Frontiers of Freedom
by Chuck Muth

10/31/05

We interrupt our regularly-scheduled red-meat coverage of Supreme Court nominations, politically-inspired indictments, amnesty for illegal aliens and pork-barrel spending to bring you a discussion about ... GSEs. Wait! Don't touch that dial. Before your eyes glaze over, know that today's topic, while not 'sexy,' is critically important to those of you who might want to buy a house in the post-Greenspan era -- complete with another example of Republicans in Congress wandering off the conservative reservation...

http://tinyurl.com/cwjd5


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Mother Jones
by Tom Engelhardt

10/31/05

So we all continue with 'the worse possible outcome.' What remains with us -- and the administration -- as well is the ongoing, devolving catastrophe in Iraq where, in just the last three days, 8 more American soldiers have died during a month, not yet at an end, in which 79 American servicemen and countless Iraqis were killed. At the heart of the case that brought us into this war were a series of deliberate lies and forgeries. And I'm not just referring to Scooter Libby's series of ridiculous, ad-lib whoppers to the grand jury. (Was he throwing himself on his sword to protect his boss or was this just the typical we-can-get-away-with-it hubris of the Bush White House?)...

http://tinyurl.com/bn7kk


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Human Events
by Robert Novak

10/31/05

Bush's blunder on Miers reflects his genuine disdain for Washington and the national government, still intense after nearly five years in office. That is basically why he reaches back to longtime friends and associates (cronies, say his critics) whom he trusts. Having been told that the conservative Republican base would not accept his friend Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on the court, Bush tried to sneak through Gonzales's successor as White House counsel. That Miers would pass muster inside the White House suggests how limited a group Bush consults. Cronyism is endemic with this president, and there is nobody close at hand to advise him otherwise... [editor's note: Much of this column was immediately superseded by the nomination of Alito, but some of it is still important; more interesting is the fact that Novak didn't know what was coming -- guess his inside sources dried up, eh? - TLK]

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=9992


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

The American Spectator
by Patrick Devenny & Robert McLean

11/01/05

At home, Britons were stunned by the graphic footage of their soldiers being assaulted in a city thought to be 'safe,' especially in comparison to the blood-soaked urban areas of the Sunni Triangle which dominate news coverage emanating out of Iraq. The violent imagery was only the latest and most troubling indication of the British military's failure in Basra and its environs, a disastrous turn of events which seemed unthinkable two years ago, when British troops were welcomed into Basra with relatively open arms. The root of this failure stems from the very strategy that was once lauded as the antidote for insurgent violence...

http://www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=8953


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Independent Institute
by Ivan Eland

10/31/05

The normally formidable Bush spin machine, which has perfected Orwellian doublespeak to an art form, has obviously been rattled by the Lewis Libby indictment and the whole Valerie Plame affair. The administration's uncharacteristic and lame response has taken a well-worn page from a public relations playbook: try to change the subject. It has pursued this strategy by speeding up the selection and announcement of the Supreme Court nominee of the month. But this mere diversion might actually signal that the White House has done something wrong. Furthermore, trying to change the subject shows weakness that could embolden critics. That's the kind of response one would expect from a weak-kneed Clinton administration. Remember the U.S. cruise missile attacks on Sudan and Afghanistan in 1998 on the day that Monica Lewinsky was testifying before the grand jury? The Bush administration would never want to be caught dead imitating the Clinton administration's 'small thinking'...

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1600


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

AntiWar.Com
by Christopher Deliso

11/01/05

If the Libby trial does go ahead, threatening to expose awkward and sensitive administration secrets, what could Bush and Cheney do to reduce the pressure? There's always the option of launching a new war against Syria and Iran on the basis of phony evidence. And hey, could we really put it past them? After all, these are the very people who delight in creating their own reality for the rest of us to follow, and who are perfectly willing to concoct elaborate fictions in order to expedite the needless deaths of thousands, as in the war on Iraq...

http://www.antiwar.com/deliso/?articleid=7856


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Please activate today to save our coastlines and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge! Thanks to North American Ocean Noise Coalition member Richard Charter and the National OCS Coalition for their work to defeat the Budget Reconciliation Package and for sending this alert to Seaflow. The Arctic Refuge may be drawing its last breath at the hands of the oil industry. Thanks for speaking up and spreading the word on behalf of our wild spaces and wild faces. Mary Jo Rice P.S. The vote on the House floor is scheduled for November 7. Please don’t delay.

Only Seven Days to Save Your Coast in Congress:

A bill aimed at opening all of America's most sensitive coastlines to offshore drilling will be voted on, up or down, on the House Floor in only a week, on November 7. House Leadership has chosen to hide offshore drilling within a broader budget bill that is immune from any amendments, so your own Representatives must now vote against "final passage" of what is called the "Budget Reconciliation Package" to save your state's coastal waters.

Hastily approved by a party-line vote in the House Resources Committee on October 26, the deceptively titled "Ocean State Options Act" would immediately remove all of our existing coastal protections by quickly rescinding the bipartisan offshore drilling moratorium that has been renewed each year for twenty-four years. This treacherous proposal would instead create a complex new bureaucracy requiring each state's legislature and governor to continually agree to ask the Secretary of Interior, every five years, for an additional extension of their state's protection, but after ten years all protection for every state would be gone. The Secretary of Interior could, at any time, deny continued coastal protection, even while states would be continually coerced - with offers of money - to allow offshore drilling.

If that's not bad enough, the very same Budget Reconciliation Package would also open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil companies while opening our coast. The oil industry, flush with record-setting profits, is now lobbying hard to get this bill passed by the House of Representatives and signed into law before coastal communities and the public can wake up to what is in this last-minute legislation. Each American who cares about their favorite coastal natural treasure now has a critical role to play in the upcoming House vote. We need to alert the media in all coastal regions with our own Op-Eds and calls to reporters, and above all, we must make calls to be absolutely sure that our own Representatives will vote against final passage of the Budget Reconciliation Act on November 7. This is a history-making moment, and the future of our coast, forever, depends entirely on what actions we each take in the next seven days.

To get direct contact information such as the DC office phone number for your Representative, you can visit http://www.visi.com/juan/congress or go to http://www.house.gov You can also call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask for your Representative's office.

http://www.seaflow.org


Informant: Scott Munson

The Bush administration has missed dozens of deadlines set by Congress after the September 11 attacks for developing ways to protect airplanes, ships and railways from terrorists.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110105M.shtml

One of the reporters at the center of the CIA identity leak investigation says he first learned Valerie Plame's name from President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110105L.shtml

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Time Reporter Says He Learned Agent's Identity From Rove Matthew Cooper Says I. Lewis Libby Confirmed Information

Oct. 31 2005 — - One of the reporters at the center of the investigation into the leak of the identity of an undercover CIA officer, says he first learned the agent's name from President Bush's top political advisor, Karl Rove.

Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper also said today in an interview with "Good Morning America," that the vice president's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, confirmed to him that Ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was a covert CIA operative.

A grand jury charged Libby on Friday with five felonies alleging obstruction of justice, perjury to a grand jury and making false statements to FBI agents. If convicted, he could face a maximum of 30 years in prison and $1.25 million in fines. Libby was not charged with the crime that the grand jury was created to investigate -- specifically, who leaked the name of Plame to reporters in 2003. Rove has not been charged.

Wilson, who went to Nigeria in 2002 to investigate whether or not the country was supplying Iraq with uranium to make weapons of mass destruction, opposed the war. He said he found no evidence of such an exchange in an op-ed in The New York Times. Wilson has argued that the Bush administration revealed his wife's identity in order to silence his opposition to the war.

"There is no question. I first learned about Valerie Plame working at the CIA from Karl Rove," Cooper said.

Libby has since claimed that he heard the Plame rumors from other reporters. Cooper disputed that version of events. "I don't remember it happening that way," he said. "I was taking notes at the time and I feel confident."

If a trial goes ahead, Cooper said he would name Rove as his source of the information.

"Before I spoke to Karl Rove I didn't know Mr. Wilson had a wife and that she had been involved in sending him to Africa."

