Shadows of the cave

Internet Free Speech Under Threat! Eric Pepin - Higher Balance Institute Sue SOTT for 4.47 Million Over SOTT Forum Comments!

2008-03-11T13:38:00.004-04:00

Well, the absurdity of the pathological is rearing it's ugly face once again. I have mixed feelings of disgust, astonishment and ridiculousness. 'Preposterous' just climbed to a new height in my dictionary. Make no mistake, the actions of this deviant reflects the systems of society at large (to include our legal systems) and so such a legal suit, no matter the frivolousness of it...could be successful! So those who have a yearning for truth this is the time to show support (make sure to read the end of the article).

Internet Free Speech Under Threat! Eric Pepin - Higher Balance Institute Sue SOTT for 4.47 Million Over SOTT Forum Comments!

Laura Knight-Jadczyk
sott.net

Fri, 07 Mar 2008 06:10 EST

©Oregonian

"Master" Eric J Pepin

Yesterday, as I was working on finishing up the next installment of the Comet Series of Articles, FedEx delivered a packet of mail from our corporate registered agent in the U.S. It was "Complaint and Demand for Jury Trial" filed in the State of Oregon by Eric Pepin's Higher Balance Institute, LLC. The reason? A discussion on the SOTT Forum that begins HERE.

Well, that was entertaining enough when you think about the fact that the discussion that he objects to was centered on several newspaper articles that describe his close calls with the legal system in Oregon over charges of sex abuse.

The legal document I received is 10 pages long so I'm just going to summarize it here. If you want to read the whole thing (it's hilarious beyond belief!) go HERE for the pdf.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF OREGON

Civil No.: CV '08-0233 HA

COMPLAINT AND DEMAND FOR JURY TRIAL

HIGHER BALANCE, LLC, an Oregon
Limited Liability Company, dba HIGHER
BALANCE INSTITUTE, Plaintiff

v.

QUANTUM FUTURE GROUP, INC, a
California corporation, and LAURA
KNIGHT- JADCZYK, Defendants.

Plaintiff Higher Balance LLC, dba Higher Balance Institute ("HBI") files this Complaint against defendants Quantum Future Group, Inc. ("QFG") and Laura Knight-Jadczyk and alleges the following:

...defendants committed intentional torts that were purposefully targeted at HBI within the State of Oregon; defendants knew that HBI is a resident of the State of Oregon; defendants' tortious conduct cause HBI to suffer economic harm within the State of Oregon; HBI's claims arise out of defendants' activities relating to the State of Oregon; and the exercise of jurisdiction over defendants is reasonable in light of their intentional misconduct directed towards a resident of the State of Oregon.

As this Court has specific personal jurisdiction over the defendants, venue is proper in this district and division under 28 U.S.C 1391(a)(3)

General Allegations:

HBI is an Oregon-based company with over 40,000 customers from all over the world. HBI is dedicated to helping its customers relieve stress, reduce anxiety, and achieve emotional balance and spiritual enlightenment through meditation techniques. The majority of HBI's revenues are derived from the online sale of its books and CDs, which are designed to help its customers learn these meditation techniques.

[Etc...]

Defendant QFG operates a website known as Signs of the Times ("SOTT"). QFG posts articles and sponsors forums regarding various conspiracy theories and allegedly corrupt organizations on the SOTT website.

Employees and agents of QFG, including defendant Knight-Jadczyk, serve as administrators and moderators of SOTT forums. QFG employees and agents, including defendant Knight-Jadczyk, post comments and analyses in SOTT forums. These employees and agents act within the course and scope of their agency for QFG when serving as administrators and moderators of the SOTT website and when posting comments and analyses on the SOTT website.

SOTT forums are available to the general public online.

...Many of HBI's existing and potential customers read the SOTT website as a source of alternative media....

FIRST CLAIM FOR RELIEF - Defamation - Libel

....Beginning in May 2006, QFG sponsored a forum on the SOTT website concerning HBI under the heading "COINTELPRO."

Beginning in November 2007, defendants intentionally posted several false, baseless, and derogatory accusations concerning HBI on the SOTT website including, but not limited to:

a. HBI is a "front for pedophilia";
b. HBI is a "cointelpro" organization;
c. Meditation, as sold by HBI, is an act of "falling into confluence with a psychopathic reality";
d. Those associated with HBI must be careful to avoid sexual molestation by HBI members;
e. HBI is conning the public;
f. "Fishy sexual conduct is occurring at HBI; and
g. HBI "leads people more deeply into sleep."

By posting these statements in a public internet forum, defendants have published and communicated false and baseless accusations concerning HBI to third parties, including existing and potential HBI customers.

Defendants' statements tend to subject HBI to hatred, contempt, and ridicule and tend to diminish the esteem, respect, goodwill and confidence in which HBI is held by the public and by its customers.

Defendant made these false statements with knowledge of their falsity or with reckless disregard for their truth.

As a result of defendants' false and defamatory statement, HBI suffered general damages in the form of loss of reputation in an amount to be determined at trial, but in any event, not less than $500,000. HBI has also suffered special damages in the form of lost income in amounts to be determined at trial, but in any event, not less than $834,732.

Defendants defamatory statements are still available to the general public on the SOTT website and are easily found through internet searches relating to HBI. Defendants conduct causes HBI irreparable harm, and HBI is entitled to an injunction preventing defendants' continued defamation of HBI.

SECOND CLAIM FOR RELIEF: False Light

Defendants intentionally gave publicity to matters concerning HBI that placed HBI in a false light before the public. etc

...economic damages ... not less than $834,732.

THIRD CLAIM FOR RELIEF: Intentional Interference with Economic Relations - Interference with Business Relationships

Defendant intentionally interfered with many of these business relationships by communicating the false and defamatory information listed...

...economic damages ... not less than $97,299.

HBI... has also suffered damages in the form of loss of reputation ... damages .... not less than $500,000.

...Defendants conduct was malicious and warrants punitive damages...

FOURTH CLAIM FOR RELIEF: Intentional Interference With Economic Relations - Prospective Economic Advantage

Defendant's interference has diminished the esteem, respect, goodwill, and confidence in which HBI is held by the general public, thereby hindering HBI's ability to obtain many new customers with whom HBI had a prospective business relationship. ... damages to be determined at trial...

...On its First Claim for Relief, that HBI be awarded general and special damages in amounts to be determined at trial, but in any event, not less than $1,334,732, and that defendants be enjoined from their continued defamation of HBI.

...On its Second Claim for Relief, that HBI be awarded damages in an amount to be determined at trial, but in any event, not less than $1,334,732. and that defendants be enjoined from continuing to place HBI in a false light.

...On its Third Claim for Relief, that HBI be awarded damages in an amount to be determined at trial, but in any event, not less than $597,299. plus punitive damages, and that defendants be enjoined from their coninued interference with HBI's prospective business relationships.

...On its Fourth Claim for Relief, that HBI be awarded damages in an amount to be determined at trial, but in any event, not less than $1,205,000 plus punitive damages, and that defendants be enjoined from their continued interference with HBI's business relationships.

... That HBI be awarded pre-judgment and post-judgment interest on all damages recovered.

...That HBI be awarded its costs and disbursements incurred in this action; ...

Harry and David demands a trial by jury on all issues so triable.

25th day of February, 2008.

Bullivant houser Bailey PC
Renee E. Rothauge
Chad M. Colton
Tel 503.228.6351
Attorneys for Higher Balance Institute

Whoah! That's some heavy duty stuff, eh? Sounds like we just ripped up on that poor guy for no reason at all!

But that's not quite the situation. The original article about Eric Pepin that was brought to our attention on page 5 of the above-mentioned forum thread read as follows:

A 39-year-old Aloha man who promises spiritual awakening through meditation books and CDs he sells on the Internet is facing sex-abuse charges.

Beaverton police Detective Mike Smith said Eric J. Pepin runs what appears to be a cult out of his Higher Balance Institute on Southwest Second Street in Beaverton.

Pepin was arraigned Tuesday in Washington County criminal court on one count of using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct, two counts of second-degree sexual abuse, and four counts of third-degree sexual abuse. He was released after posting $26,750 cash, or 10 percent of $267,500 bail. A trial was set for Sept. 12.

Using a child in a sexual display is a Measure 11 crime punishable by a mandatory minimum of 5 years and 10 months in prison.

Jamison Dwight Priebe, 21, who works for Pepin and lives at the same address in the 19600 block of Southwest Cooperhawk Court in Aloha, also was arrested on one count each of using a child in a sexual display and third-degree sexual abuse.

Priebe and Pepin turned themselves in at the Washington County Jail last week after a grand jury handed down secret indictments. Priebe was released after posting $25,375 cash bail and is awaiting arraignment Monday.

Smith said a man who is now 20 was 17 and working for Pepin when he allegedly was sexually abused at the Higher Balance office in the 11900 block of Southwest Second Street in Beaverton and at Pepin's former home in the city.

A call to the Higher Balance Institute on Wednesday was answered by a "Personal Star Reach Coach," who referred questions to Pepin's private attorney, Sam Kauffman.

"The charges are false, and we are confident Mr. Pepin will be exonerated," Kauffman said.

