http://thinkprogress.org/2005/11/16/tortureisnotus/


Informant: Andrea Ball

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2005/1115/1?rss=1


Informant: NHNE

David Corn: In a Veterans Day speech on Friday, George W. Bush veered from the usual commemoration of sacrifice to strike at critics who have questioned whether he steered the country into war by using false information. While accusing his critics of falsifying history, Bush never conceded that he launched the war on a false premise - that Saddam Hussein was up to his neck in WMDs - and, thus, as he paid tribute to veterans of this war and others, he did not accept responsibility for sending American troops into battle for a cause that did not exist.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505G.shtml

Though the medieval-looking church exudes serenity and other-worldliness, the 3,500-member congregation has been speaking out on controversial issues since an All Saints rector protested the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. That tradition continues, with the recent disclosure that the IRS is threatening the church's tax-exempt status because of an anti-war sermon there last year.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505F.shtml

At a time when the Bush administration is furiously parrying a new round of accusations that it exaggerated the threat from Saddam Hussein in leading the nation to war, the imagery on Monday was startling. There was Ahmad Chalabi - who, as a leader of Iraqi exiles before the war, funneled what proved to be inaccurate information about Mr. Hussein's weapons programs to the United States - being whisked into meetings with Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505E.shtml

The race for New Jersey governor between the multimillionaires was supposed to be a tight one, or so the final polls said before Tuesday's election. But Douglas R. Forrester, a Republican, lost by a wide margin to Senator Jon S. Corzine, a Democrat, and the chief reason, Mr. Forrester now says, is President Bush's unpopularity.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505D.shtml

The American government, which claims to lead a campaign against terror so that democracy and freedom may triumph in the world, is ever more often forced to explain itself about the way its agents treat prisoners. Arbitrary detentions, secret prisons, torture: accusations against the United States pile up.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505B.shtml

Halliburton and its subcontractors hired hundreds of undocumented Latino workers to clean up after Katrina - only to mistreat them and throw them out without pay.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505A.shtml

Why You Need to Read this Pamphlet:

Today, we confront a government whose greed and thirst for power has deceived us into war, deserted thousands of us in a time of need knowing the devastation about to happen, and continued to fail us as we pleaded for help.

http://missionnotaccomplished.us/WTPv17n.pdf


From Information Clearing House

The man who leaked thousands of pages of top secret documents to the media in 1971 to expose the U.S. government's handling of the Vietnam War warned Saturday that another terrorist attack could permanently damage civil liberties.

http://tinyurl.com/dmp2r


From Information Clearing House

The proposed protective order, which was agreed to by Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, would cover grand jury transcripts, witness statements and a wide range of other documents involved in the case. Any leaks could result in civil and criminal fines, the order warns.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051115/pl_nm/bush_leak_dc


From Information Clearing House

The analogy the administration is using for this invasion? Cambodia, which the Nixon administration accused of harboring North Vietnamese troops during the war in Southeast Asia.

http://www.counterpunch.com/hallinan11142005.html


From Information Clearing House

The return to civilian life for U.S. Soldiers deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan is full of pitfalls, with an unemployment rate three times the national average.

http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,80320,00.html


From Information Clearing House

There is great ignorance of the war on Iraq within the British population. Many perceive Blair as a liar and can rightly guess that he pulled pretexts out of thin air to justify it?

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11002.htm

According to Congressional records, George W. Bush's out-of-control spending spree has cost YOU PERSONALLY at least $27,666 since he took over the White House in 2001.

http://tinyurl.com/9xn3m


From Information Clearing House

More than 35,000 Iraqis have been detained by American troops since the invasion of the country but only a tiny fraction have been convicted of wrongdoing.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1642816,00.html


From Information Clearing House

The United Nations has reported that the US military in Iraq is detaining people faster than a new board can review their cases to determine whether their rights are being respected.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/B08A367C-3F80-4AA8-B250-A78786E6ACFD.htm


From Information Clearing House

"Such actions are contrary to international law governing armed conflict and in any event they constitute a denial of the protection of international human rights law," the report said.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2005-11-14-iraq-un_x.htm?POE=NEWISVA


From Information Clearing House

Video

How the U.S. military occupation looks from the other end of the gun barrel. On the ground footage shows the humiliation and dehumanization, inevitable in a colonial situation.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8055.htm

By Steven E. Jones
Department of Physics and Astronomy.
Brigham Young University

In writing this paper, I call for a serious investigation of the hypothesis that WTC 7 and the Twin Towers were brought down, not just by damage and fires, but through the use of pre-positioned explosives.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11017.htm

· 42 operatives traced going through Palma airport
· Names unearthed match Italian and German inquiries

By Giles Tremlett in Madrid

Spanish police have traced up to 42 suspected CIA operatives believed to have taken part in secret flights carrying detained or kidnapped Islamist terror suspects to interrogation centres and jails in Afghanistan, Egypt and elsewhere.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11013.htm

Kahlschlag: Protest gegen Urwaldvernichtung vor der finnischen Botschaft (16.11.05)

Greenpeace-Aktivisten brachten heute die Urwaldzerstörung aus Finnland nach Berlin. Vor die finnische Botschaft legen die Umweltschützer 15 Kubikmeter Astwerk aus einem abgeholzten Urwald. Auf einem Transparent stand: "Schützt Finnlands Urwälder - kein Papier und Holz aus Urwaldzerstörung". Der Grund für die Aktion: Die finnische Regierung lässt die letzten Urwälder im Norden des Landes weiter abholzen. Seit Anfang Oktober fällt das staatliche finnische Forstamt Metsähallitus nahe des Inari-Sees in Nordfinnland wieder im Urwald. Greenpeace Untersuchungen haben ergeben, dass der Einschlag im Urwaldsogar gesetzlich geschützte Arten zerstört, wie seltene Baumpilze. Deutschland ist Finnlands wichtigster Abnehmer des aus diesem Urwaldholz hergestellten Papiers.

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12315

Öffentliche Unternehmen und Gremien: Datenschützer fordern Offenlegung von Funktionärs-Bezügen (16.11.05)

Mitglieder öffentlicher Gremien und Funktionsträger dem Staat gehörender Unternehmen sollen nach Ansicht der Informationsfreiheitsbeauftragten Deutschlands ihre Aktivitäten und Bezüge offenlegen müssen. Auf ihrer Sitzung am Montag beschlossen die Datenschutzbeauftragten aus den Ländern, in denen es bereits ein Informationsfreiheitsgesetz gibt, zwei entsprechende Entschließungen. Sie forderten Bundes- und Landesgesetzgeber auf, "mehr Transparenz in den öffentlichen Unternehmen zu schaffen".

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12305

Tag "Journalisten hinter Gittern": Derzeit 186 Journalisten im Gefängnis (16.11.05)

Anlässlich des internationalen Tags "Journalisten hinter Gittern" am Mittwoch hat die Menschenrechtsorganisation Reporter ohne Grenzen die Regierungen verschiedener Länder aufgerufen, die in ihren Ländern inhaftierten Journalisten freizulassen. Weltweit seien derzeit 186 Medienleute im Gefängnis, weil sie ihren Job erledigt haben, hunderte seien in diesem Jahr vorrübergehend festgenommen worden. Vor allem wer über Machtmissbrauch, Korruption oder Drogenhandel berichte, lebe gefährlich.

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12308

"Shell schafft Tatsachen": Umweltschützer gegen Öl- und Gasausbeutung in Russland (16.11.05)

Anlässlich der Beratungen des Verwaltungsrats der Osteuropabank über das Öl- und Gasprojekt Sakhalin II im fernen russischen Osten veröffentlichten Umweltschutzorganisationen die aus ihrer Sicht "10 wichtigsten Gründe", warum die Osteuropabank (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, EBRD) das Projekt nicht fördern sollte. Wahrend das Projekt noch in Diskussion sei, schaffe der Ölkonzern Shell Tatsachen.

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12304

In Laboratorien: "2.265.489 Versuchstiere zu Forschungszwecken verbraucht" (16.11.05)

Der Deutsche Tierschutzbund beklagt, dass auch 2004 die Versuchstierzahlen in Deutschland weiter angestiegen seien. Dies belege die Bilanz der Versuchstierstatistik des Bundesministeriums für Verbraucherschutz, Ernährung und Landwirtschaft. Nach dieser seien 2.265.489 Tiere zu Forschungszwecken und somit 153.000 mehr als im Vorjahr "verbraucht" worden. Die Gentechnologie sei offenbar auch bei Tierversuchen "eine neue Spielwiese für die Wissenschaft". Eine Expertengruppe des Verbraucherschutzministeriums versucht weiterhin, Alternativmethoden zu den Tierversuchen "ausfindig zu machen".

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12301

Urgent:

Culling elephants in Kruger National Park lacks scientific justification. There are more humane options.

Thousands of elephants in South Africa’s Kruger National Park need your help.

The largest land mammal on earth, elephants are extremely intelligent, social and grieve tremendously for the loss of family members. Can you imagine these majestic creatures being herded into family groups by helicopters, and then shot in the head by marksmen?

This population control measure by lethal means (called a cull) is exactly what is being proposed by South Africa National Parks (SANParks) in order to protect the vegetation of the park from a perceived overpopulation of elephants. But culling is a cruel, unethical and scientifically unsound practice that does not consider the welfare implications to elephant society as a whole, which is why it has been banned in South Africa since an international outcry halted the practice in 1994.

Speak out against the mass killings of elephants now
http://www.kintera.org/TR.asp?ID=M712347919936594321133665

Culling has been heavily criticised by many independent scientists, some of whom are considered to be the most reputable scientists working on elephant biology and population dynamics in Southern Africa. Very little is actually known about the impacts that elephants are having on biodiversity in the Park. Published ‘evidence’ of the destruction caused by elephants comes from non-scientists and is based largely on observation.

There is a better way. A way that relies on nature itself to manage elephant populations and reduce any impact large elephant herds could potentially have on vegetation in national parks.

By allowing a greater migration of elephant groups between parks and countries in southern Africa, i.e. the creation of a network of connected protected areas or ‘megaparks,’ elephant populations can be managed by natural forces such as drought. In fact, Kruger is already part of a trans-boundary initiative linking it to national parks in Mozambique and eventually Zimbabwe.

We have squeezed elephants into small reserves in which, in many cases, the natural factors controlling elephant populations can no longer operate. A series of conservation networks that include differing landscapes and conditions — some ideal and some non-ideal for elephants — can restore conditions that give rise to natural mortalities. Elephants would benefit, people would benefit and so would the revenues raised by tourists wanting to view the magnificent sight of herds of roaming elephants.

No proof means NO CULL

Sound science should be informing the management of the Kruger National Park. By dealing with elephants in short-term isolation, SANParks is not considering a holistic approach to the management of the Park’s resources. A cull will also tarnish South Africa’s image as a reputable wildlife destination.

The Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism is due to make a final decision on elephant culling by the end of the year. That’s why we need you to send South Africa a message urging the government to reject culling elephants in Kruger National Park right now.

http://www.kintera.org/TR.asp?ID=M712347929936594321133665

It is said that elephants never forget. Let’s make sure South Africa doesn’t forget why it banned the culling of elephants in the first place.

Thanks for all you do,

Fred O’Regan President and CEO

P.S. Culling elephants in Kruger National Park is a quick-fix solution for reducing elephant populations that lacks scientific justification. There are more humane options, such as contraception and larger migratory boundaries, yet to be fully explored. Please speak out now to stop the mass slaughter of these highly intelligent and emotional creatures.

http://www.kintera.org/TR.asp?ID=M712347939936594321133665

IFAW © 2005

From: Eileen O'Connor
Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2005 19:01:43 -0000
Subject: Alex Markham Head of Cancer Research comments in Guardian

News Report

Surge in consumption criticised as oral cancer cases increase

James Meikle, health correspondent Wednesday November 16, 2005 The Guardian

Surging alcohol consumption has contributed to a 25% rise in cases of oral cancer over the past 10 years, a leading charity said yesterday. Criticising the relaxation of licensing laws, Alex Markham, head of Cancer Research UK, said "we have to be aware of the cost" of increased drinking. "We have seen this explosion in the rate of oral cancer in a 10- to 12-year period when we know the extent of exposure to the main risk factor, ie smoking, has fallen and over a period when consumption of alcohol in the UK has gone up precipitately." End

I don't know any 10 - 12 year old children who binge drink, but I know many who over use mobile phones. We owe it to our children to put out this serious warning.

The Daily Mail reported a 25% increase in young people being hit by mouth cancer on 25/9/05. The British Dental Health Foundation (BDHF) said risk factors are normally caused by smoking and drinking, however none of these are common risks in younger people. The figure is forecast to rise sharply in the next ten years, with people in their twenties and thirties increasingly vulnerable. (Daily Mail Report 10/11/03).

I am concerned that radiation from phones will intensify around the mouth if children or adults are wearing braces or have fillings, metal intensifies radiation. See statement

http://www.chemistryquestion.com/English/Questions/ChemistryInDailyLife/23c_microwave_metal.html

This is an area that needs urgent attention!!!


Also enclosed recent BBC report on 50% increase in cancer in teenagers as reported byTim Eden - from Manchester's Christie hospital http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4366606.stm

Kind Regards
Eileen O'Connor EM Radiation Research Trust http://www.radiationresearch.org

Take a look at a Charity Canceractive they are prepared to offer information with regards to prevention. It may come as a shock to many people that Cancer Research only put 2% of all their funding towards prevention. We all want a cure but isn't it better not to get cancer in the first place. Maybe it's their lack of funding towards prevention that is leading to their lack of knowledge. Please offer this charity your full support and ask all your family, friends, neighbours and colleagues to raise any future funds for this charity.


Dear All,

Please, see enclosed reports provided by Eileen O'Connor and myself for the Charity Canceractive:

"Mobile Phone And Mast Radiation - How Dangerous Are These"
by Eileen O'Connor
http://www.canceractive.com/page.php?n=970

Johansson O, "The effects of radiation in the cause of cancer",
The Charity Canceractive, Nov 6, 2005
http://www.canceractive.com/page.php?n=967


With my very best regards
Yours sincerely
Olle J.

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


From Mast Sanity

--------

The Effects Of Radiation In The Cause Of Cancer
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1158742/

Young people hit by mouth cancer
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1007418/

Dentist's mouth cancer warning
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/2947519/

"On 9/26/05, I knew I was breaking the law by sitting on the White House sidewalk without a permit. But, I was sitting there to call attention to the murderers who live and work there." - Cindy Sheehan

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111605Y.shtml



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

Das „Office of Public Works“ (OPW), die irische Regierungsbehörde für staatliche Bauten, hat angeordnet, dass keine Mobilfunkmasten mehr in der Nähe von Schulen aufgestellt werden, bis eine Überprüfung der Strahlung durch einen offiziellen Ausschuss stattgefunden hat. Tom Parlon, der für das OPW zuständige Minister, kündigte diese Maßnahme an. Er erklärte, dass sie sich trotz der Gewissheit, dass diese Einrichtungen den entsprechenden Sicherheitsrichtlinien in jeder Hinsicht entsprechen, der anhaltenden Besorgnis aufgrund der Einrichtungen in der Nähe von Schulen bewusst sind. Deshalb hat das Kabinett kürzlich die Gründung eines Ausschusses genehmigt, der damit beauftragt ist, alle vorliegenden wissenschaftlichen Daten zu sichten und, falls erforderlich, Empfehlungen für eine Überarbeitung der Richtlinien für Telekomeinrichtungen auszusprechen. Die Reaktion der Regierung wird von Bürgerinitiativen begrüßt, die behaupten, dass Personen, welche in der Nähe von Masten leben, gesundheitlich beeinträchtigt seien und u.a. über Kopfschmerzen, Übelkeit und Muskelschmerzen klagten.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2091-1849413,00.html


Aus: FGF-Infoline vom 03.11.2005

--------

Freeze on all phone masts near schools
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1104057/

Robert Fisk writes that American journalists now refer to "abuse laws" rather than torture laws.... "Abuse sounds so much better, doesn't it? No screaming, no cries of agony when you're abused. No shrieks of pain. No discussion of the state of mind of the animals perpetrating this abuse on our behalf."

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111605P.shtml

With deep remorse, former US Army interrogator Specialist Tony Lagouranis talks about his own involvement with abusing detainees in Iraq and torture carried out by the Navy Seals. He apologizes to the Iraqi people and urges US soldiers to follow their conscience.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111605N.shtml

Boston Globe
by Thomas Oliphant

11/15/05

Just for the record, the polling numbers President Bush claims not to read show the following with regard to the run-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003: According to The Wall Street Journal-NBC News survey last week, 57 percent of the sample believe Bush deliberately misled the country on the way to war, more than 20 points above the numbers asserting he was straight with the country. In denying the charge, however, it is fascinating that the White House spin machine has avoided giving examples of its nuanced rhetoric on the subject of the alleged threat posed by Iraq at the time in order to make its case to a skeptical public. That's because there aren't any. Instead, there has been an entertaining chorus of claims that the charge is false but that everybody else did it -- other countries' intelligence services, assorted politicians in this country (especially Democrats). Lacking a defense, Bush's operatives have sought to construct a Potemkin universe of intelligence dupes...

http://tinyurl.com/dpjfh


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

The American Prospect
by Matthew Yglesias

11/15/05

Grant President Bush one thing: There is a whiff of hypocrisy about Democratic senators and representatives who favored the Iraq War complaining that the president distorted intelligence findings to sell the war to the public. That the biggest and most important of Bush's deceptions -- that Saddam Hussein was likely to give a nuclear bomb or other mass-casualty device to al-Qaeda -- was a deception was well-understood among those who cared to inform themselves about the matter beforehand. The administration's more subtle manipulation of the WMD intelligence was less obvious at the time, but an inquisitive member of Congress could have gotten a fairly clear picture of things were he or she interested in doing so. A staple of Bush's pre-war rhetoric was simply to exploit the ambiguity inherent in the term 'weapons of mass destruction.' Speeches would glide from intelligence regarding Saddam's chemical weapons programs to the threat of nuclear weapons, with 'WMD' serving as a convenient but essentially meaningless bridge...

http://www.prospect.org/web/view-web.ww?id=10620


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Miami Herald
by Molly Ivins

11/15/05

I can't get over this feeling of unreality, that I am actually sitting here writing about our country having a gulag of secret prisons in which it tortures people. I have loved America all my life, even though I have often disagreed with the government. But this seems to me so preposterous, so monstrous. ... Who are we? What have we become? The shining city on a hill, the beacon and bastion of refuge and freedom, a country born amid the most magnificent ideals of freedom and justice, the greatest political heritage ever given to any people anywhere. ... If you are dead to all sense of morality, let us still reason together on the famous American common ground of practicality. Torture does not work. It is not productive. It does not yield important, timely information. That is in the movies. This is reality. Why did we bother to beat the Soviet Union if we were just going to become it? Shame. Shame. Shame...

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/13169165.htm


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Sarasota Herald Tribune
by staff

11/15/05

Personal privacy, a bedrock principle of conservative political philosophy, is being invaded through a Patriot Act provision that allows the FBI to delve into the lives of ordinary Americans. The provision grants the FBI almost unfettered use of 'national security letters,' which were conceived as a tool for tracking foreign agents but now are freely employed against everyday citizens, The Washington Post reported recently. Republicans in Congress, many of whom champion conservative values, have been reluctant to challenge the Bush administration on its exercise of the Patriot Act. But that, fortunately, is starting to change...

http://tinyurl.com/a9fup


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Human Events/Evans-Novak Political Report
by Robert Novak

11/15/05

For the first time, we hear the 'I' word -- impeachment -- bandied about Washington by Democrats who can be taken seriously. We have even been told by some astute Republicans that it smells mighty like 1973 in the capital, but that is premature at best. Any talk of impeachment now would cost the Democrats as perceived excessive partisanship, and astute Democrats know that. ... Meanwhile, the disarray of the Republican majority in Congress cannot be overestimated...

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/enpr/current_enpr.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Self-Sovereign Individual Project
by Kitty Antonik Wakfer

11/05

If those who lead and are members of 'Iraq Veterans Against the War' really want the death and destruction to stop, they would best make it clear that the US participants need to stop their actions NOW. All IVAW members would need to become former enforcers -- no longer active in the military. Some might then call for a strike or sick-out, or they might urge mass resignations, registration as conscientious objectors, rejection of enlistment/re-enlistment incentives and other methods to opt out. Whatever the actual mechanism, the purpose would be to STOP the initiation of force. These actions would bring the real issues to the forefront, instead of them being masked by the political excuses given these past 3 years...

http://selfsip.org/focus/improvedeffectivity.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

The Free Liberal
by Robert Capozzi

11/16/05

In your heart, you know something has gone wrong. Terribly, horribly wrong. With the world. With America. And even with your life. This is a thoroughly negative perspective, and yet, try as one might, it's a conclusion that is difficult not to, in those quiet moments in which we really reflect on the state of affairs, quietly nod in agreement. Surely there are blessings. Much seemed to have gone very right. Americans, at least, are by and large healthy (if overfed) and wealthy, if not wise. Except for the hardest cases, even those among us who are considered 'poor' have more materially than most on Earth, and far more than perhaps 99% of those who've ever lived. The answer to what's gone wrong perhaps is found in, of all places, a quartet of films with the word 'America' or 'American' in it...

http://www.freeliberal.com/archives/001639.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Strike the Root
by Per Bylund

11/15/05

It is not possible to make the world libertarian. One cannot force freedom on others; it would not be freedom but force. One cannot strengthen or empower others through forcing them to make choices; it would be to subject them to your will (that they must choose) rather than someone else’s. One cannot abolish or lessen power through claiming it for oneself; politics is not a means to achieve freedom from politics...

http://www.strike-the-root.com/52/bylund/bylund6.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

AntiWar.Com
by Justin Raimondo

11/16/05

The recent Senate vote to require regular reports from the White House detailing all the wonderful 'progress' we're making over there was more reflective of a desire to cover their a... as election time approaches than it was of growing antiwar sentiment in the U.S. Congress. This, after all, is substantially the same group of fools who voted overwhelmingly to authorize the invasion of Iraq in the first place, and pretty much stood by and did nothing even as the majority of Americans turned against the war. What makes this a surprise, however, is that the competition between the two parties was limited, during the debate over the resolution, to who came up with the idea first. Remember when almost no one dared oppose the war, at least in public, and news anchors were wearing American flags on their lapels as they breathlessly 'reported' our glorious 'victory?' The times, they sure are a' changin'!