Copyright © 2005 ABC News Internet Ventures

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/print?id=1265736


Informant: maintzger

On the day we honored Rosa Parks, Mother of the Civil Rights Movement, George W. Bush appointed a white male to replace Sandra Day O'Connor. Marjorie Cohn writes that, evidently unable to find a woman or Latino sufficiently "qualified" to sit on the high court, Bush reached deep into the trough of right-wing federal judges and pulled out Samuel Alito.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110105I.shtml

More bad publicity has motivated the Beast of Bentonville to fight back.

http://www.tompaine.com/uncommonsense/index.php#6614

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldbriefing/story/0,15205,1605919,00.html

Simon Tisdall, The Guardian

When the going gets rough at home, American presidents leave the country.

http://www.tompaine.com/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/31/AR2005103101386_pf.html

by E. J. Dionne Jr., The Washington Post

The indictment makes it crystal clear that the White House misled the public about its role in sliming Wilson and outing Plame.

http://www.tompaine.com/

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What the 'Shield' Covered Up:

As long as Bush still faced the voters, the White House wanted Americans to think that officials such as Libby, Karl Rove and Vice President Cheney had nothing to do with the leak campaign to discredit its arch-critic on Iraq, former ambassador Joseph Wilson.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10855.htm

by Chris Pearson and Ryan O'Donnell, TomPaine.com

A year ago, we elected a president. How do we change the fact that, for two-thirds of us, our votes meant nothing at all?

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051101/the_shrinking_battleground.php

Democrats forced the Republican-controlled Senate into an unusual closed session Tuesday, demanding answers about intelligence that led to the Iraq war.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110105X.shtml

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/hirsch.php?articleid=7861


Informant: Carol Moore

From ufpj-news

Einflüsterungen: Umweltverbände fordern kompromisslose Umweltpolitik (01.11.05)

Die Umweltverbände Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland (BUND), Naturschutz­­bund Deutschland (NABU), Greenpeace und World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) haben Union und SPD aufgefordert, in ihren Koalitionsvertrag keine auf Kosten des Umwelt- und Naturschutzes gehenden Kompromisse aufzunehmen. Die Verbände begrüßten, dass am Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz festgehalten werden solle. Die vereinbarte Abschaffung der Eigenheimzulage ist nach Auffassung der Verbände ebenfalls ein Schritt in die richtige Richtung. Weitere umweltschädliche Subventionen müssten abgebaut und Energie-Effizienzprogramme beschlossen werden. Der Flugverkehr solle durch eine Kerosinsteuer und der Autoverkehr durch eine Kfz-Steuer auf Kohlendioxid-Basis belegt werden. Bisherige Leerstellen in den Verhandlungsrunden wie die Sicherung der Gentechnikfreiheit, die ökologische Verkehrswende, der Schutz der Verbraucher vor gefährlichen Chemikalien und der Erhalt von Naturschutzflächen gehörten dringend auf die Tagesordnung. Bei der Diskussion um mögliche Laufzeitverlängerungen von Atomkraftwerken dürfe die SPD keinesfalls den Einflüsterungen der Industrielobby erliegen.

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12180

Reportage et Annexes sur un Contrôle de Mesures Officielles suivant le protocole ANFR dans les locaux d'ASL (CREST Drôme)

http://www.next-up.org/main.php?param=mesuresctrl

According to Cindy Sheehan, the price many of us are paying is so much costlier than the mere monetary expense or loss of reputation. Over 2000 American families have paid the price of our dear loved ones to the insanity. Over 15,000 of our young people are wounded.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110105Y.shtml



Cindy Sheehan
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Sheehan

Weg mit den Knästen!
http://www.telepolis.de/tp/r4/artikel/21/21238/1.html

Full-Time-Jobs, aber kein Geld für Essen
http://www.telepolis.de/tp/r4/artikel/21/21256/1.html

http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_19839.shtml


Informant: Our bill of rights

Ericsson and Nokia loose a High Court case in USA

Please, read:

(START OF COPY) Ericsson and Nokia loose a High Court case in USA  Class action ahead?

The Mobile telephone manufactures did not succeed with their Stop-proposal at the American High Court. The Mobile phone manufacturers wanted to put a stop for consumers being able to take out court summons. Against them related to health risk from radiation from mobile phones, according to Bloomberg news.

The manufacturers behind the proposal were, between others, Nokia, Motorola and Ericsson. The High Court decision opens up for a class action against the mobile phone manufacturers, to go ahead. A group of consumers in Louisiana demands that every mobile phone user be given a headset to lower the radiation. Analysts tells Bloomberg news that the decision can open up for mass actions, by people who have contracted cancer, running into multimillions against the mobile phone manufacturers.

http://www.dagensps.se/artikel.asp?articleID=13340

Translated from Swedish by Agnes http://www.mast-victims.org/
(END OF COPY)


Olle Johansson, assoc. prof.
The Experimental Dermatology Unit
Department of Neuroscience Karolinska Institute
171 77 Stockholm Sweden

--------

Cell phone makers lose case at Supreme Court

Houston Chronicle

10/31/05

The Supreme Court refused today to consider throwing out class-action lawsuits that accuse cell phone makers of failing to protect users from unsafe levels of radiation. The cell industry argued that because the phones comply with federal rules, the lawsuits should be dismissed. Justices declined without comment to consider the appeal...

http://tinyurl.com/cmk9z


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

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Cell phone class action cases to proceed
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1114156/

Aktionsbündnis Sozialproteste Homepage: http://www.die-soziale-bewegung.de
Email: die-soziale-bewegung@web.de


Bei unserem letzten bundesweiten Treffen am 1. Oktober haben wir gemeinsam beschlossen, dass für eine Verbreiterung der Proteste eine Vernetzung mit anderen Spektren der sozialen Bewegungen und mit den Gewerkschaften notwendig ist.

Ein geeigneter Anlass, dies in Angriff zu nehmen, ist die Aktions- und Strategiekonferenz am 19. und 20. November in Frankfurt (Main), die dort in den Räumlichkeiten der Universität stattfindet. Wir haben uns als Koordinierungskreis in den letzten Wochen an deren konzeptioneller Ausgestaltung beteiligt. Im Vergleich zum Sozialforum in Deutschland, das im Juli in Erfurt stattgefunden hat, soll bei der Konferenz in Frankfurt der Vernetzungsgedanke und die Arbeit auf gemeinsame Projekte hin mehr im Vordergrund stehen.

Der Koordinierungskreis des Aktionsbündnis Sozialproteste und weitere Personen, die unserem Aktionsbündnis nahe stehen, werden sich vor allem in dem Forum "Arbeit und Soziales neu gestalten" engagieren. Ebenso wird es in dem Eingangsblock einen Vortragsteil "Arbeit umverteilen + Mindestlöhne + Grundeinkommen" geben. Aber auch in den anderen Veranstaltungen geht es immer wieder um die verschiedenen Facetten der Thematik Erwerbstätigkeit, Erwerbslosigkeit und Verfügung über den gesellschaftlichen Reichtum.

Die Einladung zu der Konferenz mitsamt Anmelde-Schnipsel findet Ihr auf unserer Homepage (sie wäre mit 160 kb als PDF-Datei zu groß für den Email-Versand) unter:
http://www.die-soziale-bewegung.de/2005/aktionskonferenz/aktionskonferenz_einladung.shtml

Weitere Punkte, die kurz erwähnt werden sollen:

* Die Kampagne gegen Zwangsumzüge ist angelaufen. Bisher haben wir von Initiativen in 8 Regionen erfahren, dass sie entsprechende Nottelefonnummern eingerichtet und teilweise davon die Presse unterrichtet haben. Ihr seid weiterhin aufgefordert, uns die entsprechenden Informationen zukommen zu lassen per Email an die-soziale-bewegung(at)web.de .

* In den nächsten Tagen wird ein Treffen zwischen Mitgliedern unseres Kokreises mit einigen MdBs der Linkspartei in Berlin stattfinden. Dies ist die Konsequenz aus einem Beschluss des 8. bundesweiten Treffens in Kassel: Die Linkspartei solle mit unseren Forderungen konfrontiert werden, um eine spannungsreiche und produktive Zusammenarbeit auf den Weg zu bringen.

* Wir haben eine Pressemitteilung im Namen des Koordinierungskreises abgesetzt, die die Demokratiegefährdung durch die aktuelle Missbrauchskampagne anklagt und sich auch an die ausländischen Medien wendet. Diese findet Ihr im Anhang dieser Email.

* Das nächste bundesweite Treffen wird am 10. Dezember im DGB-Haus in Göttingen von 12 bis 17 Uhr stattfinden.

Teilt uns bitte mit, wenn Ihr an der Aktionskonferenz in Frankfurt (Main) teilnehmen möchtet. Um Fahrtkosten zu sparen, möchten wir für die Hin- und Rückfahrt Fahrgemeinschaften mit der Bahn bzw. dem Auto gerne koordinieren. Ihr findet einen entsprechenden Link auf der Homepage.

Wir freuen uns, Euch in Frankfurt oder beim nächsten bundesweiten Treffen in Göttingen begrüßen zu dürfen.