Pepin's Web site claims he has located more than 100 missing persons and runaways, along with U.S. Navy submarines, through a psychic ability he calls "remote viewing."

Pepin's meditation systems, which sell for $79 to $149, help customers develop their "sixth sense" and apply it "inward to awaken a dimensional universe within the mind," the Web site says.

According to an affidavit Smith filed with a request for a search warrant, the alleged victim told police that Internet customers who rave about Pepin's teachings are men and women usually older than 35. But, the man said Pepin told him he should recruit "good-looking men" between the ages of 18 and 24 to work for him.

The court record also says Pepin knew the man was 17 when he forced him to perform sex acts.

The boy, Smith wrote, "was taught by Pepin to believe that the sexual contact was only a spiritual necessity." But after a while, the affidavit says, the boy decided he was being used by Pepin, who bought him meals and paid him $200 after sex.

The man contacted Beaverton police in January.

Smith said anyone who may have had underage sexual contact with Pepin should call him at 503-526-2280.

Smith said the man accusing Pepin told police he met one of Pepin's followers at Beaverton Town Square in April 2004. He told Smith the recruiter invited him to meet Pepin and see him demonstrate levitation.

Pepin introduced himself dressed in a robe emblazoned with the words "Master Eric" and a triangular symbol and told the victim to take off his shirt, the detective said.

"It's a cult," Smith said, "anytime you have a guy who fancies himself as the master, the leader."

In another story from Associated Press found HERE, we read:

Beaverton police Detective Mike Smith said Pepin operated the Higher Balance Institute in Beaverton. Smith said the ornate robe emblazoned "Master Eric" turned up during a search.

Well, I've been falsely accused of trying to start a cult myself, so I might ordinarily have had sympathy for Pepin, but when I read the bit about the robe, I blew my tea through my nose. I guess that's why I'm such a failure as a cult-leader (aside from the fact that I'm not interested in the job) - I hardly ever wear anything other than sweats and bedroom slippers and spend all my time working!

In any event, even though a grand jury felt that there was enough evidence to indict Pepin, he was eventually acquitted in trial before a judge as the following report informs us:

Institute leader acquitted of sex charges

HOLLY DANKS - HILLSBORO -- A Washington County Circuit judge called the leader of a metaphysical Internet sales company manipulative and controlling and his testimony unbelievable, even as he acquitted him Wednesday of charges that he had sex with an underage boy.

Judge Steven L. Price, after a five-day trial without a jury, found Eric James Pepin, 40, not guilty of two counts of second-degree sexual abuse, four counts of third-degree sexual abuse and one count of using a child in a display of sexually explicit conduct.

Also acquitted of third-degree sexual abuse and using a child in a pornographic display was Jamison Dwight Priebe, 21, who has worked for Pepin's Higher Balance Institute since he was 18.

"Everybody has stood by me who knows me," Pepin said Wednesday after hugging supporters. "They had faith in me, prayed for me. I told them I wouldn't let them down. I did nothing of what was alleged. I've been nothing but honorable and impeccable."

However, Price said it was "probable that the conduct alleged in all counts occurred," but he wasn't convinced beyond a reasonable doubt. "There's a lack of strong corroboration," such as a date-stamp on a videotape of the sexual encounter, the judge said.

The accuser testified Pepin had him take off his shirt the first day they met at Pepin's Beaverton home in April 2004.

"He was going to try and fix my energy and he needed me to trust him," the accuser said. Pepin touched the teen's "chakra points" on his heart, head and lower abdomen.

"Eric asked me to tell him everything I had done in my life that I was ashamed about," the teen added.

The accuser said Pepin asked him how old he was the first day they met and that he told him the truth.

"He said students had to be 18 because he didn't like parents fussing around," the accuser said.

But within days the two were having sex, including a three-way encounter with Priebe, the youth testified. Pepin called it "crossing the abyss," the accuser said, "surrendering yourself to your teacher, your master."

Pepin testified he is gay and has had sexual relationships with most of his 11 employees, but not before they were 18. Pepin said he gave his accuser a job, even though the teen was a poor worker, and continued to be intimate with him and give him money after he was fired, to help him out.

Stephen A. Houze, Pepin's private defense attorney, called the accuser a liar more than 100 times in his closing argument and noted that Pepin was "the perfect patsy" because society wants to believe the worst of a gay man. Houze said the accuser brought the charges because he wanted to shake down Pepin.

Pepin's Higher Balance Institute, now on Northwest Saltzman Road in Cedar Mill, reached an annual high of $2 million in Internet sales of meditation CDs, tapes and books before his arrest in July.

Pepin touts himself as a psychic and "remote viewer" who has found lost submarines and missing people, and says he created the "psychic pill" Magneurol6-S that enhances brain function, heals nerve damage, heightens paranormal experiences and relieves stress for $79 a bottle.

Andrew Erwin, deputy district attorney, called Higher Balance nothing more than a sex cult run by a "snake oil" salesman who preys on the troubled.

The accuser had nothing to gain by going to police and turned down $250,000 from Pepin to drop the sex charges, Erwin said.

"I'm disappointed," Erwin said of the verdicts. "The judge wants proof beyond all doubt and that's too high a standard."

And now, Pepin wants to sue QFG and yours truly for talking about these articles, published in a newspaper and scattered across the web (though all of them are no longer on the newspaper's website, wonder what's up with that?)!!

Notice that Pepin, himself, revealed his "sex cult" practices in his own testimony. We'll be trying to get transcripts of the trial to publish so our readers can hear it from the horse's mouth; stay tuned for that.

Notice also that Pepin's attorney, Houze, accused the victim of bringing charges because he wanted to shake down Pepin even though the kid turned down 250 K hush money offered by Pepin. Well, maybe that's what gave Pepin the idea of suing me. Only thing is, he's gonna have a hard time collecting his 4.47 million because I don't own a thing, live in a rented house, drive a used car and QFG rarely has more than a grand in the bank at any given time. When we have fund-raisers, the funds are used almost instantly, repaying loans and covering basic expenses for the site and equipment.

It's also humorous that Pepin is suing QFG which only sponsors a world-wide group of independent researchers who, together, make up sott.net. QFG doesn't own sott, nor does QFG have any employees nor any official oversight of anything that the sott.net researchers say or do.

But the bottom line is this: Eric Pepin is convicted out of his own mouth of being a sexual predator. I mean, what kind of teacher of meditation says that he has sex with all his employees? And all of them young men?

Nope, we aren't backing down. We firmly believe, based on available official documents and court records, that Eric Pepin is a danger to innocent people looking for spiritual guidance. Obviously, young guys just looking for sex and money and a good time will be delighted to take his pills, listen to his tapes and attend his retreats. But the wider public who are not aware of these things in Pepin's background, who are not aware that even the judge who acquitted him regretted having to do so, and that the Prosecutor of the case was also convinced that justice had NOT been done, need to be warned about this sexual predator in our midst.

Maybe Eric Pepin will take Sott.net down, we don't know. We don't have money for an expensive defense attorney, we barely stay afloat. But even if that happens (and we hope our readers will help us out now as never before), there are others who know and I don't think that Eric Pepin and all his minions can track down and silence all of them.

Even if you can't give to our legal defense fund, I will appreciate letters of support during this trying time. Write to sott(at)sott.net and I will try to answer each and every one.

And thanks to all our readers for your constant support and encouragement.

SoTT Comment: Oregon police say man abused teen in cult-like operation
"Two Aloha men arrested on sex-abuse charges"
Leader of Washington County Internet company acquitted of sex abuse
Sexual predators in the religious scene

Make no mistake about it: This is an attack on internet freedom and freedom of speech, plain and simple. If Eric Pepin were to win, based on the accusations in the complaint, it would set a precedent that would reverberate across the world. It would make anyone who had a different opinion or view of the world - other than that which is approved by the PTB - subject to suppression and censure. The issues of psychopathy and conspiracy are specifically named in the complaint as well as the connection between religion and making money. If this suit were to succeed, it would significantly chill further discourse about conspiracies, pathological deviance, mind control methods and real cults, including the Judao-Islamo-Christian dominator trio. It would be a disaster.

And so, I think we can begin to notice who is and is not interested in assisting us in publicizing this threat, what so-called "alternative news" sites or "conspiracy theory" sites are willing to come to our aid in facing this threat against all of us on the net.

Certainly there are people and sites that have felt the sting of our critique and we have felt theirs more than once. This is the watershed. As Martin Niemöller said:

"In Germany, they came first for the Communists, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist;

And then they came for the trade unionists, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist;

And then they came for the Jews, And I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew;

And then . . . they came for me . . . And by that time there was no one left to speak up."

It's time for those who stand for freedom of speech, for our First Amendment Rights, to speak up or forever be silenced. Because that is what will happen if Eric Pepin and the Higher Balance Institute prevail. He will create the precedent for total suppression for the PTB masters whether that is his intention or not.

Signs of The Times

2006-09-11T20:01:00.000-04:00

George Galloway doing what he does best

2006-08-11T14:57:00.000-04:00

In case you haven't seen it yet, 'Gorgous George' throws some daggars of truth at the MSM.