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8046


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Slate
by Fred Kaplan

11/14/05

President George W. Bush has suddenly shifted rhetoric on the war in Iraq. Until recently, the administration's line was basically, 'Everything we are saying and doing is right.' It was a line that held him in good stead, especially with his base, which admired his constancy above all else. Now, though, as his policies are failing and even his base has begun to abandon him, a new line is being trotted out: 'Yes, we were wrong about some things, but everybody else was wrong, too, so get over it.' Quite apart from the political motives behind the move, does Bush have a point? Did everybody believe, in the run-up to the war, that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction? And are Bush's Democratic critics, therefore, hypocritically rewriting history when they now protest that the president misled them -- and the rest of us -- into war by manipulating intelligence data?

http://www.slate.com/id/2130295/


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Los Angeles Times

11/15/05

The former chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting repeatedly violated the organization's contracting rules and code of ethics in his efforts to promote conservatives in the system, according to an internal investigation released today. The 42-page report -- the culmination of a six-month investigation by Kenneth A. Konz, the corporation's inspector general -- described former Chairman Kenneth Y. Tomlinson as a rogue politico who overstepped the boundaries of his position to right what he viewed as a liberal tilt in public broadcasting. Tomlinson, who resigned his board position this month in advance of the report, denied any wrongdoing in a statement included in the report, calling the charges 'malicious and irresponsible.' The investigation was requested in the spring by Reps. David Obey (D-WI) and John Dingell (D-MI)...

http://tinyurl.com/7k8d9


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

USA Today

11/15/05

There are enormous differences between the war in Iraq and the one in Vietnam that defined a generation. The current conflict hasn't lasted as long, taken nearly as many American lives or sparked the sort of anti-war movement that marked the '60s and '70s. But when it comes to public opinion, Americans' attitudes toward Iraq and the course ahead are strikingly similar to public attitudes toward Vietnam in the summer of 1970, a pivotal year in that conflict and a time of enormous domestic unrest...

http://tinyurl.com/dqoag


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

http://www.organicconsumers.org/epa6.cfm


Informant: ireland

Two unrelated reports detailing Republican misdoings in government agencies have a common thread: putting politics before the people.

http://tompaine.com/uncommonsense/index.php#6743

by Michael T. Klare, TomPaine.com

With his advisers and his agenda against the wall, Bush may just use a new war to distract his detractors.

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051116/a_war_for_karl.php



Wag the Dog

Now that the current occupant of the White House is facing roiling political scandals of his own, Michael Klare reasons that he, too, or his embattled adviser, Karl Rove (not to mention his besieged Vice President, Dick Cheney) may be thinking about ways to "wag the dog."

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111605S.shtml

by Gary Bass, TomPaine.com

Will moderate Republicans on the Hill have the courage to stand up to their far-right colleagues?

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051116/the_moderates_integrity_test.php

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2005/11/13/the_politics_of_pandemics/


Informant: binstock

--------

Pandemic jitters

Washington Times
by Tom Bethell

11/15/05

It was refreshing the other day when Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said 'no' to the administration request for an extra $7.1 billion for the latest 'pandemic.' 'I would vote against it and I would encourage others to vote against it,' Mr. Barton said. Good for him. Avian flu has been grossly exaggerated and it's time someone said so. There have been all of 60 deaths, worldwide. The same virus infected 18 people in Hong Kong in 1997. Then, two years ago, there were a handful of cases in both Vietnam (population 83 million) and Thailand (population 66 million). In both countries combined, 20 people, known to have been working with chickens, contracted influenza symptoms. All this is from the New England Journal of Medicine. Now the government wants to reach into taxpayers' pockets for billions more to prepare for a flu crisis. It is feared the virus will mutate and become easily transmitted from person to person. But it has shown no sign of doing so over eight years...

http://www.washtimes.com/commentary/20051114-102617-5550r.htm


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

by Dan Bacher

The Sacramento City Council, by an 8 to 1 vote on November 1, called for “a humane, orderly, rapid and comprehensive withdrawal of United States military personnel and bases from Iraq.” The Council also asked Congress and President Bush to deliver “promised veterans’ health, education, disability, and rehabilitation benefits, and otherwise meet the needs of returning veterans.” Sacramento, joins a growing list of cities, including Chicago, San Francisco and Philadelphia, calling for withdrawal. California’s capital city is the second community in the Central Valley after Davis to support an anti-war resolution...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Bacher1116.htm

by Lucinda Marshall

There have been a couple of encouraging signs of sanity lately that make me wonder if we've finally hit rock bottom and begun to see the light. I say that very cautiously, fully realizing that after the siege of the last five years, this could be grasping at straws. But hopefully they are the straws that break the proverbial camel's back. First, there was the crystal clear message sent by voters in last week's election, a slam-dunk vote of no confidence. That is not an illusion because right on the heels of the election, Congressional Republicans are frantically re-thinking their budget cuts after the realization set in that they all of a sudden might not be able to get away with slashing out the heart of basic social services...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Marshall1116.htm

Pentagon officials acknowledged Tuesday that US troops used white phosphorus as a weapon against insurgent strongholds during the battle of Fallujah last November.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111605Z.shtml

A crusading defender of Brazil's Pantanal wetlands set himself on fire and died of burns to protest a proposed sugarcane alcohol plant. The Mato Grosso do Sul state assembly is debating a project to build alcohol plants on the upper Paraguay River, which runs through the Pantanal, the world's largest wetlands. The alcohol would be used to fuel vehicles.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/111505ED.shtml

A federal judge Monday stopped a logging project in Giant Sequoia National Monument, keeping intact more than 1,000 acres in a preserve that houses two-thirds of the world's largest trees.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/111505EC.shtml

Louisiana marshes are a nursery for many fish caught in the gulf, and they support the state's rich Cajun culture. But years of oil and gas development and water engineering projects have weakened the entire marsh system. Scientists now question whether some marshlands must be given up to the encroaching Gulf of Mexico.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/111505EB.shtml

Loren Farell went downstairs, looked through the peephole and saw an Army sergeant. "You remember how you got butterflies as a kid?" Farell asks. "I got that tenfold. I opened the door, and she asked me, 'Does Ashley Ashcraft live here?' I said, 'Yes, she's my daughter,' and the sergeant asked if she could speak to her." Farell knew what was coming. His daughter's husband, Evan Ashcraft, 24, was with the 101st Airborne Division.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505S.shtml

Investigators at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting concluded today that its former chairman repeatedly broke federal law and its own regulations in a campaign to combat what he saw as liberal bias.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505R.shtml

Mittwoch, 16. November 2005

Ihre Meinung zu diesem Beitrag:
http://www.svz.de/prignitzer/gaestebuch/

Kein neuer Stand beim Funkmast

Vodafone und BI diskutierten miteinander / Stadt entscheidet nächste Woche

Lenzen • Wer auf neue Entwicklungen zum geplanten Mobilfunkmast in Lenzen gehofft hatte, dürfte nach der Einwohnerversammlung enttäuscht sein. Der alte Stand ist auch der neue.

Von Hanno Taufenbach

Investor Vodafone bekräftigte, dass der geplante Standort an der Feuerwehr aus Unternehmenssicht der einzig machbare sei. Die Bürgerinitiative (BI) gegen den Funkmast möchte den Mast nach wie vor außerhalb der Stadt haben und befürchtet anderenfalls langfristig gesundheitliche Schäden. So liegt es nun wirklich in den Händen der Stadtverordneten, ob sie zu ihrem Vertrag mit Vodafone stehen, oder diesen einseitig aufkündigen.

Die Entscheidung darüber fällt voraussichtlich am Mittwoch, dem 23. November. Gleich im Anschluss an die Versammlung am Montagabend haben Bürgermeister Christian Steinkopf und Amtsdirektor Axel Wilser diesen Termin ins Gespräch gebracht und entschieden: Die Stadtverordneten fassen den Beschluss im öffentlichen Teil der Sitzung.

"In Lenzen wird gut und viel telefoniert", zerstreute Diplomingenieur und Vodafone-Fachreferent Dirk Schulz Zweifel an der Wirtschaftlichkeit eines UMTS-Mastes und machte zugleich auf ein technisches Dilemma aufmerksam: "UMTS-Sendeleistungen haben durchschnittlich nur eine Reichweite von 500 Metern, deshalb müssen die Sendemasten in der Stadt stehen."

Genau das will die BI aber verhindern. "Wir bitten Vodafone, einen größeren Abstand zu bewohnten Gebieten einzuhalten. Das muss doch bei einer kleinen Stadt wie Lenzen machbar sein", so BI-Sprecher Thilo Schmidt.

"Nein, wir müssen im Ort bleiben, haben mit der Feuerwehr einen optimalen Kompromiss gefunden", bekräftigte Dirk Schulz. Immerhin liege dieser Standort nicht mehr genau im Ortszentrum, was Vodafone noch viel lieber gewesen wäre. Auch der Standort Klärwerk komme nicht in Frage. Funktechnische Gründe führte Vodafone dafür an. So wie diesen habe das Unternehmen auch andere von der Stadt vorgeschlagene Alternativstandorte geprüft und wieder verworfen.

Zwar könne Vodafone die Ängste der Lenzener vor gesundheitlichen Schäden nachvollziehen, wies diese aber im Grunde zurück. Unterlegt mit physikalischen Gesetzen und Messwerten blieb Vodafone bei seiner Darstellung, dass gesundheitliche Schäden durch von Mobilfunkmasten ausgehende elektromagnetische Felder nach derzeitigem wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnisstand auszuschließen seien.

Omega: das stimmt nicht. Siehe „Gesundheitliche Schäden durch Mobilfunk“ unter: http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1158700/

Nicht mal ein Prozent der gesetzlich festgelegten Werte erreiche die Strahlung, die vom geplanten Mast ausgehen werde. Im Vergleich zu anderen Strahlungsquellen sei Mobilfunk nicht dominant, ja geradezu schwach. Als Beispiele nannte Schulz Fernsehsendeanlagen. Selbst im Haushalt gebe es wesentlich höher konzentrierte Strahlenquellen wie schnurlose Telefone oder Internetzugänge. Sogar Hobbyfunker im Nachbargebäude könnten mit ihren Anlagen höhere Werte verursachen.

Omega die Aussagen von Dirk Schulz sind schlichtweg falsch und irreführend. Hobbyfunker arbeiten nicht mit pulsmodulierten Signalen und nicht 24 Stunden am Tag. Die Spektren eines Fernsehsenders und einer Basisstation unterscheiden sich ganz erheblich. Biologisch gesehen gibt es entscheidende Unterschiede zwischen einer Basisstation und einer Fernsehsendeantenne: Die wesentlich höhere Pulswiederholfrequenz und 100-fach kürzere Pulsdauer sowie die Einbettung in das ,Rauschen` des Bildsignals ist nach allem, was wir heute wissen, biologisch weniger wirksam als die pulsmodulierten Signale einer Basisstation. Das gleiche gilt auch für alle anderen ungepulsten Modulationsarten wie z.B. auch Hobbyfunk. Siehe weiter „Argumente der Mobilfunkbetreiber widerlegt“ unter: http://omega.twoday.net/stories/327522/

Prinzipiell sei das alles richtig, bestätigte Bernd Rainer Müller. Der Ingenieur für Nachrichtentechnik arbeitet für Umweltverbände und den Arbeitsschutz, zu der Einwohnerversammlung wurde er als Experte hinzu gebeten. "Ihre rechtlichen Möglichkeiten, aus Angst vor gesundheitlichen Folgen den Mast zu verhindern, sind gleich Null", sagte er an die Adresse der BI gewandt.

Müller wies aber auch darauf hin, dass die festgelegten Grenzwerte lediglich nachweisbare Gesundheitsschäden ausschließen. Deswegen könne es trotzdem zu einer Beeinträchtigung des Wohlbefindens kommen. Schlafphasen können sich durch elektromagnetische Felder ändern, ebenso Gehirnströme.

Omega die festgelegten Grenzwerte schließen überhaupt keine Gesundheitsschäden aus, da sich nur auf die thermischen Wirkungen des gepulsten Mobilfunks beziehen. Die biologisch wirksamen athermischen Wirkungen wurden bei der Grenzwertgestaltung überhaupt nicht berücksichtigt.

Schlaflosigkeit oder Kopfschmerzen seien mögliche Folgen. Aus diesem Grund werde auch häufig von sensiblen Bereichen wie Schulen oder Kindergärten gesprochen, in deren Nähe möglichst keine Funkmasten stehen sollen.

Bernd Rainer Müller unterstützte die BI, indem er den Standort Klärwerk nicht komplett ausschließen mochte. Sicher sei der ungünstiger als einer in Stadtlage, aber vielleicht doch noch ausreichend. Müller machte aber auch klar, dass Vodafone nur den Anfang mache, das weitere UMTS-Sendeanlagen folgen werden. Sieben bis zehn prognostizierte er für die Stadt, erwähnte Feuerwehr- und Polizeifunk bzw. andere Mobilnetzbetreiber. Deshalb sollte die Stadt rechtzeitig mögliche Standorte benennen.

Im Laufe der Diskussion räumte Vodafone ein, dass der geplante Mast allein nicht ausreiche, um die ganze Stadt zu versorgen. Deshalb werde der bestehende Mast im Gewerbegebiet perspektivisch ebenfalls auf UMTS umgerüstet.

Thilo Schmidt zeigte sich nach der Diskussion enttäuscht. "Unsere Sorgen nimmt Vodafone nicht ernst, ich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass die Abgeordneten heute vom Mast überzeugt wurden und hoffe auf eine Kündigung des Vertrages auf der Stadtverordnetenversammlung."

http://www.svz.de/prignitzer/newspri/PRIVermischtes/16.11.05/2680870/2680870.html

--------

Mobilfunksender raus aus den reinen Wohngebieten?
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/163594/

Please, see enclosed reports provided by Eileen O'Connor and myself for the Charity Canceractive:

"Mobile Phone And Mast Radiation - How Dangerous Are These"
by Eileen O'Connor
http://www.canceractive.com/page.php?n=970

Johansson O, "The effects of radiation in the cause of cancer",
The Charity Canceractive, Nov 6, 2005
http://www.canceractive.com/page.php?n=967
http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/the_effects_of_radiation_in_the_cause_of_cancer.htm


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

--------

Cancer Clusters in Vicinity to Cell-Phone Transmitter Stations
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/580224/

Mobile phone and acoustic neuroma
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1181396/

Mobilfunk und Gesundheit
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/303598/

Mobilfunk und Krebs
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/284796/

Die Naila-Studie
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/351483/

Gesundheitliche Schäden durch Mobilfunk sind nicht nachgewiesen?
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/379258/

Schädlichkeit von Mobilfunk
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1041394/

Ärzteappelle gegen Mobilfunk
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1064751/

Dossier: Compatibilité électromagnétique entre antennes relais de téléphonie mobile et appareils électroniques utilisés a domicile: Risques pour la santé en découlant.

http://www.sauvonsleon.fr/main.php?param=dernieresinfos&date_news=2005-11-16

http://www.bbvforums.org/cgi-bin/forums/board-auth.cgi?file=/2197/14274.html


Informant: NHNE

16. November 2005

Schwarz-"rote" Außenpolitik: Bis an die Zähne bewaffnet - aber kein Geld für Zahnersatz

Wolfgang Gehrcke, außenpolitischer Sprecher des Parteivorstandes, zu außenpolitischen Aspekten der Koalitionsvereinbarung:

Die künftige aus CDU und SPD zusammengesetzte Bundesregierung schreibt in ihrem Koalitionsvertrag, dass deutsche Außenpolitik dem Frieden in der Welt verpflichtet sei. Sie wolle einen wirksamen Beitrag zur Verhinderung und Beilegung von Konflikten leisten sowie zur Linderung von Armut beitragen. Diesen allgemeinen wohlklingenden Worten folgt allerdings eine gegenteilige Praxis. Denn gleichwohl fühlt sie sich zusammen mit ihren transatlantischen Partnern dazu verpflichtet, einen Beitrag im Kampf gegen den internationalen Terrorismus durch den Ausbau global intervenierender Streitkräfte zu leisten. Während im Inneren die Sozialausgaben gekürzt, Gesundheit und Bildung verschlechtert werden, wird zugleich der Rüstungshaushalt erhöht. Die Militarisierung der Außenpolitik, welche die Regierung Kohl noch zaghaft begonnen hatte und die unter Rot-Grün systematisch fortgesetzt und ausgebaut wurde, erhält jetzt eine weitere Wendung. Zu Recht sieht die Friedensbewegung im außenpolitischen Teil der Koalitionsvereinbarung, dass sich Deutschland auf dem Weg von einer europäischen Mittelmacht zu einer hoch gerüsteten Großmacht mit weltweiten Ambitionen und besonderen geostrategischen Interessen in Osteuropa, im Nahen und Mittleren Osten sowie in Afrika und Asien befindet. Europa soll zwar erweitert werden, aber unter verstärktem deutschem Einfluss. Europäischer Multilateralismus, noch propagandistischer Kernbestandteil rot-grüner Europapolitik, die vorgab den Interessensausgleich mit Frankreich zu suchen, wird damit entwertet. Die größte Gefahr, die von der schwarz-roten Außenpolitik ausgeht, stellt die Anbiederung an die USA dar. In völliger Verkennung der Tatsachen wird behauptet, dass " Die Zusammenarbeit mit den USA besonders wichtig für ein gedeihliches Verhältnis zwischen der islamischen Welt und dem Westen, bei der Sicherung von Frieden und Stabilität im Nahen Osten" wäre. Die Anbiederung an die Nahostpolitik der USA, die zu einer verstärkten Instabilität im Nahen Osten und der übrigen Welt beigetragen hat, führt Deutschland allerdings an der Seite der USA in neue bewaffnete Konflikte. Davon zeugt bereits die Verschärfung der Lage in Afghanistan, wo die Bundeswehr schrittweise zur Führung von Kampfeinsätzen vorbereitet und selbst zunehmend zum Ziel von Angriffen wird. Damit wächst auch die Gefahr, dass Deutschland zum Ziel terroristischer Anschläge wird. Eine andere Politik zur Beilegung und Verhinderung von Konflikten, zur Bekämpfung von Armut und Hunger, zur Beseitigung der Ursachen und des Einflusses, den der Terrorismus auf weite Bevölkerungsteile der islamischen Welt ausübt, wäre erforderlich. Rüstungsausgaben, insbesondere solche Projekte wie das Luftabwehrsystem MEADS und das Transportflugzeug A400, die unsinnig sind, weil sie keinen wirklichen Schutz bieten, sollten zurückgenommen werden. Eine Kürzung der Wehrausgaben um 10 Prozent und ihre Überführung in die Entwicklungshilfe wäre der logischere Weg, um Armut und Hunger zu bekämpfen. Bis zum heutigen Tage kommen deutsche Regierungen der Verpflichtung nicht nach, 0,7 Prozent des Bruttosozialproduktes für die Entwicklungshilfe bereit zu stellen. Deutschland erreicht mit knapper Not 0,28 Prozent. Die Koalition hat hier zwar Änderung in Aussicht gestellt, was durchaus positiv zu bewerten ist, aber ob dies auch umgesetzt wird, muss sich erst zeigen. Einzusparen wären auch die Ausgaben für Militäreinsätze der Bundeswehr im Ausland, die von 1999 bis 2004 7 Milliarden Euro verschlangen. Mit diesem Geld hätte man nicht den Zahnersatz in Deutschland streichen müssen. Schon jetzt ist klar: Während die Sozialausgaben dramatisch abgebaut werden, steigen die Rüstungsausgaben unverhältnismäßig an. Anstelle einer Unterstützung der US-Politik im Nahen Osten sollte die deutsche und europäische Politik mit allen islamischen Staaten eine Politik der Partnerschaft auf gleichberechtigter Grundlage befördern und mit diesen ein Partnerschaftsabkommen schließen. Im Mittelpunkt dieser Politik muss die Förderung einer ausgeglichenen nachhaltigen Entwicklung stehen, um Ungleichheit und Ungerechtigkeit zu überwinden.

http://sozialisten.de/presse/presseerklaerungen/view_html?zid=30860

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/1115-03.htm


http://omega.twoday.net/topics/Falluja/

TRANSCRIPT

Joint Senate Hearing on Energy Pricing and Profits
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/09/AR2005110901070.html

From FindLaw

White House Energy Task Force Litigation
http://news.findlaw.com/legalnews/lit/energytaskforce/index.html


Document Says Oil Chiefs Met With Cheney Task Force

By Dana Milbank and Justin Blum
Washington Post Staff Writers

Wednesday, November 16, 2005; A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/15/AR2005111501842.html

[foto] Testifying at a Senate hearing last week were, from left, Lee R. Raymond of Exxon Mobil, David J. O'Reilly of Chevron, James J. Mulva of ConocoPhillips, Ross Pillari of BP America and John Hofmeister of Shell Oil. (By Chip Somodevilla -- Getty Images)

A White House document shows that executives from big oil companies met with Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001 -- something long suspected by environmentalists but denied as recently as last week by industry officials testifying before Congress.

The document, obtained this week by The Washington Post, shows that officials from Exxon Mobil Corp., Conoco (before its merger with Phillips), Shell Oil Co. and BP America Inc. met in the White House complex with the Cheney aides who were developing a national energy policy, parts of which became law and parts of which are still being debated.

In a joint hearing last week of the Senate Energy and Commerce committees, the chief executives of Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips said their firms did not participate in the 2001 task force. The president of Shell Oil said his company did not participate "to my knowledge," and the chief of BP America Inc. said he did not know.

Chevron was not named in the White House document, but the Government Accountability Office has found that Chevron was one of several companies that "gave detailed energy policy recommendations" to the task force. In addition, Cheney had a separate meeting with John Browne, BP's chief executive, according to a person familiar with the task force's work; that meeting is not noted in the document.

The task force's activities attracted complaints from environmentalists, who said they were shut out of the task force discussions while corporate interests were present. The meetings were held in secret and the White House refused to release a list of participants. The task force was made up primarily of Cabinet-level officials. Judicial Watch and the Sierra Club unsuccessfully sued to obtain the records.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.), who posed the question about the task force, said he will ask the Justice Department today to investigate. "The White House went to great lengths to keep these meetings secret, and now oil executives may be lying to Congress about their role in the Cheney task force," Lautenberg said.

Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for Cheney, declined to comment on the document. She said that the courts have upheld "the constitutional right of the president and vice president to obtain information in confidentiality."

The executives were not under oath when they testified, so they are not vulnerable to charges of perjury; committee Democrats had protested the decision by Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) not to swear in the executives. But a person can be fined or imprisoned for up to five years for making "any materially false, fictitious or fraudulent statement or representation" to Congress.

Alan Huffman, who was a Conoco manager until the 2002 merger with Phillips, confirmed meeting with the task force staff. "We met in the Executive Office Building, if I remember correctly," he said.

A spokesman for ConocoPhillips said the chief executive, James J. Mulva, had been unaware that Conoco officials met with task force staff when he testified at the hearing. The spokesman said that Mulva was chief executive of Phillips in 2001 before the merger and that nobody from Phillips met with the task force.

Exxon spokesman Russ Roberts said the company stood by chief executive Lee R. Raymond's statement in the hearing. In a brief phone interview, former Exxon vice president James Rouse, the official named in the White House document, denied the meeting took place. "That must be inaccurate and I don't have any comment beyond that," said Rouse, now retired.

Ronnie Chappell, a spokesman for BP, declined to comment on the task force meetings. Darci Sinclair, a spokeswoman for Shell, said she did not know whether Shell officials met with the task force, but they often meet members of the administration. Chevron said its executives did not meet with the task force but confirmed that it sent President Bush recommendations in a letter.