Mit solidarischen Grüßen Wolfram Altekrüger, Claudio Coladangelo, Renate Gaß, Peter Grottian, Ottokar Luhn, Michael Maurer, Edgar Schu, Detlef Spandau, Rainer Wahls, Helmut Woda

Aktionsbündnis Sozialproteste Koordinierungsstellen: Michael Maurer, m.m(at)dalichow-online.net (Brandenburg); Ottokar Luhn, info-gotha (at) offenes-buendnis.de (Thüringen); Helmut Woda, Helmut.Woda (at) web.de (Karlsruhe); Detlef Spandau, Detlef.Spandau (at) gmx.net (Ostwestfalen/Lippe); Claudio Coladangelo, teoanacatl (at) web.de (Giessen/Mittelhessen); Rainer Wahls, Rwahls (at) web.de (Berlin); Wolfram Altekrüger, W.Altekrueger(at)gmx.de (Sachsen-Anhalt) Vernetzungsbüro: Renate Gaß, R.Gass1 (at) gmx.de, Tel.: 0151 1539 0382 (Kassel); Edgar Schu, E.Schu1 (at) gmx.de, Tel.: 0179 672 9724 (Göttingen) Wissenschaftliche Beratung: Peter Grottian, pgrottia (at)

Anlagen:

Clement im menschenverachtenden Abseits Bundeswirtschaftsminister gefährdet mit seinem Parasitenvergleich die Demokratie in ihrer Substanz

Von keinem geringeren als Bundeswirtschaftsminister Clement stammt ein Report vom Arbeitsmarkt im Sommer 2005 mit dem Titel: "Vorrang für die Anständigen - Gegen Missbrauch, "Abzocke" und Selbstbedienung im Sozialstaat". Die Wortwahl und Sichtweise des Ministers haben in Deutschland große Empörung ausgelöst.

Im Jahr 2005 ist es in Deutschland wieder möglich, Arbeitslose und ökonomisch schwächste Mitglieder der Gesellschaft als "Sozialschmarotzer" zu bezeichnen. So geschehen in dem "Report vom Arbeitsmarkt 2005" des Bundesministeriums für Wirtschaft und Arbeit.

Autoritäre Regime kommen nicht "über Nacht". Sie werden über gesellschaftlich akzeptierte Vorformen politischer Gewalt gegenüber wehrlosen Bevölkerungsgruppen sukzessive eingeführt. Zu diesen Vorformen zählen Ignoranz, Abwertung, Verleumdung und Ausgrenzung. Herr Wolfgang Clement ist aber mit seiner betriebenen Diffamierung und Präsentation Arbeitsloser als SozialbetrügerInnen weit über diese Vorformen hinaus gegangen.

Schon mehrmals wurden von namhaften deutschen Politikern Menschen mit Ungeziefer verglichen. 1979 nannte Franz Joseph Strauß, damaliger Ministerpräsident von Bayern und Kanzlerkandidat, Schriftsteller "Ratten und Schmeißfliegen". Der heutige designierte Wirtschaftsminister Edmund Stoiber verteidigte diese Straußsche Entgleisung, und vor kurzem verglich Franz Müntefering, SPD-Fraktionsvorsitzender, Hedgefonds mit Heuschrecken.

Der aktuelle Rückgriff auf eine Sprache, deren Worte in gefährlicher Nähe zur Wortwahl des Dritten Reiches stehen, erfolgt, um Ursache und Wirkung bei der Entstehung von Arbeitslosigkeit auf den Kopf zu stellen. Damit Arbeitslose auch als wirkliche Verursacher ihrer eigenen Arbeitslosigkeit erscheinen, werden sie öffentlich von Amtsträgern der Bundesregierung diffamiert und entwürdigt.

Wir begrüßen es, dass viele Menschen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland diesen Entwicklungen nicht tatenlos zusehen und deshalb gegen den Bundesminister Clement Strafanzeige erstattet haben. Aus Verantwortung für die deutsche Geschichte halten wir es aber für erforderlich, mit dieser Pressemitteilung auch das Ausland aufmerksam zu machen, welche Tendenzen sich in Deutschland breit zu machen versuchen.

Wir stehen Ihnen gerne für Rückfragen und weitere Informationen zur Verfügung.

Koordinierungskreis des Aktionsbündnis Sozialproteste

Nicholas Kristof: Mr. Cheney, tell us what happened. If you're afraid to say what you knew, and when you knew it, then you should resign.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110105Z.shtml

For full coverage of the CIA leak investigation, go to our Special Coverage Page.

Mr. Fitzgerald Calling
http://www.truthout.org/fitzgeraldcalling.shtml

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/051031_mystery_monday.html


Informant: Gabriele Garibaldi

Eric Le Boucher agrees with former French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin that a new transnational, privileged, self-perpetuating elite is being created.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105H.shtml

Amy Davidson talks with Jeffrey Goldberg who writes about Brent Scowcroft, the national-security adviser under President George H. W. Bush - and the former President's best friend - who has been at odds with the current administration. Goldberg discusses Scowcroft and the divide within the Republican party over Iraq.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105F.shtml

Senator Harry Reid: The nomination of Judge Alito requires an especially long hard look by the Senate because of what happened last week to Harriet Miers. Conservative activists forced Miers to withdraw from consideration for this same Supreme Court seat because she was not radical enough for them. Now the Senate needs to find out if the man replacing Miers is too radical for the American people.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105E.shtml

David Addington, counsel to Vice President Cheney, is currently considered the leading candidate to succeed Scooter Libby as Cheney's chief of staff. But Addington's own role in the Plame matter is emerging just as the vice president considers whether to name him to the job.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105D.shtml

Howard Fineman and Richard Wolffe: Singed by the special prosecutor and rattled by the Harriet Miers mess, Team Bush is in turmoil.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105C.shtml

Vice President Dick Cheney makes only three brief appearances in the 22-page federal indictment that charges his chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby Jr., with lying to investigators and misleading a grand jury in the CIA leak case. But in its clear, cold language, it lifts a veil on how aggressively Mr. Cheney's office drove the rationale against Saddam Hussein and then fought to discredit the Iraq war's critics. The document now raises a central question: how much collateral damage has Mr. Cheney sustained?

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105A.shtml

http://qwstnevrythg.blog-city.com/army_secret_surfaces_deadly_chemicals_at_sea.htm


Informant: beefree

Mit freundlichen Grüßen

Michael Meyer
Netzwerk Zivilcourage Risiko Mobilfunk Österreich Plattform Sozialstaat Österreich
michael_meyer@aon.at
A-5165 Berndorf, Stadl 4
0043 – 6217 - 8576


GRAZER WOCHE 23.10.2005

An den Schulen soll bald Funkstille herrschen

Eine (politisch) breite Front hat den Kampf gegen Handys an Grazer Schulen aufgenommen und fordert ein Verbot.

In Wien ist der Streit um ein Handyverbot an Schulen bereits voll entbrannt – nun hat das heiße Eisen auch die Murmetropole erreicht. Denn die Mobilfunk-Gegner gehen nun in die Offensive. Zwei der schärfsten Verfechter: Grünen-Klubobfrau Sigi Binder und Kinderbüro-Geschäftsführer Bernhard Seidler. „Handys gehören sowohl aus pädagogischen als auch aus gesundheitlichen Gründen in Schulen verboten“, betonen beide.

Denn die Undiszipliniertheit mancher Schüler, die während der Stunde ihr Mobiltelefon benutzen, würde den Unterricht zerstören. „Und vor den Gefahren des Elektro-Smogs kann man nicht genug warnen. Aktuelle Forschungsergebnisse zeigen klar, dass die Strahlung von Mobiltelefonen auf Kinder eine besonders schädliche Auswirkung hat“, erklärt Seidler.

*Breite Unterstützung*

Argumenten, denen sich Schulstadtrat Detlev Eisel-Eiselsberg und Josef Prassl, Büroleiter des Landesschulratspräsidenten, „inhaltlich voll anschließen“. Doch hier erwartet man sich vor allem aus den einzelnen Schulen Initiativen. „Das muss vor Ort mit den Eltern abgesprochen werden. Nur wenn diese einen derartigen Schritt unterstützen, ist ein Verbot umsetzbar“, so Eisel-Eiselsberg. Dem pflichtet auch Ilse Schmid, Präsidentin der steirischen Elternvertretung, bei: „Wenn, dann funktioniert so etwas nur über die Hausordnung an Schulen.“

Was ist Ihre Meinung zu diesem Thema? Gehören Handys an Schulen verboten? Schreiben Sie an die GRAZER WOCHE, Belgiergasse 3, 8020 Graz, per E-Mail an redaktion@woche.at oder posten Sie hier.

http://www.grazerwoche.at/gw/local/2064/index.do

Dienstag, 1. November 2005

Das oberste Gericht der USA will einen Appell von Mobilfunkanbietern nicht anhören und macht so den Weg für fünf Sammelklagen von Mobilfunkgegnern frei.