The fruit of Israel

2006-08-10T21:07:00.000-04:00

From the Angery Arab: This is Zionism. Raja' Abu Sha`ban, 4, was killed by Israeli missiles in Gaza yesterday. She was caught launching missiles on Israel. Don't feel sorry for her.

The fanatical weather extremists

2006-08-03T18:37:00.000-04:00

So where do you think the above image is from? Perhaps last years snow fall in New England, maybe Colorado or New York?

Try South Africa!

The last time this happened I was three months old.

S. Africans shiver through harsh winter

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - Snow. Floods. Icy winds. Maybe even a tornado.
South Africans are facing one of their harshest winters in years, with at least
four deaths blamed on flooding from heavy rain that has caused travel delays in
the south and west of the country.

While north of the equator, much of the United States sweats through
a heat wave, Johannesburg saw flurries Wednesday for the first time in at least
eight years, the national weather service said. Stunned office workers pressed
against windows to savor the spectacle.
Freezing temperatures are not unusual
at higher altitudes during the winter, but heavy snow has fallen in some
interior towns that rarely experience such weather. More snow and gale force
winds were expected Thursday in some areas, Weather SA said.

Torrential rains have caused flooding along the southern coast,
including the town of George in the Western Cape province, where a rain-swollen
river swept a car from a bridge. Police recovered two men and two children who
had been inside the vehicle, but rescuers were looking for a fifth person
believed to have been in the car.

Homes were flooded, sending scores of families to seek shelter at a
community center and school, local authorities said.

Heavy snow, rain and falling rocks closed mountain roads in parts of the
interior, including a border post with Lesotho, according to local news
reports.

The George airport was closed Tuesday, disrupting 24 flights before it
reopened Wednesday morning, airport officials said. Passenger trains in the
Western Cape were running up to 14 hours late, the Spoornet rail company
said.

Meteorologists were investigating whether a severe storm that swept through
the northern town of Dullstroom on Tuesday night was a tornado. At least six
people were injured in the heavy winds and rain, which also ripped roofs off
homes, police said.

and

Rare snowfall across South Africa

JOHANNESBURG (AFP) - Snow fell on South Africa's biggest city Johannesburg
for the first time in 25 years as icy temperatures gripped vast swathes of the
country, the weather office said.

"It (the snow) is by no means freakish but I would certainly classify it as
rare," said Kevin Rae, assistant manager of forecasting at the South African
Weather Service in Pretoria.
Forecasters said snow was reported in the
southern Johannesburg township of Soweto and the posh northern suburb of
Sandton, as well as the nearby towns of Carletonville and
Westonaria.
Johannesburg last had snow on September 11, 1981.

"Sleet has been recorded occasionally since then, but never snow," added
climatologist Tracey Gill.

Bloemfontein, the capital of the central Free State province, got its first
snow in 12 years, receiving 13 centimetres (5.2 inches).

Comparable widespread snow across the country had been recorded only twice
in the past 20 years, in 1981 and 1988, said Rae.

Some welcomed the colder weather, however.

At the Tiffindell ski resort in the southern Drakensberg mountains of the
Eastern Cape province, guests were elated.

"They are very excited," said the resort's chief snow-maker, Johan Smuts.
"It is not every day that you get to see snow fall in Africa."

In warmer weather, Smuts oversees the manufacture of snow for the resort
through a process involving water and air compression.

Tiffindell usually gets about five snowfalls a year, he said, but rarely 25
centimetres in one day, as on Tuesday.

The weather service posted a warning on its website of very cold
temperatures for the southeastern high elevations of the country into
Thursday.

It expected snowfalls to continue over areas of the central Free State, the
Drakensberg and the Eastern Cape, but to have passed by Friday.

In the northern provinces, the snow was expected to clear by Wednesday
afternoon, said Rae.

In my own part of the year we're experienceing the opposite extreme. But don't worry about climate change; it's really only a small detail, pay no attention...

Heat, humidity combine to torture East

By DERRILL HOLLY, Associated Press Writer Thu Aug 3, 2:31 AM ET
WASHINGTON - Record-breaking heat and oppressive humidity made people across the eastern half of the country miserable Wednesday and sent tourists in the nation's capital scrambling for relief in the cool marble halls of Capitol Hill.
Others forced to work outdoors guzzled icy drinks to cope with the heat wave that has sent temperatures soaring over 100 across the East and parts of the Midwest.
"This is unbelievable," said Bob Garner, a tourist from Atlanta who retreated with his family into the air-conditioned comfort of the Capitol. "They get the hottest days of the year while we're here."
By late afternoon, the temperature at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport had risen to 99, with a heat index of 106. It was even hotter on the steaming pavement downtown. In New York, the temperature rose to 101 at LaGuardia Airport and 96 in Central Park. Philadelphia and Baltimore climbed into the upper 90s.
The National Weather Service posted heat advisories and warnings from Maine to Oklahoma. Forecasters said the heat would linger until Thursday night, when a cool front was expected to bring temperatures down into the 80s.
Thousands who made it through the heat of a day found themselves in the dark Wednesday night after thunderstorms downed trees and power lines in parts of Massachusetts. Most of the power was expected to be restored overnight.
At the Capitol, tourists filled water bottles at drinking fountains and doused themselves. Others drenched their baseball caps before putting them on.
At the Library of Congress daycare center, children stayed inside because it was deemed too hot to swim. Washington Redskins coach Joe Gibbs cut his players a break by pushing back their 4 p.m. practice session to 7 p.m.
"It's unbearable, it's oppressive," said Joy Haber, 44, who canceled a trip from Long Island into Manhattan because of the stifling weather. Her 13-year-old son, Sean, skipped day camp when his bus arrived with a malfunctioning air conditioner.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the city was fortunate that no fatalities were linked to the brutal weather. Subway riders were in for a sweltering commute — the temperature was about 111 at a Pennsylvania Station platform.
The city's electric utility, Con Edison, set its second record in two days for peak electricity demand, surpassing the level from a day earlier. The Long Island Power Authority also set a record.
The Dixie Chicks postponed their Wednesday night show at the outdoor Jones Beach Theater on Long Island because of the scorching heat.
In Philadelphia, concrete worker Bob Ferguson was building walls 32 feet below street level. "Down in that hole, there's no air," said Ferguson, who wore the mandatory hard hat, long sleeves, long pants and work boots.
Bicycle messenger Gravett Dhuja tried to look at the bright side as he rested near a Capitol Hill office building: "It's been hot, but rain is a lot worse for us."
Authorities in the capital were prepared to go door to door to get people to public cooling centers, said Mark Brown, deputy director of the D.C. Emergency Management Agency. The city also passed out fans to low-income residents and kept its homeless shelters open around the clock.
The same heat wave was blamed for as many as 164 deaths last week in California.
In Kentucky, an 18-month-old boy was found dead Wednesday inside a van about 60 miles northeast of Lexington. The vehicle's doors were locked, and the boy's mother had to break a window to get to the child, authorities said.
Norfolk Naval Station in Virginia hoisted black flags at gymnasiums and ports to caution sailors against doing strenuous exercise outdoors.
In Boston, animals at the Franklin Park Zoo were kept cool with sprinklers and frozen treats. The African wild dogs and lions got frozen blood; the primates received frozen fruit juice.
"It's a matter of taste, I guess," zoo President John Linehan said.
Boston authorities awaited autopsy results on a pregnant woman who died Saturday after collapsing at a sweltering Red Sox game. Denise Quickenton, 29, suffered an apparent heart attack after sitting in sunny bleacher seats where the temperature was at least 90 degrees, officials said. She was seven months pregnant, but a medical team was able to deliver her 4-pound infant at a hospital.
Some Washington tourists pressed on with their plans, gulping bottled water and fanning themselves with brochures outside such landmarks such as Union Station and the Washington Monument.
"The humidity is so bad — not like in Spain," said Carlos Mulas, 56, of Madrid, before boarding a tour bus. "But Washington is so beautiful. We expect to enjoy it."
Several members of tourist Gregg Selewski's extended family spent their nights in a recreational vehicle parked at a campground in Greenbelt, Md. They vowed to see everything, despite the heat.
"This is what we came to do," said Selewski, 13, of Canton, Mich.

An attack on Humanity

2006-07-27T16:16:00.000-04:00

As the weeks pass, the initial shock of horror of Israel's destruction of the Lebanese people seems to wear off in the main stream media - that is if they were even ever able to convey some sense of the true horror of what is really happening.

As of yesterday in the Lebanese conflict: Lebanon has suffered 391 civilian deaths, 31 Hezbollah deaths, and 20 deaths from the military. Over 1,550 Lebanese have been wounded. Israel has 18 civilian deaths, 28 military deaths, and over 380 wounded. 800,000 Lebanese have been displaced. In this past month in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: 140 Palestinians have been killed - 1 Israeli soldier has been killed. 5,273 people have been killed (most all Palestinians) according to an AFP count since the the start of Al-Aqsa Intifada in September 2000, spurned by Arial Sharon's instigation of his visit to the Temple Mount.

It's clear that Israel is not fighting a war against Hezbollah nor Hamas. They are committing murder. They are slaughtering the Lebanese like they have been doing to the Palestinians for close to 60 years (but most intensly for the last six).

