Disinformation » War On Terror

Senator Rand Paul Detained By TSA

ralph — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 20:39:13 +0000

The TSA is denying this, here is what Tim Mak reported on the Politico below. This kind of reminds me of when the late Senator Kennedy was placed on the “no-fly” list, however, in Senator Paul’s case, given his vocal criticism of the TSA, this incident makes great political theater. (I wonder if his father will bring up in the next Republican presidential debate …)

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul was blocked from boarding a flight Monday by the Transportation Security Administration in Nashville, Tenn., after refusing a full body pat-down, POLITICO has confirmed. “I spoke with him five minutes ago and he was being detained indefinitely,” Paul spokesperson Moira Bagley said. “The image scan went off; he refused patdown.”

Paul’s father, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), tweeted out news of the incident, saying that there had been an “anomaly” with a body scanner. “My son @SenRandPaul being detained by TSA for refusing full body pat-down after anomaly in body scanner in Nashville. More details coming,” wrote the authenticated Twitter account of presidential candidate Ron Paul.

The TSA disputed this characterization of the incident.

Ron Paul Introduces Legislation To Strike NDAA’s Unconstitutional Section 1021

Camron Wiltshire — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 13:41:27 +0000

Kurt Nimmo writing at Infowars.com:

Rep. Ron Paul left the campaign trail on Wednesday to speak on the House floor about the National Defense Authorization Act, which was signed into law on the first day of the new year by Obama.

Paul introduced legislation to strike the NDAA’s Section 1021, the discretionary detention provision authorizing the President to detain persons accused by the government of supporting terrorism.

Ron Paul has serious reservations despite Obama’s issuing a signing statement declaring that he will not use the law to detain Americans. In December, Paul said the bill will accelerate the country’s “slip into tyranny” and virtually assures “our descent into totalitarianism.”

The Texas congressman and presidential candidate said on Wednesday the bill “provides for the possibility of the U.S. military acting as a kind of police force on U.S. soil, apprehending terror suspects, including Americans, and whisking them off to an undisclosed location indefinitely.”…

Lakhdar Boumediene’s Guantanamo Nightmare

JacobSloan — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 16:52:50 +0000

Someone forward this to Obama? In the New York Times, a Bosnian citizen and former humanitarian aid worker discusses being tortured and imprisoned at Guantanamo for seven years as an innocent man without facing charges, before the Supreme Court ordered him freed:

Wednesday, America’s detention camp at Guantánamo Bay will have been open for 10 years. For seven of them, I was held there without explanation or charge. During that time my daughters grew up without me. They were toddlers when I was imprisoned, and were never allowed to visit or speak to me by phone.

Some American politicians say that people at Guantánamo are terrorists, but I have never been a terrorist. Had I been brought before a court when I was seized, my children’s lives would not have been torn apart, and my family would not have been thrown into poverty. It was only after the United States Supreme Court ordered the government to defend its actions before a federal judge that I was finally able to clear my name and be with them again.

I left Algeria in 1990 to work abroad. In 1997 my family and I moved to Bosnia and Herzegovina at the request of my employer, the Red Crescent Society of the United Arab Emirates. I served in the Sarajevo office as director of humanitarian aid for children who had lost relatives to violence during the Balkan conflicts. In 1998, I became a Bosnian citizen. We had a good life, but all of that changed after 9/11.

When I arrived at work on the morning of Oct. 19, 2001, an intelligence officer was waiting for me. He asked me to accompany him to answer questions. I did so, voluntarily — but afterward I was told that I could not go home. The United States had demanded that local authorities arrest me and five other men. News reports at the time said the United States believed that I was plotting to blow up its embassy in Sarajevo. I had never — for a second — considered this.

The fact that the United States had made a mistake was clear from the beginning. Bosnia’s highest court investigated the American claim, found that there was no evidence against me and ordered my release. But instead, the moment I was released American agents seized me and the five others. We were tied up like animals and flown to Guantánamo, the American naval base in Cuba. I arrived on Jan. 20, 2002.

I still had faith in American justice. I believed my captors would quickly realize their mistake and let me go. But when I would not give the interrogators the answers they wanted — how could I, when I had done nothing wrong? — they became more and more brutal. I was kept awake for many days straight. I was forced to remain in painful positions for hours at a time. These are things I do not want to write about; I want only to forget.