The person familiar with the task force's work, who requested anonymity out of concern about retribution, said the document was based on records kept by the Secret Service of people admitted to the White House complex. This person said most meetings were with Andrew Lundquist, the task force's executive director, and Cheney aide Karen Y. Knutson.

According to the White House document, Rouse met with task force staff members on Feb. 14, 2001. On March 21, they met with Archie Dunham, who was chairman of Conoco. On April 12, according to the document, task force staff members met with Conoco official Huffman and two officials from the U.S. Oil and Gas Association, Wayne Gibbens and Alby Modiano.

On April 17, task force staff members met with Royal Dutch/Shell Group's chairman, Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, Shell Oil chairman Steven Miller and two others. On March 22, staff members met with BP regional president Bob Malone, chief economist Peter Davies and company employees Graham Barr and Deb Beaubien.

Toward the end of the hearing, Lautenberg asked the five executives: "Did your company or any representatives of your companies participate in Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001?" When there was no response, Lautenberg added: "The meeting . . . "

"No," said Raymond.

"No," said Chevron Chairman David J. O'Reilly.

"We did not, no," Mulva said.

"To be honest, I don't know," said BP America chief executive Ross Pillari, who came to the job in August 2001. "I wasn't here then."

"But your company was here," Lautenberg replied.

"Yes," Pillari said.

Shell Oil president John Hofmeister, who has held his job since earlier this year, answered last. "Not to my knowledge," he said.

/Research editor Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report./

© 2005 The Washington Post Company


Informant: Teresa Binstock

By Eric Lerner,
Workers Democracy Network

The US Senate today, by an 84-14 vote passed the Graham-Levin amendment which abrogates the writ of habeas corpus in the US, destroying the basis for democracy in this country. The Senate then UNANIMOUSLY passed the defense appropriations act that contains this amendment.

I have appended the text of the amendment at the end of this note. I will be attending a meeting at CCR tomorrow to discuss the Commission of Inquiry and I’m sure we will also be discussing possible joint actions by many groups in response to this vote. I’ve also added CCR statement on the matter.

I have just a few thoughts on this right now. First, in my opinion, anyone who looks to the Democrats as an alternative should stop looking as of now. Every Democrat in the Senate voted for this re-institution of slavery.

Second, I think our most urgent task is to explain to every one that if this becomes law (which is very likely) it will mean the end of democratic rights for everyone, not just for aliens. While on the surface the law appears to apply only to those now at Guantanamo, in fact it means that ANYONE can be taken without charge to Guantanamo and will thereby be deprived of the right of habeas corpus. That includes citizens because there is no mechanism, without the habeas corpus writ, that you can even appeal to the courts on the basis that you are wrongly accused of being an alien.

The amendment has some window dressing about rights of appeal to the US Appeals Court for DC. But there is a huge, very deliberate, loop-hole. There is NO right to any appeal to any court before the “review broad” decides. In other words, ANYONE can be kept FOREVER at Guantanamo without any appeal to any court, just so long as they don’t get around to your review. And nothing can force them to do that.

Of course all this does not mean that they can enforce the dictatorship they are legislating into existence. It is up to the American people to decide if they will allow themselves to be enslaved. But we should be clear that that is what this laws means. And it was passed UNANIMOUSLY by the Senate.

Eric


CCR Statement on the Graham-Levin Habeas Jurisdiction Stripping Amendment

Synopsis

November 15, 2005 – The Center for Constitutional Rights condemns the Graham-Levin Amendment to the Military Authorization Bill, passed today by the United States Senate. This bill is directed at those persons held at the Guantanamo prison camp. For the first time in our history, it would strip people of a right which has been the shining jewel of Western jurisprudence since the 13th Century, the right to petition a federal court for a writ of habeas corpus.

It is particularly disturbing that this legislation was enacted stealthily and without any meaningful deliberation by the Senate or its Judiciary Committee. As happens so often, it is easy to carelessly give up our rights and much more difficult to get them back, once lost.

That these prisoners are so called ‘enemy combatants’ does not justify this suspension of the writ, since it has applied during earlier times of war, in particular World War II and the American Civil War. Fundamentally, the writ of habeas corpus requires any authority that holds a prisoner to present that prisoner before an independent magistrate and show good cause why that person has been seized and is being detained. It is a linchpin to the rule of law and the proposition that individuals have rights and that the power of government is limited.

Many Guantanamo prisoners were seized nowhere near a battlefield and are absolutely innocent and being held without any justification. What the government fears is not judicial interference in the war on terror. What it fears is objective judicial oversight that allows a public challenge to the abuse of innocent people.

We believe that this blow to our fundamental rights is just the beginning. ‘Enemy combatants’ are an easy target and therefore it is easy to erase their rights. However, this Administration is no friend of the Bill of Rights and this bill will serve as a model for the future as the president and Congress attempt to undermine our most basic rights by stripping federal courts of jurisdiction to hear cases raising issues of free speech, freedom of religion, racial discrimination and countless other rights for which the American people have struggled so long and so hard.

We attach a statement by pro bono habeas counsel of all political and philosophical stripes, which have tirelessly represented prisoners at Guantanamo.


Statement of Habeas Counsel Denouncing Midnight Raid on Constitution November 15, 2005

The Senate's treatment of the habeas issue is a scandal. The Great Writ of Habeas Corpus is as old as the Magna Carta. It is too fundamental, too important, too precious, to be rewritten on the back of an envelope, then passed as a floor amendment to an authorization bill on four days' notice, and then hastily further revised.

There have been no hearings on this issue. There are no committee reports reflecting thoughtful consideration of the merits of these amendments or their implications. No one even saw the Graham amendment until the day it was put to a vote. Since then, there has been a tornado of proposed changes and "compromise" positions.

In the meantime, these rushed efforts to rip up the Constitution have been uniformly and rightly condemned nationwide by judges, former military officers, and the great newspapers of the land.

Many are alarmed by these measures on the merits. Many others are alarmed by the precedent they could set for other modifications of habeas. Still others are alarmed by the impetus these modifications could give to other jurisdiction-stripping measures.

The Senate has had no opportunity to consider these views. Graham-Levin violates the Constitution's guarantee against suspension of the Great Writ. It also violates equal protection, due process, and other fundamental rights, and is a forbidden Bill of Attainder.

To legislate this way is disgraceful. It is also completely unnecessary. This is not an emergency situation. The Graham-Levin amendment should be stripped out in conference. The genuine deliberation required by the gravity of the issue can then begin.

Text of Graham_Levin Amendment
SEC. __. REVIEW OF STATUS OF DETAINEES.

(a) Submittal of Procedures for Status Review of Detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.--Not later than 180 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Defense shall submit to the congressional defense committees, and to the Committees on the Judiciary of the Senate and the House of Representatives, a report setting forth the procedures of the Combatant Status Review Tribunals and the noticed Administrative Review Boards in operation at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for determining the status of the detainees held at Guantanamo Bay.

(b) Procedures.--The procedures submitted to Congress pursuant to subsection (a) shall, with respect to proceedings beginning after the date of the submittal of such procedures under that subsection, ensure that--

(1) in making a determination of status of any detainee under such procedures, a Combatant Status Review Tribunal or Administrative Review Board may not consider statements derived from persons that, as determined by such Tribunal or Board, by the preponderance of the evidence, were obtained with undue coercion; and

(2) the Designated Civilian Official shall be an officer of the United States Government whose appointment to office was made by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate.

(c) Report on Modification of Procedures.--The Secretary of Defense shall submit to the committees of Congress referred to in subsection (a) a report on any modification of the procedures submitted under subsection (a) not later than 60 days before the date on which such modification goes into effect.

(d) Judicial Review of Detention of Enemy Combatants.--

(1) IN GENERAL.--Section 2241 of title 28, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:

``(e) No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien outside the United States (as that term is defined in section 101(a)(38) of the Immigration and Naturalization Act (8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(38)) who is detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.''.

(2) REVIEW OF DECISIONS OF COMBATANT STATUS REVIEW TRIBUNALS OF PROPRIETY OF DETENTION.--

(A) IN GENERAL.--Subject to subparagraphs
(B),
(C), and
(D), the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit shall have exclusive jurisdiction to determine the validity of any decision of a Designated Civilian Official described in subsection (b)(2) that an alien is properly detained as an enemy combatant.

(B) LIMITATION ON CLAIMS.--The jurisdiction of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit under this paragraph shall be limited to claims brought by or on behalf of an alien--

(i) who is, at the time a request for review by such court is filed, detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and

(ii) for whom a Combatant Status Review Tribunal has been conducted, pursuant to applicable procedures specified by the Secretary of Defense.

(C) SCOPE OF REVIEW.--The jurisdiction of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on any claims with respect to an alien under this paragraph shall be limited to the consideration of--

(i) whether the status determination of the Combatant Status Review Tribunal with regard to such alien applied the correct standards and was consistent with the procedures specified by the Secretary of Defense for Combatant Status Review Tribunals
(including the requirement that the conclusion of the Tribunal be supported by a preponderance of the evidence and allowing a rebuttable presumption in favor the Government's evidence); and

(ii) whether subjecting an alien enemy combatant to such standards and procedures is consistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States.

(D) TERMINATION ON RELEASE FROM CUSTODY.--The jurisdiction of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit with respect to the claims of an alien under this paragraph shall cease upon the release of such alien from the custody of the Department of Defense.

(3) REVIEW OF FINAL DECISIONS OF MILITARY COMMISSIONS.--

(A) IN GENERAL.--Subject to subparagraphs (C) and
(D), the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit shall have exclusive jurisdiction to determine the validity of any final decision rendered pursuant to Military Commission Order No. 1, dated August 31, 2005 (or any successor military order).

(B) GRANT OF REVIEW.--Review under this paragraph--

(i) with respect to a capital case or a case in which the alien was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 10 years or more, shall be as of right; or

(ii) with respect to any other case, shall be at the discretion of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

(C) LIMITATION ON APPEALS.--The jurisdiction of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit under this paragraph shall be limited to an appeal brought by or on behalf of an alien--

(i) who was, at the time of the proceedings pursuant to the military order referred to in subparagraph (A), detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and

(ii) for whom a final decision has been rendered pursuant to such military order.

(D) SCOPE OF REVIEW.--The jurisdiction of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on an appeal of a final decision with respect to an alien under this paragraph shall be limited to the consideration of--

(i) whether the final decision applied the correct standards and was consistent with the procedures specified in the military order referred to in subparagraph (A); and

(ii) whether subjecting an alien enemy combatant to such order is consistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States.

(e) Effective Date.--

(1) IN GENERAL.--Except as provided in paragraph
(2), this section shall take effect on the day after the date of the enactment of this Act.

(2) REVIEW OF COMBATANT STATUS TRIBUNAL AND MILITARY COMMISSION DECISIONS.--Paragraphs (2) and (3) of subsection (d) shall apply with respect to any claim whose review is governed by one of such paragraphs and that is pending on or after the date of the enactment of this Act.


Les Evenchick
New Orleans
piratefish@yahoo.com


UNITED FOR PEACE & JUSTICE | 212-868-5545


From ufpj-news

http://www.abbotsfordtimes.com/issues05/113105/opinion/113105le5.html

Pulsed microwave radiation and wildlife - Are Cell Phones Wiping Out Sparrows? (Update)
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/926007/

Probable connection between EM radiation and H5N1 Avian Virus outbreak
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/741183/

http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=96038;show_parent=1
http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=96040;show_parent=1

http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=96030;show_parent=1
http://disc.server.com/discussion.cgi?id=149495;article=96311;show_parent=1

--------

WAKE UP AMERICA ! -THIS SAYS IT ALL ABOUT FORCED VACCINE DANGERS

Vaccines: Ingredients may be kept secret and more.

11-5-2005

The below immediately below was posted on http://www.fourwinds10.com/ with a date of 5 Nov 2005.

Give Me Liberty OR They May Give Me Death.

From: lilyann12

[ This is serious stuff...please take action and forward to everyone you know. If we don't protect our freedoms, we deserve to lose them. Jim Walters, N.D. ]

GIVE ME LIBERTY OR THEY MAY GIVE ME DEATH

We are, I am sorry to tell you, facing a uniquely dangerous moment in our history. An industry with more money than sense and a government with more greed than patriotism are conspiring to take away your right to control your body, keep it safe and, if harmed, seek recompense from the corporation which harmed you. I often write to you to alert you to important health and health freedom issues. This letter is an urgent notice about an immediate threat to your well-being and your liberty. If you do nothing else to safeguard your health freedom, I urge you to take action on this issue, pass this email to everyone you know and become a source of information and strength to everyone you know. If there ever was a time for activism, this is it.

The Threat's Name? S 1873

Senator Richard Burr,http://burr.senate.gov/, of North Carolina has introduced a bill which, if passed, means the end of health freedom, possibly the end of your health and most certainly the end of your right to a trial by a jury of your peers in the all-too-likely event that you or your child have been harmed by a vaccine. The "Biodefense and Pandemic Vaccine and Drug Development A ct of 2005" also takes away your right to know what you have been injected with (no disclosure, no Freedom of Information Act suits, none!) and your right to be compensated if that vaccination harms you or a loved one.

I am writing to you to ask you to take all three types of action listed below:

1. Write to your Congressmen/women to let them know that both the Senate (S1873) and House (HR3970) versions of the bill must be defeated,

2. Call Congress. The Congressional Switchboard is 1-202-225-3121. The operators will connect you with your congressional delegation when you tell them your zip code.

3. Call the White House. Their number is 1-202-456-1414.

Tell the people you speak to that you are adamantly opposed to S1873 and HR3970 since vaccines are dangerous and compulsory vaccination violates your personal rights to self determination. Further, you flatly reject the creation of a secret agency which would operate without public oversight to created and compel the use of vaccines whose composition, side effects and hazards are not only unknown, but would be kept permanently hidden from the public.

Let them know that you will not tolerate the loss of compensation for harm and the loss of a trial by a jury of your peers to determine the nature and extent of any such harm to you or your loved ones and that a vote for these bills -- or others like them -- is completely unacceptable if the member of Congress wants to stand for re-election.

Make no mistake about it: Bird flu vaccines do not exist and cannot exist for some 6-18 months. Whatever you are vaccinated with will be experimental and therefore dangerous. With no liability to deter them, the vaccine makers can try anything they want or use any shoddy techniques they like and you cannot claim any harm has been done to you for the purposes of compensation. Not only that, the contents of these forced vaccinations for who-knows-what are secret! So whether the vaccines contain

Stealth viruses (which many now do) Squalene (a major threat to life and health as many a Gulf War Veteran knows to his/her endless distress) Mercury Formaldehyde Aluminum or other known toxins Live viruses which should have been killed or Other contaminants, not only will you never know, you can be forced to submit to vaccination and accept whatever comes next. The issue here is two fold: your health and your health freedom.

Would it shock you to know that serious scientists question the very premise of public health through vaccination? That the sacred cow of “herd immunity” (diseases go away because all of us have been vaccinated) is not very good science and, because of the dangers of vaccines, terrible medicine?

Vaccination is neither effective nor safe although we have been told that both are true for so long that their effectiveness and safety seems self-evident. The truth, however, is far more disquieting. And for untested vaccines, the story is worse. Much worse. Here are some sites to which you can go to get in-depth information about this troubling question:

Vaccination Information and Choice Network Vaccine Dangers Vaccination Dangers Deep Down Wellness NCOW Rense.com Educate-Yourself The Vaccine Page National Vaccine Information Center Even if you believe in vaccines for you and yours, the idea of a compulsory vaccine program administered by a secret agency with zero accountability to you and the same legal liability for the companies who make potentially lethal injections (zero once again) is a major threat to your liberty and mine. I urge you to take action and ask your circle of influence to do the same. Yours in health and freedom,

Rima E. Laibow, MD

Medical Director

PS: I testified before the FDA today on the overuse of psychoactive medications in children and adolescents. It was fascinating. I'll tell you about it in my next email to you. In the meantime, please support our work defending health and health freedom for all of us!

PPS: Oh, yes, please give to the Natural Solutions Foundation and help us keep on keeping our freedoms alive!


PASSED ALONG BY THE GOOD FOLKS AT THE UNIFIED VETERANS COALITION, THE BACKWOODS VETS, THE VETERANS PARTY OF AMERICA, THE BLUE GOOSE CLUB, & THE VETERANS FOR VETERANS CONNECTION

UNIFIED VETERANS COALITION
http://xsorbit27.com/users5/unifiedveteranscoalition/

THE VETERANS PARTY OF AMERICA http://www.veteransparty.us/

The WW2 Veterans Advocacy group - The Blue Goose Club bluegooseclubusa@aol.com

Veterans For Veterans Connection http://www.vfvc.net/


Informant: Scott Munson

Artikel von Siegfried Dierke zum Umbau des Gesundheitssystems, erschienen im express, Zeitschrift für sozialistische Betriebs- und Gewerkschaftsarbeit, 10/05.

http://www.labournet.de/diskussion/wipo/gesund/dierke.html

Aus dem Text: „ (…) Von einer neu einsetzenden Ökonomisierung des Gesundheitssystems kann also nicht gesprochen werden. Neu ist jedoch, in welchem Maße nun alle Bereiche der gesundheitlichen Versorgung ökonomischen Prinzipien unterworfen und von Effizienzkriterien durchdrungen, Solidarprinzipien entsorgt sowie Krankheitsrisiken privatisiert werden sollen. Gesundheitsversorgungsstrukturen entziehen sich dabei immer stärker einer öffentlichen Steuerung und Kontrolle. (…) Sozial bedingte Risiken (aufgrund von Wohn-, Arbeits- oder Einkommensverhältnissen, Zugang zu Bildungs- und Freizeiteinrichtungen, gesellschaftlichem Status und sozialer Verankerung) werden ignoriert und/oder privatisiert. (…) Diese Debatte muss in die Öffentlichkeit getragen werden unter Einforderung einer Liste unveräußerlicher individueller Rechte wie Garantie der Hilfe, Gleichbehandlung, Diskriminierungsverbot und besondere Förderung bzw. Schutzmaßnahmen für Benachteiligte. Damit dies nicht abstrakt bleibt und wirkungslos verpufft, müssen diese Forderungen nach Rechten eingebracht werden in die realen Kämpfe von PatientInnen, Beschäftigten und BürgerInnen allgemein…“

Aus: LabourNet, 16. November 2005

New facts come to the fore.

Extracts from "Medical Mafia" by Guylaine Lanctot, M.D.

Why this lethal relentlessness?

What is the objective of the world authorities in destroying people's health, both in industrialized countries and in the Third World? It is always difficult to presume the intentions of others, particularly when one is not close to them. And this is true in this instance.

But there are certainly advantages for someone, somewhere, to so doggedly keep-up the campaign for vaccinations, by any and all means possible. They must profit someone, somewhere. One thing is certain. It is not to our advantage. In order to determine what these advantages are, and for whom, let us stop and look at the CONSEQUENCES of these massive vaccination programs and draw our own conclusions.

I. Vaccination is expensive and represents a cost of one billion dollars annually. It therefore benefits the industry; most notably, the multinational manufacturers. One sells the vaccines. The other then provides the arsenal of medications to respond to the numerous complications that follow. Their profits increase while our expenses go through the roof. To the point where we have simply had it up to here and are ready to accept the unacceptable, such as socialized medicine in the United States, for example.

http://www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/coulter/sids.html http://www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/coulter/vacc-deb.html http://homepages.enterprise.net/whale/sch.html http://www.trufax.org/nwcch/vaccines.html

2. Vaccination stimulates the immune system, the body's defense mechanism. Repeated, vaccination exhausts the immune system. It gives a false sense of security and, in doing so, it opens the door wide to all kinds of illnesses. Notably, to those related to AIDS, which can only develop on ripe ground, where the immune system has been disturbed. It causes AIDS to explode. It ensures that the illness flourishes perpetually.

http://alt.medmarket.com/members/reiddds/herbplus/info/immune.html

3. Vaccination leads to social violence and crime. What better way to destabilize a country than to disarm its inhabitants, and reinforce police and military control? The authorities subtly create situations of panic and fear among the population which, in turn, necessitate the reinforcement of protection measures", including forbidding citizens from owning weapons. The authorities then come across as saviors and strengthen their control. It is certain that, in order to impose a single world army, one must first disarm the citizens of every country. One must therefore create violence, if they are to achieve this disarmament, particularly in the United States where the right to bear arms is guaranteed by the Constitution.

4. Vaccination encourages medical dependence and reinforces belief in the inefficiency of the body. It creates people who need permanent assistance. It replaces the confidence one has in oneself with a blind confidence in others, outside ourselves. It leads to loss of personal dignity, in addition to making us financially dependent. It draws us into the vicious circle of sickness (fear - poverty - submission) and, in this way, ensures the submission of the herd so as to better dominate and exploit it. And then lead them to the abattoir. To slaughter. Vaccination also encourages the moral and financial dependence of Third World countries. It perpetuates the social and economic control of Western countries over them.

5. Vaccination camouflages the real socio-political problems of poverty of some due to exploitation by others, and results in techno-scientific pseudo-solutions that are so complicated and vaccination diverts funds which should be used to help improve living conditions, and channels them into the banks of the multinationals. It is so sophisticated that patients cannot understand. In addition,the gap widens between the dominant rich and the exploited poor.

6. Vaccination decimates populations. Drastically in Third World countries. Chronically in industrialized countries. In this regard, Robert McNamara, the former President of the World Bank, former Secretary of State in the United States, who ordered massive bombing of Vietnam, and a member of the Expanded Program on Immunization, made some very interesting remarks. As reported by a French publication, j''ai tout compris", he was quoted as stating: "One must take draconian measures of demographic reduction against the will of the populations. Reducing the birth rate has proved to be impossible or insufficient. One must therefore increase the mortality rate. How? By natural means. Famine and sickness." (Translation)

7. Vaccination enables the selection of populations to be decimated. It facilitates targeted genocide. It permits one to kill people of a certain race, a certain group, a certain country. And to leave others untouched. In the name of health and well-being, of course.

http://www.tetrahedron.org/research.htm http://www.new-atlantean.com/global/birthcon.html

Take Africa, for example. We have witnessed the almost total disappearance of certain groups. Some 50% dead, estimate the most optimistic. Some 70% dead, according to the less optimistic. As if by chance, many were in the same region, such as Zaire, Uganda, the extreme south of the Sudan. In 1967, at Marburg in Germany, seven researchers, working with green African monkeys, died of an unknown hemorrhagic fever.

In 1969, also by chance, the same sick-ness killed one thousand people in Uganda. In 1976, a new unknown hemor-rhagic fever killed in the south of Sudan. Then in Zaire. It is noteworthy that since l968, virologists (virus specialists) have installed their sophisticated equipment in certain hospitals in Zaire.At a CIA hearing, Dr. Gotlieb, a cancerologist, admitted having dispersed, in 1960, a large quantity of viruses in the Congo River (in Zaire) to pollute it and contaminate all the people who used the river as their source of water. Dr. Gotlieb was named to head up the National Cancer Institute!