Yesterday, Israel bombed a UN embassy. While Olmert expressed 'deep regret' over the four UN observers killed and said how it was simply a 'mistake,' the facts show otherwise. According to the following report (and the same information is supported by other news organizations, i.e. the BBC and Aljazeera) Israel was warned 12 times by the UN and another 6 times by an Irish Army Officer - That's 18 times it was asked not to bomb their area and then they killed the four observers with a PRECISION BOMB!

UN says Israel warned many times before fatal attack
United Nations said on Wednesday it asked Israel a dozen times to stop bombing near a UN post in Lebanon in the hours before an Israeli air attack destroyed the position killing four peacekeepers.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan initially referred to Tuesday's deadly Israeli strike as the "apparently deliberate targeting" of the Khiam UN observer post.
(...)
Jane Holl Lute, a deputy head of UN peacekeeping operations, told the Security Council behind closed doors there were 21 strikes within 300 meters (yards) of the observer post during the six hours before it was completely destroyed.
Twelve of the 21 struck within 100 meters (yards), including four which scored direct hits, Holl Lute said, according to a text of her remarks.
Firing continued during the rescue operation, "despite repeated requests to the Israeli Defense Forces for an abatement," she said. Another U.N. base came under Israeli fire on Wednesday as an artillery round fell 10 meters (yards) from its headquarters compound in Naqoura, she added.
(...)
An Irish army officer in south Lebanon warned Israeli forces six times that its strikes threatened the lives of the four observers, Ireland's Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.

Still think this is a war on Hezbulla?

What about when Israel attacks Red Cross ambulances? As the following video shows, the ambulances are clearly marked as the red cross - and it also shows how obvious that it was no mistake that they were attacked. The people driving the ambulances were trying to save lives - for that, the Israel's saw it fit to murder them.

Red Cross ambulances destroyed in Israeli air strike on rescue mission

"The ambulance headlamps were on, the blue light overhead was flashing, and another light illuminated the Red Cross flag when the first Israeli missile hit, shearing off the right leg of the man on the stretcher inside. As he lay screaming beneath fire and smoke, patients and ambulance workers scrambled for safety, crawling over glass in the dark. Then another missile hit the second ambulance."

Still think this is a war on Hezbollah, that Israel plays by the rules?

This last part is the most disturbing and goes into the real depth of truth of the situation. Israel is killing with chemical weapons. It is not only illegal to use chemical weapons, it is a horrific act of psychopathy - an act without conscience.

Lebanon's Children and Israeli Phosphorous Bombs

Did the American people see on CNN the child whose face was burnt by Israeli phosphorous bombs in Lebanon? Did they hear him screaming in pain at Sidon Hospital, with his mother falling to pieces in agony beside him because of the injury he sustained from the terrible bombs? How can the American people accept their elected President George W. Bush's rejection of a ceasefire?
The insanity of the Jewish State that is brutally attacking families and children in South Lebanon and in Beirut's southern suburb has almost become an everyday feature in the Palestinian territories.

If you haven't seen it here it is:

How is it that Israel has the capacity to do such atrocities?

From an ABC report:

"Over here, everybody is the army," one soldier said. "Everybody is
Hezbollah. There's no kids, women, nothing."
Another soldier put it plainly: "We're going to shoot anything we see."

And then there's those who say, 'But dem der terrist, Al-Kayda just came out today sayin' der wit de Hezbollada'

Yep, that's 'true'. Osama's deputy, Zawahiri, called for a worldwide war against Israel in support of Gaza and Lebanon. But there's a lot to this 'truth.' Kurt Nimmo reports how Zawahiri has had established links with the Pentagon:

As we know, al-Zawahiri has verified links to the Pentagon, as he served as commander of the Mujahedeen forces in the Balkans.

“The role of the Pentagon in airlifting the Mujahedeen terrorists into Bosnia and Kosovo between 1992 to 1995 has been well documented and widely reported in the European and Canadian media, but almost completely ignored in the United States,” writes Tim Howells for Online Journal.

Another bit of information, long ago flushed down the memory hole (reconstituted here), reveals how al-Zawahiri was sponsored by FBI operative and failed CIA agent Ali Mohamed, who brought him to San Francisco on a “covert fund-raising mission” during the Pentagon’s recruitment of “al-Qaeda,” sent to Bosnia (see this congressional press release, dated 16 January 1997).

Anytime there's an uproar of critisism against Israel's actions or those of the United States isn't it just so interesting that 'al-Qaeda' shows up and 'supports the enemy'?? If you find this concept hard to accept just pay attention to world politics for a bit and watch it happen over and over again. It wouldn't do any harm to do some real research into 'al-Qaeda' as well.

Most of the articles I used in todays post came from Signs of the Times daily collection of real news. If you want to have a much more detailed look at the world go check it out.

Messages from Isreali children to the Lebanese

2006-07-19T16:27:00.000-04:00

These are all real images from the AFP. How can anyone say that the Israelis want peace that they work for the betterment of humanity, that they are the civilized ones?!?!!!!!! The vulgarity of the situation is too much to express. The 'story' behind this is supposedly that the girls were 'trapped' in a bunker for hours and when they were finaly were let out they were bored and so desided to write some messages out of fustration - something along those lines. So for a few hours, some Israeli kids experience a minute fraction of the suffering of what their Arab nieghbors have endured from the hand of the Israeli government (and not to forget the fifty years of systematic genocide Israel has been committing on the native Palestinians) and so they think it 'fun' to write messages to Lebonon that has been causing the death of hundreds? The world has gone completely mad and the Americans are the dumb (meaning both silent and stupid) one in the center of the crazyhouse.

For a beginging of understanding where this perverse mentality comes from check out the ponerology material.

To Speak the Truth for a Dream of the Future

2006-07-15T14:48:00.000-04:00

"Have you seen whats going on?," asks a 20-something patron of the local coffee shop to his friend as he gazes down at the front page of the news.

"Uh, yeah... kinda.. I try not to pay too much attention to it..." she says, as though she were fighting something - but not too much.

"Hm..Yeah, ...if you want to be in a good mood it's better that you don't" the patron responds conveying a slight feeling of loss mixed with apathy.

And with that the friend strategically places her bag of chocolate kisses to block the view from her and the photo of the raging night fire burning the Lebonese airport.

Just moments before, I sat reading what is the definative new beginings of an all out War in the Middle East. Rage boiled in my blood and sorrow flooded throughout my body as I read what I know to be blatent propaganda diseminated by the NY Times - and thought about the results that will ensue.

It hurts to see how many people seek their own blind comfort over the truth of things that are going on in the world. People actively turn away from the pain of others. 'If we don't admit there is a problem then it really doesn't exist'. This is how evil grows and spreads - such activity pumps it full of life. We can't make such people wake up to reality - they've already denied it. But some do care. Some do what to know.

As the Cassiopaean's have said:

Life is religion. Life experiences reflect how one interacts with God. Those who are asleep are those of little faith in terms of their interaction with the creation. Some people think that the world exists for them to overcome or ignore or shut out. For those individuals, the worlds will cease. They will become exactly what they give to life. They will become merely a dream in the 'past.' People who pay strict attention to objective reality right and left, become the reality of the 'Future.'

The apathetic are fodder in this worldwide psycological war. They ignore - living in a fantasy that hides the actions of those who wish to dominate and overcome the world. They pretend the world others are suffering through doesn't exist, and thus allowing the reign of the US and Israel to grip the entire world. This manipulative and pathocratic group of blood thirsting Nazis planned and orcastated the events that are coming to pass. Israel was long prepared to invade the Gaza strip before any kidnapping. You can bet the same will hold true about this attack on Lebanon.

And with all of Israel's destruction in Lebanon - the genocide being commited in Palestine is continued to being ignored. Any attention they did get in the past weeks will now be removed in favor of bigger things that Israel has drummed up in Lebanon. The thing about this is, it will allow Israel to lay a complete siege on the Palestinians with no one looking. Think about what Israel has been able to do in the past when attention was placed on them. The bombing of Lebanon's people and infastructure doesn't seem to make any sense - until you look at Israel's intentions and efforts of the past. They are and have been working for the complete genocide of the Palistinian people.

Last night I read, A Child Called "It" by Dave Pelzer, a true account of unthinkable abuse that reaches the darkest depths of true evil. It reminded me of our current world situation.