Mobilfunkgegner haben in verschiedenen US-Staaten fünf Sammelklagen wegen zu hoher Strahlenbelastung eingereicht, wie Reuters mitteilt. Die betroffenen Anbieter haben gegen die Klagen zunächst mit Erfolg appelliert; nun hat der US Supreme Court aber entschieden, die Anbieter nicht anzuhören. Die Klagen sind damit nun doch zugelassen.

In der Argumentation der Anbieter, darunter Nokia und Cingular, ging es vor allem darum, dass Mobilfunk-Zulassungen in den USA bereits national durch die FCC (Federal Communications Commission) erteilt werden und somit nicht auch noch einzelstaatlichen Regelungen unterworfen sein sollten: Die Anbieter haben Bammel vor einer "Balkanisierung der Netzwerkstandards", wie es im Appell heisst - sie fürchten, dass FCC-genehmigte Geräte künftig nicht mehr automatisch in allen US-Staaten benutzt werden können und das Geschäft damit komplizierter wird. (ub)

http://www.infoweek.ch/news/NW_single.cfm?news_ID=12083&sid=0

--------

Oberster Gerichtshof der USA weist Mobiltelefonprozess nicht ab

Der oberste Gerichtshof weigerte sich, eine Sammelklage abzuweisen, die Mobiltelefonhersteller beschuldigt, sie würden Kunden nicht vor gefährlicher Strahlung schützen. Die Mobiltelefonindustrie wandte ein, dass die Klagen abgewiesen werden sollten, weil die Geräte den gesetzlichen Vorschriften entsprechen. Die Gerichte lehnten diesen Einwand kommentarlos ab. In verschiedenen Staaten wurden Klagen eingereicht, die fordern, dass die Hersteller die Mobiltelefone sicherer machen. Die Ankläger wollen Hinweise für die Anwender und Freisprechanlagen, weil diese das Risiko von Hirntumoren verringern sollen. Die Verbraucher behaupten, die Industrie verletze verschiedene Gesetze, zum Beispiel im Hinblick auf Verbraucherschutz, Produkthaftung, Fahrlässigkeit und Betrug.

http://www.usatoday.com/


Aus: FGF-Infoline vom 03.11.2005

George Galloway has accused a US Senate committee of making allegations based solely on lies and demanded that it clear his name.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10821.htm

If Libby lied about how he discovered Plame's identity - he claims he heard it from journalists and had forgotten Cheney had told him - why would he tell such clumsy fibs? The only rational explanation is he was protecting his boss.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10834.htm

When the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) finally had the opportunity to look at the documents itself, it concluded they were forgeries. Last week the Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported that they had been created by low-level agents of Sisme, the Italian intelligence service, which was trying to curry favour with the White House by supporting its WMD campaign.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10827.htm

Sleaze, leaks and an indictment add up to the worst presidential crisis since Nixon. And it will get worse. The White House has lost one key man but the whole chain of command may be engulfed by a scandal slowly revealing the lies that led to war.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10825.htm

PRESIDENT Bush faced calls from Republicans and Democrats last night to dismiss Karl Rove, his chief adviser, as the fallout from the CIA-leak scandal continued to take a heavy toll on the White House.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,11069-1851093,00.html


From Information Clearing House

Letter from Iraq: America - Behind the Curtain:

Libby and the likes of him have devastated my already ruined country. Anything that exposes these people for what they are must bring some gratification.

http://iraquna.blogspot.com/2005/10/america-behind-curtain.html


From Information Clearing House

The idea that we are now fighting in Iraq to protect America has gained some currency, and its popularity is a testament to how far down the rabbit hole we have truly fallen.

http://lefthook.org/Politics/Alam102605.html


From Information Clearing House

The day after a federal grand jury returned a three count indictment against him for allegedly laundering $45,500 into President Bush's re-election campaign, Tom Noe appeared in shackles and handcuffs before a U.S. magistrate in Orlando to be arraigned.

http://www.northcountrygazette.org/articles/102905NoeFreed.html


From Information Clearing House

Thirty Ohioans who raised a combined $4.1 million for President Bush's re-election campaign have received more than $1.2 billion in public funds for their companies and clients, a newspaper reported.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10840.htm

U.S. not legally bound to reveal dump sites:

For decades, the U.S. Army secretly dumped millions of pounds of chemical weapons off the coasts of America and other nations throughout the world. Today, in the second day of a two-part series, we examine the extent — and the potential environmental disaster — of the dumping that occurred worldwide.

http://www.mcall.com/news/local/all-a1_5dumpday2oct31,0,3757483.story


From Information Clearing House

President George W Bush has nominated federal appeals court judge Samuel Alito to the US Supreme Court.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4392540.stm



Alito Supports Unauthorized Strip Searches:

In Doe v. Groody, Alito agued that police officers had not violated constitutional rights when they strip searched a mother and her ten-year-old daughter while carrying out a search warrant that authorized only the search of a man and his home. [Doe v. Groody, 2004]

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/10/31/samuel-alitos-america



The Record of Samuel Alito:
Pdf file:

A Preliminary Review: This preliminary report provides a summary of Judge Samuel Alito’s professional record. In compiling this document, we have focused primarily on those opinions, concurrences and dissents which were authored by Judge Alito himself and provide important insight about his record concerning important issues of fundamental rights and liberties.
http://media.pfaw.org/stc/AlitoPreliminary.pdf



Alito: Where were you in '72?:

A lot has been said this morning about Samuel Alito, President Bush's nominee for the Supreme Court, and his impeccable legal resume. Well, here's one portion of his resume we hope gets some very, very close scrutiny over the next few weeks, before his confirmation hearings.

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/10/31/samuel-alitos-america


From Information Clearing House

Rove should be fired, spy’s husband says:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9875093


From Information Clearing House

The annual worldwide press freedom index from Reporters Without Borders shows the United States, which is supposedly spreading freedom and liberty throughout the world, is in a fast decline regarding the freedom of its own press.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10839.htm

Amnesty International said today that recent revelations about deaths in custody and abuses by US troops in Afghanistan are further evidence of a culture of disrespect for fundamental rights in the “war on terror” which the US has failed to adequately address.

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR511722005


From Information Clearing House

Lawyers for Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks say they have uncovered evidence supporting claims that the South Australian may have been the subject of organised torture by American troops. - Hicks's father Terry has detailed allegations of physical and sexual abuse of his son by American soldiers.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10837.htm



The Case Against David Hicks:

"The Australians, the Americans, they all know – this is a façade, this is a farce"... David Hicks’ US lawyer Josh Dratel.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10838.htm



Bahrain formally demands probe into Gitmo torture:

The Bahraini Embassy in Washington has formally asked the U.S. government to launch an immediate investigation into torture, abuse and other brutal tactics used against a Bahraini prisoner held at its detention center in Guantanamo, Bay, Cuba, Bahraini foreign ministry source has revealed.

http://tinyurl.com/ajykv


From Information Clearing House



A Tale of Two Lives Destroyed by Abu Ghraib:

DER SPIEGEL looks at two lives destroyed by Abu Ghraib. One, an Iraqi community leader -- the other, his American guard.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10527.htm

Says former advisor:

United States president George W. Bush no longer trusts Italy's prime minister Silvio Berlusconi after remarks he made stating he did not want the US and Britain to attack Iraq.

http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level.php?cat=Politics&loid=8.0.224305282&par=0


From Information Clearing House

An update from http://www.lifeboatnews.com
Paul Grignon
http://www.lifeboatnews.com
http://www.paulgrignonart.com

Small communities would be wise to start a "garden" program in order to remain fairly self-sufficient in food. See: http://www.growarow.org

Oil Peak in 2005? Dale Allen Pfeiffer in Dale Pfeiffer's Blog Sunday 30 of October, 2005 http://www.lulu.com/allenadale

More evidence is coming in weekly to suggest that world oil production peaked in 2005. Within this past month, two notable petroleum geologists have produced statements to that effect. First there was Ali Samsam Bakhtiari, who said this past October. "In my humble opinion, we should now have reached 'Peak Oil'. So, it is high time to close this critical chapter in the history of international oil industry and bid the mighty 'Peak' farewell... At present, global oil output fluctuates around 82 mb/d as some institutions try vainly to push 2005 statistics towards 83 and 84 mb/d (as they always do). But they will be obliged to backtrack as 'actual' oil supplies fail to follow their 'paper' ones." (1)

This was followed by Colin Campbell's announcement at a conference in Rimini, Italy on October 28th that 2005 could be the year when world oil production peaks, to be soon followed by an irreversible decline.