I went on a hunger strike for two years because no one would tell me why I was being imprisoned. Twice each day my captors would shove a tube up my nose, down my throat and into my stomach so they could pour food into me. It was excruciating, but I was innocent and so I kept up my protest.

In 2008, my demand for a fair legal process went all the way to America’s highest court. In a decision that bears my name, the Supreme Court declared that “the laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.” It ruled that prisoners like me, no matter how serious the accusations, have a right to a day in court. The Supreme Court recognized a basic truth: the government makes mistakes. And the court said that because “the consequence of error may be detention of persons for the duration of hostilities that may last a generation or more, this is a risk too significant to ignore.”

Five months later, Judge Richard J. Leon, of the Federal District Court in Washington, reviewed all of the reasons offered to justify my imprisonment, including secret information I never saw or heard. The government abandoned its claim of an embassy bomb plot just before the judge could hear it. After the hearing, he ordered the government to free me and four other men who had been arrested in Bosnia.

I will never forget sitting with the four other men in a squalid room at Guantánamo, listening over a fuzzy speaker as Judge Leon read his decision in a Washington courtroom. He implored the government not to appeal his ruling, because “seven years of waiting for our legal system to give them an answer to a question so important is, in my judgment, more than plenty.” I was freed, at last, on May 15, 2009.

Today, I live in Provence with my wife and children. France has given us a home, and a new start. I have experienced the pleasure of reacquainting myself with my daughters and, in August 2010, the joy of welcoming a new son, Yousef. I am learning to drive, attending vocational training and rebuilding my life. I hope to work again serving others, but so far the fact that I spent seven and a half years as a Guantánamo prisoner has meant that only a few human rights organizations have seriously considered hiring me. I do not like to think of Guantánamo. The memories are filled with pain. But I share my story because 171 men remain there. Among them is Belkacem Bensayah, who was seized in Bosnia and sent to Guantánamo with me.

About 90 prisoners have been cleared for transfer out of Guantánamo. Some of them are from countries like Syria or China — where they would face torture if sent home — or Yemen, which the United States considers unstable. And so they sit as captives, with no end in sight — not because they are dangerous, not because they attacked America, but because the stigma of Guantánamo means they have no place to go, and America will not give a home to even one of them.

I’m told that my Supreme Court case is now read in law schools. Perhaps one day that will give me satisfaction, but so long as Guantánamo stays open and innocent men remain there, my thoughts will be with those left behind in that place of suffering and injustice.

Can Undercover Investigators Legally Be Indefinitely Detained or Assassinated?

Good German — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 19:35:49 +0000

Now that the Presidency has dictatorial powers, will civil disobedience and investigative journalism become capital offenses? Dean Kuipers writes in the Los Angeles Times:

The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force has recommended for many years that animal activists who carry out undercover investigations on farms could be prosecuted as domestic terrorists. New documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request by activist Ryan Shapiro show the FBI advising that activists – including Shapiro – who walked onto a farm, videotaped animals there and “rescued” an animal had violated terrorism statutes.

The documents, which were first published on Will Potter’s website, Green Is the New Red, were issued by the Joint Terrorism Task Force in 2003 in response to an article in an animal rights publication in which Shapiro and two other activists (whose names were redacted from the document), openly claimed responsibility for shooting video and taking animals from a farm.

The FBI notes discuss the videotaping, illegal entry and the removal of animals, then concludes with “there is a reasonable indication that [Subject 1] and other members of the [redacted] have violated the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, 18 USC Section 43 (a).”

Curiously, the name of the act seems to be an error; the act was called the Animal Enterprise Protection Act until 2006, when it was largely superseded by an act called the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. The crime named in the original 1992 act, however, was always called terrorism. The penalties for such a conviction can include terrorism enhancements which can add decades to a sentence.

Later, in 2004, Shapiro and a colleague, Sarahjane Blum, working as a group called Gourmet Cruelty, were prosecuted for a different but similar act in which they walked onto a fois gras farm, videotaped the operation and took a few ducks. They were prosecuted for felony burglary and pleaded to misdemeanor trespassing.

“Sarahjane and I and everyone with Gourmet Cruelty – the undercover investigation and especially the open rescue were acts of civil disobedience,” said Shapiro by phone. He is currently a doctoral candidate in the Department of Science, Technology and Society at MIT. “We openly took credit for the things that we were doing in order to expose the horrific cruelty on factory farms and to educate the public about it. So a trespassing charge seemed like a perfectly reasonable price to pay.”