Dave Pelzer writes:

I timidly watched Mother as she turned the cold water tap in the bathtub fully open. I thought it was odd that she forgot to turn on the hot water as well. As the tub began to fill with cold water, Mother tore off my clothes and ordered me to get in the tub. I got into the tub and laid down. A cold fear raced thoughout my body. "Lower!" Mother yelled. "Put your face in the water like this!" She then bent over, grabbed my neck with both hands and shoved my head under the water. Intictively, I thrashed and kicked, trying to desperately to force my head above water so I could breathe. Her grip was too strong. Under the water I opened my eyes. I could see bubbles escape my mouth and float to the surface as I tried to shout. I tried to thrust my head from side to side as I saw the bubbles becoming smaller and smaller. I began to feel weak. In frantic effort I reached up and grabbed her shoulders. My fingers must have dug into her because Mother let go. She looked down on me, trying to get her breath. "Now keep your head below the water, or next time it will be longer!"
I submerged my head, keeping my nostrils barely above the surface of the water. I felt like an alligator in a swamp. When Mother left the bathroom her plan became more clear to me. As I laid stretched out in the tub, the water became unbearably cold. It was as thoughI was in a refrigerator. I was too frightened of Mother to move, so I kept my head under the surface as ordered.
(...)
Before the family sat down for dinner, Mother came into the bathroom and yelled at me, telling me to get out of the bathtub and put on my clothes. I responded immediately, grabbing a towe to dry myself. "Oh no!" she screamed. "Put your clothes on the way you are!" Without hesitating, I obeyed her command. My clothes were soaked as I ran downstairs to sit in the backyard as instructed. The sun had begun to set, but half the yard was still in direct sunlight. I tried to sit in the sunny area, but Mother ordered me me into the shade. In the corner of the backyard, while sitting in the P.O.W. position, I shivered. I wanted only a few seconds of heat, but with every passing minute my chances of drying off were becoming less and less. From the upstairs window I could hear the sound of "the family" passing dishes full of food to each other. Once in a while, a burst of laughter would escape through the window. Since Father was home, I knew whatever Mother had cooked was good. I wanted to turn my head and look up to see them eating, but I didn't dare. I lived in a different world. I didn't even deserve a glance at the good life.
The bathtub treatment soon became routine.
(...)
During the last week in October, it was tradition at Mother's house for the boys to carve designs on the pumpkins. I had been denied this privilage since I was seven or eight years old. When the night came to carve the pumpkins, Mother filled the tub just as soon as I finished my chores. Again she warned me about keeping my head under the water. Then she stormed out of the bathroom, turning the light out as she went. Looking to my left, I could see through the small bathroom window that night was begining to fall. I passed the time by counting to myself. I started at one and stopped at one thousand. Then I started over. As the hours passed , I could feel the water slowly draining away. As the water drained, my body became colder and colder. I cupped my hands between my legs and laid the length of my body against the right side of the bathtub. I could hear the sounds of Stan's Halloween record that Mother had bought for him several years before. Ghosts and ghouls howled, and doors creaked open. After the boys had carved their pumpkins, I could hear Mother in her soothing voice telling them a scary story. The more I heard the more I hated each and every one of them. It was bad enough waiting like a dog out in the backyard on the rocks while they enjoyed dinner, but to lay in the cold bathtub, shivering to keep warm while they ate popcorn and listened to Mother's tales made me want to scream.
Mother's tone of voice that night remined me of the kind Mommy I had loved so many years ago. Now, even the boys refused to acknowledge my presence in the house. I meant less to them than the spirits that howled from Stan's record.

I can only imagine the hate, saddness and humiliation that this boy endured as his brothers and father looked away as his mother starved, burned, stabbed and brutilized him. The isolation and severe disconnect of any love from all people around him is something truely difficult to comprehend. How could nieghbors, relatives, and his own family turn their back when a human being is in such pain? What will become of the world if we continue to deny the terror of humanity in favor of superficial comforts? It will become a dream of the past. But for those who want a future, we must pay attention. We must see the world as it is and expose the truth. We must see that the pain of David the abused child is the same that the Palistinians are experiencing - and Americans are the family that ignores the brutality their parents inflict. However, we are not children and so we have a responsibility. The Palistinians are suffering and America is allowing it.

Signs Editorial:
Dispatch from Gaza: We Suffer Together
Testimony recorded by Silvia Cattori on July 14, 2006
Our friend Swiss journalist Silvia Cattori is in Palestine reporting on the criminal actions of the Israeli army in Gaza. She sent us this report.
The testimony of this Palestinian living in the north of Gaza gives an idea of the way Palestinians are reacting to the events that are hitting them.
Silvia Cattori: What is the mental state of the population after weeks of bombings and deprivations?
A: We have suffered. We are in a dramatic situation. The Israeli army has entered up to Saladine Street; the military has cut Gaza in two: it is like it was before. They have installed a base. There are a dozen tanks with bulldozers. They are in the process of razing land, greenhouses; they are destroying all that remains of life. For two weeks, the F-16s and the drones bomb and destroy our homes. There are hundreds of dead and badly wounded.
S.C.: Is it blind bombing of everything as opposed to bombing that is targeting "terrorists"?
A: The day before yesterday, for example, the Israelis attacked a house, assassinating an entire family, under the pretext that it sheltered Mohamed Daif, the head of those firing the Qassam rockets. However, it wasn't true. Unfortunately, an entire family, a father, a mother, five daughters and two sons lost their lives.
S.C.: Having cut Gaza in two, are the soldiers threatening the population from this position?
A: Yes, their tanks, posted in the centre of the Gaza Strip, between Del Balla and Kahn Younes, are currently firing rockets - just like in the north of Gaza.
S.C.: Are the tanks moving?
A: No, the Israeli soldiers are chicken; they are afraid of being attacked by the resistance.
S.C.: Do the members of the Hamas Government still show themselves on the street?
A: We are seeing no one. They are all on the list of the next assassinations. They only come out when they have a rendez-vous, but it is always done with great secrecy.
S.C.: During the two weeks of the bombings that have left you without water,
without electricity, without food, have you been afraid for your family?
A: The first attack by the Israeli planes at Betlaya was near my house. It was there that there were a large number of wounded and killed. The children were in a panic. Fearing that Israel would attack our neighbourhood, we left our house to move away from the zone. Now, we have returned home.
S.C.: How do people put up with living in such a horrible situation? Do theywant you to free the captured soldier as quickly as possible to end Israel's pretext to continue the collective punishment?
A: The majority of the Palestinians support the position of the resistance,
the position that the soldier won't be released until Israel releases 1000 of the weakest prisoners they hold, women and children. Prisoners that are living - contrary to the Israeli propaganda film shown recently on television in the west that we have heard about - under inhuman conditions. This film didn't talk about the torture of the prisoners, didn't show prisoners being held like beasts in tents, plagued by insects and disease, didn't say that most of the prisoners can
only see their families once every six months. [1]
S.C.: Has the accord signed between Fatah and Hamas two weeks ago taken affect?
A: They were speaking of an entente. But on the ground, it is the contrary. The Fatah militia continues their assassinations, so the Palestinians continue to be threatened by two enemies: that is, by Israel and by those Palestinians who are collaborating with the occupier in order to destablize Hamas. The Israeli attacks actually prevented a civil war between Palestinians. At this moment, each Palestinian, no matter what party, feels above all like a target of Israeli shooting.
S.C.: Can even the father of a family like you, who has nothing to do with the resistance, be hit by what they call a targeted assassination?
A: You must know that our crime is being Palestinian, to belong to Palestine. If I find myself by chance in the same taxi as someone that an Israeli plane wants to assassinate, I can be killed.
S.C.: For that you will have to face more and more aggression? The Israeli army has announced that Operation Summer Rain will last as long as necessary.
A: You know that Israel is government by lunatics at this moment. They are narrow-minded politicians. They have unleashed war in Gaza, and, as of two days, they have declared war on Lebanon. Maybe that will give us a bit of a break because the pressure is only longer only concentrated on us.
S.C.: One thing that is worrisome in any situation of war is the trauma undergone by the children. Are they still normal after all they have had to endure?
A: The other day I wanted to take my kids to the sea. My three-year-old daughter started to cry. She said, "No, Daddy, I never want to go to the beach again." I asked her why. "I don't want to die." I said, "OK, if you don't want to die, I'll go with your brothers and sisters." "You neither. No one should go to the beach," she cried. You can see how a three-year old child reacts after seeing on television the family massacred on the beach. If I talk about the beach, she cries.
S.C.: Were the victims these last months people like you, people who are not armed, who have no protection, and who do not harm anyone? A: Almost all of the victims are civilians. However, the Israeli army justifies the bombings of families who are eating or sleeping saying that there are fighters among them. There are members of the resistance, but they aren't among these victims. Everyone in Palestine, with the exception of the collaborators, is a resistor in spirit.
S.C.: With such a catastrophic situation, one that is ongoing, in what kind of mental state are you?
A: We continue to live in spite of the unlivable situation Israel imposes upon us. We are accustomed to living this life that isn't a life. There is no food, there is only brackish water, there is no electricity. This is our life. But it is better than living a life were we crush ourselves.
SC.: How will you be able to rebuild yet again the entire infrastructure that the Israel bombing is destroying? Do you think they can be put back in action quickly?
A: The Israelis will never leave standing anything we build. Each time that we repair the transformer in the north or the south of Gaza, they bomb it again. We have yet to hear any protests from the Arab or European states. Some states have condemned the Israeli operations, but their condemnations are too weak. It isn't enough to make Israel back off. From the moment that Europe cut off our aid, it meant they have been collaborating with Israel in its collective punishment, to starve us and to make us suffer more.
S.C.: Do you have the impression that the journalists who obtained permission to enter Gaza have been correctly informing the world on the suffering you are undergoing?
A: It is always the same thing, whether they come or not. I would have been very happy it if had been you who had gotten permission to come, because I am certain you would have reported with honesty. We follow the news. It is always a superficial and Israeli version of things that is shown. The suffering of the people, our pain, all those at CNN, Fox News, the BBS, have no idea what it is. They lie in our faces. We watch their lies live.
S.C.: Don't you think that those journalists that ignore your reality and repeat the same things are led into error by the Palestinian chauffeurs and guides accompanying and supervising them and informing them in a biased way?
A: All they have to do is what you do, go out into the street and get people to talk. It's not by them all staying in the same five star hotels in Gaza that they will be able to find the truth.
S.C.: They don't go out into the streets?
A: Even when they go, they conform to the information given by Israeli press
officers or the supervision of their agencies. At the end of the day, they say what their Jerusalem or other office tells them to say and don't say what they have been told not to say. You're a journalist; you should know how it works.
S.C.: I wasn't able to enter Gaza this time and can't report on what is happening to you. It makes me all the more sad because I have remained very attached to the place and I knew so many Palestinians who were suffering and two members of the ISM as well as the London journalist James Miller - who wanted to report about your suffering and the assassination of children - who were killed in 2003 by the Israeli army.
A: They won't let you in because you are too honest. Israel well knows that you do not look at our reality in the same way as the journalists who generally come here. If you were seeing everything through the eyes of Israeli propaganda, you could have entered Gaza....
S.C. I was interrogated by the Israel secret service Sabak on my arrival at Ben Gurion airport. Won't I put any Palestinian I meet into danger if these services, which have their spies on every Palestinian street, are watching me now?
A: You can't put anyone in danger. Every Palestinian is in danger. At any moment, the drone that is flying overhead can strike me. Don't let yourself be intimidated. Do you know why they intimidated you when you arrived and why they follow you? Because those people are afraid of you?
S.C.: Afraid of me? Are you joking?
A: All of these soldiers and spies that make up the most formidable army in the world, in spite of their power, are afraid of anyone who uses his words...to speak the truth. They are afraid of those who speak the truth. They are weak people. We can win this fight even though our means are nothing compared to theirs, because we have the will and the courage that they don't have.
S.C.: What I have seen since I started traveling through the West Bank is without a doubt less atrocious than what is happening in Gaza, but, believe me, it is already too much to support. I cried when I saw a group of people being held like animals in an enclosed space at the checkpoint in Bethlehem. I cried when I arrived in Naplouse and I saw the crowd of silent people who were waiting for the soldiers to condescend to let them leave. You Palestinians seem so strong in the face of all of these humiliations they impose. Do you cry sometimes?
A: Of course I cry. I often cry now when I see all of these families who have been assassinated. A quarter of the victims are children.
S.C.: Does your wife cry, too?
A: Yes, often. Everywhere around, here in Gaza, or over there in the West Bank, are people struck by misfortune that breaks your heart. We are one people and we are suffering together. We are one unique body.
[1] It may be the film recently shown by the television network Arte. P.S.:
This interview was conducted via internet and telephone. Translated by Signs of the Times

