Swear in Public? That'll Cost You $20, Payable to the State

Chris | InformationLiberation

Anyone who thinks democracy is a proper system of government need look no further.

Citizens in the Massachusets town of Middleborough voted to impose a $20 fine on their fellow subjects for committing the newly created "crime" of swearing.

Via AP:

MIDDLEBOROUGH, Mass. (AP) ? Residents in Middleborough voted Monday night to make the foul-mouthed pay fines for swearing in public.

At a town meeting, residents voted 183-50 to approve a proposal from the police chief to impose a $20 fine on public profanity.

Officials insist the proposal was not intended to censor casual or private conversations, but instead to crack down on loud, profanity-laden language used by teens and other young people in the downtown area and public parks.

"I'm really happy about it," Mimi Duphily, a store owner and former town selectwoman, said after the vote. "I'm sure there's going to be some fallout, but I think what we did was necessary."

Statist logic: To swear in public is horrible and profane, to impose a tax on someone for swearing in public and threaten to jail them for not paying said tax is A-OK.

UPDATE: Adam Kokesh is organizing a "Free F**KING Speech Demonstration In Middleborough, MA!" Check it out on Facebook!

Latest Tyranny/Police State
- Allegation: Utah Police Wrote Phony Tickets To Tourists, Pocketed The Cash
- Gardening in the twenty first century [Comic]
- Police Arrest Woman For Filming Them, Take Phone Out Of Her Bra, Claim That It Must Be Kept As 'Evidence'
- In Russia Police Obeys You
- Cellphone Video Shows Four Cops Beating Philly Motorist Charged with Aggravated Assault and Resisting Arrest
- The Nature of Bureaucracy is to Grow - Doug Casey
- Fatal Police Shootings Up 70 Percent in Los Angeles County
- 'Click It Or Ticket' Now Applies To Your Cats & Dogs, NJ Residents Face $1,000 Tickets If Pets Not Locked In Harness

People are voting to take away their own rights.

Humans, the most stupid creature on the planet.

Middleborough is a town in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 23,116 as of the 2010 census.

Notable residents:

Count Primo Magri, a dwarf celebrity with P. T. Barnum

General Tom Thumb, stage name of Charles Sherwood Stratton, dwarf celebrity with P. T. Barnum

Lavinia Warren, dwarf with P.T. Barnum who married Gen. Tom Thumb and later Count Primo Magri

Minnie Warren, dwarf with P.T. Barnum

Rick Fuller, professional wrestler

hey cops and those in support fuck you!

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Fatal Police Shootings Up 70 Percent in Los Angeles County

by Tim Lynch

From the Associated Press:

The number of suspects killed by police in Los Angeles County has risen nearly 70 percent in 2011 over the previous year.

The Los Angeles Times reports Sunday that 54 people were killed by law enforcement in 2011 countywide. In about two-thirds of the cases, the person was armed with a gun, knife or other weapon. In 12 cases, the person was unarmed.

Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck says the majority of shootings are legitimate responses to serious threats. He says police have become more adept at responding quickly to violent situations.Fatal police shootings this year, however, have fallen back to 2010 levels.

The increase in police killings come at a time when murder rates have fallen to historic lows ? 612 homicides were recorded countywide last year.

Latest Tyranny/Police State
- Allegation: Utah Police Wrote Phony Tickets To Tourists, Pocketed The Cash
- Gardening in the twenty first century [Comic]
- Swear in Public? That'll Cost You $20, Payable to the State
- Police Arrest Woman For Filming Them, Take Phone Out Of Her Bra, Claim That It Must Be Kept As 'Evidence'
- In Russia Police Obeys You
- Cellphone Video Shows Four Cops Beating Philly Motorist Charged with Aggravated Assault and Resisting Arrest
- The Nature of Bureaucracy is to Grow - Doug Casey
- 'Click It Or Ticket' Now Applies To Your Cats & Dogs, NJ Residents Face $1,000 Tickets If Pets Not Locked In Harness

the 12 just ran up againest your typical brainwashed,myopic,pigs!It,s cheaper to pay for a dead person than a live one is how they are trained.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Agent Provocateur At Bilderberg 2012 Tried to Set Up Protesters With Fake Bomb Threat

By Alex Thomas

An agent provocateur tried to set up protesters in a fake bomb plot on the morning of the first day of the Bilderberg Meetings at the Westfield Marriot in Chantilly, Virgina.

The provocateur showed up very early in the morning when the only activists or journalists there were myself, Shepard Ambellas, Jason Bermas, two We Are Change activists, the whole Truth Exposed Radio Crew, and few other protesters.

Literally less than two hours after we arrived and as we were setting up our cameras, we noticed an older man who looked very out of place and suspicious.

Read More

Latest Big Brother/Orwellian
- US Continues To Try To Block Megaupload From Using Its Lawyers, Pretends It Has Jurisdiction Over The World
- Rand Paul proposes bill to prevent warrantless drone surveillance
- U.N. could tax U.S.-based Web sites, leaked docs show
- Labor Department backs off plan forcing reporters to use government-issued computers
- US Government Still Insisting It Can't Be Sued Over Warrantless Wiretapping
- FBI Did Not Steal Megaupload Evidence Because It's "Digital"?
- Obama Administration Argues No Warrant Required for GPS Tracking of Citizens
- Caveman Blogger Fights for Free Speech and Internet Freedom

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Mexico Should Just Legalize Drugs

by Jacob G. Hornberger

According to a front-page article in today?s New York Times, Mexico?s top presidential contenders are signaling a shift in how Mexico intends to fight the drug war. While the movement is in a positive direction, unfortunately it still doesn?t go far enough. Mexico should just end its entire participation in the drug war. It should legalize drugs.

Six years ago, the newly elected Mexican president, Filipe Calderon, decided that he was going to really crack down in the drug war, apparently with the aim of finally winning the war. Since the president is limited to one six-year term, Calderon figured that he had that period of time in which to defeat the drug cartels, the drug lords, and the drug gangs.

Calderon figured that to win the drug war, he had to rely on much more than just the police. And who?s best at waging war but the military? So, Calderon deployed Mexican troops to wage the war on drugs, especially in the northern region, along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Needless to say, U.S. officials were ecstatic.

Now that Calderon?s term is coming to an end, can he claim victory in the war on drugs? Has his fierce military crackdown been successful?

Nope. It?s the exact opposite. The drug dealers, drug cartels, and drug gangs are still smuggling and distributing drugs, just like they were six years ago. In fact, the lack of victory is reflected by the fact that U.S. officials are saying that it?s more important than ever that the war on drugs continued to be waged into the indefinite future.

Of course, there is one big factor that the Mexican presidential candidates and the Mexican citizenry have to consider: Some 50,000 people are now dead who were alive six years ago.

Yes, 50,000 people. Think about that. That?s almost the number of U.S. soldiers killed during the Vietnam War. And they?re dead owing to Calderon?s fierce, six-year military crackdown in the war on drugs.

Now, that?s not to say that Calderon?s forces didn?t kill, arrest, jail, and destroy plenty of drug lords and drug gangs. Sure they did. But as soon as they?d knock off one drug dealer, ten more would pop up to take his place.

You see, the more they cracked down, the greater the risk for drug dealers. The increased risk caused drug prices and drug profits to soar. The soaring drug profits lured new people into the drug trade.

In other words, the more successful Mexican forces were in killing or capturing drug dealers, the further away from ?victory? Mexico found itself.

All this should be a lesson for American drug-war proponents, especially those who say that the problem is that the U.S. government really hasn?t truly cracked down in the war on drugs. They ought to bring the U.S. military to the border, the American drug warriors have long exclaimed, especially combat-hardened troops who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan.

It shouldn?t surprise anyone that the Mexican military, in its fierce quest to win the drug war within 6 years, was notorious for violating the civil liberties of the Mexican citizenry. Military forces trying to win wars are never too concerned about civil liberties. Many Mexican citizens began demanding that the troops be withdrawn from their cities, preferring to take their chances with the drug lords.

Mexico apparently has had enough. According to the Times, ?The candidates, while vowing to continue to fight drug trafficking, say they intend to eventually withdraw the Mexican Army from the drug fight. They are concerned that it has proved unfit for police work and has contributed to the high death toll, which has exceeded 50,000 since the departing president, Felipe Calderon, made the military a cornerstone of his battle against drug traffickers more than five years ago.?