“However, it’s simply outrageous to consider civil disobedience as terrorism,” Shapiro adds. “Civil disobedience is not terrorism. It has a long and proud place in our nation’s history, from Martin Luther King to Occupy Wall Street, and the AETA takes that kind of advocacy that we celebrate from the civil rights movement and turns it into a terrorist event.”

Obama Signs NDAA With ‘Serious Reservations’

majestic — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 15:15:16 +0000

While you were out partying on New Year’s Eve, President Obama signed away your civil liberties. Via the Washington Post:

HONOLULU — President Obama expressed misgivings about several provisions of a sweeping defense bill he signed into law on Saturday, pledging that his administration will use broad discretion in interpreting the measure’s legal requirements to ensure that U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism are not detained indefinitely by the military.

The $662 billion National Defense Authorization Act provides funding for 2012 at $27 billion less than Obama’s request and $43 billion less than Congress authorized in 2011.

The bill also contains several detainee provisions that civil liberties groups and human rights advocates have strongly opposed, arguing that they would allow the military greater authority to detain and interrogate U.S. citizens and non-citizens and deny them legal rights protected by the Constitution.

Obama initially had threatened to veto the legislation. In a signing statement released by the White House on Saturday, Obama said he still does not agree with everything contained in the legislation. But with military funding due to expire Monday, Obama said he signed the bill after Congress made last-minute revisions at the request of the White House before approving it two weeks ago.

In several cases, the president called those changes “minimally acceptable” and vowed to use discretion when applying the provisions.

“I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of suspected terrorists,” Obama said. “I want to clarify that my Administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens. Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most important traditions and values as a Nation.”

The president said his administration would seek to repeal any provisions that are inconsistent with his values and added that he would “reject any approach that would mandate military custody where law enforcement provides the best method of incapacitating a terrorist threat.”…

What The Government Told Gizmodo About Osama Bin Laden’s Body

HAL9000 — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 04:27:14 +0000

Amazing read. Sam Biddle writes on Gizmodo:

Months ago, I asked the Pentagon for its visual records of Osama bin Laden’s sea burial under the Freedom of Information Act. Today, I received a thick packet of No— a complete denial that any records exist. Read it.

The core of the response is this: the Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, United States Special Operations Command, and the Department of the Navy all had their records searched. Nothing. Admiral Mike Mullen’s email was scanned. Nothing. The Pentagon claims not a single person aboard the USS Carl Vinson, where Bin Laden’s remains were disposed of, took a single picture. Not a single email from the ship makes reference to photo or video. Essentially: nobody in the military has evidence. So did these things ever exist? If so, they’re in a filing cabinet at the CIA, where they’ll be safe for the rest of time.

Indefinite Detention Isn’t the Only Troubling Thing About NDAA

aaroncynic — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 17:08:52 +0000

Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:

The National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 breezed through Congress and headed to the White House, even though public opposition to parts of the bill, now directed at President Obama in the hope of a hail Mary veto, remains strong. The most troubling aspects of the bill violate fundamental rights provided in the U.S. Constitution to American citizens by giving the government sweeping power to indefinitely detain citizens without trial. Like many other pieces of legislation, this year’s NDAA is another push in a long series of movements marching the U.S. Towards a hard right, nearly fascist state.

In addition to this, the NDAA also contains troubling language regarding Department of Defense interests in Iran, China, Wikileaks, defense contractors and more. A report from a conference on the NDAA contains tough talk in respect to both China and Iran. Considering the amount of saber rattling many warhawks have already engaged in, one has to wonder seriously whether the U.S. Could further engage in military actions towards Iran and what exactly, the DOD believes our attitude towards the Chinese will be in the coming year. The bill contains an amendment which requires economic sanctions towards entities in Iran as well as a provision for “an independent review of current U.S. Capability gaps to counter Iran and China” (emphasis mine). The conference report also says it “takes steps to ensure that the United States is fully prepared to defend our vital interests against an emerging competitor” in regards to China.

Given the information dumps from Wikileaks over past two years, as well as the horrid treatment of Private Bradley Manning, on trial for providing information to Wikileaks, the Pentagon is very interested in keeping other potential whistleblowers at bay. The Defense Department’s research arm already expressed interest this year in employing a disinformation campaign against would be Wikileakers. The NDAA conference report codifies that interest, saying it:

Requires the Secretary of Defense to establish a comprehensive program to detect unauthorized uses of classified information. Requires technological solutions, updated policies and procedures, and enforcement measures to assist with detection of such unauthorized activities.