The world's responsibility

2006-07-07T14:26:00.000-04:00

Palestinians run for cover Thursday as Israeli troops open fire in the area of Beit Lahiya, in the northern Gaza Strip. It was the bloodiest day since Israel invaded the area over a soldier's capture. Troops seized three empty Jewish settlements abandoned by Israel last year and pushed toward densely populated towns. (DAVID GUTTENFELDER/Associated Press)

Over 30 Palastiniens have been killed since Isreal entered the Gaza Strip a couple of days ago. 9000 have been imprisioned. Families have been slaughtered. Innocent people having nothing to do with any of the conflict that Israel mounts. How much of this will you read in the daily news? None, if your in America - the land of the free. Free to ignore reality. How do you express your vioce over something like this - and how do you not? This hell that these people are exeriencing is real - more real than the veiled material life I and most everyone lead here in the US. And so what is it that I care about? And what is it that I do? What is it that you do? The only think I know to do is to seek to understand. There is a very real and destructive force that is gaining ground all over the world. how much longer until it consumes us all?

this force is, I think from our responsibility that we ignoring. Turning away from humanity - from those close to us and from those far away. We ignore our own real needs. Seeing and working to develope a true sense of self is among the hardest things I've undertook - actually it is the hardest. Vanity, self importance and other lower emotions cloud the view of reality and through such blind navigation harm to others is inevitable.

we all owe this world something.

Abovetopsecret.com Exposed!!!

2006-03-23T04:40:00.000-05:00

abovetopsecret.com is probably one of the biggest if not the biggest conspiracy theory forums on the internet. Below is the latest in the investigations that abovetopsecret.com may be COINTELPRO. The support for this claim is overwhelming. Besides reading the below article, if you're interested, also check out the Signs of the Times forum where it's being discussed and the links that describe the research up to this point (links are included below the article).
This issue has a direct relationship to all the holes in the official version of 9/11. There are plenty of disinformation agents out there hired by the U.S. government to spread lies. It seems abovetopsecret.com is for that purpose.

The Signs of the Times news site produced the Pentagon Strike flash video, and this is where the current issue has its origins.

If you haven't seen it already here it is (it's only a couple minutes long - and being that its been seen by close to 600 million people, you might have already seen it) http://www.pentagonstrike.co.uk/

--------------------------------
http://www.signs-of-the-times.org/signs/signs20060322.php

Signs Under Attack! abovetopsecret.com EXPOSED!!!
Some of you may have noticed that Signs of the Times was down three times today. This was a result of threats by abovetopsecret.com's attorney to our website host. It seems that abovetopsecret.com finally could no longer stand the negative attention they were getting from our exposure of them as a probable CoIntelPro operation, initially in the form of Joe Quinn's article:

Evidence That a Frozen Fish Didn't Impact the Pentagon on 9/11 - and Neither Did a Boeing 757
http://abovetopsecret.narod.ru/Above_Top_Secret_article.htm

which was an analysis of the "catherder" article on abovetopsecret.com which essentially was support for Bush and the Neocon's conspiracy theory about the events of September 11.
After removing this "offending material", we published the letter from abovetopsecret.com's attorney on our forum. Within FIVE minutes, the Signs page was taken down again by the website host. When we called our server to ask "what now," we were informed that abovetopsecret.com's attorney had called again and was claiming that in the five minutes the forum posting was up, he had already received death threats because we had published his name and location! (which, incidentally, is freely available on the web.) We were forced to remove that information also. It seems that abovetopsecret.com's attorney is also well-versed in the tactics of CoIntelPro.

As anyone who is familiar with copyright law knows, our rebuttal of the 'Catherder' article is perfectly legal under standard copyright law. However, abovetopsecret.com, like Bush and the Neocons, make up their own laws and enforce them with intimidation and bogus threats from their 'hired-gun' attorney. As Laura has chronicled on her blog, abovetopsecret.com's urgent demands that we remove this article because it was a violation of their "creative commons" copyright was absurd and simply evidence of their position as an active cointelpro/psy-ops propagator on the internet. It isn't copyrights that abovetopsecret.com is concerned about, it is google bombing and running psy-ops. And now, they have proven it.

This action also is highly suggestive of the idea that the Pentagon issue is a LOT more sensitive than anyone has thus far suspected! Do take note of THAT!

We hope that everyone who reads this will spread this information far and wide because these people are covert Bush supporters, Cyber Nazi Brown Shirts.

Don't worry, there will be lots more information on this matter available soon and we will keep our readers updated. Check back regularly, and it will help a LOT if you can find some spare change to put in the legal defense kitty.
Thanks from the SOTT Team.
---------------------------

Here are the links detailing the issue up to this point. I'd urge anyone who is interested in the truth about 9/11 to read all of it (there is a lot to read but I think you will not be disappointed).

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_01_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_07_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_10_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_11_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_12_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_14_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006_01_24_laura-knight-jadczyk_archive.html

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2006/03/abovetopsecretcom-exposed.html

and at the Signs of the Times Forum:
http://signs-of-the-times.org/signs/forum/viewtopic.php?id=751

http://signs-of-the-times.org/signs/forum/viewtopic.php?id=614

http://signs-of-the-times.org/signs/forum/viewtopic.php?id=626

Children are being killed

2006-03-17T02:32:00.000-05:00

This picture is of a little boy who was killed in a U.S. raid. He was murdered by the actions of another human being. He was one of four other children murdered. This was not some rouge soldiers going off on the deep end. This was an organized effort of the U.S. military. Americans are murdering children. These are children, CHILDREN! my god, what the hell is it going to take for people to see and do something about this filthy, disgusting, butchering, murdering mess. Conversations continue about reality tv shows WHILE CHILDREN ARE BEING SLAUGHTERED!!!!!!!!! WHAT THE FUCK! How much clearer can it get! Look at that boy, he's a baby for christs sake. Look at this womans finger on his lifeless body. I had to crop this photo cause the only real ones I could find where spattered with the appauling advertising lusts of some photo corporations who could care less about the dignity of this boy. While I was doing that, I had to look at this child, at the blanket he was wrapped in, at the clothes he wore. If you've ever held a baby there is something so comforting about their clothes, their blanket, their smell and their beauty. Well this image does more then tear my heart out. This little boy was murdered. The comforts reminencent of those images of beauty come crashing down in the contrast of this little boy's murder. How do people go on living a life of lies, of false emotions when there are things like this occuring every day.