U.S. officials have been careful to stay out of the presidential race, to avoid the appearance of meddling in Mexico?s internal affairs, but there is no question but that they are seething over the probable shift in direction. Congressman Ben Quayle, an Arizona Republican, reflected the mindset of the Washington establishment with his pointed exclamation: ?Will there be a situation where the next president just turns a blind eye to the cartels, or will they be a willing partner with the United States to combat them? I hope it?s the latter.?

Mexico has paid a big enough price for the U.S. government?s failed, immoral, and destructive decades-long war on drugs. Mexico should reject halfway measures in the war on drugs. It?s time to have the courage and fortitude to openly admit, no matter how angry U.S. officials become, that the drug war is evil, immoral, deadly, and destructive. All the drug war has done is enrich the bank accounts of drug dealers and government officials, including those in the United States.

It?s time Mexico went its own way in the drug war. The best thing Mexico could ever do is dissolve its drug-war partnership with the U.S. government by fully and completely legalizing the possession and distribution of all drugs. As the front-runner in Mexico?s presidential race, Enrique Pe?a Nieto, put it, Mexico should not ?subordinate to the strategies of other countries.?

And who knows? By fully and completely ending its participation in the U.S. government?s war on drugs, Mexico could lead the world, including the United States, out of the drug-war morass of death, destruction, violence, and corruption.
_
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of the Future of Freedom Foundation.

View the original article here

Family net worth plummets 40%

By Charles Riley

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The average American family's net worth dropped almost 40% between 2007 and 2010, according to a triennial study released Monday by the Federal Reserve.

The stunning drop in median net worth -- from $126,400 in 2007 to $77,300 in 2010 -- indicates that the recession wiped away 18 years of savings and investment by families.

The Fed study, called the Survey of Consumer Finances, offers details on savings, income, debt, as well as assets and investments owned by American families.

The results, though more than a year old, highlight the marked deterioration in household finances brought on by the financial crisis and ensuing recession.

Much of the drop off in net worth -- to levels not seen since 1992 -- was attributable to a sharp decline in housing values, the Fed said.

Read More

Latest Economy
- Selling 1 Oz Gold Coin for $25 (When it's Worth Over $1,500)
- U.S. Government Bond 'Bubble' to Burst, Faber Says
- Peter Schiff: America the next Greece?
- Doug Casey - Chairman, Casey Research - @Cambridge House Live - June 2012
- Peter Schiff - The Real Crash: America's Coming Bankruptcy - @Cambridge House Live - June 4, 2012
- Jeff Berwick - The Dollar Vigilante - @Cambridge House Live - June 2012
- The Zombie Apocalypse: Economic Implications
- Estonia Embraced Austerity, Now Their Economy is Booming

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

The Drug War Is Finished

by Jacob G. Hornberger

If you want to see a look of stunned silence on the face of a drug-war proponent, ask him the following question: To win the war on drugs, what do you propose be done that hasn?t already been done during the last forty years of drug warfare?

He won?t know what to say. Everything that drug-war proponents have proposed has, at some point or another, been tried.

Yet, here were are some 40 years after President Nixon declared ?war on drugs? and still no ?victory.? In fact, the best evidence that victory has still not arrived is the fact that drug-war proponents say that it is still more necessary than ever to continue waging the drug war, perhaps even for another 40 years.

We have seen inordinately long jail sentences meted out to both drug possessors and drug distributors as well as to people who have simply conspired to commit such acts. We?ve seen mandatory minimum sentences. We?ve seen new generations of ?maximum sentence? judges replace previous generations of ?maximum-sentence? judges. We?ve seen asset-forfeiture laws. We?ve seen massive infringements on financial privacy. We?ve seen enormous violations of civil liberties, especially in the area of search and seizure.

We?ve seen it all, for 40 long years. And still no victory in sight. In fact, as the crackdowns have increased over the years, the situation has only gotten worse.

And then there are the adverse collateral effects of the drug war. There are the robberies, burglaries, thefts, and muggings by which drug addicts try to get the money to pay the enormous black-market prices for their drugs. There are the gang wars, the murders, the assassinations, and other violence that come with black-market drug-war activity. There are the bribes and payoffs to law-enforcement agents, prosecutors, and judges to get them to look the other way or to provide leniency.

It would be difficult to come up with a better example of a government disaster than the drug war.

Of course, some drug-war proponents still hold out hope for one final drug-war program: bring in the military. The idea is that by shipping U.S. troops who have been battle-tested in Iraq and Afghanistan to the U.S.-Mexico border, the war on drugs would finally be won.

What such drug-war proponents fail to realize is that that program has already been tried and, like all the others, has proven to be a manifest failure.

Look at Mexico, where the president of that country deployed the Mexican military to the border regions in an attempt to finally win the war on drugs. The result? Some 50,000 dead people in the last six years alone. Gruesome tales of kidnapping, torture, assassination, and murder, along with massive drug-war corruption within the military and other government agencies. The harder the military cracked down, the worse the violence became.

Let?s also not forget that the U.S. military and the CIA themselves have long played an active role in the drug war, especially in Latin America. The result? No matter how many raids, busts, arrests, incarcerations, or killings have taken place, the situation has only just gotten worse.

The U.S. military and the CIA have themselves participated in the killing of innocent people as part of their drug war activity. Of course, this shouldn?t surprise us, given the mindset of these two organizations. When they perceive themselves at war, the military and the CIA focus on killing enemy combatants, not on protecting the rights of suspected criminals.

Recall the CIA?s 2001 drug-war shoot-down of a plane in Peru, which killed a 35-year-old missionary named Veronica Bowers and her 7-month old baby Charity. And recall the U.S. military?s 1997 drug-war killing of 18-year old Texas goat-herder Esequiel Hernandez Jr.

Drug war proponents never cease to remind us of their good intentions ? of how opposed they are to drug abuse or even drug use. They tell us they just want to attain a drug-free society.

To which we libertarians respond: Why should we care about your good intentions? What difference do they make? Do they affect the outcome? Have they prevented the horrific adverse consequences of the drug war? Good intentions mean nothing. All that matters are the real consequences of the drug war.

We should also never forget the most powerful reason for ending the drug war: the state has no legitimate authority to punish a person for engaging in entirely peaceful behavior, including the possessing, ingesting, or distribution of liquor, tobacco, marijuana, cocaine, heroin, fatty foods, sugary drinks, or any other item that a statist might deem harmful. A free society protects, not punishes, the exercise of such choices.

Unfortunately, all too many statists won?t confront the real reason that so many government officials still favor the drug war despite its manifest failure: power and money. There is an extensive web of well-paid government positions that depend on the existence of the drug war, including judges, prosecutors, court clerks, secretaries, and law-enforcement officials whose jobs depend on the drug war. There are also the bribes and payoffs that come with the drug war, which make some government officials very wealthy very rapidly. And there is the tremendous power that the drug war enables government officials to wield over the citizenry.

The drug war is finished. They?ve tried everything for 40 years, and nothing has worked. The drug war has brought nothing but death, destruction, ruin, and corruption to our nation. It is impossible to find a more direct infringement on the freedom of the American people. There is not one good reason that Americans should permit this immoral and failed government program to continue in existence any longer.
__
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of the Future of Freedom Foundation.

View the original article here

Marijuana Legalization Breaks 60% in Colorado Poll

by Phillip Smith

In November, voters in Colorado will decide whether to approve Amendment 64, a state-wide ballot initiative to end marijuana prohibition and regulate marijuana like alcohol. A new Rasmussen poll released Monday suggests the initiative could be well on the way to victory.

In its June 6 survey of likely voters, Rasmussen found support for marijuana legalization at 61%. More strikingly, only 27% opposed legalization, with 12% undecided. Respondents were asked whether they supported "legalizing marijuana and regulating it in a way similar to the way alcohol and tobacco cigarettes are regulated today."

The conventional wisdom among initiative watchers is that initiatives need to be polling at 60% or above at the beginning of the campaign to have a chance of winning. Veteran observers note that opponents of an initiative are always able to peel away some support with negative campaigning late in the game.

But in Colorado, not only is support for pot legalization strong, it is trending upward. A December 2011 Public Policy Polling survey had support at 49%, with 40% saying it should remain illegal.

Marijuana legalization also had more support than either major party presidential candidate. Both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney garnered 45% support. How the politics of marijuana in Colorado will affect the presidential race there remains to be seen.

Rasmussen conducted phone interviews with 500 likely Colorado voters. The poll's margin of error is +/-4.5%.

Latest General
- "Support the Troops!" [Comic]
- Julian Assange vs Rupert Murdoch - RAP NEWS 13: A News Hope
- Donna Summer believed her cancer was linked to 9/11 dust
- Michael Moore on Occupy Bilderberg: "Occupy what?"
- John Stossel - The Mystery Of Happiness
- Jimmy Kimmel to Obama: "Remember when the country rallied around you in hope for a better tomorrow? ...That was a good one."
- Freedom in the 50 States
- Freedom Around the World

THAT won't bring the feds down on them, will it? Its a matter of time before its legal.read it and weep u Pussy prohibitionist! U will have to actually catch real criminals now...ohhh for shame u wont be able to take ppls property no more.or ruin ppl lives like u ohhh so much enjoy.apply like you make vomit.cannabis will be legal it is but a matter of time! Yeeeeeeeehaaaaaaaa.m

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Obama and Eric Holder Are Still Lying About the Medical Marijuana Raids

by Scott Morgan

On Thursday, Eric Holder lied to Congress about DOJ's escalating attacks against medical marijuana:

Mr. Holder said federal officials are not going after those who are staying within the confines of their states' medical marijuana laws, but said some have "come up with ways in which they are taking advantage of these state laws."

"We limit our enforcement efforts to those individuals, organizations that are acting out of conformity with state law," Mr. Holder told a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing. [Washington Times]

That statement is simply false, and flagrantly so. It's been widely reported in the press that federal prosecutors have threatened to arrest state officials merely for administering their own medical marijuana laws. One cannot claim that regulators performing their official duties are "acting out of conformity with state law". They are the state. You can't threaten them with arrest and then subsequently claim that enforcement is only directed at those who violate local laws.

Moreover, the feds have raided hundreds of dispensaries without making any effort at all to determine whether state laws are being violated. Most of the time, they're just confiscating money and medicine without even charging anyone. They keep saying the people they raid were breaking local laws, but they aren't proving that to be the case. When have they ever demonstrated that any of these businesses were violating state laws?

This whole just-enforcing-state-laws excuse is the same nonsense we were hearing from the President a month ago, and the Obama Administration's ability to comfortably repeat this crap owes much to the media's total failure to follow up on it.

Latest Politics/Corruption
- Minor Cuts to Defense Budget Could Lead to War: Top US Military Official
- Rand Paul Answers: Why He Endorsed Romney
- Tom Woods Has Info Ron Will Not Be Endorsing Romney
- Carol Paul Speaks about Rands Endorsement of Romney and Ron Paul 6-13-12
- Why Rand Paul was Wrong to Endorse Mitt Romney & Jack Hunter is a Statist
- Rand Paul Responds to Endorsement Controversy on Peter Schiff Show
- Joe Scarborough: Why I voted for Ron Paul
- Mitt Romney Once Harangued a Neighbor for Smoking Pot, Then Called the Cops

Even if the feds really were enforcing State Law, do they even have jurisdiction to do that? If the State law was violated, wouldn't the State's police be the ones to enforce that law?
10th Amendment?
The County Sheriff is the highest law enforcement authority. I believe the Sheriff could tell the DEA (ATF, TSA, all of them) to stay out of his/her county. Not that the Federal agencies would listen.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

U.N. could tax U.S.-based Web sites, leaked docs show

by Declan McCullagh and Larry Downes

The United Nations is considering a new Internet tax targeting the largest Web content providers, including Google, Facebook, Apple, and Netflix, that could cripple their ability to reach users in developing nations.

The European proposal, offered for debate at a December meeting of a U.N. agency called the International Telecommunication Union, would amend an existing telecommunications treaty by imposing heavy costs on popular Web sites and their network providers for the privilege of serving non-U.S. users, according to newly leaked documents.

The documents (No. 1 No. 2) punctuate warnings that the Obama administration and Republican members of Congress raised last week about how secret negotiations at the ITU over an international communications treaty could result in a radical re-engineering of the Internet ecosystem and allow governments to monitor or restrict their citizens' online activities.

"It's extremely worrisome," Sally Shipman Wentworth, senior manager for public policy at the Internet Society, says about the proposed Internet taxes. "It could create an enormous amount of legal uncertainty and commercial uncertainty."

Read More

Latest Big Brother/Orwellian
- US Continues To Try To Block Megaupload From Using Its Lawyers, Pretends It Has Jurisdiction Over The World
- Rand Paul proposes bill to prevent warrantless drone surveillance
- Agent Provocateur At Bilderberg 2012 Tried to Set Up Protesters With Fake Bomb Threat
- Labor Department backs off plan forcing reporters to use government-issued computers
- US Government Still Insisting It Can't Be Sued Over Warrantless Wiretapping
- FBI Did Not Steal Megaupload Evidence Because It's "Digital"?
- Obama Administration Argues No Warrant Required for GPS Tracking of Citizens
- Caveman Blogger Fights for Free Speech and Internet Freedom

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Police Arrest Woman For Filming Them, Take Phone Out Of Her Bra, Claim That It Must Be Kept As 'Evidence'

by Mike Masnick

In the comments to our story last week about false arrests for filming police, someone pointed to yet another such story of a woman who was arrested for filming the police. Even worst, the police confiscated her phone -- which she had shoved into her bra -- and then have refused to return it, claiming that it's now "evidence" of a crime.

If there's any "good" news in this story, it's that the police chief immediately ordered an investigation into the officer who did this, and noted that it's legal to film police. Still, the details of what happened seem pretty crazy. As reported by the New Haven Independent (linked above):

?Stop filming right now!? Rubino ordered her.

?No this is my civil right,? she recalled saying. Gondola said she?s ?always on all these news sites? reading about recent cases in which cops got in trouble for snatching cameras from citizens.

?Well, I have to right to review it,? Rubino allegedly told her.

Gondola claimed she remained ?very quiet and calm? and ?pressed play? to show him the video. ?But I didn?t let him touch my phone.?

Rubino?s response, according to Gondola: ?It?s evidence of a crime. You need to give it to me right now.?

Her response to his response: ?I?m not giving you the phone.?

His next response: ?If you don?t give me the phone, you?re getting arrested.?

So Gondola slipped the phone into her bra. Rubino ?twisted my hand hard behind me and put the cuffs on me. Really tight. My wrists are black and blue,? she said.

Rubino next ordered a female officer to pat her down and commanded, ?I want that phone out of her bra.? The woman removed the phone. Rubino ?put it in his pocket,? Gondola said.

The article, written a few days later, notes that later on she demanded the phone back, and was once again told that it was "evidence" and that the only way she can get her phone back is to wait until she goes to court, and asks the judge to return the phone. At the very least, it sounds like she will be without her phone for well over a week. In these days, when phones are pretty central to a lot of people's lives, that can be a pretty big hardship... all for doing something perfectly legal: filming the police on duty.

Latest Tyranny/Police State
- Allegation: Utah Police Wrote Phony Tickets To Tourists, Pocketed The Cash
- Gardening in the twenty first century [Comic]
- Swear in Public? That'll Cost You $20, Payable to the State
- In Russia Police Obeys You
- Cellphone Video Shows Four Cops Beating Philly Motorist Charged with Aggravated Assault and Resisting Arrest
- The Nature of Bureaucracy is to Grow - Doug Casey
- Fatal Police Shootings Up 70 Percent in Los Angeles County
- 'Click It Or Ticket' Now Applies To Your Cats & Dogs, NJ Residents Face $1,000 Tickets If Pets Not Locked In Harness

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Allegation: Utah Police Wrote Phony Tickets To Tourists, Pocketed The Cash

Welcome to America!
Chris | InformationLiberation

A revenue extraction agency in a tiny town in Utah which tourists are forced to travel through on their way to a local National Park has been accused of writing phony tickets to tourists and pocketing the cash.

Via The Salt Lake Tribune:

Police in the town that promotes itself as "The Gateway to Zion National Park" wrote citations to foreign tourists, required them to pay cash and didn't document the fines, according to a Utah State audit released this week.

Also, perhaps thousands of dollars in fines collected by Springdale, Utah, police are missing, the audit says. Auditors can't be sure because Springdale police kept poor records.

"Thus, the possibility exists that officers could have written citations, collected the citation fines from defendants on the spot ... destroyed the citations, and kept the money without anyone ever detecting," state auditors wrote.

It isn't clear if there are any criminal investigations into the practices. Utah Attorney General spokesman Paul Murphy said the office has not been contacted about the findings. Ryan Shaum, the lead prosecutor at the Washington County, Utah, Attorney's Office, said he is not aware of any criminal investigation.

Besides the question of the missing money, the audit says the practices violated at least five state statutes and that Springdale police violated the tourists' rights under the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees equal protection.

[...]Springdale has only about 500 residents, but because it sits at the south entrance to Zion National Park, the bulk of the park's 2.8 million annual visitors pass through the town. The city of Springdale's website says the police department has three full-time officers plus reserve officers.

Sounds like they're providing quite the "service."

Latest Tyranny/Police State
- Gardening in the twenty first century [Comic]
- Swear in Public? That'll Cost You $20, Payable to the State
- Police Arrest Woman For Filming Them, Take Phone Out Of Her Bra, Claim That It Must Be Kept As 'Evidence'
- In Russia Police Obeys You
- Cellphone Video Shows Four Cops Beating Philly Motorist Charged with Aggravated Assault and Resisting Arrest
- The Nature of Bureaucracy is to Grow - Doug Casey
- Fatal Police Shootings Up 70 Percent in Los Angeles County
- 'Click It Or Ticket' Now Applies To Your Cats & Dogs, NJ Residents Face $1,000 Tickets If Pets Not Locked In Harness

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Implosion of The Houla Massacre Story -- Is Anyone Paying Attention?

by Daniel McAdams

A respected mainstream publication, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), has reported that the infamous Houla massacre in Syria, which the US and NATO hoped would be the casus belli for their planned invasion, was in fact carried out by rebel forces.

Highlighted in the National Review, of all places, the FAZ investigation was exhaustive and convincing.

NRO reports on the original FAZ story:

According to the article's sources, the massacre occurred after rebel forces attacked three army-controlled roadblocks outside of Houla. The roadblocks had been set up to protect nearby Alawi majority villages from attacks by Sunni militias. The rebel attacks provoked a call for reinforcements by the besieged army units. Syrian army and rebel forces are reported to have engaged in battle for some 90 minutes, during which time "dozens of soldiers and rebels" were killed.

"According to eyewitness accounts," the FAZ report continues,

"the massacre occurred during this time. Those killed were almost exclusively from families belonging to Houla's Alawi and Shia minorities. Over 90% of Houla's population are Sunnis. Several dozen members of a family were slaughtered, which had converted from Sunni to Shia Islam. Members of the Shomaliya, an Alawi family, were also killed, as was the family of a Sunni member of the Syrian parliament who is regarded as a collaborator. Immediately following the massacre, the perpetrators are supposed to have filmed their victims and then presented them as Sunni victims in videos posted on the internet.

For weeks, alternative media analysts and even eyewitnesses had been poking enormous holes in the suspiciously convenient Western narrative that Assad's forces slaughtered the villagers, cutting and killing at close range. No one paid attention, as usual.

The NRO piece continues with a fascinating story from a Christian monastery in the vicinity:

"Already at the beginning of April, Mother Agn?s-Mariam de la Croix of the St. James Monastery warned of rebel atrocities' being repackaged in both Arab and Western media accounts as regime atrocities. She cited the case of a massacre in the Khalidiya neighborhood in Homs. According to an account published in French on the monastery's website, rebels gathered Christian and Alawi hostages in a building in Khalidiya and blew up the building with dynamite. They then attributed the crime to the regular Syrian army. 'Even though this act has been attributed to regular army forces . . . the evidence and testimony are irrefutable: It was an operation undertaken by armed groups affiliated with the opposition,' Mother Agn?s-Mariam wrote."

Either Mother Agn?s-Mariam is a liar or Hillary Clinton is a liar. You decide.

A few things to consider in light of these dramatic developments:

1) Western governments and media blamed the Assad government immediately and without evidence, pushing condemnation through the UN Security Council without delay to take advantage of the horror and outrage.

As astute observer James Jatras predicted a month before the Houla deception:

Watch for staged "atrocity" to trigger ?#NATO? action in ?#Syria?: "From ?#Srebrenica? and ?#Racak? to ?#Benghazi? and ?#Homs?" http://t.co/JfyUvKMq

2) The Assad government was telling the truth when it said that Syrian forces did not commit the massacre. According to the "regime change" narrative, the regime to be changed must be immediately and totally discredited so that nothing it claims is to be believed. Even some alternative and antiwar sites painstakingly repeated regime change propaganda about the horrors of the Assad regime -- repeated with particular venom by those who six months earlier could scarcely find Syria on the map. The question is now, if they were telling the truth about Houla, what else have they been telling the truth about all along?

Could it be that the "democratic" Gulf States of Saudi Arabia and Qatar are indeed playing a dirty and destabilizing game? How about Israel, which stands to benefit enormously from the downfall of Iran's closest ally in the region? Today a senior Israeli minister accused the Assad government of genocide and urged international intervention to overthrow the regime. Not to be outdone, Netanyahu added that it is not only the Syrian regime undertaking genocide: also Iran through its proxy Hezbollah is guilty. Some might mention a slow-motion genocide resulting from Israel's policies in the occupied territories, but that would not be polite.

3) UN Secretary General is, as was his predecessor, a mere tool of the US and Western governments who pay his salary. Though he is supposed to be a neutral party he is clearly and unreservedly repeating Western regime-change propaganda.

4) U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, is a psychotic, bloodthirsty monster who deserves to be jailed as a war criminal. When the Syrian government denied responsibility for the Houla massacre, Rice with no evidence immediately dismissed the denial as a "blatant lie." Rice and her evil partners Samantha Power and Hillary Clinton are hell-bent on ensuring that left-wing interventionism is as bloody and destructive as its right-wing counterpart, even if they call it "humanitarian." Alawi and Shia minorities do not count as human to the likes of Rice, Hillary, and Power, so they are not entitled to the same human rights protections. They are standing in the way of progress by continuing to live, so their destruction is all for the greater good.

Syrian government responsibility for Houla was a lie; it was in fact a provocation by the rebels to get the Libya-style foreign intervention they need to overthrow the government. Will anyone listen now that a major mainstream outlet has reported it?

Latest Cover-Up/Deceptions
- Yet Another Of The FBI's Own Terrorist Plots... Involves A Group Of Senior Citizens
- CIA reportedly thwarted new al-Qaida underwear bomb plot
- Treasure Hunter Fears Assassination Over Search For Bin Laden's Body
- HOT: Breitbart's Coroner Possibly Poisoned to Death
- Key witness to RFK assassination says Sirhan Sirhan didn't act alone: "The truth has got to be told. No more cover-ups."
- Ron Paul Warns of False Flag Attack
- DOJ Denies Bid to Reopen Probe of Kent State Shootings
- Police Have Mysteriously Lost The Video Of The Megaupload Raid

'Susan Rice, is a psychotic, bloodthirsty monster' - I was listening up until this line. Your court-room-level proof, please?

Regardless of your point-of-view or motives, this is character assassination. It blows your argument to pieces by destroying this article's claim to being impartial. It is clearly biased. It cannot, therefore, be trusted.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Labor Department backs off plan forcing reporters to use government-issued computers

The Labor Department has backed off a plan to force news agencies to use government-issued computers and other equipment to report on jobless reports and other key economic data, following a GOP-led House hearing this week, according to several published reports.

Agency officials have said they want reporters who analyze, then write about economic reports inside their so-called ?lock up? room to use U.S. computers, software and Internet lines so the government can further protect against such potential security breaches as hacking.

But the plan also resulted in cries about potential free-speech violations and the government now having computer access to news agencies.

?This proposal threatens the First Amendment,? Bloomberg News Executive Editor Dan Moss said during a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing. ?The government would literally open the reporters? notebooks.?

Read More

Latest Big Brother/Orwellian
- US Continues To Try To Block Megaupload From Using Its Lawyers, Pretends It Has Jurisdiction Over The World
- Rand Paul proposes bill to prevent warrantless drone surveillance
- Agent Provocateur At Bilderberg 2012 Tried to Set Up Protesters With Fake Bomb Threat
- U.N. could tax U.S.-based Web sites, leaked docs show
- US Government Still Insisting It Can't Be Sued Over Warrantless Wiretapping
- FBI Did Not Steal Megaupload Evidence Because It's "Digital"?
- Obama Administration Argues No Warrant Required for GPS Tracking of Citizens
- Caveman Blogger Fights for Free Speech and Internet Freedom

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Cellphone Video Shows Four Cops Beating Philly Motorist Charged with Aggravated Assault and Resisting Arrest

by Ed Krayewski

The video below purports to show what happens after two Philadelphia cops stop a motorist for allegedly ramming into a pole and driving off last week. Backup shows up about two minutes in, and then it's four of the city of brothelry love's finest subduing Marcus Warryton, the "suspect" (who does not appear to be charged in connection with the traffic violation). The Philadelphia Daily News reports, by way of an update that all but one officer (the one who? "struck" Warryton) are back on patrol:

During the struggle, police said, two officers suffered cuts and bruises, and another injured his neck.

At one point, Warryton allegedly reached for one officer's handgun, police said.

Warryton needed seven staples to close gashes on his head. He was charged with aggravated assault, simple assault and resisting arrest.

Warryton's family said publicly that they believed that he was the victim of police brutality.

Presumably the portions of the police narrative that aren't on tape happened at some point before (and probably not after) the video. An Internal Affairs investigation was opened and in another Daily News article that asked whether cops used too? much force in the arrest, a police spokesman admits there are some "training issues" apparent from the incident:?

Latest Tyranny/Police State
- Allegation: Utah Police Wrote Phony Tickets To Tourists, Pocketed The Cash
- Gardening in the twenty first century [Comic]
- Swear in Public? That'll Cost You $20, Payable to the State
- Police Arrest Woman For Filming Them, Take Phone Out Of Her Bra, Claim That It Must Be Kept As 'Evidence'
- In Russia Police Obeys You
- The Nature of Bureaucracy is to Grow - Doug Casey
- Fatal Police Shootings Up 70 Percent in Los Angeles County
- 'Click It Or Ticket' Now Applies To Your Cats & Dogs, NJ Residents Face $1,000 Tickets If Pets Not Locked In Harness

cops should just have some chloroform lol...

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Rand Paul Damage Control

By Michael Suede

Jack Hunter claims Rand Paul ?had? to endorse Romney. ?Mike Adams claims Rand Paul is lying in his endorsement in an attempt to insert himself into a position of power. ?An article on the Daily Paul?also claims the same thing.??Dan McCarthy of the American Conservative?claims this is simply?retail politics that doesn?t mean anything. ?Economist Robert Murphy posted a few?apologist?pieces, including apologist commentary from Lew Rockwell.

The Lew Rockwell interview was interesting. ?The interviewer (on RT, of course) asks some great questions. ?One of them being, ?Why cater to an establishment party that shut out what your morals are this whole time?? ?Lew?s response was, I?m not for catering, I?m for forgetting about it.

Well, I?m not in favor of ?forgetting about it?.

I have no problems forgiving, but I?m not about to support someone who climbs in bed with some of the most heinous men the world has ever known. ?If Rand wants my cash, he better start changing his tune. Imagine if Rand was a German politician during the rise of the Third Reich. ?Imagine if Rand had endorsed Hitler because he wanted more power within the Nazi party, even though he didn?t agree with the majority of what the Nazis were doing. ?Someone please explain to me how his endorsement of Romney is any?different. ?As Lew points out in his interview, the establishment is for endless war, concentration camps, drones in your backyard, regulation of the internet, etc.. etc..

So if the establishment is for all of those horrible things that Lew lists off, how could he possibly support what Rand did? ?I fail to see any difference between endorsing Romney or endorsing any other psychopathic?homicidal?maniac for the presidency. ?I really don?t care if Rand can do some good within the party. ?I care about principle; Rand has just clearly demonstrated that he has none.

It is important not to get caught up in an improper attachment to a political figure. ?When people show approval towards politicians who engage in what they know to be bad behavior, they take on the role of an enabler. ?Many people make huge emotional and monetary investments in their favorite political figures; clearly, this makes it hard for them to denounce bad behavior. ?I think that is?precisely?what we are seeing here in the responses to Rand Paul?s support for the neo-Hitler Romney.

How many democrats still blindly support Obama after he failed to end the wars, stop the drug raids, end the cronyism, and halt the bailouts? ?How many republicans support Romney, the very guy who implemented?Obamacare?in his own state and has flip-flopped so many times on so many issues that there isn?t a single issue he?s ever been consistent on? ?Why should we support people who endorse these clowns with our money, votes or time?

I don?t blame Lew or the rest of the bunch for being?apologists, they are simply caught up in a psychological state that precludes them from making a rational?assessment?of the situation. ?Either that, or they subconsciously support Romney themselves.

We must always remember what all politicians are: mafia bosses. ?Even the great Ron Paul still gets a paycheck that is derived from the theft of the masses. ?I support Ron because of his incredible unwavering support of the non-aggression principle, but he is by far the exception to the rule. ?As much as I love Ron, I?m not going to blindly approve of actions he might take that violate what I know to be true and just. ?If Ron Paul did something ?bad?, I would be among the first to denounce him. ?In this case, Rand?s endorsement of Romney is inexcusable given the fact that his father is still technically running and Gary Johnson is still in the mix.
_
Michael Suede runs LibertarianNews.org

Latest Commentary
- Lew Rockwell Talks Rand's Romney Endorsement on AJ
- Government-Caused Impoverishment: Why Do We Stand for It?
- The Drug War Is Finished
- The So-Called Private Economy
- Tom Woods: The Libertarian Speech I Would Deliver to the Whole Country
- Mexico Should Just Legalize Drugs
- "The Competition of Crooks" -- Hans Hoppe Explains How Democracy REALLY Works
- Laws Restricting Nonviolent Activity Are Acts Of Aggression

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Rand Paul Endorses Romney, Mucho Drama Ensues

Chris | InformationLiberation

I don't really care for politics, and I didn't follow Rand's campaign too much because he was a compromiser from square one.

Nonetheless, lots of people supported him.

I'm sure they understood he's not perfect, but that's the idiocy of politics, you're called on to support people you disagree with because it's a choice between who will rule over you.

The sickening part of Rand's endorsement is when he says his endorsement will get Ron Paul's young supporters to support the warmongering NDAA loving Neo-con trash that is Mitt Romney.

Frankly, it's disgusting.

It's one thing to make some calculated (idiotic) political move to advance your own career, it's another to sell out your supporters.

Here's some videos on the incident:

Kokesh:

AJ:

AJ w/ Kokesh:

Kokesh w/ former Ron Paul Staffer Penny Freeman:

Here's the article she cites: Can Ron Paul Be Tamed? by Justin Raimondo

Latest Politics/Corruption
- Minor Cuts to Defense Budget Could Lead to War: Top US Military Official
- Obama and Eric Holder Are Still Lying About the Medical Marijuana Raids
- Rand Paul Answers: Why He Endorsed Romney
- Tom Woods Has Info Ron Will Not Be Endorsing Romney
- Carol Paul Speaks about Rands Endorsement of Romney and Ron Paul 6-13-12
- Why Rand Paul was Wrong to Endorse Mitt Romney & Jack Hunter is a Statist
- Rand Paul Responds to Endorsement Controversy on Peter Schiff Show
- Joe Scarborough: Why I voted for Ron Paul

This is why it is critical to put your trust in the Lord rather than man. Governments, flags, soldiers, constitutions, or politicians never "gave" you your rights or freedoms only God can give you life and liberty. People run around like maniacs following certain people expecting them to give them their liberties back and always end up disappointed. Man will always fail you. Even Ron Paul says it is bigger than just him or his campaign for the Republican nominee. The idea of liberty is so much bigger than a candidate, an election, or fixing a corrupt government. Until you turn to God you will never be free. Man will always chain you down by stealing from you via the income tax or through the stealth tax that is inflation through the federal reserve system. Man will lock you up (NDAA) or send you to fight in an unjust war. Man will sell you out like Rand Paul just did. Jesus will never sell you out ever and that brings me comfort. -humanalarmclock crucial series of videos. i didn't follow it closely either and never even heard of jesse benton or trygve olson. The "Tea Party" was co-opted long ago. It's over and Rand Paul has sold out to the new Bolsheviks. He's irrelevant now.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Rand Paul proposes bill to prevent warrantless drone surveillance

By Eric W. Dolan

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) introduced legislation on Tuesday that would prohibit law enforcement agencies from using unmanned aerial vehicles to conduct surveillance without a warrant.

?I?m not against technology per se,? he explained on CNN. ?What I am for are the constitutional processes that protect our civil liberties. So, you know, it?s not like I?m against the police using cars or against them using airplanes or helicopters or robots. But I am for personal privacy for saying that no policeman will ever do this without asking a judge for permission.?

This year?s Federal Aviation Administration funding bill contained provisions that made it easier for law enforcement agencies to use drones within the United States. The new law requires the FAA to speed up the process by which it authorizes government agencies to operate drones. The law also requires the FAA to allow agencies to operate any drone weighing 4.4 pounds or less as long as it is operated within line of sight, during the day and below 400 feet in altitude.

Read More

Latest Big Brother/Orwellian
- US Continues To Try To Block Megaupload From Using Its Lawyers, Pretends It Has Jurisdiction Over The World
- Agent Provocateur At Bilderberg 2012 Tried to Set Up Protesters With Fake Bomb Threat
- U.N. could tax U.S.-based Web sites, leaked docs show
- Labor Department backs off plan forcing reporters to use government-issued computers
- US Government Still Insisting It Can't Be Sued Over Warrantless Wiretapping
- FBI Did Not Steal Megaupload Evidence Because It's "Digital"?
- Obama Administration Argues No Warrant Required for GPS Tracking of Citizens
- Caveman Blogger Fights for Free Speech and Internet Freedom

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Selling 1 Oz Gold Coin for $25 (When it's Worth Over $1,500)

Mark Dice tries to sell a 1 ounce solid gold coin for $25 outside of a coin shop in San Diego, CA. HINT- It's worth WAY more than $25, but does anyone want it?

Latest Economy
- Family net worth plummets 40%
- U.S. Government Bond 'Bubble' to Burst, Faber Says
- Peter Schiff: America the next Greece?
- Doug Casey - Chairman, Casey Research - @Cambridge House Live - June 2012
- Peter Schiff - The Real Crash: America's Coming Bankruptcy - @Cambridge House Live - June 4, 2012
- Jeff Berwick - The Dollar Vigilante - @Cambridge House Live - June 2012
- The Zombie Apocalypse: Economic Implications
- Estonia Embraced Austerity, Now Their Economy is Booming

They won't buy it because they think it's a scam. It's not because they are stupid or ignorant. Mark Dice makes great Vids.
Check out that microphone.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

US "Six Strikes" Anti-Piracy Scheme Delayed

by Ernesto, TorrentFreak

Soon the file-sharing habits of millions of BitTorrent users in the United States will be monitored as part of an agreement between the MPAA, RIAA, and all the major ISPs. Those caught sharing copyright works will receive several warning messages and will be punished if they continue to infringe. However, it now appears that the much-discussed July start date will have to wait until later in the year as the parties involved may fail to meet the provisional deadline.

In the coming months the Center for Copyright Information (CCI) will start to track down ?pirates? as part of an agreement all major U.S. Internet providers struck with the MPAA and RIAA.

The parties agreed on a system through which copyright infringers are warned that their behavior is unacceptable. After six warnings ISPs may then take a variety of repressive measures, which include slowing down offenders? connections and temporary disconnections.

The plan was announced under the name ?Copyright Alerts? in July last year and the first ISPs were expected to send out the first warnings before the end of 2011. But this deadline passed silently and as things stand now it looks like the July 1, 2012 deadline is not going to be met by all ISPs either.

TorrentFreak asked the CCI about the upcoming target date, and their response suggests that things may take longer than expected.

?The dates mentioned in the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) are not hard deadlines but were intended to keep us on track to have the Copyright Alert System up and running as quickly as possible and in the most consumer friendly manner possible,? a spokesperson told us.

?We do not intend to launch until we are confident that the program is consumer friendly and able to be implemented in a manner consistent with all of the goals of the MOU. We expect our implementation to begin later this year.?

In other words, it?s taking more time than expected. That said, the CCI did inform us that they have finally selected a third-party company that will be responsible for monitoring BitTorrent swarms. However, the name of the firm remains a secret for now.

?The technology partner we have identified and begun working with is an independent and impartial expert and we expect to have an announcement about the independent expert shortly,? TorrentFreak was told.

As described in the agreement, this independent ?technology partner? will first be tested by yet another independent expert to see if their data collection methods stand up to scrutiny. This is a possible reason for the ?delay? but there are many more.

At their end the internet providers all have to create a system that allows them to keep track of the warnings. To ensure the privacy of subscribers, this database of alleged pirates is not stored centrally.

Hoping to find out more about what type of punishments ISPs have planned and their views on the agreement, we contacted several of them.

Verizon was quick to respond but didn?t want to provide any details on the planned punishments. The ISP did say that they believe the voluntary agreement is the right solution for the piracy problem.

?Verizon has always said that copyright infringement is wrong and through this voluntary consumer friendly system, we believe we can educate our consumers and offer them access to legal alternatives,? the company told TorrentFreak.

?We believe this program offers the best approach to the problem of illegal file sharing and, importantly, is one that respects the privacy and rights of our subscribers. It also provides a mechanism for helping people to find many great sources of legal content.?

Other Internet providers contacted by TorrentFreak, including Comcast and AT&T, did not respond to repeated inquiries about the BitTorrent crackdown.

The CCI, however, ensured TorrentFreak that none of the ISPs has plans to terminate the accounts of subscribers. Temporary disconnections remain as one of the possible punishments. Which measures the various ISPs will choose remains a mystery for now. We?ll publish more on this and other details of the scheme in the near future.

View the original article here

Regular Patrol Cops To Get "Ballistic Shields" In Florida

Equipment normally used in SWAT raids
Paul Joseph Watson

Regular patrol officers in Florida are to be provided with bullet-proof ballistic shields in another sign of how police departments are preparing for violence and civil unrest in America.

?Saxon Security and its partner LCOA Defense have been named suppliers to the St. Petersburg (Florida) police department for new ballistic shields for general patrol officers,? reports BusinessWire. 45 ballistic shields will be provided to routine beat cops.

The video above shows the Deadstop Ballistic Shield repelling bullets. The clip displays the use of the shield in SWAT-style scenarios but now regular beat officers will also carry it while on patrol.

LCOA?s website also clearly places the use of the shield in the context of SWAT operations, not day to day patrols.

?DeadStop? Shields provide protection for a tactical squad in a live fire scenario. Developed in concert with US SWAT teams, our shields provide expected coverage at a surprising net weight,? states the promo text.

Arming general patrol officers with bullet and projectile-repellent shields is another indication that law enforcement bodies across the country are preparing for potential civil dislocation.

The federal government is also making similar preparations. Back in March, the Department of Homeland Security awarded defense contractor ATK a deal to provide the DHS with 450 million rounds of bullets over a five year period.

The DHS has also recently purchased a number of bullet-proof checkpoint booths that include 'stop and go' lights.

With forecasters predicting violent unrest later this year as a result of a deepening economic crisis, police bodies like the NYPD have held "mobilization exercises" to train police to prepare for civil unrest in the United States.

In August last year, the NYPD Disorder Control Unit brought together police from all five of the city's boroughs to rehearse what the response would be "should out-of-control riots break out here".

A report produced by the U.S. Army War College's Strategic Institute in 2008 warned that the United States may experience massive civil unrest in the wake of a series of crises which it termed "strategic shock."

"Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security," stated the report, authored by [Ret.] Lt. Col. Nathan Freir, adding that the military may be needed to quell "purposeful domestic resistance".

The video below shows police using the Deadstop ballistic shield as part of SWAT training. Now regular patrol officers in Florida will have this same tool.

__
Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a regular fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show and Infowars Nightly News.

View the original article here

Who Would Jesus Sue? Tim Tebow Threatens Bogus Lawsuit Against Maker of 'MY Jesus' T-Shirt

Chris | InformationLiberation

Intellectual property laws frequently make people do stupid things. Case in point, Tim Tebow apparently threatened a lawsuit against the seller of a "MY Jesus" T-shirt because they claim the site is using his likeness. That the site specifically says they've got nothing to do with Tim Tebow nor the NY Jetts is apparently of no consequence to his idiot lawyers, they're just hoping their threats and intimidation get the T-Shirt maker to submit to their will -- as Jesus would have.

Fortunately the T-shirt maker, CubbyTees, is not submitting to Tim Tebow and his lawyer's thuggery.

Via TMZ:

TMZ obtained the cease and desist letter Tebow's attorneys sent to cubbytees.com last month -- in which they claim "The Merchandise makes it appear as if Mr. Tebow actually endorses Cubby Tees and its products."

Interestingly, the tee shirts in question do not use Tebow's image or name -- but instead spell out "MY Jesus" using the colors and font of his new team ... the NY Jets. In fact, the website clearly states, "This fun design is not officially endorsed by New York's backup quarterback or the Son of God, but plays off the themes of Tebow's faith and his new team."

Still, Tebow's attorneys are demanding the site stop "any use of Mr. Tebow's name and/or likeness" -- and according to Cubby Tees, Tebow already successfully petitioned eBay to remove the tees.

The shirt makers tell TMZ they aren't backing down, and actually sent a response to team Tebow ... saying the design "shares nothing with Mr. Tebow except for promotion of a common Lord and Savior." The shirts are still for sale.

It's amazing how bad laws can turn otherwise seemingly friendly people into piranhas. I'm sure Mr. Tebow thinks he was somehow wronged by this T-shirt maker using his "likeness," in reality all that happened was someone printed a T-shirt promoting him at no cost to himself.

Nonetheless, thinking in line with the idiocy of IP laws, he thinks in order to "right" this "wrong," he must threaten to haul the person into court and use the state to shake the person down for everything they've got.

All these wrongheaded IP laws should be repealed, from likeness to slander to reputation rights, etc. They're all nonsense, and they're serving to turn even Jesus lovers like Mr. Tebow into devils.

Latest Commentary
- Even Worse Than Democracy
- A Century of Cosmetics: Is the End Near?
- The War on Drugs: Cui Bono?
- Sending Your Kids to Public School Is Child Abuse
- Five Pillars of Economic Freedom
- Seize Chuck Schumer's Ill-Gotten Assets & Banish Him From The Country
- Brazil and the Spirit of Liberty
- Heat and Light in the TSA Line

I have great respect for Mr. Tebow, but this lawsuit is just plain silly (and I have a feeling that it's his lawyers, not Tebow himself, who are behind this). This is clearly a Christian parody shirt, which is perfectly legal and the likes of which can be found in virtually any Christian bookstore. CORRECTION: What I meant to say in the first sentence was, "...but this threat of a lawsuit is just plain silly".

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

Outraged Fullerton citizens react to Kelly Thomas beating tape

The May 15 city council meeting in Fullerton, California was packed with outraged citizens ready to voice reactions to newly released security camera footage showing police brutally beating Kelly Thomas to death at a bus depot. Thomas was a 37-year-old schizophrenic drifter who died after a July, 2011 altercation with six police officers in which he was tasered, beat with batons, and hit repeatedly in the face.

Cpl. Jay Cicinelli will face charges of involuntary manslaughter and excessive force, while officer Manuel Ramos will face charges of involuntary manslaughter and second-degree murder.

At the city council meeting, Ron Thomas, Kelly Thomas's father, called for the arrest and termination of another officer involved with the incident, officer Joe Wolfe, whom he says also murdered his son.

It was announced at the meeting that Kelly Thomas's mother would accept a settlement from the City of Fullerton totaling $1 million.

Written and produced by Paul Detrick.

Approximately 3:13 minutes.

Latest Tyranny/Police State
- Citizen Video Evidence Helps Two Arrested Photographers Have Their Cases Dropped
- All-White Jury Acquits Houston Ex-Police Officer in Videotaped Beating of Black Teen Chad Holley
- DEA Terrorists Gun Down Two Pregnant Women & Other Innocents From Safety Of Helicopter
- 74-Yr-Old Calls Police After Being Beaten In His Home, Police Show Up, Arrest Him & Throw Him In Jail
- Wall Street Editorial Page: If the Government Claims You Are a Terrorist, Then You ARE a Terrorist
- If Cops Can't Taze a Pregnant Woman, The Terrorists Will Win
- Regular Patrol Cops To Get "Ballistic Shields" In Florida
- Armed 'Environmental Police' Shut Down Ice-Cream Stand

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

IP-Address Can't Even Identify a State, BitTorrent Judge Rules

by Ernesto, TorrentFreak

The mass-BitTorrent lawsuits that are sweeping the United States are in a heap of trouble. After a Florida judge ruled that an IP-address is not a person, a Californian colleague has gone even further in protecting the First Amendment rights of BitTorrent users. The judge in question points out that geolocation tools are far from accurate and that it?s therefore uncertain that his court has jurisdiction over cases involving alleged BitTorrent pirates. As a result, 15 of these mass-BitTorrent lawsuits were dismissed.

In recent years more than a quarter million people have been accused of sharing copyrighted works in the United States.

Copyright holders generally sue dozens, hundreds or sometimes even thousands of people at once, hoping to extract cash settlements from the alleged downloaders. The evidence they present to the court is usually an IP-address and a timestamp marking when the alleged infringement took place.

Early 2010, when these mass-lawsuits began, copyright holders targeted IP-addresses from all across the US in single lawsuits. This led some judges to dismiss cases because their courts have no jurisdiction over people who live elsewhere.

As a result, copyright holders switched to a new tactic. Before filing a suit they ran their database of infringing IP-addresses through so-called ?geolocation? services so they could argue that the defendants most likely reside in the district where they were being sued.

This worked well for a while, but a new ruling by California District Court Judge Dean Pregerson puts an end to this new approach, killing 15 lawsuits in the process.

According to Pregerson, alleged BitTorrent pirates are protected by the First Amendment as they are ?engaging in the exercise of speech, albeit to a limited extent.? Therefore, the copyright holder?s request to identify anonymous internet users has to meet certain criteria.

One of the requirements is that it?s absolutely clear that the accused are residents of the region where the court has jurisdiction, but according to Judge Pregerson it is not sufficient to use the results from a ?geolocation? tool to prove it.

In a previous order the copyright holder ? movie company Celestial Inc. ? was asked to convince the court of the accuracy of these tools. In a reply Celestial referred to a website which contained some general claims as well as a quote from the company that collected the evidence, but it wasn?t enough.

?Based on Plaintiff?s own reliability claims, there may still be a 20 to 50 percent chance that this court lacks jurisdiction,? Judge Pregerson writes in his order.

The Judge adds that even if there is a slight chance that these tools are wrong, he simply can?t sign off on the subpoena request.

?Even if the most advanced geolocation tools were simply too unreliable to adequately establish jurisdiction, the court could not set aside constitutional concerns in favor of Plaintiff?s desire to subpoena the Doe Defendants? identifying information.?

?Again, it is the First Amendment that requires courts to ensure complaints like this one would at least survive a motion to dismiss, before the court authorizes early discovery to identify anonymous internet users.?

The IP-address lookups and additional information provided by Celestial Inc. can?t guarantee that the defendants do indeed reside in California, and Judge Pregerson therefore dismissed the 15 mass-BitTorrent lawsuits the company filed at his court.

It also means the end of mass-BitTorrent lawsuits in the Californian court, as no geolocation tool is 100% accurate.

While the ruling doesn?t mean the end of all mass-BitTorrent lawsuits in the US just yet, it appears that there?s a growing opposition from judges against these practices.

For example, two weeks ago we reported on a related ruling in which a Florida judge dismissed several cases because an IP-address doesn?t identify a person. In other words, even when a court has jurisdiction, the copyright holder can not prove that the account holder connected to the IP-address is the person who shared the copyrighted file.

If other judges adopt either of the rulings above, it means the end of mass-BitTorrent lawsuits as we know them.

View the original article here

How Corrupt Prosecutors Get Away With Sending Innocent People to Jail

Prosecutors are arguably the most powerful figures in the American criminal justice system, a system that is not equipped or willing to punish their crimes.
By Phillip Smith

Prosecutors are arguably the most powerful figures in the American criminal justice system. They decide which charges to bring, what plea bargains to offer, and what sentences to request. Given their role in the system and the broad powers they exercise, it is critical that they discharge those duties responsibly and ethically.

But according to attorneys and criminal justice reform advocates, prosecutors across the country are misbehaving -- and getting away with it. While the most common forms of prosecutorial misconduct are hiding exculpatory evidence and engaging in improper examination and argumentation, another form of intentional misconduct is the knowing use of false testimony to win convictions.

"Perjury can easily undermine a defendant's right to a fair trial," said Chicago criminal defense attorney Leonard Goodman.

He ought to know.

In 2009, Goodman represented Brian Wilbourn in a federal narcotics case in which prosecutors knowingly allowed an informant to testify that Wilbourn sold crack cocaine out of a penthouse apartment over a three-year period when he was in fact nowhere near the scene at any time.

"Mr. Wilbourn was safely locked away in prison when the informant testified that Wilbourn was selling drugs at the penthouse between 2002 and 2005," Goodman explained.

The US 7th District Court of Appeals overturned Wilbourn's conviction because of the perjured testimony.

"When the government obtains a conviction through the knowing use of false testimony, it violates a defendant's due process rights," wrote Judge Daniel Manion as he ordered the reversal.

And when a prosecutor knowingly allows perjured testimony to be heard, that's prosecutorial misconduct. In the Wilbourn case, Assistant US Attorney Rachel Cannon knew that her informant's testimony was false -- because Goodman told her so before the trial -- yet she has not been sanctioned in any way. That's not unusual.

Read More

Photo by bloomsberries, Flickr Creative Commons

Latest Politics/Corruption
- D.A.R.E To Charge Taxpayers For Your Political Propaganda
- Colorado Drugged Driving Bill Dies--Again
- 3.6 Million Taxpayer Dollars Being Used To Support The Lavish Lifestyles Of Former Presidents Such As Bush And Clinton
- House of Representatives Votes Down Defunding Medical Marijuana Raids
- Pelosi Condemns Medical Marijuana Crackdown
- Drug czar: There are no good reasons to legalize marijuana
- Drug Czar Denies that Marijuana Users Are Arrested and Forced into Treatment
- Elizabeth Warren Caught in Lie: Claimed To Be "Minority" -- Turns Out She's Only 1/32nd Cherokee Indian

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which in some cases has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Such material is made available for the purposes of news reporting, education, research, comment, and criticism, which constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. It is our policy to respond to notices of alleged infringement that comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (found at the U.S. Copyright Office) and other applicable intellectual property laws. It is our policy to remove material from public view that we believe in good faith to be copyrighted material that has been illegally copied and distributed by any of our members or users.
About Us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened..." - Winston Churchill

View the original article here

The Case of the Missing Terrorists

Paul Craig Roberts

If there were any real terrorists, Jose Rodriguez would be dead.

Who is Jose Rodriguez? He is the criminal who ran the CIA torture program. Most of his victims were not terrorists or even insurgents. Most were hapless individuals kidnapped by warlords and sold to the Americans as ?terrorists? for the bounty paid.

If Rodriguez?s identity was previously a secret, it is no more. He has been on CBS ?60 Minutes? taking credit for torturing Muslims and using the information allegedly gained to kill leaders of al Qaeda. If terrorists were really the problem that Homeland Security, the FBI and CIA claim, Rodriguez?s name would be a struck through item on the terrorists? hit list. He would be in his grave.

So, also, would be John Yoo, who wrote the Justice (sic) Department memos giving the green light to torture, despite US and International laws prohibiting torture. Apparently, Yoo, a professor at the Boalt School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley, was ignorant of US and international law. And so was the US Department of Justice (sic).

Notice that Rodriguez, ?The Torturer of the Muslims,? does?t have to hide. He can go on national television, reveal his identity, and revel in his success in torturing and murdering Muslims. Rodriguez has no Secret Service protection and would be an easy mark for assassination by terrorists so capable as to have, allegedly, pulled off 9/11.

Another easy mark for assassination would be former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, who staffed up the Pentagon with neoconservative warmongers such as Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, who in turn concocted the false information used to justify the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. Rumsfeld himself declared members of al Qaeda to be the most vicious and dangerous killers on earth. Yet Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, Richard Perle, together with neoconservative media propagandists, such as William Kristol and Max Boot, have been walking around safe for years unmolested by terrorists seeking revenge or bringing retribution to those responsible for as many as 1,000,000 Muslim deaths.

Condi Rice, Colin Powell, who delivered the Speech of Lies to the UN inaugurating the invasion of Iraq, and Dick Cheney, whose minimal Secret Service protection could not withstand a determined assassination attempt, also enjoy lives unmolested by terrorists.

Remember the deck of cards that the Bush regime had with Iraqi faces? If terrorists had a similar deck, all of those named above would be ?high value targets.? Yet, there has not been a single attempt on any one of them.

Strange, isn?t it, that none of the above are faced with a terrorist threat. Yet, the tough, macho Navy Seals who allegedly killed Osama bin Laden must have their identity kept hidden so that they don?t become terrorist targets. These American supermen, highly trained killers themselves, don?t dare show their faces, but Rodriguez, Rumsfeld, and Condi Rice can walk around unmolested.

Indeed, the Seals? lives are so endangered that President Obama gave up the enormous public relations political benefit of a White House ceremony with the heroic Navy Seals. Very strange behavior for a politician. A couple of weeks after the alleged bin Laden killing, the Seals unit, or most of it, was wiped out in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan.

If you were a Muslim terrorist seeking retribution for Washington?s crimes, would you try to smuggle aboard an airliner a bomb in your underwear or shoe in order to blow up people whose only responsibility for Washington?s war against Muslims is that they fell for Washington?s propaganda? If you wanted to blow up the innocent, wouldn?t you instead place your bomb in the middle of the mass of humanity waiting to clear airport security and take out TSA personnel along with passengers? Terrorists could coordinate their attacks, hitting a number of large airports across the US at the same minute. This would be real terror. Moreover, it would present TSA with an insolvable problem: how can people be screened before they are screened?

Or coordinated attacks on shopping malls and sports events?

Why should terrorists, if they exist, bother to kill people when it is easy to cause mayhem by not killing them? There are a large number of unguarded electric power substations. Entire regions of the country could be shut down. The simplest disruptive act would be to release large quantities of roofing nails in the midst of rush hour traffic in Boston, New York, Washington DC, Atlanta, Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco. You get the picture: thousands and thousands of cars disabled with flat tires blocking the main arteries for days.

Before some reader accuses me of giving terrorists ideas, ask yourself if you really think people so clever as to have allegedly planned and carried out 9/11 couldn?t think of such simple tactics, plots that could be carried out without having to defeat security or kill innocent people? My point isn?t what terrorists, if they exist, should do. The point is that the absence of easy-to-do acts of terrorism suggests that the terrorist threat is more hype than reality. Yet, we have an expensive, intrusive security apparatus that seems to have no real function except to exercise power over American citizens.

In place of real terrorists carrying out easy plots, we have ?terrorist? plots dreamed up by FBI and CIA agents, who then recruit some hapless or demented dupes, bribing them with money and heroic images of themselves, and supplying them with the plot and fake explosives. These are called ?sting operations,? but they are not. They are orchestrations by our own security agencies that produce fake terrorist plots that are then ?foiled? by the security agencies that hatched the plots.

Washington?s announcement is always: ?The public was never in danger.? Some terrorist plot! We have never been endangered by one, but the airports have been on orange alert for 11.5 years.

The federal judiciary and brainwashed juries actually treat these concocted plots as real threats to American security despite the government?s announcements that the public was never in danger.

The announcements of the ?foiled? plots keep the brainwashed public docile and amenable to intrusive searches, warrantless spying, the growth of an unaccountable police state, and endless wars.

The ?War on Terror? is a hoax, one that has been successfully used to destroy the US Constitution and to complete the transformation of law from a shield of the people into a weapon in the hands of the state. By destroying habeas corpus, due process, and the presumption of innocence, the ?War on Terror? has destroyed our security.
__
Paul Craig Roberts [send him mail], a former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury and former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal, has been reporting shocking cases of prosecutorial abuse for two decades. A new edition of his book, The Tyranny of Good Intentions, co-authored with Lawrence Stratton, a documented account of how americans lost the protection of law, has been released by Random House. Visit his website.

View the original article here