A couple of years ago, Reuters reported: 'An illness similar to AIDS has killed 60,000 in the south of Sudan. They call the illness, the killer. Families, whole villages, have disappeared. This illness, the Kalaazar, takes the form of a fever and loss of weight. The symptoms are the same as those of AIDS. The immune system is deficient and one dies of other infections." It is obvious that Africa, particularly those countries in the center and to the south, contain fabulous resources that have always incited westerners to crush their inhabitants to take over their riches. And beware anyone who stands in their way. The colonies have disappeared. But not colonialism.

8. Vaccination serves as a form of experimentation, to test new products on a great sampling of a population. Under the guise of health and the well-being of the population, people are vaccinated against a pseudo-epidemic with products that one wants to study. The vaccine of hepatitis B seems to be the choice of authorities to accomplish this goal. Yet, this vaccine is manufactured by a process of genetic manipulation. And it is much more dangerous than the traditional vaccine because it inoculates into the body cells that are foreign to its genetic code. Moreover; this vaccine is produced from virus cultivated on the ovaries of Chinese hamsters. One can only imagine what future generations will look like! But there is more. It is also reported to cause cancer of the liver. Despite all that, it enjoys great popularity among the authorities, who impose it first on all those who work in the health field, and then on the rest of the population.

http://www.new-atlantean.com/global/ith_gulf.html

In 1986, the medical authorities administered the vaccine against hepatitis B to Native Indian children in Alaska, without any explanation or the consent of their parents. Many children fell ill. And several died. It seems there was a virus called RSV (Rous Sarcoma Virus) in the vaccine. American Indian tribes have been subjected to many vaccinations. Let us be aware that they are difficult to beat into submission, and they own vast tracts of land which the authorities would like to have for their own benefit.

Recently when I met a group of Native women to chat about health with them, the subject of vaccinations cropped up. I was giving them some information on the topic when, suddenly, the group's nurse confided in me that the federal government had given her complete freedom in the management of their health, but on one strict condition. That every vaccination had to be scrupulously applied to all. The silence was deafening. We all understood.

pIn 1988, the Ambassador of Senegal gave a radio interview reporting on the ravages of AIDS in his country where entire villages were being decimated. A few years earlier, scientific and medical teams had come to vaccinate their inhabitants against hepatitis B.

In 1978, a new vaccine was tested on homosexuals in New York.

And in 1980, on those in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, Chicago, and St Louis. Officially, this "new vaccine" was against hepatitis B and, as we now know, it caused many of them to die from AIDS. It sounded the "official" beginning of the AIDS epidemic in 1981. The vaccination program of homosexuals against hepatitis B was led by Saint W.H.O. and the National Institute of Health.

There are reports of collaboration between these two organizations in 1970 to study the consequences of certain viruses and bacteria introduced to children during vaccination campaigns.

In 1972, they transformed this study to focus on the viruses which provoked a drop in the immune mechanism. Wolf Szmuness directed the anti-hepatitis B experiments undertaken in New York. He had very close links with the Blood Center where he had his laboratory, the National Institute of Health, the National Cancer Institute, the FDA., the W.H.O., and the Schools of Public Health of Cornell, Yale, and Harvard. In 1994 a vast vaccination campaign against hepatitis B was undertaken in Canada. It is both useless, dangerous and costly. And what for? Is there a hidden agenda? I note that the Province of Quebec is a particular target, over the course of three years.

1992: vaccination against meningitis
1993: re-vaccination against meningitis
1994: vaccination against hepatitis B.

I was there in 1993. It troubled me to see that it was aimed at a whole generation (1 to 20 years), in only one province. Since when do viruses respect borders, and specially provincial ones at that? The facts are:

There was no epidemic, nor risk of one. Epidemiologists confirmed it. Three different vaccines were administered, each in a designated area. Certain nurses were selected and trained to administer a special vaccine. All children were entered into a computerized data bank. The pressure to vaccinate the children was enormous. Schools were turned into clinics. Those who did not want to be vaccinated were pointed out and treated as social outcasts. Nurses chased down parents at home who did not want their children vaccinated. I had a direct account of one of these kids. The mother did not want her child vaccinated. The nurse who came to the house made her believe that it was compulsory. The mother gave in...the child is now handicapped: physically and mentally (paralyzed spastic).

The vaccination cost $30 million. Why was there such a murderous will? Like Native peoples, the people of Quebec are also a "bother". They believe in their cultural identity and in sovereignty. What is more, Quebec with its Native territories, encompasses huge reservoirs of water which many a multinational have their eyes on. As an acquaintance of mine who sits on the California water management board said, "Water today is gold." Could one think of a more appropriate biological weapon to possibly remove any impediments to accessing that resource?

9. Vaccinations permit epidemiological studies of populations to collect data on the resistance of different ethnic groups to different illnesses. It permits one to study the reactions of the immune systems of large numbers of the population to an antigen (virus, microbe) injected by vaccination. Should it be within the framework of the fight against an existing illness, or one that has been provoked. In 1987, certain American laboratories and the Department of Biotechnology of India signed an agreement authorizing the testing of genetically manufactured vaccines on the people of India. This agreement was met with fierce opposition because it gave access to epidemiological and immunity profiles of a population. This data is extremely important from a military standpoint. It is even more valuable because India has never experienced yellow fever. And, at time of writing this book, it had known only a handful of cases of AIDS. Over and above all that, the private American laboratories proposed to test products on the Indian population for which they had no right to test in the United States! And the Indian authorities acquiesced!

10. Vaccination is a biological weapon at the service of biological warfare. It permits the targeting of people of a certain race, and leaves the others who are close by more or less untouched. It makes it possible to intervene in the hereditary lineage of anyone selected. A new speciality is born. Genetic engineering. It is flourishing, enjoys much prestige, and is receiving substantial research hinds. The challenge is staggering. To find a vaccine which gives an illness against which we already have the vaccine! In this way, we would be able to send in troops who have already been vaccinated against the killer vaccine, which they would then spread among the enemy. It is absolutely crazy and insane! Meanwhile, industrial theft is in full swing. Captain and biologist of the US Navy at Fort Detrick, Neil Levitt, reported the disappearance of 2.35 liters of an experimental vaccine. A dose sufficient to contaminate the entire world. Fort Detrick is a research laboratory which manufactures vaccines. It is located quite close to Washington, in Maryland, and it is attached to the National Cancer Institute at Bethesda, a suburb of the capital. It is hardly astonishing that, in every major vaccination campaign, one finds the same tangled web. Government, the military, Saint W.H.O., financiers, researchers, laboratories, universities, the CIA, and the World Bank. Let us not lose sight of the fact that: In the name of the defense of our countries, we manufacture the most murderous of weapons. War; whether it be biological or not, is war. And weapons kill. Biological warfare is a giant business, largely financed BY OUR FUNDS, through the medium of the military, research, and our donations. It is also financed, and without our knowledge, BY OUR LIVES. Those of our children and of millions of innocents who have beensacrificed.

It is we, those who live in the Western world, who are responsible for all the illnesses and acts of genocide in the world. By our acceptance of vaccinations, both at home and abroad.

http://www.pnc.com.au/~cafmr/online/vaccine/index.html http://www.unc.edu/~aphillip/www/vaccine/informed.htm http://www.new-atlantean.com/global/vaccine.html http://www.909shot.com/ http://www.gn.apc.org/inquirer/rubella2.html http://www.unc.edu/~aphillip/www/vaccine/informed.htm http://www.ozemail.com.au/~shotinfo/

Karin Schumacher Vaccine Information and Awareness
12799 La Tortola San Diego, CA 92129
619-339-5498 (voicemail)
619-484-1187 (fax) via@access1.net (email) http://www.access1.net/via (website)


We Must Have The Freedom To Choose & Respect Everyone's Choice

Any information obtained here is not to be construed as medical OR legal advice. The decision to vaccinate and how you implement that decision is yours and yours alone.

BECOME A MEMBER OF NATIONAL VACCINE INFORMATION CENTER

Please become a member of the National Vaccine Information Center who has been working for the right of a parent to a fully informed vaccine decision since 1982. Becoming a become will help ensure that your rights are better protected.

http://www.909shot.com/order.htm
(NVIC MEMBERSHIP INFORMATION)

Thank you again for your interest and good luck on your search and decision.


Forwarded by Zeus Information Service Alternative Views on Health
http://www.zeusinfoservice.com

All information, data and material contained, presented or provided herein is for general information purposes only and is not to be construed as reflecting the knowledge or opinion of Zeus Information Service.


Informant: beefree

16.11.2005

Print-Ausgabe

Minister Gorbach: Handymast bleibt

DISPUT / Landesrätin Michaela Resetar (ÖVP) hatte das Aus für den Müllendorfer Handymasten beschlossen, Minister hob diesen Beschluss auf.

VON DORIS FISCHER

MÜLLENDORF / Die Hoffnungen der Müllendorfer, dass der vermeintlich gesundheitsschädigende Handymast verschwinden könnte, erlitten einen argen Rückschlag. Von Landesrätin Michaela Resetar (ÖVP) wurde ihnen eine Stilllegung in Aussicht gestellt. Mit einem Bescheid vom April hatte Resetar den Antrag des Mobilfunkbetreibers, den bereits errichteten Sender nachträglich nach den Bestimmungen des Eisenbahngesetzes zu genehmigen, abgelehnt. Dem folgte ein Berufungsverfahren des Mobilfunkbetreibers.

Das Infrastrukturministerium hob den Bescheid der Landesregierung mit der Begründung auf, „dass nur solchen Anlagen die Erteilung der Ausnahmebewilligung zu verwehren ist, die einem konkreten Eisenbahn-Bauprojekt und dem damit einhergehenden konkreten öffentlichen Verkehrsinteresse hinderlich sind“. Resetar ärgert sich: „Landtagsbeschlüsse aus dem Jahr 2001, die einen Ausbau der Eisenbahnschleife Müllendorf fordern, sind Gorbach zu wenig.“ Und meint weiters, dass hier besonders die mangelnde Verkehrsplanung des Landes zu kritisieren sei. Gemeindearzt Reinhold Jandrisovits, der die Häufung der Krankheitsfälle seit Bestehen der Anlage aufzeigt, spricht von einem „Skandal“. Gesundheitslandesrat Peter Rezar (SPÖ) resigniert: „Ich habe keine kompetenzrechtlichen Möglichkeiten mehr, obwohl ein umweltmedizinisches Gutachten vorliegt.“ „Obwohl der Umweltmediziner Gerd Oberfeld zu dem Schluss kommt, dass es einen Zusammenhang zwischen den auftretenden Krankheiten und der Mobilfunkanlage gibt. Da ist Gefahr im Verzug“, betont Rezar: „Gorbach hat es in der Hand gehabt, den Bescheid zu bestätigen. Diese Chance hat er vertan.“

Ein Machtwort erwartet sich auch Müllendorfs VP-Bürgermeister Alfred Schlögl. „Ich bedaure, dass Gorbach den Bescheid des Landes nicht so gesehen hat. Hätte er es getan, wäre dies die Lösung des Problems gewesen.“ Schlögl wird das Gutachten anfordern und will alle rechtlichen Möglichkeiten ausschöpfen.

http://www.bvz.at/redaktion/bvz-eis/article.asp?Text=187884&cat=830



http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=M%C3%BCllendorf
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Reinhold+Jandrisovits

http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/volturino_missgebildete_tiere.doc
http://elettrosmogvolturino.interfree.it/ http://elettrosmogvolturino.interfree.it/antenne.html http://elettrosmogvolturino.interfree.it/animali.html
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1157746/

Volturino Italie guinea pig city: Noxious effects (degeneration) on animals
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1856457/

Pulsed microwave radiation and wildlife - Are Cell Phones Wiping Out Sparrows?
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/926007/

Spanish paper on RF effects on birds
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/904106/

Birds suffer from biological effects of GSM, 3G (UMTS), DECT, WIFI, TETRA
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/900299/

Mobile phone mast blamed for vanishing pigeons
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/286416/

Schlaflos in Volturino: immer mehr missgebildete Tiere in bestrahltem Dorf
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1157746/

Tiere und Mobilfunk
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/196960/

Der einsame Kampf gegen Elektrosmog

Vor einigen Tagen wurde Antenne Nummer 115 auf einem Hügel über Volturino installiert, wem sie gehört weiß Antonio nicht. Wie fast alle anderen Antennen wurde auch sie widerrechtlich angebracht und erhöht weiter die Elektrosmog-Belastung im Ort. „Für eine einzige Antenne gibt es eine Genehmigung, alle anderen wurden illegal errichtet“, erzählt Antonio. „Die Stadt könnte sie abreißen lassen. Ich habe immer wieder nachgefragt, aber es passiert einfach nichts.“ Seit 16 Jahren kämpft Antonio Gagliardi gegen die Antennen und ihre gefährliche Strahlung. Ein Kampf mit wenig Aussicht auf Erfolg. Denn einige der illegal errichteten Anlagen gehören dem italienischen Ministerpräsidenten Silvio Berlusconi. Antonio ist schon oft vor Gericht gezogen und bekam auch Recht. Doch trotzdem blieb alles beim Alten.

115 Antennen sind auf einem Hügel über Volturino installiert Seit 16 Jahren kämpft Antonio Gagliardi gegen Elektrosmog

Die Antennen sind in Volturino allgegenwärtig. Kein anderer Ort in Italien hat höhere Elektrosmogwerte. Trotzdem unterstützen nur wenige der 2000 Einwohner Antonios Arbeit. Viele fürchten, Volturino könnte als ‚Krebsdorf‘ stigmatisiert werden. Antonio hat in den letzten Jahren die Veränderungen bei den Tieren genau dokumentiert: Missbildungen, Augenkrankheiten, Krebs und Totgeburten. Aber auch für die Menschen stellen die Antennen eine Bedrohung dar. Der Arzt Michele Abatescianni sammelt seit fünf Jahren Daten, die einen möglichen Zusammenhang zwischen der Strahlung und den Krankheiten der Einwohner belegen können. „Es gibt Patienten, auch viele junge, die unter Impotenz leiden. Die meistverkauften Arzneimittel in Volturino sind Schlafmittel. Viele Leute hier können einfach nicht mehr schlafen.“ Und Assunta Danesim ist überzeugt, dass ihr Krebsleiden und das ihrer Freundin durch die Strahlung verursacht wurden. Antonio hofft jetzt, dass der neu gewählte Bürgermeister ihn unterstützt. Der alte Bürgermeister hatte die Gerichtsbeschlüsse ignoriert und wie viele andere an den Antennen mitverdient. Antonio will weiterkämpfen, bis die Antennen mit ihrer gefährlichen Strahlung aus seinem Heimatort verschwunden sind. Filmautor: Robert Jahn/MDR

http://www.br-online.de/politik/ausland/themen/09922/

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Italien/Volturino: Erschreckende Fotos von missgebildeten Tieren unter Mikrowellenbestrahlung: Immer mehr missgebildete Tiere in bestrahltem Dorf

http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/volturino_missgebildete_tiere.doc

http://elettrosmogvolturino.interfree.it/ http://elettrosmogvolturino.interfree.it/antenne.html http://elettrosmogvolturino.interfree.it/animali.html

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Volturino Italie guinea pig city: Noxious effects (degeneration) on animals
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1856457/

More and more malformed animals in the irradiated village of Volturino
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1157799/

Tiere und Mobilfunk
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/196960/

Pulsed microwave radiation and wildlife - Are Cell Phones Wiping Out Sparrows?
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/926007/

Krebscluster in der Nähe von Funkantennen
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/227418/

Ron Paul wants health freedom.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/paul/paul288.html

http://www.lewrockwell.com/engelhardt/engelhardt132.html
http://www.ufppc.org/content/view/3655/

http://www.NewsWithViews.com
November 16,
2005 News Alert

Finally, main stream press reports on "Chemtrails" aerial spraying that's making people sick. This is a must read.

http://www.lasvegastribune.com/20050819/headline1.html

We begin with the action page links. Please submit them both, or if you like read on first

http://www.nocrony.com (No right wing conservative to replace Sandra Day O'Connor)

VOTE LIKELY ON THIS NEXT ONE TOMORROW!

http://www.millionphonemarch.com/habeas.htm (Restore Habeas Corpus)

If the election results of this last week are any indicators, the American people are beginning to speak out in a way that has gotten the attention of Congress. For the last year we at the The People's Email Network have been preaching the power of the people speaking out. For those perpetual defeatists who have said that "they" (the Republicans because they were too controlled, and the Democrats because they were too spineless) would never listen to us, it is a wonder what a couple of election losses can do. This week we saw the breathtaking collapse of the majority cruelty budget with its agenda of budget cuts for the poor to finance additional tax cuts for the wealthy, and the conversion of the ANWR giveaway to the windfall profit pocketing oil companies into a virtual third rail. Our own participants generated 12,000 submissions opposing the latter. If only the people will speak out, they will be heard, and only if we are vigilant and CONTINUE to do so.

We are now at a critical crossroads in American judicial history. The Alito nomination represents a tipping point of disaster that the right wing has been spent 20 years working for. The only reason we are even approaching this looming crisis now has been the abject cowardice of those who are supposed to be protecting our rights (abetted by the failure of enough of us to speak out before), in waving through so many objectionable right-wing philosophical cronies without much more than a whimper of protest. All they need is one more John Roberts' style con job and we stand to lose our entire court system as a check and balance on the power of a president to impose corporate rule on every aspect of our lives. We have barely two months to build the people's consensus that will be needed to stop them and every day is increasingly precious.

It really is a very simple formula. If we all speak out to our members of Congress, one of two things MUST happen. Either 1) they will heed our voices and bend to the will of the people, and we win, or else 2) they further increase the motivation of those of us who are speaking out by ignoring us, in which case we have mobilized the base to vote them out of office next time, so again we win. The ONLY way we can lose is if not enough of us speak out. We created our one click resource so that you can send your personal message to all your members of Congress at once, and you can also make it a Letter to the Editor of your nearest daily newspaper, all at the same time. But most of all on this we need to have a unified message. We have proposed the following:

"NO RIGHT WING CONSERVATIVE TO REPLACE SANDRA DAY O'CONNOR"

Please note that it is NOT enough to just oppose Alito on some particular statement or ruling. When Karl Rove climbed out from under his rock the other night to get a standing ovation (for getting away so far with outing a CIA agent?) from the Federalist society convention, he gloated about how they had already packed the courts with 200 of their ideological cronies. As they say in baseball, their bench is very deep, and it is not sufficient to bat away one, only to lay down for the next. They have their mantra and they have a corrupt corporate media to push it relentlessly. Their talking points are "Strict constructionist" and "It's a done deal" and "He deserves and up-or-down vote" and "Conservatives are the mainstream," despicable lies each and every one. And any one of us who dares let those words pass our lips in approval or resignation needs to have their mind washed out with soap.

Instead we must propagate our own concept and use every media resource in our power (especially the internet and progressive radio) to purge the propaganda of the other side. If you have a better idea as to what that theme should be, we would like to hear from you IMMEDIATELY so that everyone can be on the same page. But whatever it is we need to settle on it quick, fast and in a hurry, before the situation is allowed to drift any further to the right. So again, the key idea is that the most objectionable thing about Alito is that he is conservative at all, and in so being entirely out of step with what the American people are demanding from their elected representatives now. Some think he would be worse that Roberts. But regardless which one would win the reactionary potato sack race, we can ill afford yet one more.

http://www.nocrony.com (No right wing conservative to replace Sandra Day O'Connor)

The first and biggest lie of all is that there is any such thing as a "strict constructionist," meaning the only role of the courts is to apply the laws that Congress passes in terms of some frozen idea of the intent of the framers of our Constitution. Historically, there have been some very bad laws passed (including a fast one from just the other day we will address in a moment), and it has been the duty of our courts to step in and apply the ultimate doctrine of all law, what is known as "equity." The word appears prominently in the Constitution specifically in defining "The judicial Power of the United States . . . in Equity." From the earliest times in our legal traditions there were separate Courts of Equity set up to dispense justice and to arrive at a fair result even without a controlling law. It has ALWAYS been the place of the courts to correct what is clearly wrong and twisted and contorted, whether given explicit guidelines on how to do it by law and precedent or not. That is exactly what the framers meant in the Ninth amendment to the Constitution when they said:

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people"

For example, suppose there were no laws against pollution and someone is dumping arsenic into a stream feeding your medieval pond in ages past and all your fish die. You go to the king's Court of Equity and you ask them to intercede, and hopefully they look at the case (assuming they are not ignorant of the poisonous effects of arsenic) and order the polluter to stop what he is doing. But the "strict contortionist" would say that there is no such law and that the arsenic dumper is just exercising his own "liberty" in doing so. We would all agree that is the wrong result. And yet corporate ideologues on the benches of our courts are making such decisions in favor of industrial polluters right now in defiance of the laws that we DO have, and none of their reactionary supporters are accusing them of any kind of so-called judicial activism in that regard. Remember, NOT acting is itself also a form of activism, and activism itself is only in the eye of the one being ruled against.

But even the Constitution itself may be no protection where, as just the other day with little advance notice, the Republican majority in the Senate approved an amendment to the Defense Appropriation bill forever denying the detainees at Guantanamo and elsewhere the right to challenge the legality of their detention by habeas corpus. Leaving aside the thorny problem of whether the courts could correct a law removing their own jurisdiction, the "strict contortionist" would say that Congress can pass any damn law they please (assuming it's one they agree with) even if it's contrary to the Constitution, and the courts should just fall in line (unless they should not).

The 14th Amendment, AFTER speaking of the rights of citizenship, goes on to say that no "person" shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without the due and equal process of the law. Article III makes it perfect plain that the judicial power of the courts extends to foreign nationals where the U.S. is a party. The motto emblazoned on the Supreme Court does not say "Equal Justice Under The Law for Americans Only." The "strict contortionist" is always babbling about judges who "legislate from the bench." And yet here the Congress is attempting to do an uninvited end run around an express ruling of the Supreme Court and in violation of the heart of the Constitution. Are you hearing anybody accuse them of "adjudicating from the legislature?" Maybe you just did.

McCain, who at least got the torture amendment right, in defense of his own vote to scuttle habeas corpus for those in Guantanamo said that we can't have them petitioning to complain about the food allowed. Well, gee, maybe they don't like being in lemon chicken hell with two kinds of fruit (just for staged photo ops) to be imprisoned indefinitely without charges. A spokesperson for the so-called moderate Senator Snowe asked "Do we need all those lawyers going down there to hear their complaints?" One can only wonder how much McCain would have appreciated it if a lawyer had turned up in his defense when he was being tortured himself in North Vietnam. But the "strict contortionist" would say that we can make up a subclass of humans called "enemy combatants," with the president king the sole arbiter of who should be so degraded.

Patrick Fitzgerald was perfectly able to convict terrorists in the cases he handled. Moussaoui, a real terrorist, chose to plead guilty when confronted with the evidence against him. Do we need lawyers going down there? You bet we do, and the more the better, to show the world that everyone in the United States of America gets a fair trial, even if you are an accused terrorist. The problem is the real reason they may be so afraid of letting these people into our courts is they are still trying the cover up the torture which has already taken place in our names. If the detainees are guilty of something let them be tried in open court in the glorious splendor of our freedom. For Congress to presume to pass anything to abort that is a stench in the nostrils of our own democracy.

http://www.millionphonemarch.com/habeas.htm (Restore Habeas Corpus)

We are a nation of laws, not of men. But it is still up to our Supreme Court to correct the law when it strays too far from the mean of true justice (equity), to be then applied equally to all. It is THAT which has made the United States the greatest country in the world, a legal system the envy of the world's citizenry. And that is what is threatened most by these patently biased nominees. The amount of damage they can do in the lower courts is thankfully limited by the overriding balance of hopefully the prudent reason in the Supreme Court, which is precisely what they have schemed these many years to tilt. Some say the Muslim extremists want to go back to the 13th century. The "strict contortionist" wants to go back to the 10th, a time when the judiciary turned a deaf ear and a cold heart to anyone who was not rich, or could not stand to hold a burning hot poker in their hand without screaming.

These nominees are being hand picked not for their fairness, but for their willingness to tow the corporate crony line, to defer to the president dictator, and in some specious way attempt to make it sound perfectly reasonable. Sure, Alito has some very offensive opinions on the record as an appellate judge, but were he unwisely be allowed to ascend to the Supreme Court he would no longer be bound by the controlling letter of higher precedent, and only by his own "respect" for that precedent. And we are very sure he would say he still respects Roe v. Wade very much in the morning after he casts the deciding vote to overturn this case he so clearly believes was wrongly decided.

In short, just like Roberts, Alito will don the sheep's clothing of not being one of those mean old nasty "activist" judges only long enough to try to sneak past his confirmation hearing . . . again. In fact, they can recycle the outfit Roberts used since he himself no longer has any need of it. To get on the appellate bench, Alito promised that he would recuse himself from cases involving Vanguard, where he had extensive holdings. Yet he broke that promise the first chance he got, until someone called him on it, and did it again in another parallel case. The "strict contortionist" would say (and Alito in fact did say) that he was being "unduly restrictive" in his initial sworn representation to the Senate. And we can expect he will say he was also being unduly restrictive in promising restraint when the stampede of precedent reversals begins for which the mouths of the right wing have watered for so long.

At its best and brightest moments our Supreme Court has been a bulwark against injustice not otherwise struck down. The real danger is in allowing a clearly ideological extremist to be unleashed in yet another seat on our highest court, to be then only restrained by a sense of fairness they have demonstrated they do not possess. The most unpopular second term president in American history would not have freely nominated anyone who would not give his most reactionary supporters every decision they could have predetermined themselves. The only objections you hear coming from the right wing are concerns that Alito might not be sufficiently and manifestly in their pockets, their basis for demanding the withdrawal of the crony Miers, who you should know was also introduced for enthusiastic applause by Rove at the Federalist soiree.

Alito must be rejected, and each and every other subsequent candidate of this federalist gang, by filibuster if that is what it takes, until the people get what they deserve and will demand, no worse than a true moderate centrist as a replacement for Sandra Day O'Connor. To win we must do much more than nitpick this or that case or whatever. This goes far beyond opinions to effectively immunize employers from race discrimination cases or to strip search 10 year old girls or whether Alito dishonored his promise to recuse himself. We must put our foot down as the true majority of the American people to say that NO conservative whatsoever is acceptable for this seat. We need every voice out there on our side to repeat that essential position every day for the next two months.

And for that to happen we the people need to speak out with our own voices now and send a personal message on what YOU have to say to your Senate.


Informant: Scott Munson

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/11/15/1632233


Informant: John Calvert

by Mike Whitney

Confidence in the media has never been lower. A broad section of the public doesn’t believe anything they read in the papers nor do they see reporters as impartial observers of world events. This should be no great surprise. The model of a privately owned media ensures that the facts are massaged to suit ownership, a practice that inevitably undermines credibility. The marriage between the media and the state increases the danger to the public interests. This is especially true when the media becomes a marketing tool for the government, promoting its vastly unpopular wars, its attacks on the social safety net, and its vicious assault on civil liberties. The media has become an adversary to the people it is supposed to serve. It now functions exclusively as a weapon in the imperial arsenal, exalting the state and its wartime agenda, while savaging the institutions of democracy and personal liberty. Its role as state-propagandist is conspicuous in everything from its blind devotion to the president to its obfuscation of facts that discredit the administration. If we consider a few of the critical stories the mainstream media suppressed, we get a clearer idea of its overall agenda...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Whitney1115.htm

Rediscovered Testimony Given by CIA Director in 2001
Suggests Manipulation of Pre-war Intelligence

by Jason Leopold

President George W. Bush’s attempt Friday to silence critics who say his administration manipulated prewar intelligence on Iraq is undercut by congressional testimony given in February 2001 by former CIA Director George Tenet, who said that Iraq posed no immediate threat to the United States or other countries in the Middle East, Dissident Voice has found. Details of Tenet’s testimony have not been reported before...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Leopold1115.htm

by Evelyn J. Pringle

In its systematic and concerted effort to portray a link between Saddam and bin Laden, the White House propaganda team was so successful that a poll conducted in late 2002 showed that over half of the people polled believed that Saddam was connected to 9/11. While that may have been great news for the home team back then, the problem for Bush today is that he is never going to get 50% of Americans to erase their memory of all the statements that were made, and believe the line that members of the administration never said anything to make people think that Saddam was involved in 9/11...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Pringle1115.htm

by Jim Glover

Dear SLPD:

In your editorial of November 12, you continue to beat up on military whistleblower Jimmy Massey, who had the temerity to point out that our brave men and women in uniform in Iraq might not be acting as humanely as our mythology would have them do. You conclude by congratulating yourself as follows: Absolute truth is hard to come by, but as the bloggers bloviate and the blowhards blow, good reporters and good newspapers are out there digging. Really? Perhaps, then, you could answer a few questions that have been bothering me about good newspapers...

http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Glover1115.htm

Red State Road Trip: A 60-Minute Documentary

How could America have given George W. Bush a second term? Filmmaker Chris Hume decided to find out by embarking on a 6,000-mile, cross-country journey in search of America’s soul. The result: a fascinating, hilarious, and often disturbing road-trip adventure.

http://www.truthout.org/multimedia.htm

The intelligence community's "failure to undertake a real review of the documents - even though their validity was the subject of serious doubts - was a major failure of the intelligence system," the presidentially appointed Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States concluded last March.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505P.shtml

"They took us to a cage - an animal cage that had lions in it within the Republican Palace," he said. "And they threatened us that if we did not confess, they would put us inside the cage with the lions in it.... And they opened the door and they threatened that if I did not confess, that they were going to throw me inside the cage. And as the lion was coming closer, they would pull me back out and shut the door, and tell me, 'We will give you one more chance to confess.' And I would say, 'Confess to what?'"

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111505N.shtml

15.11.05

Für den Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland (BUND) bietet der Koalitionsvertrag von CDU/CSU und SPD in wesentlichen Teilen keine ausreichenden Antworten auf die umweltpolitischen Herausforderungen. "Das nur halbherzige Antasten der umweltschädlichen Subventionen" bewertet der Umweltverband als ungenügend. Akzeptabel sei die faktische Fortsetzung der bisherigen Energiepolitik. Hervorzuheben sei "die Tatsache", dass die SPD eine Verlängerung der Laufzeiten für Atomkraftwerke verhindert habe. Bei den Themen Chemikaliensicherheit und Gentechnik haben sich Union und SPD nach Auffassung der Umweltschützer jedoch dem Druck einflussreicher Industriebranchen gebeugt. Die drohende Verwässerung der Schutzbestimmungen vor gefährlichen Chemikalien und das Aufweichen bislang vorbildlicher Haftungsregeln in der Agro-Gentechnik seien gravierende Rückschläge beim Verbraucherschutz.

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12291

Geostrategische Ziele: Friedensbewegung kritisiert Deutschlands "weltweite Ambitionen" (15.11.05)

Für die deutsche Friedensbewegung ist der außenpolitische Teil des Koalitionsvertrags von CDU/CSU und SPD vor allem eine Sammlung "wohlklingende Phrasen". Und dort, wo es konkret werde, sei er problematisch. "die stärkere Betonung der nationalen Interessen im Europäischen Einigungsprozess, die Rehabilitierung des Anbiederungskurses der CDU/CSU an die US-Kriegspolitik gegen den Irak, eine aktivere Industriepolitik zur Konsolidierung der deutschen und europäischen Rüstungsproduktion, die offensivere Formulierung geostrategischer Ziele in Osteuropa, im Nahen und Mittleren Osten und in Asien, den in Erwägung gezogenen Einsatz der Bundeswehr im Inneren, die Unterordnung der Entwicklungspolitik unter sicherheitspolitische Belange." Die Experten der drei Parteien hätten im Wesentlichen fortgeschrieben, was auch in der rot-grünen Koalition außenpolitischer Konsens gewesen sei: Die Bundesregierung beschreite weiter "den Weg Deutschlands von einer europäischen Mittelmacht zu einer hoch gerüsteten Großmacht mit weltweiten Ambitionen".

Die ganze Nachricht im Internet:
http://www.ngo-online.de/ganze_nachricht.php?Nr=12292

November 14th, 2005

Please forward to anyone who might be interested!

CAMPUS ANTIWAR NETWORK

* NATIONAL DAY OF COUNTER-RECRUITMENT * December 6, 2005
http://www.campusantiwar.net

ENDORSED BY: Cindy Sheehan, Pablo Paredes, war resister; David Airhart, Iraq War vet and Kent State student facing expulsion for peaceful counter-recruitment; Tariq Khan, George Mason University student assaulted for peaceful counter-recruitment; Charles Peterson, Holyoke Community College student assaulted for peaceful counter-recruitment; David Swanson, co-founder of AfterDowningStreet.org; Traprock Peace Center; Anthony Arnove, editor, Iraq Under Siege and co-editor with Howard Zinn, Voices of a People’s History of the United States.

* Say No to the Solomon Amendment!

Campus Anti-War Network is calling for actions around the country to show the federal government that they cannot intimidate schools for kicking out military recruiters. On December 6, the Supreme Court will hear the FAIR v Rumsfeld case (brought by several universities), which will decide whether schools can ban military recruiters wihout losing federal funding. Currently, the Solomon Amendment allows the government to cut off federal funding from schools that ban military recruiters. This policy forces schools to accept military recruitment, even though the military’s anti-gay “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy violates university anti-discrimination policies.

* Bring the movement for COLLEGE NOT COMBAT to a recruiting station near you!

On Dec 6, when the Supreme Court hears FAIR v Rumsfeld, students will hold protests at military recruiting stations across the country, including in San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, New York City, and many other cities. In Washington, D.C., a press conference and demonstration will take place outside the Supreme Court.

This action comes amid increasing revelations of the horror of the Iraq occupation. Recent video footage shows that the US used chemical weapons (white phosphorus) in Fallujah, laying bare the lies about “weapons of mass destruction.” Occupation is not liberation. On December 6, we refuse to let the military recruit young people to kill and die in a war based on lies.

December 6 is also the one-year anniversary of Navy petty officer Pablo Paredes’ refusal to board his ship in protest of the war, which sparked a national campaign that displayed and strengthened the growing refusal of soldiers to fight this war. Recently, the counter-recruitment movement won a victory in San Francisco, where 60 percent of voters approved a proposition to oppose military recruiters in schools and support scholarships to counteract the poverty draft, which targets the poor, and people of color.

Let’s mobilize on Dec 6 to counter the military’s ability to wage its illegal war and to support the right of universities to oppose military recruiting on their campuses.

Say No to the Solomon Amendment! COLLEGE NOT COMBAT! TROOPS OUT NOW!

We welcome all organizations to endorse this day of action or to sponsor it with us. If you want to endorse, or you want to organize an action in your area, email recruitersout@yahoo.com and check out our website at http://www.campusantiwar.net

Ashley Smith
ashley05401@yahoo.com



Join CINDY SHEEHAN, HOWARD ZINN, DAHR JAMAIL, war resisters PABLO PAREDES and CAMILO MEJIA, Progressive Democrats of America director TIM CARPENTER, Iraq Vets Against the War & Campus Antiwar Network member DAVID AIRHART, and many more in supporting this day of counter-recruitment action on December 6! (Full endorsement list below.)

* NATIONAL DAY OF COUNTER-RECRUITMENT *

December 6, 2005

Campus Antiwar Network - http://www.campusantiwar.net

* Say No to the Solomon Amendment!

Campus Anti-War Network is calling for actions around the country to show the federal government that they cannot intimidate schools for kicking out military recruiters. On December 6, the Supreme Court will hear the FAIR v Rumsfeld case (brought by several universities), which will decide whether schools can ban military recruiters wihout losing federal funding. Currently, the Solomon Amendment allows the government to cut off federal funding from schools that ban military recruiters.
This policy forces schools to accept military recruitment, even though the military’s anti-gay “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy violates university anti-discrimination policies.

* Bring the movement for COLLEGE NOT COMBAT to your town!

On Dec 6, when the Supreme Court hears FAIR v Rumsfeld, students will hold protests at military recruiting stations, federal buildings and school administrative offices across the country, including in San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, New York City, and many other places. In Washington, D.C., a demonstration will take place on the steps of the Supreme Court.

We are proud to join the fight against anti-gay discrimination in the military. We also believe that recruitment for the war in Iraq has no place in schools. Our action comes amid increasing revelations of the horror of the Iraq occupation. Recent video footage shows that the US used chemical weapons (white phosphorus) in Fallujah, laying bare the truth about exactly who is using “weapons of mass destruction” in Iraq. Nobody should have to take part in this to pay for school! On December 6, we refuse to let the military recruit young people to kill and die in a war based on lies.

December 6 is also the one-year anniversary of Navy petty officer Pablo Paredes’s refusal to board his ship in protest of the war, which sparked a national campaign that displayed and strengthened the growing refusal of soldiers to fight this war. Recently, the counter-recruitment movement won a massive victory in San Francisco, where 60% of voters approved a College Not Combat proposition to oppose military recruiters in schools and support scholarships to counteract the poverty draft — which targets the poor and people of color. Today, with the Bush administration in a growing crisis and expanding calls for immediate withdrawal, we want to spread the “College Not Combat” movement across the country!

Let’s mobilize on Dec 6 to counter the military’s ability to wage its illegal war, support the right of universities to oppose military recruiting on their campuses, and bring the troops home from Iraq!

Say No to the Solomon Amendment!

COLLEGE NOT COMBAT! TROOPS OUT NOW!

Organized by the Campus Antiwar Network - http://www.campusantiwar.net - RecruitersOut@yahoo.com

ENDORSED BY:

ORGANIZATIONS: Bay Area United Against War; Bloomington Peace Action Coalition; the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors; Central Vermont Peace and Justice; the City of Berkeley, CA, by unanimous vote of its city council; Cities for Peace; Free Palestine Alliance; International Action Center; International Socialist Organization; Justice in Palestine Coalition; Mid-South Peace and Justice Center; Mt. Diablo Peace & Justice Center; Peninsula Raging Grannies; San Juan Peace Network; Stop the War Coalition (UK); Texans for Peace; Traprock Peace Center; Youth Against War and Racism

INDIVIDUALS*: AHMED SHAWKI, editor, International Socialist Review and member, steering committee, National Council of Arab-Americans; ANTHONY ARNOVE, editor, Iraq Under Siege; BONNIE WEINSTEIN, Bay Area United Against War; BRIAN WILLSON, member, coordinating Committee, Humboldt Bay Veterans For Peace, and Commissioner, Arcata City Nuclear Free Zone and Peace Commission; CAMILO MEJIA, war resister; CARL WEBB, war resister; CEYLON MOONEY, co-coordinator, Wheels of Justice Tour, Voices for Creative Nonviolence; CHARLES JENKS, Advisory Board Chair, Traprock Peace Center; CHARLES PETERSON, Holyoke Community College student assaulted for peaceful counter-recruitment; CHARLIE JACKSON, co-founder, Texans for Peace; CINDY SHEEHAN, mother of U.S. soldier killed in Iraq, who camped outside Bush’s Crawford ranch to hold him accountable; DAHR JAMAIL, writer; DAVID AIRHART, Iraq war veteran and Kent State student who beat expulsion charges for peaceful counter-recruitment; DAVID ROVICS, progressive songwriter and musician; DAVID SWANSON, co-founder of AfterDowningStreet.org; DAVID ZIRIN, author, What’s My Name Fool? Sports and Resistance in the United States; DENNIS KYNE, Gulf War veteran and activist; DIRK ADRIAENSENS, coordinator of SOS Iraq and member of the Executive committee of the Brussells Tribunal; FRANCES CROWE, founder of Northampton Draft Information Center in 1968 (she counseled over 2000 young people on the draft) and co-founder of Traprock Peace Center and Western Mass AFSC; HOWARD ZINN, author of People’s History of the United States; M. JUNAID ALAM, co-editor of LeftHook.org; KATHY KELLY, Co-coordinator, Voices for Creative Nonviolence; LINDSAY GERMAN, convenor, Stop the War Coalition (UK); MICHAEL LETWIN, Co-Convener, NYC Labor Against the War, and Former president, UAW Local 2325; NATYLIE BALDWIN, Mt. Diablo Peace & Justice Center; NORMAN SOLOMON, author and syndicated columnist; PABLO PAREDES, war resister; PALOA PISI, publisher of Uruknet (Italy); PAT ELDER, co-founder, DC Anti-War Network; PHIL GASPER, Professor of Philosophy at Notre Dame de Namur University in California; RANDY KEHLER, Vietnam War draft noncooperator, long-time peace activist/war-tax refuser, former national coordinator, Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign, co-founder and first Director of Traprock Peace Center; RANIA MASRI, writer and researcher; SHANNYN SOLLITT, Peace Activist/Educator -NetWorks Productions; SHUJAA GRAHAM, exonerated Death row prisoner, anti death penalty activist; TARIQ KHAN, George Mason University student assaulted and arrested for peaceful counter-recruitment; THOMAS F. BARTON, publisher of G.I. Special; TIM CARPENTER, director of Progressive Democrats of America; TODD CHRETIEN, author of Proposition I/College Not Combat ballot initiative in San Francisco; WARD REILLY, South East National Contact - Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Baton Rouge *All affiliations are for identification purposes only

We welcome all organizations to endorse this day of action and/or organize with us. If you want to endorse, organize an action in your
area, or learn about the action nearest you, email recruitersout@yahoo.com and check out our website at

Campus Antiwar Network - http://www.campusantiwar.net

Ashley Smith
ashley05401@yahoo.com

Neuer BND-Skandal lässt viele Fragen offen.
http://www.telepolis.de/tp/r4/artikel/21/21347/1.html

Jordanien: CIA und GID http://www.telepolis.de/tp/r4/artikel/21/21353/1.html

HLV INFO 176/AT
15-11-2005

fgf 10-11-05

Die Online-Publikation „spiked“ hat sechs britische Parlamentsmitglieder (MPs) über ihre Meinung zur Sicherheit von Mobiltelefonen und Masten befragt. Weiteres Umfragethema war die Besorgnis ihrer Wähler und deren Meinung über die von den Behörden ergriffenen Vorsorgemaßnahmen nach der Veröffentlichung des Stewart Reports im Jahr 2000. Die Antworten zeigen, dass die Parlamentsmitglieder - genau wie die Bevölkerung - unterschiedlicher Auffassung darüber sind, ob Mobiltelefone ein gesundheitliches Risiko darstellen oder nicht. Einig sind sich allerdings alle darin, dass Vorsorge eine vernünftige Maßnahme ist.

http://www.spiked-online.com/

Die UN kritisiert weit verbreitete Menschenrechtsverletzungen im Irak, das Pentagon musste nun doch den Einsatz von Napalm-ähnlichen Brandbomben in Falludscha einräumen.

http://www.telepolis.de/tp/r4/artikel/21/21354/1.html

Luckily for U.S capitalism both the U.S. anti-war movement and the established labor organizations do not think that there is any relationship between the oppression of the Iraqi workers by the War on Iraq and the oppression of U.S. workers. Whew U.S. capitalism would sure be in a lot of trouble if the anti-war movement and the workers struggles in the United States began to UNITE. What if ant-war demonstrations/rallies were combined with STRIKES and shut downs and work stoppages in vital sections of the United States economy (the ports and harbors of the United States for instance)? How about an anti-war movement that shut down the U.S. harbors, the rail heads, the busses and the taxi system? The workers are generally ready to do that but for some reason the U.S. anti-war movement does not want to do work stoppages and STRIKES against the War on Iraq. Why? Why aren't anti-war actions include work stoppages and STRIKES in addition to the marches, holding ups signs and listening to speeches that the anti-war movement does at this time? The port truckers and the bus drivers (well a dissident section of the bus drivers at any rate) and the taxi drivers are ready to talk to anti-war movement activists but so far few anti-war activists have been willing to put in the time to talk to the port truckers, the bus drivers and the taxi drivers. Maybe it is time to start talking and to start to UNITE.

Jim DeMaegt


Strikes Multiply Amid Increase in Labor Fights
By KRIS MAHER
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
November 15, 2005

The number of work stoppages in the U.S., including strikes by unions and management-sponsored lockouts, is on the upswing as tensions rise between workers and companies that are seeking to cut wages and benefits.

The trend extends beyond the troubled auto and airline industries, as continuing strikes by telecom workers at Sprint
http://online.wsj.com/quotes/main.html?type=djn&symbol=fon
Corp. and machinists at Boeing
http://online.wsj.com/quotes/main.html?type=djn&symbol=ba Co.'s rocket division attest. Last week, graduate teaching assistants at New York University walked off the job and musicians at Radio City Music Hall remain locked out by Cablevision Systems
http://online.wsj.com/quotes/main.html?type=djn&symbol=cvc Corp. Unions representing copper workers at Asarco LLC, meanwhile, finally reached a tentative agreement with the company to end a four-month strike.

It remains to be seen if a surge in strikes will exacerbate labor's battered image, experts say. At a time when many workers question the relevance of unions in a mobile service economy, such increases could reinforce stereotypes of militant industrial workers. And yet, workers could be drawn to unions willing to strike to resist cuts to health-care benefits, in particular.

"A strike is a dangerous thing in terms of public relations," says Gary Chaison, a labor expert at Clark University in Worcester, Mass. Unions are presented with the opportunity to demonstrate strength, but if they lose, strikes can "point out tremendous weakness," he said.

Work stoppages, including both strikes and lockouts resulting from deadlocked negotiations and other labor disputes, are up 14% this year, according to Bureau of National Affairs Inc., a Washington, D.C., publisher of legal and regulatory information. There were 231 work stoppages initiated through the end of August, compared with 202 in the same period last year, with the vast majority being strikes. The group tracks work stoppages at companies of all sizes mainly from government reports, union publications and news reports. (The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, by contrast, only tracks work stoppages involving 1,000 or more employees.)

The United Auto Workers, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the Service Employees International Union, the International Association of Machinists and the United Steelworkers of America have all engaged in more work stoppages through August than they had last year, according to BNA data. The Teamsters were involved in 47 work stoppages through August of this year, far more than any other union, up from 38 the prior year.

The recent upswing is "a sign of frustration, almost to the point of desperation," says Prof. Chaison of Clark University. "For many workers there's no alternative. They feel that they were badly beaten up in past negotiations or that companies are making tremendous demands on them."

Many labor leaders said the strikes have been effective, pointing to the more than 18,000 Boeing machinists who recently renegotiated a more favorable health-care benefits package after striking.

More major unrest could be on the horizon. Some analysts predict the showdown between the UAW and Delphi Corp., which is seeking sharp cuts in union pay, health-care benefits and pensions, could culminate in a strike -- potentially crippling auto plants that depend on steady supplies of Delphi parts.

The vast majority of the more than 20,000 contract negotiations each year result in new contracts. Yet the increase in strikes is a stark turnabout from the steady declines of recent years. Labor experts attributed the drop to the difficulty of waging successful strikes as the percentage of union workers at many workplaces declines, and as companies increasingly hire replacement workers to thwart strikes.

Despite media focus on strikes in ailing industries, the increase in strikes could also partly be driven by the improved economy, since unions often view strikes as a more effective threat when companies are faring well and labor markets are tight. "Strikes tend to rise during economic expansions rather than contractions in the economy," says Joseph Tracy, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

But others, including union leaders, argue that the increase indicates the harsher negotiating climate. "Employers are taking a much harder bargaining position, and that's naturally going to be met by an elevated level of worker militancy," says Ron Blackwell, chief economist for the AFL-CIO. "Given what we see going on this year, you have to expect the level of strike activity would increase."

At Sprint, union members said that after absorbing rising health-care costs for several years, they are unwilling to accept concessions when the company is profitable. "If they can prove where they're hurting, we might be able to help them out," says Eddie Hicks, president of Communications Workers of America local 3871 in Bluff City, Tenn., where about 300 workers have been on strike since Oct. 10.

A total of roughly 500 workers, mostly technicians, remain on strike at Sprint, though the company says it has reached tentative agreements with two of four striking bargaining units. Sprint spokeswoman Debra Peterson said the company is asking striking unions to accept conditions that already apply to the vast majority of its employees, including many union-represented workers. "We believe that we are offering a very competitive compensation and benefits package for our employees," she says.

While several recent high-profile strikes have failed, including at Northwest Airlines
http://online.wsj.com/quotes/main.html?type=djn&symbol=nwac , where the company hired replacement mechanics to keep operations running, that may not deter frustrated workers, several labor experts said.

The aggressive public-relations tactics of unions that broke away from the AFL-CIO this year -- including the SEIU, Teamsters and Unite Here -- to create a rival labor federation called Change to Win Federation, could carry over into increased strikes at companies that can't easily bring in replacement workers, says Richard Hurd, a professor of labor studies at Cornell University. "Is this an aberration this year or is it going to be sustained?" he asks. "If defensive strikes are effective at holding onto benefits," work stoppages could well increase next year.

The breakaway unions say they left the AFL-CIO because they wanted to devote more resources to organizing new members for more aggressive campaigns. "There have been efforts in a number of industries by employers to take a hard line unnecessarily. Unions are fed up with it," says Bruce Raynor, president of Unite Here, a Change to Win union that represents 450,000 mostly hotel and apparel workers. "Unions are in a fighting mode."

Write to Kris Maher at kris.maher@wsj.com

Pressemitteilung von: ödp Rems-Murr

(openPR) - ödp-Kreisrat Gerhard Geiger findet es sehr merkwürdig, dass der Petitionsausschuss seine Petition für bessere Verbraucheraufklärung und technische Vorsorge vor vermeidbarer gepulster HF-Strahlung als normale Petition, nicht jedoch als die neuerlich mögliche öffentliche Petition angenommen habe. Dabei hatte ihm selbst das Bundesamt für Strahlenschutz im April 2005 sehr wohl auf seine Anfrage attestiert, dass Vorsicht vor den DECT-Telefonen geboten sei. Was hier der Petitionsausschuss bzw. noch mehr der Verbraucherschutz- und das Umweltministerium tue, so Geiger, sei eine unbegreifliche Nachlässigkeit. Es werde alles getan, um die Bürger über die wissenschaftlich erkannten möglichen gesundheitlichen Folgen der gepulsten DECT- und Mobilfunk-Strahlung im Unklaren zu lassen. Die Sache erinnere an die Jahrzehnte behinderte und verleugnete Raucheraufklärung. Es wäre besonders bei der DECT-Technik eine Bagatellmühe der Politik, eine auf reine Nutzungsintervalle beschränkte DECT-Strahlung (CT2-Technik) bei der entsprechenden Industrie vorsorglich hinzuwirken, erklärte Kreisrat Geiger bei der Vorstandssitzung des ödp-Kreisverbands in Fellbach. Mobilfunk ja - doch mit Maß, auch bei den Grenzwerthöhen, die ohnehin nur thermische Kriterien erfüllten.

Die eigentlich dem Wohle des Bürgers verpflichteten Politiker wären wohl vordergründig nur der Industrie hörig, vermutete Geiger. Ihre eigentliche Funktion, vor allem durch vorsorgliche Information zur Vorsorge und sinnvoller Anwendung moderner Techniken beizutragen, erfüllten sie nicht. Dabei, so Geiger, sei es technisch leicht möglich, zumindest bei den schnurlosen DECT-Heimtelefonen eine Strahlungsabschaltung im Stand-By-Betrieb einzuführen. Immerhin, so zeigten auch lokale Messungen, bestrahle die DECT-Telefone in der Regel den Menschen noch wesentlich stärker als die Mobilfunktechnik. Geiger: "Es ist geradezu lachhaft diesen minimalen Einsatz eines solchen Schaltelements nicht zu ermöglichen - nicht ermöglichen zu wollen!" Man müsse sich die Frage gefallen lassen, wie sehr die Politik hier korrumpiert sei. Es gebe zu Denken und sage viel aus, dass es keinen Haftpflichtversicherer gebe, der Betreiber von Mobilfunkanlagen schütze - auch dies sei dem Verbraucher kaum bekannt. Eigentlich, so Geiger, wäre längst eine Anzeige gegen diesen "Verbraucherschutz" und "Umweltschutz" fällig. Mit der Frage, ob ein solcher Schritt möglich sei, wandte sich Gerhard Geiger nun an die Dachorganisation der Mobilfunkinitiativen.

Ökologisch-Demokratische Partei (ödp) Kreisverband Rems-Murr
Geschäftsführer Guido Klamt, Steinbeißstr. 60, 70839 Gerlingen
Tel/Fax 07156-175257

http://www.news4press.com/1/MeldungDetail.asp?Mitteilungs_ID=79499
http://openpr.de/news/68205.html

Bereits im Vormonat veröffentlichten Australische Medien Forschungsergebnisse aus Melbourne, die von einer Beeinflussung menschlicher Gehirnströme durch Mobiltelefone berichten. Die Ergebnisse der Studie wurden nun in der Ausgabe 16 der Zeitschrift "Neuroreport" veröffentlicht: The effect of electromagnetic fields emitted by mobile phones on human sleep; Loughran SP, Wood AW, Barton JM, Croft RJ, Thompson B, Stough C.; Neuroreport. 2005 Nov 28;16(17):1973-6.

http://www.emf-portal.de/viewer.php?l=g&aid=12843


Aus: FGF-Infoline vom 10.11.2005

HLV INFO 176/AT
15-11-2005

14-11-05

Schwedisches Gericht bezeichnet die Emissionen von UMTS als eine "gefährliche Aktivität"

Das oberste Gericht für Umweltrecht in Schweden hat in einem Berufungsurteil festgestellt, dass die Emissionen von 3G-Mobilfunksendeanlagen (UMTS) eine Gefahr für die Umwelt mit sich bringen. Als Begründung wurde unter anderem angegeben, dass Risiken nicht ausgeschlossen werden können und dass schon die bloße Furcht von Anwohnern vor solchen Anlagen eine Verletzung des Umweltrechts bedeute.

Gefunden bei www.elektrosmoginfo.de
Schwedisch http://www.ssi.se/News/newsEntire.asp?ID=188
Quelle: http://www.emfacts.com/weblog/?p=275

HLV INFO 176/AT
15-11-2005

"Wählen Sie bevorzugt Orte, an denen keine Menschen leben oder arbeiten, stellen Sie sicher, dass die Bürger umfassende Informationen über alle unterschiedlichen Quellen elektromagnetischer Strahlung erhalten und führen Sie Forschung durch, insbesondere mit Kohortenstudien über die Auswirkungen auf Menschen in der Nähe von Antennen.“ Kürzlich veröffentlichten holländische Nichtregierungsorganisationen diese dringenden Empfehlungen an die Europäische Union und die Regierung der Niederlande.

http://www.emfacts.com/


Aus: FGF-Infoline vom 17.11.2005

Omega der Forschungsgemeinschaft Funk e.V. (FGF), gehören alle deutschen Mobilfunkbetreiber an.

HLV INFO 176/AT
15-11-2005

Volker Hartenstein, MdL a.D.

15-11-05

Bitte veröffentlichen Sie folgende Stellungnahme in Ihrem Verteiler:

Es wird immer wieder geklagt darüber, dass die Behörden und Betreiber sich weigern, Strahlungsleistungen an BIs und Betroffene herauszugeben.

Seit Ende 2004 sind die Aufsichtsbehörden (z.B. Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft, für Verkehr, etc.) durch das verbesserte Umweltinformationsgesetz (s. Anhang) verpflichtet, diese Informationen zu besorgen und weiterzugeben. Es gilt eine Frist von einem Monat für die Beantwortung.

http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/uig_041228.pdf

Bitte machen Sie reichlich Gebrauch davon und lassen Sie sich nicht durch das Gerede der Betreiber und Behörden über Geheimhaltungsverpflichtungen oder schutzbedürftigen Daten abschrecken - das Gesetz ist sehr eindeutig auf der Seite der betroffenen Bevölkerung: Emissionen müssen öffentlich zugänglich gemacht werden.

Anlagen als Beispiel: - UIG 12/04 - Antrag auf Mitteilung der Strahlung von WLAN in Lufthansaflugzeugen - Antrag an RegTP wegen Strahlungswerten in Wolfratshausen (wurde an Zentral eweitergegeben - bis jetzt noch keine Antwort)

Gruß

Hans Schmidt
1. Vorsitzender Bürgerinitiative Wolfratshausen zum Schutz vor Elektrosmog e.V.


Dr.-Ing. Hans Schmidt
Gebhardtstr. 2d

82515 Wolfratshausen

Tel: 08171/29751
Fax: 08171/911035

WOR, den 06.11.05



An das

Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Technologie
Fax: 01888/615-4436

Betr: fly net / WLAN auf Langstreckenflügen der Lufthansa

Antrag nach UIG auf Mitteilung der Strahlungsdaten in Lufthansa-Flugzeugen mit WLAN


Sehr geehrte Damen und Herren,

als Elektrosensibler und Vielflieger habe ich seit Februar dieses Jahres versucht, von der Lufthansa Auskunft darüber zu bekommen, wie hoch die Strahlungsdichte in den von ihnen mit WLAN ausgerüsteten Flugzeugen ist (siehe Schreiben vom 6.2.05 Anlage). Endgültig abgelehnt hat die Lufthansa mein Begehren mit Schreiben vom 23.09.05 (siehe Anlage): „Obwohl wir Ihr Anliegen sehr gut verstehen, bitten wir um Ihr Verständnis, dass wir Ihnen die Untersuchungsergebnisse sowie die von Ihnen gewünschten detaillierten technischen Daten wie Frequenz, Pulsung und Leistungsflussdichte nicht zur Verfügung stellen können.“ - Die Daten sind also wohl vorhanden, aber werden nicht zugänglich gemacht.

Die Lufthansa untersteht der Aufsicht Ihres Ministeriums. Sie ist zudem (siehe §2, Absatz 2 des UIG) eine juristische Person des Privatrechts, die öffentliche Dienstleistungen erbringt, und dabei der Kontrolle des Bundes oder einer unter der Aufsicht des Bundes stehenden juristischen Person unterliegt.

Hiermit beantrage ich nun ganz offiziell nach dem neuen Umweltinformationsgesetz die Weitergabe der von mir im Schreiben vom 6.2.05 geforderten Daten, da es sich eindeutig um Emissionen handelt, die laut §9 UIG grundsätzlich weiterzugeben sind.

Ich weise außerdem ausdrücklich auf die in §3 UIG fixierte Frist von einem Monat hin, die für die Beantwortung bzw. die Auskunft gilt.

Bitte bestätigen Sie den Eingang dieses Schreibens und, falls Sie nicht die richtige Stelle im Behördenapparat sind, leiten Sie dieses Schreiben an die richtige Stelle weiter und geben Sie mir darüber Nachricht.


Mit freundlichen Grüßen


Anlagen: mein Schreiben an die LH vom 06.02.05
Endgültige Absage der LH vom 23.09.05

The British Medical Journal recently featured an editorial on the bird flu in which they state the following:

The lack of sustained human-to-human transmission suggests that this AH5N1 avian virus does not currently have the capacity to cause a human pandemic.

Theoretical Speculation

While they do go on to say the virus could mutate with a influenza A virus and has the potential to acquire the means for rapid human to human transmission, it does not have this ability now; the preparation and warnings are entirely about a theoretical speculation.

No Lawsuits or Compensation Allowed

Meanwhile, the Bush administration's proposed $7.1-billion pandemic flu plan seeks broad restrictions on lawsuits against producers of vaccines and antiviral drugs, and makes no mention of how those injured or killed by adverse reactions could be compensated.

Yesterday's Wired magazine does an excellent review of detailing why this plan will fail. They conclude:

"...it will take at least five years to create enough manufacturing capacity to reach that goal. Then it will take another eight months to create a new vaccine that combats the specific strain that would be killing people. In other words, it would be 2011 at the earliest before every American could be vaccinated against a bird flu pandemic."

The other, even more serious shortcoming of the plan is that it would protect vacine producers and distributors except in cases of "willful misconduct," a term to be defined later.

Lawsuits Not An Undue Burden

Bush has called "the growing burden of litigation" one of the greatest obstacles to vaccine production. But critics have pointed out that lawsuits against vaccines are relatively rare; a recent study of the subject found only ten lawsuits related to flu vaccine over the past 20 years.

British Medical Journal October 29, 2005; 331(7523): 975-976

Los Angeles Times November 4, 2005 SOURCE:
http://www.mercola.com/2005/nov/15/finally_medical_journal_admits_the_truth_about_bird_flu.htm


ECOTERRA Intl.

Propaganda Matrix
by Jeffrey Tucker

11/10/05

As part of this plan, there is a website, pandemicflu.gov, which is also a helpful link if you haven't so far believed a word you have read. Here you can click around and find the Mother of All Flu Reports: The National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza. Be assured that 'the federal government will use all instruments of national power to address the pandemic threat.' That includes FEMA, the Department of Homeland Security, and a hundred other concrete palaces in DC...

http://propagandamatrix.com/articles/november2005/101105Fowl.htm


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Boston Globe
by staff

11/14/05

People in the custody of the federal government should not be without basic human rights. The Senate needs to rescind its vote last week that would prevent 750 so-called 'illegal combatants' at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from appealing their imprisonment in federal court. ... US troops are fighting to safeguard the United States, with its guarantees of personal liberty, not to have civil rights limited in the name of national security. Habeas corpus is a venerable principle of Anglo-American law under which prisoners can challenge their status in court. Congress has the power to limit it under extraordinary circumstances. The early phase of the Civil War, when Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus to maintain Washington's lifeline to the North, met that criterion. The war on terror, for all its importance, does not...

http://tinyurl.com/bf4gb


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Washington Times
by Nat Hentoff

11/14/05

Since I am not a member of the Senate Judiciary committee, I have taken the uninvited liberty to suggest a series of questions during the confirmation process of Judge Samuel Alito that bear on Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter's assertion that this nominee for the Supreme Court respects long-range Supreme Court precedents. During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, and after the fact, got Congress to agree. ... [I]n a landmark decision in 1866, Justice David Davis declared the imprisonment was unconstitutional because the civilian courts were still open. He ruled: 'The Constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and peace, and covers with the shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances. The Government, within the Constitution, has all the powers granted to it, which are necessary to preserve its existence.' Does Judge Alito agree, even in this war against terrorism, that the Constitution must be strictly constructed?

http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20051113-112008-9702r.htm


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

The American Prospect
by Michael Tomasky

11/14/05

Watching and reading George W. Bush's Veterans' Day speech last Friday confirmed my belief that it's a good thing Karl Rove wasn't indicted. If this is the best these people can do, Rove is doing Bush a lot more damage from his White House office than he would as an indictee. The speech was humiliating to Bush and the United States of America on so many levels that I don't even know where to begin. OK, actually, I do. I'll begin with the outright lie. My critics, Bush whimpered, 'are fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community's judgments related to Iraq's weapons programs.' No such thing ever happened. That bipartisan investigation ... is ongoing right now. ... The probe is finally proceeding -- but it sure hasn't 'found' anything. There is no other way to interpret Bush's sentence: It is a direct, unmediated, Nixonian lie. What kind of pathetic man would utter such a lie on Veterans' Day, when over 2,000 U.S. soldiers have died?

http://www.prospect.org/web/view-web.ww?id=10618


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Salon
by Joe Conason

11/15/05

I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby may have taken the perp walk for the Bush White House, but he will never walk alone. As the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney considers his options -- including possible cooperation with special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald -- friends of the administration are rallying to his side. Unlike his old boss Cheney, the indicted Libby lacks the millions of dollars needed to mount a proper Washington scandal defense, but evidently he will have no trouble attracting the assistance of right-wing operatives, administration aides and Republican lobbyists. Actually, someone who personifies all those categories and more has materialized to mastermind the Scooter Libby defense committee, with promises of financial assistance and supportive publicity... [subscription or ad view required]

http://www.salon.com/opinion/conason/2005/11/15/libby_defense/


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Slate
by Bruce Reed

11/15/05

Since Halloween, Sam Alito has been dressing up as a mild-mannered civil servant who followed his father into the family business. Unlike the nakedly careerist John Roberts, who bounded from one Reaganite political post to the next, Alito was supposed to have spent his youth as a career bureaucrat in short sleeves and a pocket protector. Newly released papers from the Reagan library show that Alito was as much of a right-wing suck-up as Roberts. In a 1985 job application to become a Deputy Assistant Attorney General under Ed Meese, Alito boasted of his longstanding conservative credentials: 'The greatest influences on my views were the writings of William F. Buckley Jr., the National Review, and Barry Goldwater's 1964 campaign' -- when Alito was all of 14...

http://www.slate.com/id/2130356/


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

WorldNetDaily
by Pat Buchanan

11/14/05

Echoed by anti-Bush media that can smell blood in the water, the Democratic Party is charging that Bush misled, deceived or lied us into war. With polls showing 57 percent of the nation no longer believes Bush to be honest and truthful, the unanswered charges have had a devastating impact. But Bush has a last card to play, and on Veterans Day, he played it, the ace of trumps in any president's hand: the patriot card. Speaking in Pennsylvania to the troops, Bush said that pro-war Democrats like John Kerry saw the same intelligence he did and voted to take Saddam down, and that Democrats now accusing him of faking intelligence are undercutting our fighting troops in Iraq. Translation: Democrats are giving aid and comfort to the enemy in time of war. We are one step away from the T-word. With his poll ratings at rock bottom and little to lose, Bush has just escalated the war politics...

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=47406


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

AntiWar.Com
by Justin Raimondo

11/14/05

Cornered by their critics, overwhelmed by massive antiwar sentiment, and pursued by the relentless Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the War Party is in full retreat, hiding behind the ramparts of an elaborate edifice of lies. The administration's defenders are shooting blindly, averring -- per Norman Podhoretz -- that, since 'everybody' believed what the administration was claiming about Iraq's alleged WMD prior to the invasion, we're all living in the same alternate universe. In the Bizarro World of the neocons, if we all believe a lie, that makes it true. Or, rather, that makes the whole idea of truth irrelevant, and we should all 'move on,' as the Clintonites used to say...

http://antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8023


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

CounterPunch
by Paul Craig Roberts

11/14/05

Habeas corpus prevents authorities from detaining a person indefinitely without charges; the guarantee of habeas corpus ensures that no one can imprison you without a trial. The Bush administration wants the power to detain indefinitely anyone it declares to be an enemy combatant or a terrorist without presenting the detainee in court with charges. In England the power to arrest people and to hold them indefinitely without charges was taken away from kings centuries ago. Bush apparently thinks he is the reincarnation of an absolute monarch. ... On Thursday November 10, the Republican controlled US Senate voted 49 to 42 to overturn the US Supreme Court's 2004 ruling that permits Guantanamo detainees to challenge their detentions. How dare the US Supreme Court defend the US Constitution and the civil liberties of Americans when we have terrorists to fight, argued the Republican senators. What are civil liberties, the Republicans asked rhetorically, but legal tricks that allow criminals and terrorists to escape...

http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts11142005.html


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Albany Times Union
by Tom Teepen

11/14/05

President Bush's position on torture, and his administration's, has degenerated into political gibberish. In Panama last week, Bush perfunctorily reiterated the claim that the United States doesn't use torture, then launched into one his patented and passionate soliloquies about the evil of terrorism and how it must be opposed by every possible means, in effect an argument for the torture he had just supposedly disavowed. ... In the name of protecting us, this administration is abandoning our historic values, cramping our personal freedoms, violating our privacy, making a mockery of justice and asserting a right for the president, as commander in chief, to ignore U.S. law if he wishes to. Who is to protect us from our protectors?

http://tinyurl.com/983ne


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Washington Post

11/13/05

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, which has enforced the nation's anti-discrimination laws for nearly half a century, is in the midst of an upheaval that has driven away dozens of veteran lawyers and has damaged morale for many of those who remain, according to former and current career employees. Nearly 20 percent of the division's lawyers left in fiscal 2005, in part because of a buyout program that some lawyers believe was aimed at pushing out those who did not share the administration's conservative views on civil rights laws...

http://tinyurl.com/7ltdj


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

Washington Times

11/14/05

Concerned that the nation's borders are not properly protected against terrorists, illegal aliens and drug smugglers, a Senate committee warned Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff that if he fails to correct the situation promptly, they will. Sen. Susan Collins [R-ME], chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and Sen. Joe Lieberman [D-CT] want to know whether U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) should be merged to 'enable them to operate more effectively.' In a report made public last week, the Homeland Security Department's Office of Inspector General recommended that the two agencies -- with overlapping jurisdiction for border security and immigration enforcement -- be merged, questioning whether they had the ability as separate organizations to carry out their homeland security missions. The report, requested by Collins and Lieberman, said a lack of effective coordination between the agencies had affected apprehension, detention and removal efforts...

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20051114-014004-5760r.htm


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp

On the Spanish island of Majorca, the police quietly opened a criminal investigation in March after a local newspaper reported a series of visits to the island's international airport by planes known to regularly operate for the Central Intelligence Agency. Now, it has emerged that an investigative judge in Palma has ordered the police inquiry to be sent to Spain's national court, to consider whether the CIA was routing planes carrying terrorism suspects through Majorca as part of its so-called rendition program.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111405E.shtml

Kelpie Wilson: Buried in the bowels of the budget bill is a stunning poison pill - one of the biggest land grabs in history. Engineered by the Chair of the House Resources Committee, Mr. Richard Pombo, this pill is disguised as a modification to mining law. It would transfer up to 350 million acres of public land into private ownership in order to fund a $70 billion tax cut for the rich. The only appropriate response is to regurgitate this poison pill all over their slick designer shoes.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111405A.shtml

Here's a copy of my email to Mr. Vousden at Downs School, Brighton. I sent it to BECTA as well.

Dear Mr. Vousden,

Apologies for not explaining why I sent this email to you. I wrote in support of Mr. Graham Parfitt, but had not realised it was in relation to WLAN and not masts.

In relation to WLAN, my fears are the same. I have recently been reading 'The Zapping of America' by Paul Brodeur. He tells of the cover-up of the effects of microwaves and Electromagnetic freqency emissions from the protective devices put up by the Dept. of Defense in America and the probability of genetic damage to human beings. A similar situation exists in our own country, with government ignoring the incontrovertible proof and evidence dating from as long ago as the 1930s.

My own experience of damage from computers, is that a year ago I opted for extra lessons, spending 4 hours per week at class as well as the time I spend at home. Since then my eyes have been increasingly sore, bloodshot and sight blurred and I have been diagnosed with Seborrheoic Dermatitis - itching, dry, spotty facial skin which is getting worse. I think I sent you the document re: the damaging of mast cells in the skin from microwaves emanating from Computers? In case I did not, I will try to find it and attach it to this email, otherwise I will post it to you.

I agree with Mr. Parfitt that it would not be a good idea to inflict too long a period of computer studies upon young children

Very sincerely,

Gillian Lyden

http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/effects_of_emr_frequency_emissions_from_masts.htm
http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/agnes_malvern_no_2.html
http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/cherry_brief.doc
http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/chromosomal_damage.html
http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/patricia_hewitt.doc

--------

WLANs in schools
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1145992/

http://www.emfacts.com/weblog/index.php?p=306

The Allergy and Environmental Health Association of Quebec
http://www.aeha-quebec.ca/

Environmental Sensitivities - A Definition

Environmental sensitivities can occur when people become sensitive to substances or phenomena in their everyday environment at levels well below what would be considered to be acceptable to “normal” people. Sensitivity reactions can be triggered by scented products, cleaning products, laundry detergents, paints, petrochemicals, cigarette smoke, pesticides, pets, plants, fuels, electromagnetic radiation, molds and foods.

The effect of environmental sensitivities can be overwhelming. Productive people may suddenly or gradually become unable to tolerate offices, homes, schools, hospitals and public places. Employers, who may or may not be aware of the problem, may refuse to make the accommodations necessary to allow people affected to continue working in safety. Many people with sensitivities lose their jobs if they are not provided with the accommodations they need to work productively. Some become homeless. All too often, retirement savings are depleted and debts are incurred in an attempt to create safe living conditions and to fund the cost of treatment. Treatment of these problems can be expensive and difficult to obtain, and includes avoidance of offending agents. Some people with sensitivities do improve after many years if they are able to find a safe environment in which to live and work, and if they can obtain (and afford) treatments that are both tolerable and effective for them. Sadly, despite skills and education, some people with sensitivities end up on social assistance. Many become socially isolated as they are forced to retreat from places and activities they love, and for some, the devastation extends to losing spouses, family and friends who may not believe that they are ill.

The disability may be invisible, but it is real. Like others with disabilities, persons with sensitivities have special needs which include, but are not limited to: housing in a safe and tolerable environment so that their bodies can heal, well-tolerated, environmentally safe products available at a reasonable cost, consumer self-help groups, a support system, tolerable meeting places, publicly funded treatments, safe hospitals, schools and other pubic facilities, and accommodation in the workplace. Like all Canadians, we are entitled to freedom from discriminatory treatment, which includes the right to accessible workplaces, accommodation and public facilities. Notably, environmental sensitivities have been recognized as disabilities by the Canadian Human Rights Commission and many provincial human rights commissions.

Republikanische Abgeordnete fordern den Bau einer großen amerikanischen Mauer zu Mexiko, um die Einwanderung zu verhindern.

„Vom großen Aufbruch in die Offenheit, in eine grenzenlose Welt von Freiheit und Demokratie mit einem globalen Fluss von Menschen, Informationen und Gütern, wie sich das manche nach dem Ende des Kalten Kriegs und der Mauer zwischen Ost und West vorstellten, ist heute nicht mehr viel übrig geblieben. Schon eher lässt sich beobachten, dass überall neue Mauern errichtet werden, um die Grenzen vor unerwünschten Eindringlingen zu sichern…“ Artikel von Florian Rötzer in telepolis vom 06.11.2005

http://www.heise.de/tp/r4/artikel/21/21283/1.html


Aus: LabourNet, 15. November 2005

Europa – Ausweg aus der Globalisierungsfalle? Die gewerkschaftliche Sicht auf Europa ist unrealistisch und weltfremd

Überarbeiteter Vortrag von Werner Sauerborn auf der Europakonferenz von attac D am 4./5. März in Stuttgart.

http://www.labournet.de/diskussion/eu/sopo/sauerborn.html


Aus: LabourNet, 15. November 2005

Mitbestimmung ist auch bei US-amerikanischem Verhaltenskodex in Deutschland einzuhalten

„… Das Landesarbeitsgericht hat in seiner Sitzung am 14.11.2005 folgende Abschnitte des Kodexes als mitbestimmungspflichtig eingestuft: Anordnung und Nutzung der Telefonhotline; Annahme von Geschenken und Zuwendungen; Belästigung und unangemessenes Verhalten (mit Ausnahme des Passus, der Gewalt auf dem Betriebsgelände oder in Ausübung der arbeitsvertraglichen Tätigkeit verbietet.) Nicht mitbestimmungspflichtig sind nach Ansicht der erkennenden Kammer folgende Abschnitte des Verhaltenskodexes: Pressemitteilungen im Namen der Firma ohne Zustimmung durch die entsprechende Abteilung; Privatsphäre (Die hierin enthaltene Berechtigung zur Einsichtnahme in Personal- bzw. Krankenakten ist nach der Ethikrichtlinie nur berechtigten Mitarbeitern und solchen mit einem betrieblich begründeten Anliegen vorbehalten.); Einschränkungen bei Beziehungen/Liebesbeziehungen (Die entsprechenden Regelungen verstoßen gegen das Grundgesetz und sind daher von vornherein unwirksam.)…“ Pressemitteilung Landesarbeitsgericht Düsseldorf, Beschluss vom 14.11.2005 – 10 TaBV 46/05 (pdf)

http://www.lag-duesseldorf.nrw.de/presse/mitteilungen/06_05.pdf


Aus: LabourNet, 15. November 2005

The Anti-Terrorism Bill 2005, now pending in the Senate, further entrenches severe risks for the operation of a free press in this country. We cannot preserve our democracy if we destroy institutions that serve it.

http://tinyurl.com/8g5n5


From Information Clearing House

Contracts list such activities as tracking foreign reporters; "pushing" news favorable to U.S. forces; planting television news segments that promote American positions; and creating a grass-roots voting effort in Puerto Rico on behalf of the U.S. Navy, according to Pentagon records.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10990.htm

How depressing, corrupt, unlawful and tragically absurd the administration's world view actually is...how low the moral bar has been lowered...and (though I know I'm capable of intellectually lazy notions of collective guilt) how complicit our silence as citizens is.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20051111/cm_huffpost/010485


From Information Clearing House

Habeas corpus is older than even our Constitution. It is the right to compel the executive to justify itself when it imprisons people. But the Senate voted to abolish it for Adel, in favor of the same "combatant status review tribunal" that has already exonerated him. That secret tribunal didn't have much impact on his life, but Graham says it is good enough.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10994.htm

The world has known many nations where soldiers could jack people off the streets and dump them into a black hole of incarceration without charges or trials. It has seen woeful places where people could be branded traitors and denied an opportunity to fight the accusation that officials need never prove. Proudly, for 226 years the United States wasn't one of those nations. Now it is.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11000.htm

Conscious of US intelligence failures that falsely projected weapons of mass destruction inside Iraq, the Bush administration has kept the information secret but has briefed IAEA officials, including the agency's director, Mohamed ElBaradei, as well as the British, French and German governments, in an effort to turn up the heat on Tehran.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10996.htm

There is a war going on and the Jordanian government is a party to this war. The masses should be forcing their government to retreat from supporting the US-led war in Iraq.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10997.htm

Nearly a year after they occurred, a few of the war crimes committed in Fallujah by members of the US military have gained the attention of some major media outlets (excluding, of course, any of the corporate media outlets in the US).

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10998.htm

Some prisoners, or “illegal combatants”, are on hunger strike: there are allegations of men being shackled and force fed with a brutality that amounts to torture.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1072-1870939,00.html


From Information Clearing House

People are trying to kill themselves to get out of custody, because they have no legal recourse. "They won't let us live, but they won't let us die," one of our clients explained.

http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_3203612


From Information Clearing House

Mr Hadley elaborated on the Bush policy, making clear the White House could see situations where the promise not to torture might not apply.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10988.htm

http://www.emfacts.com/weblog/index.php?p=307

More on Dirty Power and dairy farms
http://www.emfacts.com/weblog/index.php?p=308

Don`t take the fear-bait : france-riots--"bird-flu"-hoax & engineered "terror"


ON THE RIOTS IN FRANCE: THE ETERNAL SQUEEZE PLAY

NOVEMBER 11, 2005. First of all, I see no credible evidence that the riots are being launched by "radical Islamists." It is apparent that the rioters are young, poor, without much hope, and disconnected from the mainstream of society.

This is not a song of praise for the mainstream. It's just a fact.

I have read one or two reports from French citizens on the scene who state that many of the rioters are white.

Let's look at the concept of The Squeeze Play. If you, in your neighborhood, watched night after night as destructive riots creeped toward your block, you would understandably become nervous. You would want the authorities to do something. You wouldn't be eager to sacrifice your house or apartment building to people lighting fires.

You would care less and less about who was responsible. You would want action. This would place you on the side of the police. You might or might not ordinarily be friendly toward the cops, but in this instance you would want them to do something effective.

The whole point of a Squeeze Play is getting you to side with the authorities against the troublemakers.

A Squeeze Play tries to trigger every possible prejudice lurking in the back of your mind.

A Squeeze Play tries to push you over the edge into the camp of fascists.

At a great distance from violence and destruction of property, you might have all sorts of ideas about who is working behind the scenes to foment chaos---but when that rioting comes close to where you live, your ideas tend to undergo a rapid transformation.

During the LA riots after the Rodney King verdict, I was living at the base of a hill in Hollywood. >From a window I could watch the fires move north toward me. I had no idea when those fires would stop. I could also observe the gradual tightening of my feelings and thoughts. It's an interesting experience.

And I wasn't really that close to the action.

During the threat of riots, people who go to work every day begin to experience feelings toward the disenfranchised unemployed people who are rioting. All sorts of ugliness surfaces without volition.

So...who is planning and executing the basic Squeeze Play?

Who wants you to go over to the side of the representatives of the State who are carrying guns?

Who wants you to take sides?

Who wants you to exacerbate, in your mind, the sense of polarization?

Think about being a New Yorker who just arrived at work on the morning of 9/11. Who perhaps saw the planes coming in low through the city and crashing into the WTC. Who saw people streaming out of the towers. Who saw the smoke pouring out of the towers. Who later watched the towers collapse. Who had friends and family in those towers.

Do you think there was, on 9/11 and in the days to follow, a lot of argument among such New Yorkers about the identity of the people who had attacked New York?

"Give us the name of the enemy."

"Tell us what to do."

"Tell us how we can help."

"Assure us that we will have our revenge."

"Osama? Al Qaeda? Good. Let's go."

THE WHOLE POINT OF A SQUEEZE PLAY IS THAT IT SQUEEZES PEOPLE. Not just in theory. For real. You must understand this. We're not just talking about political theory here.

Along similar lines, when the stock market crashed in 1929 and the Great Depression set in, do you think most Americans pondered about who had actually caused the catastrophe?

Americans wanted jobs, and when the new president, FDR, created those jobs, the unemployed didn't spend a lot of time on streetcorners arguing about the merits of the free market versus government inspired socialism.

When the Squeeze begins, people want to escape it. They want to return to normalcy or some reasonable facsimile.

Bill Clinton's second-term victory had something to do with the 1995 Oklahoma bombing. People wanted assurances. They wanted to feel that someone was there to protect them. Clinton (not a genius as some people insist on believing) was, in fact, able to make a few speeches in which he urged Americans to "come home to the government." It worked. It sidetracked and put a lid on a great deal of unrest in America, a great deal of anti-government sentiment.

The Squeeze Play.

It's a time-honored strategy.

You also have to know that the people who riot are not just fake props in a school play. They have their reasons. They have their feelings. >From a distance, you may be able to see that their reasons make no sense, will not advance their cause over the long haul. But so what? They are ripe for rebellion. They are waiting for that trigger to launch them into action. You may sit in your living room and flick from channel to channel and say, "Well, they're burning their own neighborhoods, how crazy is that?" But from their point of view, it does make sense.

There are always people who are ready to opt for destruction. And there are people who, at a great distance in their mansions of placidity, see an opportunity to advance their own cause (greater political control) by igniting a spark that will drive the desperate hundreds or thousands or millions into action. The manipulators know, in their bones, that chaos always breeds a demand for a greater clamp-down.

This is a gruesome triangle. You have the manipulators, you have the desperate without hope, and you have all those sandwiched in between who want order to be restored.

It's a perfect configuration. It has the potential, at any moment, to set in motion a series of events that will result in new laws, new declarations, new popular emergency measures, new and heavier control from Above.

Let's say you have a poor neigborhood in a large city. This neighborhood is hanging on by its fingernails. There is already crime there. There is a great deal of unemployment. The schools are a mess. Now the authorities cancel funding for a few after-school centers for kids. Food programs are cut. Prices for gasoline and heating oil go up.

Now a single incident, a single death can propel that neighborhood into a frenzy. Put that resultant frenzy on TV, and other similar neighborhoods get the same idea. And they swing into action.

Never mind that, amid this wildness, most of the people in those neighborhoods are not participating.

It's all about the impression imparted on television.

For example, do you really, on reflection, think that the burning of a few thousand cars is going to bring down the French nation?

And that gets us to another facet of the modern Squeeze Play. Delivering the overall impression through the miracle of television.

We can easily swing over to an analogy, a different kind of story I have been pursuing for some time. The bird flu. The disease that, at most, has killed 65 people around the world in the last two-plus years. I say at most because the main method of testing for the supposed germ that causes this flu is so outrageously bad and irrelevant.

And yet, day after day, we can watch the flu news stories pouring out of the TV set as if out of the mouth of some fearsome monster.

The world is ending. The sky is falling. 200 million people will die. The vaccine won't work. The virus, like a satanic masterpiece, is mutating and avoiding entrapment. On and on.

And with this propagandized media blitz, we get fear. We get the emotion of wanting the authorities to step in and solve the whole threat.

Many people will accept travel bans and quarantines and other restrictions on basic freedoms---including mandatory treatment with toxic drugs and vaccines.

The media are very good at taking a localized or vague phenomenon and blowing it up into a global situation in a matter of days.

So now we are told that these French riots will possible spread all over Europe.

And governments will have to clamp down.

The Squeeze Play.

There are a number of levels of players who want to put on the Squeeze, and they have their favorite personal reasons.

But the higher you go on the food chain of political power, the more you approach the camp of elite players who see the whole planet as their preserve. They want to rule the preserve as monarchs.

This is their eternal goal.

One of their favorite strategies is chaos (or the the appearance of chaos---it doesn't really matter). No, they don't strike the match that ignites every single outbreak of angry chaos on the planet, but they do take advantage of these moments. And they pick their spots when they do, in fact, light the match.

Their moves are so predictable you could make a board game out of it. Chaos---cops---new laws---assurances from the authorities---more control...etc., etc.

At the top of the charts sit the globalists. That's the current title. These are Rockefeller types who see the "unruly" population of the entire planet as a constant threat to their "ownership of everything."

They view humans at large as wild animals.

They view nations as crazy tribes looking for means of destroying all order.

They believe only a few well-bred people (themselves) have escaped the hard wiring that inflicts the mad billions who live on the surface of Earth.

And just to prove that thesis, they now and then light the match and watch chaos ensue.

And then they step in and "quell the fear and restore order," each time removing a slice of individual freedom from the overall equation.

This is called a PATTERN.

At the moment, I do not know who exactly incited the flames in the neighborhoods ringing Paris. But I do know how such events feed into the agenda of these "share and care" globalists.

The riots in France are providing a very nice opportunity for the EU, which is now the government of Europe. Never mind that the French voted against the EU constitution (which is an interesting point when you think about it, in terms of these riots, eh?---as in Revenge). H E L L O?

The EU, at some point, can step in and say, "Well, it's time for a new set of policing laws for all of Europe. And we are the duly designated body to pass and enforce such laws, to protect you, the law-abiding citizen. You're with us, aren't you? We're with you."

The EU, of course, is a sterling example of the triumph of the globalists, in their march to eradicate nations and institute instead what could be called planetary regionalism. See NAFTA, GATT, THE WTO, CAFTA, FTAA.

The EU was, in part, the brainchild of the Bilderberger Group, an elite organization created in 1954, in the Netherlands. The BG helped lead Europe through a series of incarnations, starting with the so-called Common Market, into the present happy bureaucratic nightmare of the EU.

These days, the EU is looking for opportunities to prove its value. The French and the Dutch voted against the EU constitution. These turn-downs were really no threat to the EU, but still, it would be nice to present a shining image to the fearful millions who are watching all those car burnings on TV.

"Out of chaos, order."

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

To produce a success in this vein, you need....a series of Squeeze Plays.

When WW2 ended in Europe, the continent was in a shambles. Talk about Squeeze Play. The people of Europe were pining for a grand solution, one which would not only guarantee jobs and a rising economy, but also a protection against future wars in Europe.

Out of this desire came the Common Market, an idea so obvious and benign that only a madman would oppose it. Knock down protective tariffs between nations, open the floodgates to trade. Inject money into Europe.

This was the first small step toward a United Europe.

It would take time, but as always, the globalists had time.

Intelligent people were put to work drafting bright reports that assured one and all that a coagulated Europe was a good thing.

"Together, we can rise from the ashes. We can make a future."

We can be safe.

As the globalist/Bilderberger plan took shape, there was an aspect of the plan that was also creeping in at the edges without much notice. It was a very long-term aspect designed to make Europe LESS secure, and therefore MORE in need of an overarching program that could be fulfilled, in the long run, by a European Union, by a government over all of Europe, a government that could step into the scene and stage a rescue, so to speak.

What was this other aspect? It had to do with opening another kind of floodgate.

Unfettered immigration of the poor and the disenfranchised. From many lands.

But not just an inpouring. An inpouring that would guarantee the INABILITY OF NATIONS OF EUROPE to handle it.

An inpouring of such dimensions that governments of Europe---who were really in charge of nearly all aspects of economic life---could not deal with it. Social services would fail. There could never really be an integration of all those immigrants.

Governments running those countries, in typical fashion, would try to ignore the problem or simply throw money at it. It wouldn't work.

No matter how generous the sentiments expressed, the deal would not work.

You could say you wanted it to work and it should work and it had to work---but it wouldn't.

You didn't need to be a genius to know that.

But if you spoke out against UNLIMITED AND FOREVER immigration, you could be called all sorts of bad names. You could be labeled this or that...by people who were, in fact, taking their cues from pundits WHO HAD BEEN PUT ON VARIOUS PAYROLLS TO MAKE IT POLITICALLY INCORRECT TO SPEAK OUT AGAINST UNLIMITED AND FOREVER IMMIGRATION.

Yes, this was also part of the op.

To cement in the idea and practice of the inpouring of immigrants into Europe, a program was laid on to make it very uncomfortable for any politician to say, for any reason, "This isn't going to work."

And of course, you've had some crazies running around Europe for a long time saying that letting ANYONE into a nation in Europe who doesn't have pale blue eyes and white-blond hair and ivory skin is a crime against the Norse gods or whoever. It's been a piece of cake to lump in a politician who is against massive immigration with these Nazi types.

Understand: the program of massive immigration into European countries was brought into effect in order to make the political and economic infrastructure of Europe tremble. To make it untenable.

"We build you up here and we tear you down there. And in the end, you will have to come to us for the solution."

This was the unspoken agenda of the globalists in Europe, and it still is.

The riots in France are an illustration of this agenda.

Squeeze play.

Massive immigration is a program designed to create a permanent underclass. When we in America look at our own history, we can claim that the inpouring of people from Europe early in the 20th century was a great success, and we can talk about melting pot and free markets and all that. But when you have nations that, more and more, are run from the top of massive corporations in collusion with ever-growing government control, you have a structure that can't fold in millions of poor people coming in. That's just the way it is. It isn't a matter of morality. It is a matter of fact.

You may want to see a paradise on Earth, where everything is shared and nothing is denied, but as long as governments and corporations run on the principle of scarcity---which they do---you can't win.

It will take a revolution on the order of the one described by Bucky Fuller to change all this---and governments and corporations are fully opposed to such a revolution. Yes, we DO have the means to guarantee every person on the planet the essentials of life and survival, as he pointed out in great detail, but that's not the system we live in.

The system shaped by the globalists is different. It runs on two tracks. The first track is, let everyone in. The second track is, there will never be enough for everyone.

Those two simultaneous tracks are designed to bring about moments and events of great friction---the Squeeze Plays.

The objective is: make the people come to the globalists, when these two tracks collide, and the globalists will give the people what the people want AT THAT MOMENT IN TIME: protection, repressive laws, and an iron fist.

A little more iron each time.

(Thanks to Alex Jones and Paul Watson for their recent articles on the French riots. They reminded me of ideas I [and they] have expressed in other contexts.)

http://www.nomorefakenews.com/archives/archiveview.php?key=2881


From ECOTERRA Intl.

A catastrophic collapse in sea and bird life numbers along America's Northwest Pacific seaboard is raising fears that global warming is beginning to irreparably damage the health of the oceans. Scientists say a dramatic rise in the ocean temperature led to unprecedented deaths of birds and fish this summer all along the coast from central California to British Columbia in Canada.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/111405EB.shtml

How did American interrogation tactics after 9/11 come to include abuse rising to the level of torture? M. Gregg Bloche and Jonthan H. Marks write that much has been said about the illegality of these tactics, but the strategic error that led to their adoption has been overlooked. The Pentagon effectively signed off on a strategy that mimics Red Army methods. But those tactics were not only inhumane, they were ineffective. For Communist interrogators, truth was beside the point: their aim was to force compliance to the point of false confession.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111405S.shtml

RAINFOREST FOUNDATION

PRESS RELEASE

14th November 2005: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW UNITED NATIONS FIGURES FOR GLOBAL DEFORESTATION ARE 'BAD SCIENCE' AND CONCEAL FULL HUMAN IMPACT ON WORLD'S FORESTS

The Rainforest Foundation today claimed that new figures released today by the United Nations on the 'state of the world's forests' are misleading, inaccurate and understate the real extent of deforestation and damage to forests globally. [1]

The new UN figures purport to show that the rate of "net forest loss is slowing down, thanks to new planting and natural expansion of existing forests". [2]

However, analysis by the Rainforest Foundation indicates that there are major methodological flaws in the UN's report, especially that:

* the UN figure for 'net' deforestation is grossly misleading, as it conceals the fact that most deforestation is taking place in the world's tropical rainforests, whereas most of the reforestation and natural re-growth of forests is taking place in the northern hemisphere, and much of this consists of plantations rather than forests.

* the UN figure is based on a definition of forest as being an area with as little as 10% actual tree cover, which would therefore include areas that are actually savannah-like ecosystems and badly damaged forests;

* areas of land that presently have no trees on them at all, but that are 'expected' to regenerate, are also counted as forests;

* the UN includes in its data for existing areas of forest those that are covered by industrial tree plantations, which are actually lacking some of the key functions of true forests;

These flaws are analysed in detail in a new Rainforest Foundation report, entitled 'Irrational Numbers: Why the FAO's Forest Assessments are M isleading", which is published today to coincide with the release of the new UN figures [3]. Simon Counsell, of the Rainforest Foundation, said: "It is a global disgrace that, after decades of concern about the world's declining forests, the United Nations still can't even produce an accurate assessment of how much forest is actually left. The new Forest Resources Assessment repeats the bad science of previous assessments, which have been widely criticised, and obscures the real extent of deforestation. The United Nations should scrap this latest report, should make a firm commitment to revising the methods by which it assesses and reports on the state of the world's forests, and should then set out an urgent plan as to how global deforestation can be halted."

ENDS

For further information:

Simon Counsell, Rainforest Foundation T (office): +44 (0) 207 251 6345 T (Cell): +44 (0)7941 899 579 simonc@rainforestuk.com


Notes to editors:

[1] The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation - the agency which has lead responsibility for forests within the UN system - today launched its 'Global Forest Resource Assessment' for 2005. Similar reports have been produced since 1948.

[2] The press release issued by the FAO today claims that "The annual net loss of forest area between 2000 and 2005 was 7.3 million hectares/year... down from an estimated 8.9 million hectares/year between 1990 and 2000" (http://www.fao.org/forestry/foris/webview/forestry2/index.jsp?siteId=101&sitetreeId=1191&langId=1&geoId=0)

[3] A copy of 'Irrational Numbers' is available for download free from:
http://www.rainforestfoundationuk.org/fcpage.php?fcpage=1237&language=EN



Deforestation continues at an alarming rate

14 November 2005, Rome – Each year about 13 million hectares of the world’s forests are lost due to deforestation, but the rate of net forest loss is slowing down, thanks to new planting and natural expansion of existing forests, FAO announced today.
http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2005/1000127/index.html

Twenty percent of the world's mangroves lost over the last 25 years: Rate of deforestation slowing, but still a cause for alarm

9 November 2005, Rome - Around 20 percent of the world's mangrove forests have disappeared during the past 25 years as a result of over-exploitation and conversion to other uses, according to a new FAO study.

http://www.fao.org/forestry/newsroom/en/news/2005/highlight_108389en.html


From ECOTERRA Intl.

Pacific Command hastens preparation for possible flu pandemic

By Audrey McAvoy
Associated Press

CAMP H.M. SMITH, Hawaii — U.S. military leaders in the Pacific have accelerated efforts to prepare for a possible human flu pandemic by stockpiling anti-viral drugs and warning troops to be vigilant about cooking poultry and washing their hands. This week, officials at the Hawaii-based Pacific Command plan a workshop to test how ready they are to cope with a pandemic that could put them on the front lines of a global outbreak.

They hope the drill will expose deficiencies so they can remedy them before any real-life crisis hits.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff has ordered all the military's nine combat commands to devise anti-flu strategies. But the Pacific Command, with some 300,000 troops around the Pacific rim, could face a flu challenge more urgently than others.

The H5N1 strain of avian flu has killed at least 63 people in Southeast Asia since 2003. The virus hasn't been known to easily jump from person to person, but experts fear it may mutate and start doing so, possibly triggering a global influenza pandemic. There were three such outbreaks in the last century.

Rear Adm. Robert D. Hufstader, chief medical officer at Pacific Command's Camp Smith headquarters, said he wants to educate people so they can prepare themselves.

Like many health officials, civilian or military, Hufstader wants to avoid inciting panic.

He said the H5N1 strain of avian flu may never mutate into one easily transmittable between humans. Or if it does, it may do so over time and become less virulent.

Still, Hufstader said, the military wants to be ready for an infectious disease outbreak that could kill millions.

Coping with a flu pandemic would be more difficult than responding to last December's Indian Ocean tsunami which killed or left missing some 230,000 people across 11 nations, he said.

"The tsunami came and happened and no one could stop it — and then we all tried to pick up the pieces and deal with the aftermath," Hufstader said in an interview. A flu pandemic would be "an evolving thing that we'll try to identify as quickly as possible and work very hard to mitigate," he added.

Hufstader said the military's infectious disease research labs in Jakarta and Bangkok were part of an international network with the World Health Organization that was trying to quickly spot any H5N1 virus mutations.

It is unclear whether the military would put its hardware to use to help civilians if a pandemic breaks out. Its helicopters and ships, and its ability to move them quickly, give it capabilities not held by health organizations and other government agencies.

After the tsunami, a Navy aircraft carrier reached Indonesia within days of the disaster to deliver food and aid to thousands of victims. The United States later sent one of its hospital ships to provide badly needed medical care.

Hufstader said the military is still discussing whether Pacific Command would have any role in quarantining patients or cordoning off areas where there have been outbreaks.

In the meantime, Pacific Command has been building up its stockpile of Tamiflu pills, the medication viewed as the best available defense against a possible pandemic. Pacific Command expects its supply to reach six million doses by February, or about one-fourth of the U.S. government's stockpile of 23 million.

Hufstader said leaders have not determined how they will use the drugs. In the event of a human pandemic, however, Hufstader said nurses and doctors treating flu patients would likely be prescribed doses to protect them against contagion.

Experts say the military may also be given higher-priority access to any vaccine that scientists develop to battle a human mutation of H5N1.

Dr. Robert Kim-Farley, a professor of epidemiology at the UCLA School of Public Health, said the military's job to defend the nation created legitimate reasons for this and for ensuring the armed forces had enough Tamiflu.

He said military personnel would have a higher chance of contracting and transmitting the disease because troops live in close quarters in the field. He said many World War I soldiers caught the Spanish flu in the trenches during the 1918-19 pandemic.

The military could help other countries by dispatching a hospital ship to help overwhelmed local medical personnel, Kim-Farley said. Or it could help transport vaccines to remote areas.

Domestically, Hawaii is the only state inside the Pacific Command's area of responsibility, which extends from the U.S. West Coast to the east coast of Africa. So the command's role on the home front would be limited.

In general, any assistance the armed forces may give to state and local governments would also be limited by the law, in particular the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 that prohibits the military from acting as law enforcement.

Although President George W. Bush said after hurricanes Katrina and Rita that he was exploring ways to expand the Pentagon's role in major disasters, there is no consensus in Congress and among governors on how that should be done.

Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, among the harshest critics of the idea, accused military leaders of being on the path for an "end run coup."

A flu pandemic, rapidly spread by international travel, may override such concerns, however. Experts say that the flu could even take out local police officers, hurting the ability of communities to respond.

"It's conceivable that the scope and scale of this catastrophe, of this disaster, would be one in which traditional lines of involvement of authority might have to be flexible because so many lives could be at stake," said Leonard Marcus, the co-director of the National Preparedness Leadership Initiative at Harvard University. He said, though, that the first thing the military would have to do in a pandemic is take care of its own.

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1299373.php


Informant: beefree

Ex-intel Official: Bush Admin Will Restrict Liberties After Next Terror Attack

North Jersey Media/RICHARD COWEN | November 13 2005

MAPLEWOOD - The man who leaked thousands of pages of top secret documents to the media in 1971 to expose the U.S. government's handling of the Vietnam War warned Saturday that another terrorist attack could permanently damage civil liberties.

Daniel Ellsberg, the former U.S. intelligence official responsible for leaking the so-called Pentagon Papers to The New York Times and 18 other newspapers, told an audience of about 400 that the Bush administration most likely would respond to any terror attack on U.S. soil by severely restricting freedom of the press and the individual's right to speak out.

"In a time of fear, I believe that the majority of the American people will cling to authority," Ellsberg told the gathering at Columbia High School for New Jersey Peace Action's annual luncheon.

"And if there is another terror attack," Ellsberg added sarcastically, "I believe the president will get what he wants. And what he wants is a new Patriot Act, one that will make the current Patriot Act look like the Bill of Rights."

The Patriot Act, originally passed by Congress after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, is up for renewal.

To combat terrorism, it gave law enforcement leeway into probing the private lives of Americans - allowing for easier wiretaps, incarceration without charges, monitoring of computer use and even checking on books borrowed from libraries. Some members of Congress expressed alarm recently that the FBI had initiated 30,000 investigations of private e-mail accounts last year.

Now the Patriot Act is up for renewal, and the Bush administration is seeking even tougher measures. Ellsberg, 74, said he worries that with the Iraq war at a stalemate, a terrorist attack on American soil was "not just possible, but highly likely." Were that to happen, Ellsberg predicted that Bush would respond by escalating the war on terror - possibly to include military action against Syria or Iran - while pushing for harsher restrictions against dissent at home.

Ellsberg said that as part of Patriot Act revisions, Bush most likely would push for an Official Secrets Act - one that would make it a crime for whistle-blowers to reveal government secrets to the public. And he added, such a ban probably would apply to journalists as well.

Ellsberg worked as an analyst for the RAND Corp. in the 1960s, which conducted a huge study of U.S. policy in Vietnam. That study, which was top secret and eventually numbered 7,000 pages, is the story of what went wrong in Vietnam. Once leaked to The Times, the document became known as the Pentagon Papers, and it told of the official lies by the Johnson and Nixon administrations that the war in Vietnam was winnable.

The Nixon administration tried to prevent publication of the Pentagon Papers, but the U.S. Supreme Court sided with the public's right to know. Ellsberg eventually stood trial for leaking official secrets, but the government eventually dropped the case.

Ellsberg said Saturday that he had grave doubts he would enjoy the same freedom today.

"I don't think the current Supreme Court would see it that way," he told the audience. He added that should an Official Secrets Act be adopted, "leaks would be a thing of the past."


Informant: Milo

par Hervé Kempf
Le Monde

http://www.next-up.org/main.php?param=dernieresinfos&date_news=2005-11-14

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article327136.ece


Informant: Steven L. Robinson

From ufpj-news

Kathy wrote:

From: Ken Wiggins
Date: Thu Nov 10, 2005 11:51 am
Subject: Jack-booted thugs

The New Amerikan Gulag
By Kenneth C. Wiggins

I've been fairly sure for some time now that our country is in deep trouble. Today, I am profoundly convinced, beyond any doubt whatsoever that we are in for dire times ahead, where life "as we know it" will never be the same. Whether that comes within months or years yet to come, I have no doubts that it must and will come.

I just spent three weeks incarcerated in the new Amerikan Gulag. My crime was that I couldn't make enough money to satisfy our government's petulant expectations.

Never mind that the government "imputed" my income at four times my actual ability to earn based on my ex-wife's statements that my mother "had money." There is no question, beyond a reasonable doubt, that this was a direct "shakedown", using me to extort money from my mother. You will find the same acts in any major city, only there they call it "the mob." In the new Amerikan Gulag, it is called "Family Court", but in fact is no more respectable or responsible than any other "organized crime" syndicate. Its just "legal" by this new false process they call law.

Never mind that the government has openly refused to give me a hearing, to bring their supposed "evidence" into a court. I have filed more than forty documents in this so-called "family court", another dozen in the state appellate court and about half a dozen in the state supreme court. The one consistent factor is that they accept my documents, enter them into the record, and then openly ignore them. The appellate court offers profound excuses, which within their own rules are fraudulent, and when confronted with those facts, they use more rules to conveniently "administratively dismiss" without fact or law. I call it "law by ignorance". Its just "legal" by this new false process they call law.

Never mind that the court clerk for the state supreme court refuses to even file my documents, claiming they are "not appropriate" for that high court or some other such equally lame claim. Apparently, court clerks are now the "high authority" on adjudication in these courts. It is quite clear that the court is using its clerk to avoid hearing cases it doesn't like. Its just "legal" by this new false process they call law.

Never mind that numerous people, including several lawyers, have told me that even a felony complaint for failure to pay child support is still a "civil matter", not criminal. Thus they cannot have authority to kick in your door, your castle inviolate. Tell that to my dog, whom they Maced, and my girlfriend who had jack-booted thugs pointing guns at her. Never mind that the actual "search warrant" they executed states as its sloe "probable cause" that a cop was window peaking at our home at 9:30 at night to "observe the probable suspect" through curtained windows. No reason is given as to why he was window peeking at this house, so we might assume he was peeking in windows all over town before he got here. Apparently, window peeking is now an important job skill in the new Amerikan Gulag. Its just "legal" by this new false process they call law.

Never mind that the judge, at my arraignment, waving my six inch thick file and slamming in on his desk, made it clear that the only thing he would hear was evidence that I had paid their extortion – any thing else was a waste of my time. Then he doubled my bail to an amount more than my current "arrearage", and more than any amount yet due. There is no small irony that five years ago, he was the "family court" judge, and it was his fraud at law that put me in this boat, but of course he is now the District Court judge, and of course, he sees no conflict of interest in that. Its just "legal" by this new false process they call law.

This isn't about the woes of "my" case. Nor is it about the woes of Beatty Chadwick, incarcerated for ten years on "civil contempt", without any hearing or fact, solely because he cannot prove "what is not". Never mind that "they" have made no effort to prove "what is." Nor is it about the young men I met in jail. One such, in his twenties, was convicted of some petty crime, for which he could have gotten a maximum of ninety days in jail. Instead he did thirty days, plus six months probation. For the past three years they have "violated" his probation six times, and he has spent nearly nine months in jail, with two more to go, and still faces another two years of their "probation." Its all about what is now "just legal" by this new false process they call law.

We face a serious epidemic of this "justice", of "law by ignorance", of a false process they euphemistically call "law." Once they enter your name in their system, they own you. No longer does law serve the people, it is the people that serve their monied system, which they serve up to you by this new false process they call law.

It is no longer about the "denial of due process", that sacrosanct constitutional right that we used to own. It is about being processed by government agents that make up their own law as they go and define their process by their own convenience. It is no longer about the deprivation of our civil rights, our inalienable inheritance. It is about the destitution of a government gone awry on its own power trip.

The Constitution of the United States is gone. It no longer exists, of the people, by the people and for the people. In its place is "government", for which these peoples now exist to serve.

It was not my "rights" that were violated, but the very foundations of our free society, of "civility", … that night, when the jack-booted thugs kicked in my door and pointed their guns at my chest.


Wiley - Webmaster for:
http://www.amatterofjustice.org
http://www.parentsforchildren.net


Informant: Gomez

By Tony Long

02:00 AM Nov. 10, 2005 PT

Say you live in Greenwich, Connecticut, during, oh, the early 1850s. Your older brother left home a few years back to try his luck in the California gold fields. Like the vast majority of those who risked everything to go west, he came up empty. Now he's stranded, working in some dive on the San Francisco waterfront, pulling steam beer for the other would-be millionaires nursing their dashed dreams.

You take quill to parchment (OK, you have paper, but it's pitted with wood pulp) and write him a letter.

The Pony Express doesn't yet exist (the first rider won't set off from St. Joseph, Missouri, until April 1860), and telegraph won't be functional until late 1861, so your letter will go the usual way: by sailing ship around the Horn. Assuming it doesn't run into heavy seas or founder off Tierra del Fuego, the vessel should arrive in San Francisco Bay about three months after weighing anchor at Mystic. It's the cutting-edge technology of its day.

Today, sitting at home in Greenwich, you can dispatch an e-mail to your bartender brother out west that he'll be able to read within minutes of mixing the day's last cosmopolitan. Or you can call him and leave a message. Heck, if you guys use text messaging, you'll be chatting almost instantaneously.

On balance, any of those are probably a better alternative to the clipper ship. Hey, if I miss my brother it's kind of nice to be able to get hold of him -- now.

But that's the point. My expectations have been raised to this ridiculous level by technology running amok through my heretofore-bucolic existence. I used to be a laid-back guy. Now I'm impatient. I chafe. I get irritable when my gratification isn't instantaneous. And it isn't just me. The whole world is bitchier these days.

I'm old enough to remember when waiting a few days for a letter to arrive was standard operating procedure, even in the bare-knuckles business world. I recall a time without answering machines, when you just had to keep calling back on your rotary phone until someone picked up. (Which had the unintended benefit of allowing you to reconsider whether the original call was even worth making in the first place.) The world moved at a more leisurely pace and, humanistically speaking, we were all the better for it.

Just because technology makes it possible for us to work 10 times faster than we used to doesn't mean we should do it. The body may be able to withstand the strain -- for a while -- but the spirit isn't meant to flail away uselessly on the commercial gerbil wheel. The boys in corporate don't want you to hear this because the more they can suck out of you, the lower their costs and the higher their profit margin. And profit is god, after all. (Genuflect here, if you must.)

But what's good for them isn't necessarily good for you, no matter how much filthy lucre they throw your way.

Civilization took a definite nose dive when the merchant princes grew ascendant at the expense of the artists and thinkers; when the notion of liberté, égalité, fraternité gave way to "I've got mine; screw you" (an attitude that existed in Voltaire's day, too, you might recall, with unfortunate results for the blue bloods). In the Big Picture, the dead white guys -- Rousseau, Thoreau, Mill -- cared a lot more about your well-being than the live ones like Gates or Jobs or Ellison ever will.

But stock-market capitalism is today's coin of the realm, consumerism its handmaiden, and technology is the great enabler. You think technology benefits you because it gives you an easier row to hoe? Bollocks. The ease it provides is illusory. It has trapped you, made you a slave to things you don't even need but suddenly can't live without. So you rot in a cubicle trying to get the money to get the stuff, when you should be out walking in a meadow or wooing a lover or writing a song.

Utopian claptrap, you sneer. So you put nose to grindstone, your life ebbing as you accumulate ... what?

Look around. Our collective humanity is dying a little more every day. Technology is killing life on the street -- the public commons, if you please. Chat rooms, text messaging, IM are all, technically, forms of communication. But when they replace yakking over the back fence, or sitting huggermugger at the bar or simply walking with a friend -- as they have for an increasing number of people in "advanced" societies -- then meaningful human contact is lost. Ease of use is small compensation.

The street suffers in other ways, too. Where you used to buy books from your local bookseller, you now give your money (by credit card, with usurious interest rates) to Amazon.com. Where you used to have a garage sale, you now flog your detritus on craigslist. Almost anything you used to buy from a butcher or druggist or florist you can now get online. Handy as hell, to be sure, and nothing touched by human hands. But little shops lose business and close, to be replaced, if at all, by cookie-cutter chain stores selling One Size Fits All. The corporations have got you right where they want you.

Is this the world you want to inhabit? Really? I live near San Francisco Bay. When I think about all this, I miss the canvas sail and the wind whistling through the shrouds.


Tony Long is copy chief of Wired News. He is, by his own admission, a hopeless romantic.


Informant: Anna Webb

...Bush's job approval rating is nine points higher than former President Richard M. Nixon's approval mark at the same point in his second term. But, Pew notes, "it is largely GOP loyalty that separates Bush from Nixon at comparable points in their presidencies. Bush's 29 percent approval rating among independents is only four points higher than Nixon's standing among independents in early November 1973. And Bush's 12 percent approval rating among Democrats is nearly identical to Nixon's."...


An Important Indictment

By Dan Froomkin Special to washingtonpost.com
Wednesday, November 9, 2005; 4:18 PM

The flailing Bush presidency continues to spin off new compelling story lines almost daily; yesterday it was torture, today it's Bush as electoral albatross. It's almost inevitable that the media will let some fall by the wayside.

But according to a new Pew Research Center poll, the recent indictment of senior White House aide Scooter Libby is a really big deal: Even more important to the country, for instance, than the 1998 charges that President Bill Clinton lied under oath about Monica Lewinsky. Those, of course, led to Clinton's impeachment.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2005/11/09/BL2005110901068.html


November 14th, 2005 6:49 pm
Poll: Bush approval mark at all-time low

(CNN) -- Beset with an unpopular war and an American public increasingly less trusting, President Bush faces the lowest approval rating of his presidency, according to a national poll released Monday.

Bush also received his all-time worst marks in three other categories in the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. The categories were terrorism, Bush's trustworthiness and whether the Iraq war was worthwhile.

Bush's 37 percent overall approval rating was two percentage points below his ranking in an October survey. Both polls had a sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.

http://michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4870


Informant: John Calvert

THIS IS EXCELLENT - - - AND VERY SCARY!!!

http://www.adcritic.com/interactive/view.php?id=5927

PASS IT AROUND ------ > BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE

ZM

http://www.newswithviews.com/Brownlow/david48.htm



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

http://www.petitiononline.com/CAN2005/petition.html

To: Kent State University Administration To the administration of Kent State University:

We, the undersigned, oppose disciplinary and criminal sanctions against Dave Airhart (a Kent State Student and Iraq war veteran) by Kent city police and Kent State University for demonstrating his opposition to the war in Iraq.

Not only because we believe that students should have the right to express their opposition to the war in Iraq and because we believe that the war is unjust, but also because we believe that the administration is using the charge of “disorderly conduct” to punish Dave Airhart for his ideas, we call on the city of Kent, OH and the administration of Kent State University to suspend all proceedings against Dave Airhart. Sincerely,


David Airhart is facing a disciplinary hearing that could lead to expulsion on Wednesday, November 16 at 2:15 PM at Kent State. Cindy Sheehan, Camilo Mejia, Howard Zinn and many others have written public statements of support for him. See all public statements and get more information on the situation at
http://www.traprockpeace.org/ kent_state_students/

Follow the latest Campus Antiwar Network counter-recruitment efforts at http://www.campusantiwar.net

825 people have signed the petition. Let's make it a thousand. Please go online and give your support.
http://www.petitiononline.com/CAN2005/petition.html

Thank you.

Charles Jenks
Chair of Advisory Board and Web Manager
Traprock Peace Center
103A Keets Road Deerfield, MA 01342
413-773-7427 fax 413-773-7507 http://www.traprockpeace.org


From ufpj-news