This life of death is the norm for every single Iraqi. You can bet it will be the same for every single American in the near future too. You think a psychopath has any loyalty? They'll murder their families just as easily as they'll murder their neigbors.

Here's the story:

Iraqis say US raid on home killed 11 family members
Wed Mar 15, 2006 2:40 PM
GMT

By Amer Amery
TIKRIT, Iraq (Reuters) - Eleven members of an Iraqi family were killed in a U.S. raid on Wednesday, police and witnesses said. The U.S. military said two women and a child died during the bid to seize an al Qaeda militant from a house.
Television pictures showed 11 bodies in the Tikrit morgue -- five children, two men and four women. A freelance photographer later saw the bodies being buried in Ishaqi, the town 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad where the raid took place.
The U.S. military said in a statement its troops had attacked a house in Ishaqi early on Wednesday to capture a "foreign fighter facilitator for the al Qaeda in Iraq network".
"Troops were engaged by enemy fire as they approached the building," U.S. spokesman Major Tim Keefe said. "Coalition Forces returned fire utilising both air and ground assets.

"There was one enemy killed. Two women and one child were also killed in the
firefight. The building ... (was) destroyed."
Keefe said the al Qaeda suspect had been captured and was being questioned.
RUBBLE

Major Ali Ahmed of the Ishaqi police said U.S. forces had landed on the roof of the house in the early hours and shot the 11 occupants, including the five children.
"After they left the house they blew it up," he said.
Another policeman, Major Farouq Hussein, said all the bodies had gunshot wounds to the head. Pictures of the house targeted in the raid showed it had been reduced to
rubble, while next to it lay the burnt-out wreckage of a truck.
Iraqi police said the U.S. military had asked for a meeting with local tribal leaders.
Photographs of the funeral showed men weeping as five children were wrapped
in blankets and then lined up in a row next to freshly dug graves.
Police in Salahaddin province, a heartland of the Sunni Arab insurgency and the home region of Saddam Hussein, have frequently criticised U.S. military tactics in
the area.
In January a U.S. air strike on a house in Baiji, further north,
killed several members of a family. In December U.S. fighter jets dropped two
500-pound bombs on a village, also in the region, killing 10 people. The U.S.
military said the people targeted had been suspected of planting roadside bombs.

[the photo that spread their advertising over this dead boys body was by AFP/ Getty Images]

Consciousness is a casualty in a life of accidents

2005-12-20T02:36:00.000-05:00

"DNA" ~ E.W. Powell

The cause and effect relationship can be an interesting dynamic to observe.

A man walks across the street holding up some cars - one of the cars gets held up at the light causing the driver to just miss a traffic accident in front of him - which makes him late for work and so was fired - which is that last straw for his wife and she files for divorce... and so on.

Many thing happen to us. It may be that this is all that occurs; but if things happen to us, we are less likely to have an impact on things happening. If so, then there is really little conscious direction in our lives. We live in a world of accidents. The seemingly random events of our lives take on a connotation of good or bad luck.

A story on luck:

And old man lives with his son in a thatch house on a hill. One day his horse runs away off into the country. Being that the horse is his primary means of making his living his neighbors come and console him on his bad luck. The old man asks them how they know it is bad luck. Several weeks pass and the horse returns with a herd of wild horses. His neighbors return and commend him on his good luck. He asks how they know it is good luck. While his son tries to train one of the wild horses it bucks him off and paralyzes him from the waist down. His neighbors again return and try and console him on his bad luck. The old man still wonders how they know it is bad luck. A month later a war breaks out and his son is unable to go because of his paralysis.

And so this seems how our life can pass. Most of us identify with the events of our lives so we often miss the underlying cuases, if there are any that may be understood. The behavioral and thinking patterns engrained within us dictate a designed reaction - i.e. 'good luck' or 'bad luck'? What if it is neither, or something else? In a world of good or bad luck there seems to only be accident.

But what if there could be more than accident? There would need to be a stronger internal force within than the current ruling external force without. We would have to have control of our machine. We would need a real and conscious 'I'.

Remorse of Conscience

2005-11-30T00:09:00.000-05:00

Picture by Caroline Folkenroth

Tonight after I got home from spending a week with my family I called a friend that I have lost touch with over the past couple of months. She told me her grandfather had died. This shocked me although I had only met the man once. He was a leading force in the structure of her family and she talked about how everyone seemed in a strong state of shock. I remember this shock well. When I turned 18 my father got into a construction accident and a week later he died. I remember songs would play on the radio and I couldn't stand to hear them. I hated talking to people. All the layers and masks necessary for normal life were just too apauling to wear or see being worn. I don't mean people's sympathies; I think these were real. I mean the plastic pleasantries that are exchanged on a non-personal basis - going to the store and exchanging 'how ya doin's' with the clerk, the small talk with aquantances, etc. Someone pulls out in front of you while driving but it does not affect you. Petty things go by noticed but they do not become a part of you as occurs in normal life. These things might then be seen for what they are. Some might think that during this time you might become uncaring about the world, but I think this is when we care the most. It's because then we really care about life and those we love. It is then that we can really hear our conscience.

Many people regularly question my focus on 'negativity.' - that I still need to live my life even with the state the world is in. I try to explain, often with poor results. The global harm man does to one another is nothing new, but to me it can never become 'more of the same 'ol same 'ol.' It is because this harm becomes degenerated into the same plastic substance as our daily routine that we find ourselves in the situation that we are in. When we begin to really seek truth with no comprimise to the false warm fuzzies then we might feel our remorse of conscience. Through this we can work toward a world that does need masks.

Who benefits?

2005-11-18T11:52:00.000-05:00

This morning when my 'Inside Yahoo' news summary page popped up I saw an article with the headline, 'Bombers Kill 74 at Two Mosques in Iraq.' How does this make any sense to anybody with a remotely critical mind? Suicide bombers, who are supposedly fighting against the U.S invasion are apparently killing their own people, over and over again? I'm sorry but I can't believe for a second that this story is what so many accept - That 'the suicide bombers are just so fanatical that they will kill their own people' - that 'they are just so crazy that they cannot think what they are doing' - that 'their actions are beyond any logical comprehension'. Bush still repeatedly makes ties with the Iraqi insurgency and Al-Qaeda. So here we are to believe that those crazy illogical suicide bombers are under the same direction as the group that supposedly bombed the strongest nation (militarily-yes, morally or critically thinking-no) on earth using BOX CUTTERS????!??!?!?

Well just like I don't give an iota of credibility to the official story of 9/11, the same are my thoughts regarding suicide bombers in Iraq. Why? IT DOESN"T MAKE ANY SENSE!!! The only way it makes any sense is when you look at 'who benefits?' Then it makes all the sense in the world. The US government benefits over and over and over again. There is no plan out of Iraq because the US gov't does not want out. Iraq is their foothold to wage all the future wars that have been in the planning for years, long before 9/11. These 'crazy Arabs' provide the US with the 'excuse' of 'well we're needed here and if we leave now all these young soildiers would have died in vain'. They make me want to vomit. These psychopaths in power could care less if their percieved cannon fodder that are young men and women die or not. Haven't you heard the stories of families having to buy their enlisted sons and daughters the equipment they need to survive? No, the US government cares only about power over others, true to it's pschopathic form.

And people are surprised to hear that there are these 'conspiracy theories' that the US was involved in 9/11. How long can people hold on to these illusions that this government cares about them?

beyond physical

2005-10-25T19:50:00.000-04:00

"I adhore violence"

When most read the above, what comes to mind?

Likely, a definition of physical violence. Violence can come in a number of forms, the most obvious to us is usually physical. And so it is with the world. We interpret reality usually at the most basic level, being matter.

In our discovery of new things in the universe we might think of the discovery of new planets, solar systems, galexies, etc. But what if the new discoveries lie not in only what's 'out there' but right here and perhaps at a 'higher' reality. Such an investigation would require a different perspective and a new working hypothosis. One that includes but is not limited to the scope of our physical universe.

If there are higher realities what influence might they play on us? Human beings could be considered as existing in a higher reality than that of animals and look at our influence on them. We farm them, drug them, and eat them.

If we are not at the top of the food chain or there are higher worlds than ours might it be among the highest of importance to investigate this will real science and objective efforts?

Death as an eternal companion

2005-10-20T15:50:00.000-04:00

"Death is our eternal companion," don Juan said with a most serious air. "It is always to our left, at an arm's length. It was watching you when you were watching the white falcon; it whispered in your ear and you felt its chill, as you felt it today. It has always been watching you. It always will until the day it taps you."
~ Carlos Castaneda, Journey to Ixtlan: the lessons of Don Juan

Don Juan told Casteneda later in the story that you cannot be self important while facing your own death. How could you wear these false and vain layers if you're to face something so real? And so I think one cannot face death while wrapped in illusions of the self and the world around us.

Last night I felt like I might die if I stay here in the United States much longer. It was the most vivid taste of death I've experienced of myself and has strongly stuck with me throughout today. I've been in a car accident where I likely 'should be dead.' I've had someone very close to me die unexpectedly. Both of these events brought me close to looking at my own death, but last night was the closest and most chilling I've known.