Read the full post at Diatribe Media.

The Road to the Iraq War Will Happen Again

PatriceGreanville — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 05:56:58 +0000

The power of the corporate media to deceive the people is simply astonishing, but, mind you, it depends on an already distracted, ignorant, semi-passive multitude whose marching values have been carefully cultivated.

In 2003 we went into Iraq under scandalously false pretexts, guns blazing—bragging about our ability to deliver “shock and awe” with impunity (the mark of the bully) and with one goal in mind: to rob and rape that country blind of its riches. The official excuse was that Iraq and Saddam were mortal threats that had to be neutralized.

Within a matter of weeks if not days, the official line—adopted without missing a beat by the entire punditocracy—was that we had gone in “to save Iraq”, “make it a democracy,” and all the rest of the self-serving claptrap we use over and over again to justify our uber-criminal behavior. With a straight face the official voices declared that those who had the audacity to resist our criminal violence were ingrates. Don’t believe it? You may be forgiven: it is rather unbelievable.

Not too long after that, another somersault in logic and truth took place. This time the contortion was of Olympian quality, as we saw the same filthy pundits—a great many of them liberals—talking with a straight face (as did the man in the White House and other administration flacks) that if the Iraqis continued to “misbehave”, continued attacking our troops, imagine that, “we’d leave”—yeah, that’s right, their punishment would be that we, the self-annointed saviors, would leave!

Buwahahahahahahah….! Isn’t that a threat to shit in your pants? They didn’t receive us as liberators!

Reality quiz:

What would you do if you were the victim of a brutal home invasion; if they raped your wife and daughter, killed your animals, beat the shit out of you, and robbed you blind, to boot—oh, and reduced your house to rubble—and then they declared with a straight face that if you were not grateful for all that, if you didn’t beg them to stay … they’d leave? How’s that for the mother of all Orwellian nonsense?

Only with a totally confused public can the revolting media creatures who pass for journalists and commentators in the US foist such a huge con on the public mind … with nary an audible protest.

Yeah, it’s pathetic alright. And if we don’t watch it, it will happen again.

PATRICE GREANVILLE is editor of the Greanville Post, a site dedicated to political, cultural and historical analyses.

Post-American Iraq By The Numbers

JacobSloan — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 23:08:20 +0000

As we pull our troops out following eight years in Iraq, Barack Obama earlier this week called it a “moment of success” that came at heavy cost — “nearly 4,500 Americans made the ultimate sacrifice.” The president made no mention of the cost to Iraqis, so Juan Cole has this to add:

Population of Iraq: 30 million

Percentage of Iraqis who lived in slum conditions in 2000: 17

Percentage of Iraqis who live in slum conditions in 2011: 50

Number of the 30 million Iraqis living below the poverty line: 7 million.

Number of Iraqis who died of violence 2003-2011: 150,000 to 400,000.

Orphans in Iraq: 4.5 million.

Orphans living in the streets: 600,000.

Number of women, mainly widows, who are primary breadwinners in family: 2 million.

Iraqi refugees displaced by the American war to Syria: 1 million

Internally displaced persons in Iraq: 1.3 million

Proportion of displaced persons who have returned home since 2008: 1/8

Rank of Iraq on Corruption Index among 182 countries: 175

Joe Rogan & Duncan Trussell On ‘Indefinite Detention’

Camron Wiltshire — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 06:07:02 +0000

Fantastic and timely discussion of our current state of affairs on The Joe Rogan Experience Podcast:

Congressman Jim McDermott: “Those Things In The Bill Of Rights Are Being Taken Away From All Of Us!”

Join Or DIE — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 04:10:47 +0000

‘Indefinite Detention’ Bill Heads To Obama’s Desk As White House Drops Veto Threat

Camron Wiltshire — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 04:52:28 +0000

One more reason to vote for Ron Paul. The only candidate even speaking out over this absolute travesty of justice. Fox News fails to mention that this bill enables indefinite detention of American Citizens and revokes posse comitatus opening the door for martial law in America. Paul Joseph Watson writes on InfoWars:

UPDATE: Obama has dropped his threat to veto the bill and is now expected to sign it into law. Remember — it was Obama’s White House that demanded the law apply to U.S. citizens in the first place.

The bill which would codify into law the indefinite detention without trial of American citizens is about to be passed and sent to Obama’s desk to be signed into law, even as some news outlets still erroneously report that the legislation does not apply to U.S. citizens.

“The House on Wednesday afternoon approved the rule for the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), setting up an hour of debate and a vote in the House later this afternoon,” reports the Hill.

Mainstream news outlets like The Hill, as well as neo-con blogs like Red State, are still pretending the indefinite detention provision doesn’t apply to American citizens, even though three of the bill’s primary sponsors, Senator Carl Levin, Senator John McCain, and Senator Lindsey Graham, said it does during speeches on the Senate floor.

TSA Recruiting ‘Junior Officers’ at Airports

BananaFamine — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 06:44:51 +0000

Via InfoWars:

Remember when you were growing up and wanted to be a police officer, fire fighter or other public servant?

Now the TSA appears to be tapping children as future recruits for airport checkpoints, as evidenced by this novelty “Junior Officer” badge handed out at Austin Bergstrom International Airport. Not only are young, impressionable fliers indoctrinated by the unconstitutional checkpoints themselves, but now by a subtle driver to join the team someday when they can get the power to conduct their own pat-downs and body scans.

This Is What “Indefinite Detention” Looks Like (Video)

Camron Wiltshire — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 20:04:22 +0000

The military detention provisions are written in impenetrable legal and military jargon and incorporated into an obscure section of the “National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012″.

U.S. Senate Backs Indefinite Detention of American Citizens

Join Or DIE — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 07:21:14 +0000

Via the World Socialist Web Site:

The US Senate voted Thursday night to approve a military funding bill that codifies into law the criminal state practices begun under Bush — and continued under Obama — in the name of the “global war on terror.”

It explicitly authorizes the military’s indefinite detention without trial of American citizens and mandates that all non-citizens charged as terrorists—including those arrested on US soil—be detained indefinitely by the military rather than brought to trial in a civilian court.

The legislation was part of the National Defense Authorization Act, which provides $662 billion to finance the US military machine and its multiple wars abroad. The act passed the Democratic-controlled body by an overwhelming margin of 93 to 7, underscoring once again that there exists no serious constituency for the defense of democratic rights within any section of the American ruling elite or its two big business parties.

Thrown out by this legislation is the right guaranteed under the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution for all those accused of a criminal offense to a “speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury,” and the core provision of the Fifth Amendment declaring that no person shall be deprived of liberty “without due process of law.” It legalizes the abrogation in practice over the past decade of the bedrock principle of habeas corpus, which requires that the state bring a detained individual before an independent court and show just cause for imprisonment.

The Unsmiling Bodhisattva: Ending Our Silent Collaboration With the War Machine

Camron Wiltshire — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 00:42:04 +0000

Via Dig Within: The blog of Kevin Ryan:

Buddhist scholar Graeme MacQueen gave a talk that explained why Buddhists should take action to stop war and its causes. Unfortunately, even the most compassionate people in our western society often find justification for doing nothing while suffering grows around them. Many Buddhists are in that frame of mind and they justify their non-action by claiming that their responsibility is soley to avoid violence in themselves. But Professor MacQueen has challenged this stance, recalling Buddhist scripture and revisiting the concept of a bodhisattva.

As Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” Similarly, Professor MacQueen asks in this talk if we have the right to “give away things that don’t belong to us … the earth … species … ecosystems … the futures of our children and other people’s children.” Through silent collaboration, that is what many people are doing today.

Graeme is now a leading voice for the 9/11 truth movement, as well as being my friend and mentor. He and I have been joined by several others as we plan for The Toronto Hearings, coming this September.

Defense Bill Would Make America A Battlefield

aaroncynic — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 05:23:50 +0000

Sections inside the Defense Authorization Act, which Congress passes each year to authorize expenditures for the Department of Defense, contain vague and troubling language that could allow for the indefinite detention of American citizens. Via the ACLU:

The Senate is going to vote on whether Congress will give this president—and every future president — the power to order the military to pick up and imprison without charge or trial civilians anywhere in the world. Even Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) raised his concerns about the NDAA detention provisions during last night’s Republican debate. The power is so broad that even U.S. citizens could be swept up by the military and the military could be used far from any battlefield, even within the United States itself.

The worldwide indefinite detention without charge or trial provision is in S. 1867, the National Defense Authorization Act bill, which will be on the Senate floor on Monday. The bill was drafted in secret by Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) and passed in a closed-door committee meeting, without even a single hearing.

In support of this harmful bill, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) explained that the bill will “basically say in law for the first time that the homeland is part of the battlefield” and people can be imprisoned without charge or trial “American citizen or not.” Another supporter, Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) also declared that the bill is needed because “America is part of the battlefield.”

Read more at the ACLU’s Blog of Rights

EU Bans Airport X-Ray Scanners Over Health Concerns

HAL9000 — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 23:30:08 +0000

Reports Julia Whitty on Mother Jones:

Citing health concerns, the European Union banned from European airports this week the same kind of X-ray scanners used by TSA in airports across the US. Here’s the EU’s wording:

In order not to risk jeopardising citizens’ health and safety, only security scanners which do not use X-ray technology are added to the list of authorised methods for passenger screening at EU airports.

In How Safe Are TSA’s Porno Scanners? I wrote about the risks of using ionizing radiation in routine airport screenings. Concerned scientists have noted the health risks of X-ray scanners, where even low levels of radiation increase cancer risks. They also note that TSA’s safety testing is flawed, since:

testing is not done on the skin, which receives most backscatter X-rays

the devices used for testing airport scanners are not designed for testing airport scanners

Worse, as Pro Publica points out, TSA’s safety tests are strangely obtuse:

The researchers’ names have been kept secret, and the report on the tests is so “heavily redacted” that “there is no way to repeat any of these measurements.”

Occupy The National Security State

aaroncynic — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 18:23:56 +0000

Aaron Cynic writes at Diatribe Media:

It seems sadly fitting the USA Patriot Act turned ten years old the day after police in Oakland, California assaulted peaceful demonstrators with tear gas and rubber bullets. While police violence had been already rampant in New York in Zuccotti Park, Oakland marked one of the first major violent confrontations with Occupy demonstrators. Soon after, police in cities across American began raids on Occupy camps, many of which culminated in the use of pepper spray, tear gas, rubber bullets and sonic weapons. The evidence that such raids were coordinated by city mayors continues to mount, even though they vehemently deny any collusion. Most recently, police at UC Davis in California nonchalantly pepper sprayed peaceful students sitting on a plaza.

For ten years, we’ve watched one of the most draconian laws passed with incredible haste systematically destroy the freedoms that were supposedly under attack by terrorists and the “axis of evil.” In the name of national security, the Patriot Act has allowed our government — one that touts itself as the freeist in the world — the ability to spy on its citizens without justification, search their homes without warrants, and even penalize them for speaking a word of such actions.

Its recent anniversary in October however, also highlights something equally as insidious now embedded in the American national psyche: The Patriot Act has further cemented the normalcy of bloated security culture and the abuse of civil liberties in exchange for a supposed sense of safety. Its passage was the first nail in the coffin we’ve constructed for our constitutional rights, and paved the way for a security state that Orwell’s Big Brother would eventually be envious of. Between the FBI creating and then capturing terrorists, an incredible nexus of national security organizations, the militarization of our civil police forces and a mostly complicit mainstream media all too willing to act as a mouthpiece for whatever administration happens to hold the White House, we have wrapped ourselves in an increasingly fascist looking flag.

Read the full post at Diatribe Media

‘SEAL Target Geronimo’ Claims Bin Laden Kill Mission Took 90 Seconds

ralph — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 23:10:46 +0000

Chuck Pfarrer, a former Navy SEAL and author of SEAL Target Geronimo, offers a different account of those events in early May 2011 on The Dylan Ratigan Show:

Supreme Court Troubled By Warrantless GPS Tracking

ralph — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 17:37:59 +0000

I guess the justices of the highest court in the land (a.k.a. the Supremes) realized that the U.S. government has the power to watch any of them without any legal action … Mark Sherman reports in the AP:

The Supreme Court invoked visions of an all-seeing Big Brother and satellites watching us from above. Then things got personal Tuesday when the justices were told police could slap GPS devices on their cars and track their movements, without asking a judge for advance approval.

The occasion for all the talk about intrusive police actions was a hearing in a case about whether the police must get a search warrant before using GPS technology to track criminal suspects. The outcome could have implications for other high-tech surveillance methods as well.

The justices expressed deep reservations about warrantless GPS tracking. But there also was no clear view about how or whether to regulate police use of the devices.

The justices were taken aback when the lawyer representing the government said police officers could install GPS devices on the justices’ cars and track their movements without a warrant. To get a warrant, investigators need to convince a judge that there is reason to believe a suspect is involved in criminal activity.

U.S. & Israel To Hold Their ‘Largest and Most Significant’ War Games (Video)

imkaan — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 05:24:35 +0000

Via Press TV:

U.S. Assistant Secretary for Political-Military Affairs Andrew Shapiro says the U.S. and the Israeli regime are set to hold their ‘largest and most significant’ joint military maneuvers without offering details about the time and location of the war games.

More than 5,000 U.S. and Israeli forces will take part in the war drills, said Shapiro, in a Saturday speech at the Israeli-sponsored think tank, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP). He reportedly did not mention a specific time and location for what observers have described as part of the new U.S.-led publicity campaign aimed at raising the threat level against Iran.

The joint military maneuver will simulate Israel’s ballistic missile system and will allow Washington to ‘learn from’ Tel Aviv’s experience in warfare, the senior American official added.

More: Press TV

U.S. Government Glossed Over Cancer Concerns As It Rolled Out Airport X-Ray Scanners

Join Or DIE — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 21:53:07 +0000

Michael Grabell reports on ProPublica:

On Sept. 23, 1998, a panel of radiation safety experts gathered at a Hilton hotel in Maryland to evaluate a new device that could detect hidden weapons and contraband. The machine, known as the Secure 1000, beamed X-rays at people to see underneath their clothing.

One after another, the experts convened by the Food and Drug Administration raised questions about the machine because it violated a longstanding principle in radiation safety — that humans shouldn’t be X-rayed unless there is a medical benefit.

“I think this is really a slippery slope,” said Jill Lipoti, who was the director of New Jersey’s radiation protection program. The device was already deployed in prisons; what was next, she and others asked — courthouses, schools, airports? “I am concerned … with expanding this type of product for the traveling public,” said another panelist, Stanley Savic, the vice president for safety at a large electronics company. “I think that would take this thing to an entirely different level of public health risk.”

The machine’s inventor, Steven W. Smith, assured the panelists that it was highly unlikely that the device would see widespread use in the near future. At the time, only 20 machines were in operation in the entire country.

TSA Finds Four To Five Guns In Carry-On Bags Every Day At Airports

Join Or DIE — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 04:09:24 +0000

Reports Mike M. Ahlers on CNN:

Federal airport screeners still find four to five guns at checkpoints on a typical day, the Transportation Security Administration’s chief told a Senate hearing Wednesday.

“Yesterday we found six, including one at … Bradley (airport in Connecticut) — a loaded gun with seven rounds in it, in a checked bag that (a passenger) was trying to get through,” Administrator John Pistole said.

Passengers typically say they forgot the weapon was in their bag, TSA officials said. But in one recent case, a passenger at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport tried to board a plane with two pistols, three ammunition magazines, eight knives and a hand saw in a carry-on bag, the TSA said. That passenger was arrested by local law enforcement.

More: CNN

Hemp Activists and “Truthers” Unite

Camron Wiltshire — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 06:19:02 +0000

Via the Bob Tuskin Radio Show:

After 11 years, the Florida Hemp Fest is back with a new twist.

Dennis “Murli” Watkins, who served four months of jail time for orchestrating a “doobie toss” at the event in 1994, is bringing back what used to be an annual celebration of marijuana and a protest for its legalization. —Gainesville Sun

Murli just so happens to be a supporter of the “truth.” When we were contacted by him to set up a table and to give a talk on various topics such as the Federal Reserve, fluoride, and 9/11 we gladly accepted.

Watkins said this year’s edition will touch on other, even more controversial issues than legalizing pot. “Hemp has been cultivated for thousands of years. Here it is almost 2012, and we’re still fighting this same stupid battle,” he said. “9/11 was an inside job and they’re worried about someone smoking a doobie. They’ve got to get their priorities in order.” Watkins said there will be a “9/11 truth booth” set up at the event, which will be held on the city’s Bo Diddley Community Plaza downtown. —Gainesville Sun

Lets be blunt, no pun intended, The hemp/cannabis movement has always gone hand in hand with the type of information we cover on a daily basis.

While you obviously do not have to get high to “wake up,” I think that it is pretty well documented that the powers that shouldn’t be do not like marijuana for many different reasons, namely the fact that it may inspire thinking outside the box.

Tennessee Becomes First State With TSA Checkpoints On Highway

JacobSloan — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 12:00:22 +0000

Terrorists can’t afford airline tickets these days, so the TSA is adjusting to stay one step ahead. Tennessee News Press reports:

“People generally associate the TSA with airport security…but now we have moved on to other forms of transportation, such as highways, buses and railways,” said Kevin McCarthy, TSA federal security director for West Tennessee. They are randomly inspecting vehicles on highways in Tennessee.

Homeland Security Office Stages a Mock Zombie Invasion

moezilla — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 23:13:53 +0000

An Ohio office of the Emergency Management Agency — part of the Department of Homeland Security —
will stage a mock zombie attack on Halloween using more than 225 volunteers dressed as zombies at an Ohio college.

“Organizers hoped the theme would attract more volunteers than previous simulations of industrial accidents or train crashes,” the AP reports, quoting a spokesman for the agency as saying that “People got zombie fever here in Delaware.” The exercise included decontamination procedures for hazardous materials, and was inspired by an “emergency preparedness” post on the CDC web site citing the popular fascination with zombies. (The number of zombie ebooks in Amazon’s Kindle store has increased by 13.9% in just the last two months.)

Now, “Dozens of agencies have embraced the idea,” the AP reports, “spreading the message that if you’re prepared for a zombie attack, you’re prepared for just about anything.”

FBI Crime Maps Now ‘Pinpoint’ Average Muslims

bluemana — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 05:22:20 +0000

Spencer Ackerman reports on WIRED’s Danger Room:

It started out as a crimefighting tool. But over the years, an FBI effort known as “geo-mapping” evolved into something more expansive — a method to track Muslim communities, without any suspicion of a crime being committed.

Last month, Danger Room revealed that the FBI was training its agents that religious Muslims tended to be “violent” and that Islamic charity is merely a “funding mechanism for combat.” In response, both the FBI and the Justice Department promised full reviews of their training materials. But the geo-mapping effort indicates that the FBI may have more than just a training problem: The suspicion of ordinary Muslims promoted in those lectures may be spilling over into its counterterrorism tactics.

Last week, the American Civil Liberties Union acquired some of the FBI geo-maps (.pdf), like the one pictured after the jump, through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Although many of the maps are heavily redacted, they represent the first public confirmation that the FBI compiles maps of businesses, community centers and religious institutions in ethnic enclaves around the United States…

More: WIRED’s Danger Room

U.S. Government Could Hide Existence of Records Under Proposed Freedom of Information Act Rule

Join Or DIE — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 22:45:46 +0000

Open government? Jennifer LaFleur writes on ProPublica:

A proposed rule to the Freedom of Information Act would allow federal agencies to tell people requesting certain law-enforcement or national security documents that records don’t exist — even when they do.

Under current FOIA practice, the government may withhold information and issue what’s known as a Glomar denial that says it can neither confirm nor deny the existence of records.

The new proposal — part of a lengthy rule revision by the Department of Justice — would direct government agencies to “respond to the request as if the excluded records did not exist.”

Open-government groups object. “We don’t believe the statute allows the government to lie to FOIA requesters,” said Mike German, senior policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, which opposes the provision.

The U.S. Military’s Sexual Assault and Rape Epidemic

Good German — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 22:14:04 +0000

Sarah Lazare reports in Al Jazeera:

As the war in Afghanistan passes its ten-year mark, sexual assault runs rampant within the ranks, with an estimated one in three female service members raped during their service, according to at least one peer-reviewed study. This is in a military where women comprise more 11 per cent of active duty service members deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan and more than 15 per cent of the total military, with at least 200,000 active duty women currently serving. This epidemic also affects men: 60 per cent of women serving in the National Guard and Reserve, along with 27 per cent of men, are estimated to have experienced Military Sexual Trauma (MST). Perpetrators rely on a chain of command that appears to offer virtual impunity for sexual assaults committed against lower-ranking service members.

Military reports and Congress-appointed task forces acknowledge that sexual assault within the military is widespread. While the Department of Defense (DoD) has repeatedly said it is attempting to curb the problem, the most recent evidence shows that it has failed to adequately address the spread of this outbreak …