According to Dr. Campbell, "the maximum peak of production as far as the normal so-called oil has come this year; after that will be a long decline.

Meanwhile, for other types of hydrocarbons. the peak will occur by 2010."(2) (Translated from Italian.)

These two statements, taken in concurrence with OPEC's August market report that total light, sweet oil production was declining,(3) and declining extraction rates from all the major oil companies except BP,(4) make it a safe bet that global oil production did indeed peak in 2005. I must offer a note of thanks to Chris Vernon for making both of the observations listed above in this paragraph.

Implications If world oil production has indeed peaked, then demand and production are diverging and the trend will be towards rising oil prices from here on in. However, the real problem lies not so much with the peak and with the irreversible decline that will follow. How serious our problems will be depends in part on how steep this decline is, and-possibly in larger measure-on how we react to the divergence and decline.

So far, the market and the general public has not yet realized that world oil production has peaked, much less the significance of this event. This is because the peak is being masked by specific production problems due to natural catastrophes, wars and civil unrest. At present, neither the market, the media nor the general public has been able to see the forest for the trees.

This situation is both bad and good. It is bad for society overall, because it means that we have not started to grapple with the problem. If society would wake up right now and begin to prepare, we could optimize our chances of transitioning into a sustainable paradigm. The longer it takes our society to wake up, the worse our chances will be of making this transition.

On the other hand, this social denial is delaying the other shoe (being the economic shoe) from dropping. Once the full realization of what is happening floods into the market, there will be an economic crash in response. This intervening period, which Dr. Bakhtiari calls 'Transition One', will provide a chance for those who are aware of what is happening to quietly prepare.

Personally, I do not advocate heading for the hills. Those hills are already occupied. And the residents there will be less and less apt to receive newcomers warmly.

Nor will you, as a newcomer have the support system that you left behind along with your familiar surroundings.

Instead, preparing means taking stock of what is around you, limiting or eliminating personal debt, increasing your own energy sufficiency where you are right now, and building up a reserve of whatever items you feel might be most helpful either for personal survival or trade.

Most of all, it means getting involved in your own community.

Possibly one of the most important things you can do to ensure community security is to get involved in your local food bank, or start one if none exists in your area.

Food banks can serve as a platform from which to launch community gardening programs.

And nothing will spell security for your community so much as locally produced food and a system for ensuring that none in your community must starve.


Voltaire's advice has never been more apt in every meaning of the phrase: "Let us cultivate our garden."


Informant: friends2b

The Real Story Of The Money Control Over America
http://www.rense.com/general61/bbil.shtm


Informant: eebeeb2004

This year, more than one million women are expected to file for bankruptcy, outnumbering men by about 150,000 if trends hold. Critics say that means the new US bankruptcy law, which makes it harder for filers to expunge debts, is particularly onerous for women.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/103105WC.shtml

DeLay protege Richard Pombo was named as one of the 13 most corrupt politicians in Congress. His payback is "the steady stream of environmentally destructive legislation flowing from the House Resources Committee, which he runs. The legislation would undermine environmental safeguards and raise broad new threats to endangered species and public lands."

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/103105EA.shtml

"Ending the war in Iraq must be at the centerpiece of a campaign that includes standing for national healthcare and preserving Social Security. This is the constellation of issues with which Democrats can take back the country." - Congressman Dennis Kucinich

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/103105R.shtml

http://www.thesoapboxroadshow.com


Informant: R H

Washington Post Article by William H. Arkin 'Russia Nukes United States'.

(What Arkin - and the US military that does these excercises - fails to mention is that if Russia really were to nuke the US, the US would be toast several times over, with hardly a single person and no cities at all, left. The survival of not only US citizens, but of most land-based living things all over the world would be problematic. (this assumes current or near current warhead levels of round 2,500 warheads, used for 'city busting'.) US/Russia thermonuclear war is not an event one can 'manage'. It is an event that would be terminal at least for both societies and probably for most humans and other living things. ) Early Warning William M. Arkin on National and Homeland Security Russia Nukes the United States

Code Name of the Week: Slomonia

Scooter Schmooter, Russia is about to nuke the United States.

Tomorrow, the U.S. military begins its largest "national" military exercise of the fiscal year, an exercise that posits a return of the "old guard" to Russia and a crisis that ends in a nuclear attack on the United States.

I previously wrote about gaming a terrorist nuclear attack in Alabama and war with North Korea as part of exercises Vigilant Shield and Global Lightning. Those two exercises are being joined by Global Storm and Positive Response tomorrow, all following a highly classified common Russian scenario.

In the scenario, according to internal exercise papers obtained by this washingtonpost.com blogger, "Slomonia" loses ally "Ublame" in a "domestically driven political realignment." Slomonia adapts a more aggressive foreign policy which re-ignites what the war gamers call a "mini-Cold War."

Slomonia, which in earlier game preparation was called Rusalka, is obviously Russia. The name was changed to Slomonia to obscure the identity of the country should there be a leak. Ublame is Ukraine, which ironically was earlier called Ubundi in exercise planning. I guess the possibility that World War III could begin over Ukraine is less sensitive than a 2005 nuclear war with our good friend Moscow.

The exercise scenarios begin with the Russian loss of Ukraine and a decline in relations with the west. Russia begins to mobilize in response to increasing NATO troops on its border and then it deploys long-range bombers to the Arctic and the Far East. To "punish" the West, according to the classified exercise papers, Russia begins to provide support for "old clients long abandoned," primarily the Northeast Asian country of Purple (aka North Kraal in early exercise papers), which is North Korea.

During a 60 day "time warp" mid-way in the exercise scenario to fast forward to the really fun nuclear war, North Korea and Russia prepare to nuke the United States with missiles and bombers. The war gamers call the eventual Russian bomber attack on Alaska and the continental United States "non-doctrinal," that is, physically impossible and implausible, but necessary in the war game in order to practice air intercepts and achieve victory for the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD).

Herein lies the corrupt nature of this kind of war gaming. Everything but the kitchen sink is thrown in to improve the "play" and stress the days of the hundreds of gamers -- a decline in U.S.-Russian relations, war with North Korea, ballistic missile defenses, terrorist attacks, cyber warfare, evacuation of Washington. The "simultaneous" Armageddons become what military wags often call a "self-licking ice cream cone," that is, self-indulgent confirmation of questionable assumptions. The real effect of all of this is merely to justify weapons, levels of spending, and the policies that are being pursued, not to "test" them.

It isn't as if a return to the Cold War isn't possible with Russia; it is. Thoughout the Clinton and Bush administrations though, United States national policy has been to intentionally ignore thousands of Russian nuclear weapons as a threat and accept that democracy and stability in the former core of the Soviet Union is more or less permanent. It is a risk, but a national decision was taken not to just mindlessly pursue the old "to have peace prepare for war" adage. When it comes to Russia, there is a clear recognition that there are things that can be done on a day-to-day basis to create stability and reduce mistrust and that these things all just as valuable as maintaining missiles on 30 minute alert.

So Russia with thousands of nuclear weapons is not a threat because the U.S. national security strategy says it is not, whereas comparatively puny North Korea and Iran are threats? Again, it isn't as if North Korea and Iran don't mean the United States harm, it is just that in order to justify our over-abundance of strategic nuclear weapons, ballistic missile defenses, and even conventional military might, war gamers have to invent capabilities to fit.

The Slomonian exercise scenarios being used for Vigilant Shield-Global Lightning-Global Storm-Positive Response are by no means unique to the Bush administration. In fact, the only thing surprising about these exercises is that the country being used to justify all of this isn't China. But then Russia is the only country other than the United States that has more than a few hundred nuclear weapons. Russia is thus the only justification for the United States to continue to possess thousands of its own nuclear weapons and do nothing to continue to pursue the process of disarmament.

These days, Pentagon big thinkers are desperately seeking to frame China as the future threat, the "peer competitor" that will keep the U.S. military afloat after Iraq. Chinese intentions towards the United States aren't important in this process. Instead, war planners posit economic and demographic trends to show that China will have increased resources to build up its nuclear might and pursue military domination some time in the future. By using Russian forces in war games, future and much more robust Chinese capabilities can be tested.

And tested they are. The Slomonia exercises include not just nuclear warfare and ballistic missile defenses, but also "full spectrum" U.S. information and special operations -- computer network attack and exploitation, directed energy attacks, disablement of Russian satellites and missiles --- to test future methods of perfecting a disarming first strike capability.

