. Michael Moore, the producer of the documentary '9/11' and I thank him for educating the world on the threats to our democracy and the proceedings of this house on the acceptance of the electoral college votes for the 2000 presidential election." I am honored to the point of embarrassment because it is Maxine Waters who deserves thanks for defending our most basic right, not once, but twice. Coming out of the gates like this in the very first week of session sent a strong message that we are not going to be pushed around. If the Republicans think the next four years are going to be a cakewalk, they've got another thing coming. With Michigan Representative John Conyers leading the charge, we showed them something not seen in over 120 years. And we're just getting started! Congratulations to the tens of thousands of you who called, faxed, and e-mailed Barbara Boxer and other senators. You have shown the world, with the strength of your convictions, that the movement toward a truly representative democracy will not be stopped in its tracks. Yesterday's actions will be marked by history books as a turning point for the electoral process and for a Democratic Party that has for too long sat back and taken it on the chin. Your voices have echoed all the way up to the hallowed halls of Congress and for that, you deserve thanks more than anyone. Yours, Michael Moore MMFlint at aol.com www.michaelmoore.com P.S. If you want to see portions of what took place, check out the video clips and transcripts on the website. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++STOP THE WALL++++++++++++++++++++++++++ www.stopthewall.org www.nad-plo.org www.hrw.org www.pal-arc.org www.endtheoccupation.org www.sustaincampaign.org --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Meet the all-new My Yahoo! ? Try it today! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: