DHS issued report on extremism despite concerns
Civil liberties officials at the Homeland Security Department did not agree with some of the language in a controversial report on right-wing extremists, but the agency issued the report anyway.
Navies to guard undersea cable from Somali pirates
Foreign navies have agreed to protect a vessel installing an undersea high-speed Internet cable from pirates off the coast of Somalia, a Kenyan minister said on Thursday.
Police delete London tourists' photos 'to prevent terrorism'
Like most visitors to London, Klaus Matzka and his teenage son Loris took several photographs of some of the city's sights, including the famous red double-decker buses. More unusually perhaps, they also took pictures of the Vauxhall bus station, which Matzka regards as "modern sculpture".
Report: NSA tried to eavesdrop on Congress member
The National Security Agency tried to wiretap a member of the U.S. Congress without a warrant, and has engaged in "significant and systemic" illegal surveillance activities in the last few months including e-mail and telephone call interceptions, according to a report this week.
Obama consulted widely on memos
White House senior adviser David Axelrod says President Barack Obama spent about a month pondering whether to release Bush-era memos about CIA interrogation techniques, and considered it “a weighty decision.”
U.S. lays groundwork for bank stress test release
U.S. regulators on Thursday released some details about their bank "stress tests," moving to bolster the credibility of a process some investors worry might not reveal the financial sector's true health.
Turkey, Washington’s geopolitical pivot
By F. William Engdahl
The recent visit of US President Obama to Turkey was far more significant than the president’s speech would suggest. For Washington, Turkey today has become a geopolitical “pivot state” which is in the position to tilt the Eurasian power equation towards Washington or significantly away from it, depending on how Turkey develops its ties with Moscow and its role regarding key energy pipelines.
Exclusive: Ethiopia/USA/Somali pirates’ cover-up
By Thomas C. Mountain
One of the best kept secrets in the international media these days is the link between the USA, Ethiopia and the Somali pirates. First, a little reliable background from someone on the ground in the Horn of Africa.
Seeing Things
I compiled patches, insignia, and symbols referring to secret military programs. Strangely enough, this "black world" is rich with such symbolic imagery, even though it affiliates someone with deeply held secrets.
Md. Guard Issues Warning to Staff about Local TEA Party Protestors
A document issued by the Maryland National Guard on April 9 warns full-time Guard personnel to be aware of threats from local citizens protesting income taxes during grass roots events known as TEA (Taxed Enough Already) Parties -- one of which was held on Solomons Island March 22.
Abandoned in the jungle – the deadliest drug lord
They called him "Don Mario," and he was one of the most wanted men in the world: the head of a ruthless crime empire that carried out 3,000 murders in the past 18 months and smuggled hundreds of tonnes of cocaine, with a street value of tens of millions of dollars, from his native Colombia each year. California asks feds to back its IOUs
Facing what could be the largest cash flow problem in state history, California officials are asking the federal government to back billions of dollars in short-term loans the state must seek in July.
Baptist pastor beaten + tazed by Border patrol - 11 stitches
I told them I was a US citizen. I told them I was on a business trip. I told them I had no drugs or humans in the car. That wasn't enough. They wanted to search the car, and I invoked my 4th amendment rights. I DID NOT RESIST OR FIGHT BACK. YET I WAS TAZERED REPEATEDLY AND SHOVED IN BROKEN GLASS REPEATEDLY! I was IN the United States!!! I had crossed no international border!!!
Officials pressured to rethink Taser use
Family members, religious leaders and anti-police brutality groups took turns Tuesday night asking city leaders for answers, an apology and a promise to rethink the way police in the city use Tasers following the death last week of a Detroit teen.
The Constitution Is A Subversive Manifesto Per DHS
The Department of Homeland Security Report titled "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment" was first brought to light by Stephen Gordon at The Liberty Papers Blog. The Report was issued a week before the scheduled Tea Parties across the country, and is all over the news today. Reading the report is depressing, not because it reveals any current threat, but because of the shoddy definitions and analysis.
GM pushes faster plan to cut U.S. dealers: sources
General Motors Corp has told U.S. dealers it is accelerating its timetable for closing about 1,700 dealerships as it rushes to meet a June 1 deadline to restructure under U.S. government oversight, people with knowledge of the discussions said.
Georgetown Says It Covered Over Name of Jesus to Comply With White House Request
Georgetown University says it covered over the monogram “IHS”--symbolizing the name of Jesus Christ—because it was inscribed on a pediment on the stage where President Obama spoke at the university on Tuesday and the White House had asked Georgetown to cover up all signs and symbols there.
Frivolous Lawsuit Filed Against Napolitano?
My co-blogger David Kopel links to the lawsuit filed by Michael Savage and others over the "Right-Wing Extremism Report" issued by DHS. Isn't the lawsuit frivolous? As I read it, the lawsuit is claiming that the issuance of a government report criticizing certain groups violates the plaintiffs' constitutional rights. But the Constitution doesn't provide a constitutional right to have the government not say things that might be considered criticism. Perhaps the plaintiffs want the Constitution to be radically reinterpreted by activist judges to invent some brand-new constitutional rights?
Veterans a Focus of FBI Extremist Probe
The Federal Bureau of Investigation earlier this year launched a nationwide operation targeting white supremacists and "militia/sovereign-citizen extremist groups," including a focus on veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan, according to memos sent from bureau headquarters to field offices.
US Congress to Investigate Surveillance Program
U.S. lawmakers have ordered an investigation into allegations the National Security Agency violated legal restrictions while intercepting some e-mails and phone calls of Americans.
Bill Would Require You to Identify Yourself At All Times
The Texas Senate has approved a bizarre measure which would require citizens to show some sort of identification to any police officer who demands it, at any time, for any reason, 1200 WOAI news reports.
Colbert Torches Obama On Bagram Decision (VIDEO)
"It's essentially the same stance taken by George Bush," Colbert added, "With one important difference: Obama makes the kids like it." Sad because it's funny because it's true.
"Tea" protests flood America
Hundreds of anti-tax 'tea parties' have been held all over the US by protesters who think Obama's bank bailout and stimulus package are mortgaging the future for an easier present.
Video Takes You on 3-D Virtual Trip Into Growing Tumor
Take a virtual trip inside the human body at a cellular level to see how blood vessels grow to feed tumors. Stopping this growth is one of the primary lines of attack scientists take in trying to defeat diseases, cancer in particular.
Obama in Mexico, pledges help to slow US arms flow
After his meeting with Calderon, Obama planned to announce he would support an inter-American weapons treaty meant to take on the bloody drug trade. Officials described the plan on the condition of anonymity so they wouldn't pre-empt the announcement. The War On Drugs Is A Big Failure!
No charges against CIA officials for waterboarding
The Obama administration on Thursday informed CIA officials who used waterboarding and other harsh interrogation tactics on terror suspects that they will not be prosecuted, senior administration officials told the Associated Press.
Source: Talk of delaying 2 WTC towers for years
The owners of ground zero, locked in a new round of heated talks with a private developer about how and when to build office towers at the World Trade Center site, have proposed indefinitely putting off two of three planned skyscrapers until the real estate market recovers, officials familiar with the negotiations say.
Navy Takes Next Step Towards Laser 'Holy Grail'
U.S. Navy ships could one day knock down incoming missiles with energy weapons that never run out of shots, and tune themselves to slice through the ocean air.
The NYT's predictable revelation: new FISA law enabled massive abuses
By Glenn Greenwald
In The New York Times last night, James Risen and Eric Lichtblau -- the reporters who won the Pulitzer Prize for informing the nation in 2005 that the NSA was illegally spying on Americans on the orders of George Bush, a revelation that produced no consequences other than the 2008 Democratic Congress' legalizing most of those activities and retroactively protecting the wrongdoers -- passed on leaked revelations of brand new NSA domestic spying abuses, ones enabled by the 2008 FISA law.
Pelosi calls for panel to probe Wall Street
Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, saying that the American people are demanding "discipline and accountability" after the multibillion-dollar federal bailouts, promised Wednesday to create a legislative commission with broad oversight to investigate the causes of Wall Street irregularities and their full costs to taxpayers. The root cause of the problem is the privately owned Federal Reserve
Economic survivalists take root
When the economy started to squeeze the Wojtowicz family, they gave up vacation cruises, restaurant meals, new clothes and high-tech toys to become 21st-century homesteaders.
Bank of England, Sterling and Government Treason
The story of the Bank of England is the story of the British Empire. The British Empire was never a political empire. It was always a monetary financial empire, as much a parasite on the people of Great Britain as the rest of the world.
A Message To The Revolution: The Easiest Way To Destroy A Movement Is To Become It
The liberal newspapers and blogs are playing the part by going after their predetermined enemy, but now categorizing the Tea Party movement as a pathetic swipe against Obama by the right. I do agree in some sense that the failed and discredited republicans are basing these events around attacking Obama, while ignoring issues such as the private Federal Reserve system. The problem is that the Orwellian newspeak media has left out the fact that the Ron Paul Tea Parties started under the Bush administration, and were not focused on attacking Bush, but instead were exposing the unconstitutionality of the Fed, IRS, NAU, Patriot Act, NAFTA, wars for empire and the list goes on. Our enemy is not a politician, political party or pundit, it's the corporate governmental mechanisms of control that expand no matter who is in office.
U.S. soldier sentenced to life for Iraqi murders
A court martial sentenced U.S. Army Master Sergeant John Hatley to life imprisonment on Thursday for his part in the murder of four Iraqi detainees in Baghdad two years ago.
Armitage: 'Maybe I should have quit'
Richard Armitage, the former US Deputy Secretary of State, tells Avi Lewis on Al Jazeera's Fault Lines why he should have resigned from the Bush administration over its lack of respect for the Geneva conventions.
Is America the new Russia?
By Martin Wolf
Is the US Russia? The question seems provocative, if not outrageous. Yet the person asking it is Simon Johnson, former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and a professor at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Seventh-Inning Stretch Turns Into Suit Against Police
The New York Civil Liberties Union on Wednesday filed a federal lawsuit against the Police Department on behalf of a Queens man who was ejected from the old Yankee Stadium last August after trying to use the bathroom during the playing of “God Bless America.”
Tax Day Becomes Protest Day
By Glenn Reynolds
This influx of new energy and new talent is likely to inject new life into small-government politics around the nation. The mainstream Republican Party still seems limp and disorganized. This grassroots effort may revitalize it. Or the tea-party movement may lead to a new third party that may replace the GOP, just as the GOP replaced the fractured and hapless Whigs.
Medical Marijuana Requests Climb Sky High
The number of ailing people turning to medical marijuana to ease their symptoms has spiked this year, say dispensary owners in some of the 13 states where it's legal.
Should Boston College Linux users be looking over their shoulders
On Friday, EFF and the law firm of Fish and Richardson filed an emergency motion to quash and for the return of seized property on behalf of a Boston College computer science student whose computers, cell phone, and other property were seized as part of an investigation into who sent an e-mail to a school mailing list identifying another student as gay.
Republicans criticize report on right-wing groups
Some Republicans are criticizing a Homeland Security Department intelligence assessment, saying it unfairly characterizes military veterans as right-wing extremists.
Spain rejects US 'torture' probe
Spain's attorney general has rejected an attempt to bring a criminal case against six former US officials over torture allegations at Guantanamo Bay.
NSA Exceeds Legal Limits In Eavesdropping Program
A National Security Agency eavesdropping program exceeded legal limits intended to safeguard privacy, and officials have taken steps to bring the intercepts program into compliance, the Justice Department said Wednesday.
Portions of CIA Memos Expected to Be Released
The Obama administration is expected to release some operational details of a Central Intelligence Agency interrogation program and its legal rationale, while seeking to keep secret the names of detainees and the way techniques were applied to particular prisoners, two officials familiar with the matter said Wednesday.
Ron Paul: Bring back private pirate hunters
Republican representative Ron Paul and a handful of conservative theorists say it's time that the US Congress used the technique - pioneered by European powers hundreds of years ago as a way to wage naval warfare on the cheap.
Ron Paul on Marque and Reprisal
In his latest C4L video, Dr. Paul discusses a constitutional approach to dealing with security threats.
Housing starts dive 10.8% in March
Building permits fell to a record-low level in March and construction on new homes dropped sharply again after a big gain in February had raised hopes of a recovery, the Commerce Department estimated Thursday.
March Foreclosures On U.S. Properties Hit Record
March foreclosures increased by 17 percent from February and are up 46 percent from the same period last year and 9 percent from the previous quarter.
Robert Shiller’s Fatal Prescriptions
By Michael S. Rozeff
Economist Robert Shiller now prescribes a strong dose of medicine – actually poison – for the U.S. econom. Shiller’s diagnosis and doctoring are the same as those of the Bush-Obama-Bernanke regimes. He only wants greater and more persistent doses of the poisons.
Panetta's Tortured Defense of CIA Practices
By Jason Leopold
CIA Director Leon Panetta has consistently stated over the past several months that agency interrogators who participated in the Bush administration's sadistic torture practices should not be subject to "any investigation, let alone prosecution," because they were following legal advice provided by the Justice Department.
US warns Israel against attack on Iran
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates has cautioned Israel against launching a military attack on Iran to halt its nuclear program.
Mall operator files for bankruptcy protection
General Growth Properties Inc., the nation's second-largest mall operator, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection early Thursday after it failed to persuade a majority of its debt holders to give it more time to refinance billions of dollars in debt racked up during the housing boom.
Iraq air raids hit mostly women and children
Air strikes and artillery barrages have taken a heavy toll among the most vulnerable of the Iraqi people, with children and women forming a disproportionate number of the dead.
Study: More whites, fewer blacks going to prison for drugs
For the first time since the war on drugs became a national law enforcement obsession in the mid-1980s, the number of African-Americans in state prisons for drug offenses has declined, a criminal justice reform organization said.
Mexico debates marijuana legalization
Mexican lawmakers opened a debate this week on the legalization of marijuana as part of a possible strategy to tackle the country's powerful drug cartels. Javier González Garza, leader of the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) bloc in Congress, has come out in support of the proposed legalization measure, and said cannabis must be considered apart from drugs such as cocaine and heroin.
The Income Tax: WWII Disney Propaganda
Funded and approved by the US Department of Treasury in 1943, this Disney featurette was to encourage every good American to do his "duty" and pay his taxes, which, at this time, were at an all time high. Those who do not wish to pay or don't pay it gladly are depicted as friends of Hitler and enemies of liberty and democracy.
Robert Fisk: How can you trust the cowardly BBC?
Even when the International Court in The Hague stated that the Israeli wall was illegal – the BBC, at this point, was calling it a "fence"! – Israel simply claimed that the court was wrong.
Obama’s Science Czar Channels H.G. Wells on Climate Change
By James Lewis
How often have we seen the picture of Galileo Galilei facing the Office of the Inquisition in 1632? Galileo is held up as a scientific martyr today, because he fiercely defended the Copernican solar system against the Inquisition, which finally ordered him to stop publishing those ideas. Cardinal Bellarmine denounced Copernican theory as “a very dangerous thing, not only by irritating all the philosophers and scholastic theologians, but also by injuring our holy faith and rendering the Holy Scriptures false.”
Israel will not cooperate with UN over Gaza war crimes inquiry
Israel does not plan to cooperate with a UN agency's investigation into alleged war crimes by Israeli troops and Hamas during fighting in Gaza, an Israeli government official said on Wednesday.
Oklahoma Senate Passes 10th Amendment Resolution
State Rep. Charles Key today praised the Senate passage of a resolution demanding the federal government cease and desist mandates beyond its authority as designated by the Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
USA TODAY- Dead Wrong on Columbine
What is Greg Toppo at USA TODAY thinking? His article is full of errors, most egregiously he writes, “Contrary to early reports, Harris and Klebold weren’t on antidepressant medication …”
Don't Fall For the Old Divide And Conquer Trick
The powers-that-be are trying to distract us from the looting of our wallets by the big banks by creating a left-versus-right, us-versus-them drama.
You know, the old divide-and-conquer schtick.
Americans from across the political spectrum are furious at the financial elite who have robbed us blind, and their enablers in government.
Fed Makes Taxpayers ‘Involuntary Investors’ in Banks, Suit Says
The Federal Reserve should identify U.S. banks funded by its emergency lending because taxpayers are “involuntary investors” who need to know the risks, Bloomberg LP said today in a court filing.
Obama Vows To Rewrite, Simplify 'Monstrous' US Tax Code
With a midnight deadline looming for Americans to pay their taxes, President Barack Obama pledged to rewrite the "monstrous" U.S. tax code, which he said is "far too complicated" for most people to grasp.
S&P expects a third of Europe's junk bonds to default
A third all of junk bonds in Britain and Europe are likely to default over the course of this crisis as the debt-driven excesses of buy-out boom come back to haunt, according to a new report by Standard & Poor's.
US forces leave Iraq polluted
The initial reason to invade Iraq was the alleged presence of weapons of mass destruction. Now the US has pledged to withdraw troops, who are accused of using controversial weapons themselves, and no clean-up is planned.
Is Goldman Sachs Running the Plunge Protection Team?
Is the current stock market rebound based on fundamentals, or are more sinister forces at work? Tyler Durden, one of the best financial bloggers around, have found some circumstantial evidence that suggests the mysterious Plunge Protection Team (PPT) has recently been boosting the stock market. And some might say Goldman Sachs is running the show...
Napolitano stands by 'extremism' report
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said she was briefed before the release of a controversial intelligence assessment and that she stands by the report sent to law enforcement that lists veterans as a terrorist risk to the U.S. and defines "rightwing extremism" as including groups opposed to abortion and immigration.
US govt faces veteran anger at extremism report
The US Homeland Security Department, under fire for saying US forces returning from the Iraq and Afghan wars were potential right-wing extremist recruits, said Wednesday it honors US veterans.
Perry suggested Texans secede from the union
Texas Gov. Rick Perry fired up an anti-tax "tea party" Wednesday with his stance against the federal government and for states' rights as some in his U.S. flag-waving audience shouted, "Secede!"
At the White House, Joking about a Torture Investigation?
I was asked to go on Hardball on Tuesday night to discuss the news that Spanish prosecutors are likely to recommend a full investigation be conducted to determine if six former Bush administration officials including ex-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales ought to be indicted for having sanctioned torture at Guantanamo. So I thought I'd ask White House press secretary Robert Gibbs about the matter.
If You're Planning Tea Bagging Across The Country, 'You're Going To Need A Dick Armey' (With Video)
Like the anti-war folks, they’re letting their cause get hijacked by a variety of other causes, too, including anti-immigration and anti-gay protesters, and, now, many of the mainstream GOP hacks that had no problem growing the federal government back when they were in power. Most of these tea parties are associating themselves with Newt Gingrich. Newt probably did more to destroy the true conservative movement than any living politician. The history of that goes something like this. After the republicans rode into Washington D.C. on the wave of talk radio, President Clinton made several comments about how dangerous talk radio was. Then Newt promoted the Telecommunications Bill, which changed the number of radio stations anyone could own, making it so that large corporations (Clear Channel owns about 1,200 stations) could own more radio stations. With Newt's help that legislation was passed into law. Most of the mom and pop owned radio stations and other corporate owned stations that were around at that time were then bought out. When that happened most of the true conservatives and independents that were on talk radio were taken off the air and many were replaced with what has become known as the graduates of the Joseph Goebbels (Hitler's Propaganda Minister) School of Broadcasting and Propaganda. To a large degree that's how these present day republicans got away with expanding the size of government, running up the debt, trashing the constitution, and how we ended up with Obama. It's too bad it took millions of people all those years to figure out they were being feed a line of bullshit.