Russia loses. "Adaptive" U.S. nuclear war planning, American technological superiority, ballistic missile defenses, cyber warfare, and Top Secret U.S. methods all prevail. On November 10, Moscow is scheduled to "sue for peace," no muss, no fuss.

By William M. Arkin | October 31, 2005; 11:06 AM ET | Category: Code Name of the Week, War Games Previous: Libby's Resignation:


i wish this would happen in my life time, an 16 but that is not an exception. i must see the power that russia has in my life time i must see the world cruble on the super powers, i must see the U.S. take on countries it's on size, i must see russia exceed the U.s, i must see every nation bow down to the next great nation, i must see the power of the atomic bomb, i must live, i must see "WORLD WAR III."

Posted by: great | Oct 31, 2005 7:18:50 PM

Mr. Arkin, does a war game command this much of your column? You should know war games have been done for hundreds of years and a huge one between Russia and China was just completed where they used 10's of thousands of troops and practiced attacking stand-ins for American aircraft carriers. Why do you spend this kind of high visibility column space insinuating American Stranglovian tendencies, when America was the victim of a far larger war game scenario, not 2 months ago.

If anyone is a unreconstructed Cold Warrior, I think its one William Arkin.

One final point Mr. Arkin. Last I counted, there were more countries in 2005 with Nuclear weapons than in 2004. Probably in 2006 there will be more than in 2005. The wheel continues to turn. Presumably you seek some future time when the USA disposes of its thousands of war heads while the rest of the world re-arms, aided by a underground proliferation networks run by North Korea, Pakistan, Iran, Russia and China? Come to think of it, maybe its a blessing you are confined to column space rather than decision space.

Posted by: Can'tBelieveIt | Oct 31, 2005 6:49:58 PM

Right. This is definitely an attention grabber. What about "Joshua still playing" or something.

Posted by: El Tonno | Oct 31, 2005 4:37:15 PM

A question for Mr Arkin:

Why is no one talking about the real issue in the Valerie Plame affair--i.e., Why has Scooter Libby held an extremely sensitive job and high level clearances in the White House for the past two years??

The Ignorant news media seems to think that investigations of SCI security breaches are handled by two year long grand jury investigations --they are not.

You know how SCI info is handled. What's going on? This Valerie Plame "investigation" makes no sense.

Exposure of a covert CIA agent should have kicked off a security investigation. The list of people who could have revealed that information should have been short. Anyone having SCI clearances--including Dick Cheney -- who had knowledge that Libby might had leaked Valerie Plame's name had an affirmative OBLIGATION to report that adverse info to security officers. In the case of WHite House and CIA employees, they stood to lose their own clearances if they failed to report adverse info on Libby.

It should have taken no more than 2-3 weeks to pinpoint Libby and to have demanded that he take a polygraph.

I can see why Fitzgerald's long legal investigation was needed to pursue a criminal prosecution -- but investigating and resolving breaches of security do NOT follow those leisurely processes nor are security investigations constrained by legal rules which govern criminal prosecutions.

Security clearances can be revoked anytime there is a question whether someone is trustworthy. No one has a right to the clearances. While one is presumed innocent until proven guilty in criminal prosecutions, the opposite rule is often followed when it comes to keeping security clearances -- the holder is required to show that he should continue to be trusted with SCI info.

One may refuse to answer questions in a criminal case -- one is REQUIRED to answer questions under a polygraph to keep security clearances. I can see how Libby could have taken the Fifth and refused to take a polygraph. But at that point --say 1 month after Valerie Plame's name was revealed -- he should have had his security clearances revoked and been escorted out of the WHite House --absent a direct intervention by the President. Why did that NOT happen 2 years ago??

On the other hand, if the President adjudicated the case and decided that Libby had simply made a mistake, then why was the Fitzgerald investigation continued?

The only way this Fitzgerald process make sense to me is if the White House is concerned that Libby has done something else other than outing Mrs Wilson, he has refused to cooperate/provide info about the other matter, and they are using this criminal prosecution as a way to squeeze him to answer questions/cooperate in the investigation of the other matter. But if they had questions about his trustworthiness, they would not have left him in the White House all this time --even under intense surveillance -- would they?


Posted by: Don Williams | Oct 31, 2005 3:13:52 PM

Actually, I think what is "stupid" is pursuing a psychopathic foreign policy that encourages Russia to consider another Cold War -- in self defense.

And the mainstream media headlines that irritate me are the ones that ignore our real problems/issues in favor of the latest from the Michael Jackson trial.

Posted by: Don Williams | Oct 31, 2005 3:03:31 PM

Arkin:

Stop playing with reality and promoting these 'games' of yours. It will only lead to tensions between the West and Russia. Fool.

VH

Posted by: Vladimir Helsinkov | Oct 31, 2005 3:00:53 PM

Eisenhower warned us to be careful of the military-industrial complex. perhaps now it is too late, and the real armageddon, the one where Jesus comes back will in effect be here, and the main cause? american military-industrial power-hungry, money-making corporations and politicians.

Posted by: Dan Dubei | Oct 31, 2005 2:58:59 PM

Gentlemen:

I find it offensive for you to use a headline like"Russia to Nuke U.S." What are you trying to do stir up war? We glorify war enough without you trying to agitate anymore.

It is stupid to use such headlines. Why do you do it?

Posted by: James W. Wilder | Oct 31, 2005 2:44:56 PM


More Madness - Alabama Gets the Bomb

WebEarly Warning William M. Arkin on National and Homeland Security Nuclear War in ... Alabama

Code Name of the Week: Global Lightning

When Alabama gets the bomb... I don't know about you, but when I was growing up, Tom Lehrer's song "Who's Next" always brought a smile to my face.

Next month, Alabama gets the bomb. Well, Alabama gets bombed.

It's North Korea who's next. They get nuked.

It's all part of a classified military exercise slated to begin November 1, an exercise that, with the inclusion of North Korea and a terrorist attack in the United States, suggests up-to-the-minute relevance. In truth, though, the exercise replays the same tired Cold War global nuclear war game that has been the bread and butter of the U.S. military for decades.

The dastardly country of Purple, or maybe it's a terrorist organization aligned with Purple -- the script doesn't say for sure -- detonates a radiological dispersal device (or "dirty" nuclear bomb) onboard a merchant ship located on the Mobile waterfront. The President is in Mobile, leading a summit of world leaders addressing a tense escalation of global tensions.


The Alabama nuclear "event" kicks off the scenario for Vigilant Shield, a U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) exercise that is one in a series of national military exercises scheduled for the first ten days of November. The nuclear warfare component of these exercises -- called Global Lightning, and sponsored by U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM) in Omaha -- runs at the same time and will rehearse a nuclear war with North Korea.

In the exercise, Purple is a Northeast Asian nation thinly veiled as North Korea.

According to military documents and sources involved in the classified scenario writing for Vigilant Shield and Global Lightning, North Korea, which is posited to possess nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles to deliver them, becomes embroiled in the worldwide crisis, eventually launching a first strike attack against the United States with a number of intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs).

Though Vigilant Shield is officially a "homeland security" exercise, the focus is military and federal government "consequence management" after spectacular terrorist and North Korea nuclear strikes, and the resulting, not kidding, global nuclear war.

I've already written about how NORTHCOM will do just about anything to be relevant to the "global war on terrorism" and not dirty itself in the pedestrian missions associated with natural disasters.

Scratch the surface of Vigilant Shield and it's clear that fighting the war on terrorism domestically is only fun when it is part of the senior varsity of administration interest: global nuclear war. In addition to the North Korean missile attack, as best I can piece together, the Vigilant Shield scenario includes the administration and Rumsfeld favorite ballistic missile defenses (trying to) shoot down incoming missiles, implementation of continuity of operations plans and evacuation to alternative command posts, mobilization of the 18-wheeler mobile command center to test emergency Presidential communications, the intercept of Soviet-like long-range bombers entering U.S. and Canadian airspace, and military "consequence management" after missiles land on Washington. There are a few modern day twists -- terrorist attacks, cyber warfare or what the military calls "information operations."

Global Lightning practices the American nuclear retaliation after Vigilant Shield. This year's is the second of an annual exercise series allowing the Omaha-based command to flex bigger muscles assigned by President Bush. In 2003, the President assigned STRATCOM overarching responsibility for missile defenses, "strategic" information warfare in support of national operations, and global strike missions -- nuclear and conventional.

Global Lightning exercises, according to STRATCOM documents, practices "nuclear combat readiness, proficiency and training" and "provides a bridging exercise between nuclear and non-nuclear forces." In other words, it practices escalation from conventional to nuclear war and implementation of the Bush administration's new global strike war plan, named CONPLAN 8022.

When the first Global Lightning was held in October 2004, The Shreveport Times reported B-52 bombers from nearby Barksdale air force base practicing minimum-interval take-offs, where 13 bombers took off within a minute or less of one another.

Emergency launches of bombers held on 24/7 alert were once quite common during the Cold War, but ever since the first Iraq war in 1991, when bombers were enlisted as the centerpiece of U.S. conventional bombing, the practice of "flushing" bombers to fight make believe nuclear wars became more and more infrequent.

Now the Bush administration has revived the old practice, building the capacity for the military to respond to an instant order to conduct a preemptive strike.

(Next week, no kidding: How Ukraine Starts World War III)

By William M. Arkin | October 21, 2005; 12:26 PM ET | Category: Code Name of the Week, Nuclear Weapons


Informant: FoE Sydney - Nuclear Campaign

http://www.WantToKnow.info/051031intelligencewarfabrication


Informant: Martin Greenhut

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/1031-03.htm



Washington hid damaging Vietnam finding

By Scott Shane in Washington

The US National Security Agency has kept secret a 2001 finding by its own historian that its officers deliberately distorted critical intelligence during the Tonkin Gulf episode that helped precipitate the Vietnam War. The historian's conclusion was the first serious accusation that the agency's intercepts were falsified to support the belief North Vietnamese ships attacked US destroyers on August 4, 1964, two days after a previous clash.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10836.htm

by John Chuckman

The following quotes are from Bush's speech about the War on Terror, as given October 6, 2005, and largely repeated October 28. It was a speech especially dense with Bushspeak, a dialect which never means what it seems to say. Perspective and the occasional translation follow the quotes...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Chuckman1031.htm

Hey Harkavy!
by Sheila Samples

Remember the "Hey, Mikey" TV commercial with two brothers refusing to eat Quaker Oats' new Life cereal until their little brother, Mikey, who supposedly "hates everything" tried it first? Well, I'm not saying I get up every morning and yell, "Hey, Harkavy!" to see what's really happening in the news without all the commercial spin -- but I'm not saying I don't either. Either way, there's no better place to start your morning than with the peerless Ward Harkavy and his Village Voice blog, the "Bush Beat." In his "Morning Report" on Tuesday, Harkavy said, "It's kind of a horse race: Will Harriet Miers withdraw before Patrick Fitzgerald draws on her bosses? The White House needs to clear the decks for possible Plamegate indictments, and Miers will be needed to shuffle papers for George W. Bush's handlers. My money is on the nag to pull out before Fitzgerald pulls up in front of the White House, because everyone knows she can't make the weight." And last Thursday Harkavy wrote..."George W. Bush's handlers have finally put Harriet Miers out of our misery. She just now withdrew her name as a nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court." Harkavy's right. Not necessarily about Miers being a "nag" but, with the Fitzgerald storm clouds gathering on the dashboard of Bush's White House, the "cabal" -- as this bunch laughingly dubbed themselves early in this misadministration -- will need every lawyer it can hog-tie and drag into service...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Samples1031.htm

by Norman Solomon

Alot of media outlets are now scrutinizing some of the lies told by the Bush administration before the invasion of Iraq. Yet the same news organizations are bypassing their own key roles in the marketing of those lies. A case in point is the New York Times. On Oct. 29, hours after the indictment of Lewis Libby, the lead editorial of the Times ended by declaring that “the big point Americans need to keep in mind is this: There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.” On Oct. 30, the Times columnist Frank Rich referred to “Colin Powell’s notorious presentation of WMD ‘evidence’ to the UN on the eve of war.” And so it goes in the opinion section of the New York Times. There’s now eagerness to blast the Bush administration for some aspects of false prewar propaganda -- while the newspaper continues to dodge its own crucial role in promoting that propaganda...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Solomon1031-2.htm

by Mike Whitney

Lost in the hubbub surrounding the “outing” of Valerie Plame is the story of Plame’s CIA front company, Brewster Jennings and Associates. B.J. & A was based in Boston and was “intended to infiltrate ties between groups involved in smuggling nuclear weapons. Since NOCs (CIA agents under non-official cover) usually work at companies set up by the CIA as fronts, it has been speculated that other employees of the company may have been doing work similar to Plame. If that were true, the damage done by leaking Plame’s name would be vastly multiplied, as all the other NOC’s would be compromised” (Wikipedia) The fact that the Bush administration’s highest ranking officials deliberately endangered national security to pursue a personal vendetta is alarming, but equally disturbing is the fact that their behavior has greatly enhanced the likelihood of nuclear weapons proliferation. By outing Valerie Plame the administration has exposed the war on terror as a fraud. Brewster Jennings and Associates was a vital part of the United States’ covert strategy to fight the spread of WMD. Cheney and his lieutenants intentionally sabotaged that operation in an effort to destroy a personal enemy of the Bush White House. Their action has put us all at greater risk...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Whitney1031.htm

by Jason Leopold

Now it’s about the Niger forgeries. On Friday, after securing a five-count criminal indictment against Vice President Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, for lying to a grand jury about what he knew and when he knew it in regard to the outing of a covert CIA agent, Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald plans to pursue broader conspiracy charges against Cheney senior White House officials, and top officials at the State Department and the National Security Council, that may finally shed light on how the Bush administration came to use erroneous intelligence that claimed Iraq tried to purchase yellowcake uranium from Niger, lawyers involved in the two year old investigation said. While many federal officials and the media have long speculated that Fitzgerald was not only looking into the identity of administration officials who leaked undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson to a handful of reporters, it was only recently that those rumors were confirmed...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Leopold1031.htm

by Patricia Goldsmith

On Thursday, October 27, the impending indictment of Scooter Libby was the second story in a lot of news broadcasts and papers. The lead was the withdrawal of Harriet Miers’ nomination to the Supreme Court. The timing was no accident, of course, but the larger truth is that Miers was simply unacceptable to a rightwing base that has been eating bloody red meat with respect to the courts since the Terri Schiavo case and Justice Sunday earlier this year. William Kristol's reaction on the first day of Miers’ nomination: “disappointed, depressed, demoralized.” Phyllis Schlafly concurred: “[O]ur disappointment is acute.” As a result of the wingnuts’ severe displeasure, a new word has even been coined. If to “get ‘borked’ was ‘to be unscrupulously torpedoed by an opponent . . . to get ‘miered’ [i]s to be ‘unscrupulously torpedoed by an ally.’” The solution, according to uber-Republican Richard Viguerie, is simple: “At 38 to 39 percent support in the polls, the main thing [Bush] needs is a fight, an ideological battle to energize his supporters. He needs to pick someone who will drive Ted Kennedy up the wall.” As far as Viguerie is concerned, Miers’ withdrawal has already pumped up the base. It’s not often that you go toe to toe with the president of the United States of your own party and beat him,” he said. “It is very satisfying.”...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Goldsmith1031.htm

by Ken Sanders

While reading through the latest issue of Harper's Magazine, I came across excerpts from the more than 750 editorial changes proposed by Ambassador John Bolton, on behalf of the United States, to a draft of the Outcome Document on United Nations Reform . The purpose of the Outcome Document was to delineate the various areas of the UN that Member States, particularly the US, hope to change. The redactions and additions proposed (demanded?) by the US were startling in their implications. Based on the proposed changes, it would appear that the US wants to be able to target and deliberately kill civilians, encourage all but the worst forms of child labor, and make sure that no one does anything to meaningfully address nuclear proliferation, among other things...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct05/Sanders1031.htm

A NY Times editorial today applauds the UN for supporting Washington's demands against Syria, saying: "The killing of Mr. Hariri and 22 others was an act of international terrorism and a blatant intervention in the political life of a sovereign state." http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/01/opinion/01tues2.html

And of course the killing of hundreds of thousands of children in Iraq through sanctions and tens of thousands by bombs and bullets was not international terrorism. And the sanctions and wars were not "blatant intervention[s] in the political life of a sovereign state."

This is not just a matter of pointing out our rulers' hypocrisy. We all know every single Democrat of any stature in the party will echo the Times' rhetoric, facilitating succeeding acts of aggression by Bush, proving once again that the Democratic Party is not too cowardly to oppose Bush's warmongering -- they AGREE with it.

That's why, by the way, their joy at the Libby indictment is expressed solely around his getting caught for telling lies NOT because they disagree with the war crimes he was defending with those lies.

Remember all this when the 2006 Congressional elections come and liberals in the antiwar movement tell you to stop organizing and start hustling votes for Democrats.

Andrew Pollack


UNITED FOR PEACE & JUSTICE | 212-868-5545


From ufpj-news

http://www.ufppc.org/content/view/3574/


Informant: jensenmk

From ufpj-news

THE WORLD CAN'T WAIT: Hold a Vigil or Rally Against Bush on Tuesday November 2nd is the one-year anniversary of the election. Numerous organizations are working together to create vigils and rallies around the country against the war and against the Bush regime. Go here to get involved:

http://www.worldcantwait.net

EXPOSE THE WHIG!

Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (D-OH) has introduced a Resolution of Inquiry to demand the White House turn over all white papers, minutes, notes, emails or other communications kept by the White House Iraq Group (WHIG).

"This group, comprised of the President and Vice President's top aides, was critical in selling the Administration's case for war," Kucinich said. "We now know that the Administration hyped intelligence and misled the American public and Congress in their effort to 'sell' the war."

This Resolution must be voted on in the House International Relations Committee by November 9th, 2005. The same committee, on September 14, came within one vote of passing a Resolution of Inquiry into the Downing Street Memo (H. Res. 375).

That near victory came after a great deal of citizen activism. This time we need to persuade all of the Democrats on the Committee to push a little bit harder and a few more Republicans to do the right thing. Co-Sponsorship of the Resolution by members not on the committee helps this effort.

Email Your Congress Member:
http://www.democrats.com/peoplesemailnetwork/72

More Information and How to Get Involved:
http://www.AfterDowningStreet.org/whig

SEND CONGRESS SOME SPINE

After Downing Street is working with the BackBone Campaign to encourage Congress Members to cosponsor a Resolution of Inquiry into the White House Iraq Group.

Click here to download a Spine Postcard PDF to print (preferably on cardstock) and send to your Congress member.

Or visit the Spine Card page.
http://backbonecampaign.org/page.cfm?id=67


BONIFAZ MAY RUN FOR MASS. SECRETARY OF STATE

Constitutional attorney John Bonifaz is a co-founder of AfterDowningStreet.org and the author of Warrior King: The Case for Impeaching George Bush. He has worked tirelessly to protect voting rights as founder of the National Voting Rights Institute, which played a crucial role in the Ohio recount battle in 2004. Visit his web site to learn about his exploratory campaign for Massachusetts Secretary of State. http://www.johnbonifaz.com/


AFTER DOWNING STREET NEWS

More "Precision Strikes", More Dead Iraqi Children Who Won't Be Counted By Eli Stephens
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4255

Indicting America By Scott Ritter
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4254

Rep. Henry Waxman Renews Request for Hearings on Leak Case
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4251

Bush Should Ask for Karl Rove's Resignation Over CIA Leak By Larry Johnson

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4249

Impeachment Time: Grab the Torches and Pitchforks! By Dave Lindorff

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4247

Rep. Jerry Nadler Demands Judiciary Hearings on White House Effort to Market the War
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4245

After the Libby Indictment, the Press Is Acquitting Itself By Norman Solomon

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4241

The Libby Indictment By Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4233

Oedipus Tyrannus Wrecked By Jane Hamsher
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4220

The White House Criminal Conspiracy By TomDispatch and The Nation

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4218

Official A is Rove By Associated Press
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4177

Writing in an Age of Terror By David Swanson
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4173

One Down, 28 to Go By TomPaine.com
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4170

Reading List on War Lies By Dahlia Wasfi
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4166

What Did the President and Vice President Know and When Did They Know It? By Congressman John Conyers
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4154

Taking A Candle To The White House! By Scott Goodstein
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4137

Impeach Bush? By Jim Hightower
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4133

October 26th By Cindy Sheehan
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4104

Film of White House Vigil Wednesday Night
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4100

Conyers Responds to Gonzales
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4089

Why I'm Getting Arrested at the White House Today By David Swanson

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4050

Bush in 1999: Lies Are Impeachable By TalkLeft
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4055

Sign My Letter to Bush Demanding No Pardons for Treasongate By Congressman John Conyers
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4053

Show The War, Tell The Truth Campaign By Danny Schechter
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4051

No U.S. Coverage of Iraq Vote Fraud By Tom Hayden
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4042

Bush Crimes Commission
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4040

Rep. McGovern to Introduce Bill Ending Funding for Iraq War
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=funding

POWER POINT Here is an excellent Powerpoint presentation prepared by Michael Smith, the British reporter who originally broke the story of the Downing Street Memo. http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/4153



http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=impeach
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Downing+Street+Memo

http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=95069;show_parent=1



http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=impeach
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Downing+Street+Memo

http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=95058;show_parent=1

VETERANS MUST DEMAND FOR CRIMINAL INVESTIGATIONS
http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=95063;show_parent=1

Posted on Mon, Oct. 31, 2005

Cheney's new security adviser linked to bogus information on Iraq

BY JONATHAN S. LANDAY AND WARREN P. STROBEL

Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney replaced I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby as his national security adviser on Monday with an aide identified by a former Iraqi exile group as the White House official to whom it fed information on Iraq that turned out to be erroneous.

The Bush administration relied on some of the information from the Iraqi National Congress to argue that Saddam Hussein had to be ousted before he could give banned biological or chemical weapons to al-Qaida for strikes on the United States.

But no such weapons were discovered after the March 2003 invasion, and U.S. intelligence agencies and the independent commission on the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks found no evidence of operational cooperation between Iraq and al-Qaida.

The White House announced on Monday the elevation of John Hannah to replace Libby as Cheney's national security adviser. Earlier in the day it announced that Libby would be arraigned Thursday in federal court on charges of perjury, making false statements and obstruction of justice. He was expected to plead innocent.

The White House also announced that David S. Addington, who's been Cheney's legal counsel, would assume Libby's duties as chief of staff. Like Hannah, Addington has played a quiet, though influential, role in the vice president's office. The Washington director of Human Rights Watch accused Addington of helping draft policies that led to the abuse of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The vice president's office has previously denied that Hannah received INC information. Cheney's office didn't respond immediately to questions Monday about Hannah and Addington.

The INC's leader, Ahmad Chalabi, now a deputy prime minister in Iraq, was close to Cheney and other senior administration architects of the invasion. The INC supplied Iraqi defectors whose information turned out to be false. It has insisted that it tried its best to verify defectors' claims before passing them to the United States.

On June 26, 2002, the INC wrote a letter to the Senate Appropriations Committee staff identifying Hannah as the White House recipient of information gathered by the group through a U.S.-funded effort called the Information Collection Program. Knight Ridder obtained a copy of the letter and previously reported on it.

The letter, written by Entifadh Qanbar, then the director of the INC's Washington office, identified 108 articles in leading Western news media to which it said the INC had funneled the same information that it fed to Hannah, as well as a senior Pentagon official.

The information included a claim by an INC-supplied defector, Adnan Ihsan al-Haideri, that he had visited 20 secret nuclear, biological and chemical warfare facilities in Iraq.

Haideri's claim first appeared in a Dec. 20, 2001, article in The New York Times and then in a White House background paper, "A Decade of Deception and Defiance," released in conjunction with a Sept. 12, 2002, speech to the U.N. General Assembly by Bush.

Haideri, however, showed deception in a CIA-administered lie detector test three days before The New York Times article appeared, and was unable to identify a single illicit arms facility when he accompanied U.S. weapons inspectors to Iraq in January 2004, Knight Ridder reported in May of last year.

The White House background paper also cited INC-produced defectors' claims that Saddam ran a terrorist training camp outside Baghdad in Salman Pak where Iraqi and non-Iraqi Islamic extremists were schooled in assassination, sabotage and the hijacking of aircraft and trains.

After the war, U.S. officials determined that a facility in Salman Pak was used to train Iraqi anti-terrorist commandos.

Addington has been a key player behind widely criticized U.S. policies that have led to torture and other abuse of detainees held in Afghanistan and Iraq, according to Tom Malinowski, Washington director of Human Rights Watch.

He reportedly helped draft an opinion by then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales stating that the Geneva Convention didn't apply to some detainees in the war on terrorism.

"This was somebody who worked very hard to make sure the advice of senior military officials and national security professionals on the question of interrogation policies was ignored," Malinowski said. "The result was an unmitigated disaster for the United States."

Libby was both Cheney's chief of staff and national security adviser. He was accused of lying in a two-year grand jury investigation into the leaking to journalists of the identity of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame in 2003.

The leak came after her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accused President Bush of misleading the nation by alleging in January 2003 that Iraq had tried to buy uranium ore, the feedstock of nuclear weapons, from the African nation of Niger.

Wilson visited Niger a year earlier at the CIA's request and found no substance to the allegation.

© 2005, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/13046064.htm


Informant: John Calvert

http://www.ufppc.org/content/view/3573/


Informant: jensenmk

From ufpj-news