What brought this on has been a continual look at our economic situation and the 'straw' was listening to the Economic Apocalypse podcast put out by Signs of the Times. In it is a very likely description of what the world will be facing very shortly. Starvation, complete lockdown, death, and complete control. The window for escape out of the US is closing fast. The Bird Flu epidemic is not far off, and when this occurs it will likely be the event that stops worldwide movement. What is there to do? Work like hell (and I mean a personal work, not meaning work for 'the man').

There is no more time left.

Past Week in Review

2005-10-18T02:40:00.000-04:00

Here's a review of last week's monumental events.

Thanks to Signs of the Times daily of news collection where most of these articels come from. A percentage of articles were also found at Mparent 7777.

ISRAELIS were 9-11 short sale stock buyers, betting on WTC terror strikes, story killed...

Israel opposes transferring control of West Bank towns to Palestinians

Israeli Arabs treated like the enemy in their own country

Israel citing 'security' to limit Palestinian rights: UN

Israel Admits Planting Undercover Soldiers in Bel'in Demonstration to Instigate Violence

Israeli army kill three Palestinians on Gaza border

Ex- Mossad Official Admits Occupation is the Reason Behind "Terror Attacks" against Civilians

Iraq issues warrants in $1 bln corruption probe

Voters said to hunt for polling sites in west Iraq

3,663 Iraqis Killed in Past 6 Months

More eyewitnesses to U.S. torture of detainees pierce the Bush administration's cover-up

Were British Special Forces Soldiers Planting Bombs in Basra?

Iraqis apprehend two Americans disguised as Arabs trying to detonate car bomb

How the Zarqawi myth was made in America

Zawahiri Letter to Zarqawi: A Shiite Forgery?

Al-Qaida says letter from its No.2 leader to al-Zarqawi is a U.S. fake

Bush told Blair of 'going beyond Iraq'

G.I.'s and Syrians in Tense Clashes on Iraqi Border

Syrian general in UN inquiry found dead

Syria warns 'gates of hell will open' if U.S. attacks

Afghan election staffers fired for fraud

US wants to push ocean boundaries to limit terror threat

Government publishes anti-terror bill

Republican Congressman Slams Bush On Militarized Police State Preparation

New York subway threat was a hoax: report

Wal-Mart Turns in Student’s Anti-Bush Photo, Secret Service Investigates Him

U.S. job losses jump to 438,000

Explosives Found Near Tech Dorms

Explosive found at Midvale

New Orleans Police Beating Caught on Tape

FBI Claims 84 Videos Show NO Flight 77 Impact

Pentagon seeks power to gather secret intelligence in US

Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged

Groups unhappy with Bush performance: poll

Poll: Americans Want Bush Impeached

64% in US Now Disapprove of Bush's Iraq Policies

Power Outage Hits Parts of Downtown L.A.

Study Reveals Vast Scope of Priest Abuse

Bird flu in Turkey is deadly strain

Bird flu reported in eastern Romania

EU to focus on infection-control on farms to combat bird flu

Britain responds to bird flu threat

Greece proposes to host meeting on bird flu threat

Venezuela to partly close border with Colombia to avoid bird flu

Quake Leaves 2.5 Million Homeless

South Asia earthquake death toll now up to 54,000

'Losing race against the clock' to help quake survivors: UN official

West's response condemned as slow and inadequate

Amazon rainforest suffers worst drought in decades

Tropical Storm Vince forms in unusual location

Second tornado strikes Birmingham

Snowstorm Drops 20 Inches in Colorado

Strong earthquake jolts Indonesia's Aceh

Small Quakes Hit Central California

Three Alaska volcanoes showing signs of unrest

'I saw a fireball!'

A New World

2005-10-17T13:29:00.000-04:00

A new universe is being created right now. The individual work of each and every form of energy is building this structure we find ourselves in as I write and as you read. We contribute to it. It makes sense that our actions and inactions have an impact on what 'world' we live in. We are an integral part of the machine that runs the world. We are 'of' it and responsible for its functional or disfunctional operation. In other words we are a microcosm of the system in which we live.

What if we changed 'our' system of operation? Wouldn't that place us in a different Macrocosm?
In a non-linear system even the smallest of actions can have a tremendous impact.

The possibilities are endless of what we can create as well as what we are capable of. If we look around, we can see humanity severely limiting the capacity of what can be done for others and for ourselves. There does not have to be such unnecessary suffering. We waste food, horde information and ignore the world while feeding our addictions. This is fine for one world, even necessary I think. But perhaps there are other worlds, other possibilities.

P.D. Ouspensky wrote in A New Model of the Universe:

"The world is a world of infinite possibilities.

"Our mind follows follows the development of possibilities always in one direction only. But in fact every moment contains a very large number of possibilities. And all of them are actualized, only we do not see it and do not know it. We always see only one of the actualizations, and in this lies the poverty and limitation of the human mind. But if we try to imagine the actualization of all the possibilities of the present moment, then of the next moment, and so on, we shall feel the world growing infinitely, incessantly multiplying by itself and becoming immeasurably rich and utterly unlike the flat and limited world we have pictured to ourselves up to this moment. Having imagined this infinite variety we shall feel a "taste" of infinity for a moment and shall understand how inadequate and impossible it is to approach the problem of time with earthly measures. And we shall understand what an infinite richness of time is going in all directions is necessary for the actualization of all the possibilities that arise at each moment. And we shall understand that the very idea of arising and disappearing possibilities is created by the human mind, because otherwise it would burst and parish from a single contact with infinite actualization.
Simultaneously with this we shall feel the unreality of all our pessimistic deductions as compared with the vastness of the unfolding horizons. We shall feel that the world is so boundlessly large that a thought of the existence of any limits in it, a thought of there being anything whatever which is not contained within it, will appear to us ridiculous"

The Shaming of the Food

2005-10-13T22:56:00.000-04:00

"At the present time the beings of this present group (Americans) almost never consume for their first being-food any edible product which still retains all those active elements put into every being by Great Nature Herself as an indispensable requisite for taking in power for normal existence; but they preserve,' 'freeze,' and 'essensify' before hand all those products of theirs and use them only when most of these active elements required for normal existence are already volatilized out of them." ~ George Gurdjieff, Beelzebub's Tales to his Grandson

Gurdjieff's observations were certainly ahead of his time. He wrote the above sometime around 1925. He called Americans 'digestive organs spoiled' and said that the destruction of America will come in part from the stomach (the other part was sex). We can look around today and quite easily verify the truth in this. Although there are a number of factors that are likely lead to fall of this country, the food we eat certainly seems to be playing a part.

The 'quality' of food is practically non-existent. Everything we eat is dead of nutritional value. Our food is dressed up to look pretty while having nothing of real value inside, just like most everything else in America - the media, the monetary system, corporations, entertainment, education, and the creators of all those things in their image - the United States government (although it's hardly even being dressed up anymore - it certainly is having trouble masking its brutality and ugliness) . But all this can serve a purpose, a useful even if difficult and sometimes painful lesson in entropy - by studying this we might learn how we can escape such a strong force - that is if it is in us to do.

But back to food. Our source of nutrition is what maintains and strengthens our health, be it physically, emotionally, or mentally. A blow to our nutrition is clearly a blow to our health. With weakened immune systems we are more likely to fall prey to this seasons flu or the propaganda du jour a la Bush Administration. Critical thinking is not the average American's strong suit.

Just as the impressions we are fed are synthetic so it is the same with our physical foods. Our supermarkets are filled with genetically modified foods. Most everything we eat has some GM food in it. If it has soybean oil or corn syrup it most likely is genetically modified. There is the argument that it is unknown that there is any harm in GM foods. I'd say that argument is as artificial as the gm foods are. Jeffrey Smith authored a book, Seeds of Deception:Exposing Industry And Government Lies About The Safety Of The Genetically Engineered Food You're Eating. From a recent article (also below):

Smith said that the genetically modified maize grown in South Africa is likely to have been inserted with a gene that would make it produce Bt-toxin, which is a pesticide.

"When this pesticide was fed to mice, the mice developed an immune response equal to that of cholera toxin. They developed allergies, abnormal and excessive cell growth in their small intestines, and a greater susceptibility to allergies," he said.

Smith said the GM Bt-toxin in maize was hundreds and even thousands of times more concentrated than the spray form.

"Farm workers exposed to even the low dose Bt spray showed evidence of allergic sensitivity.

"Preliminary evidence found that 39 Filipinos living next to a Bt maize field developed skin, intestinal and respiratory reactions while the maize was pollinating," he said.

Smith said that farmers who fed their cattle 100 percent GM maize had difficulties. "Twelve cows died on a German farm, and about 25 farmers in North America said their pigs became sterile, had false pregnancies or gave birth to bags of water."

How many people do you know are allergic or intolerant to peanuts, dairy, wheat or some other food. How many do you know who are hypersensitive to perfumes, deodorants, or some other chemical we use to mask our stink? If you're in the US the number is likely high unless your head is in the sand. Might the reason so many people are sensitive to these things because our body's defense system has been broken down by these obviously harmful chemicals through repetitive ingestion, absorption, etc.? The current situation is clearly not from GM foods, but likely from all the insecticides, pesticides, preservatives, and all the like. GM foods are for the new generations. I have full faith in its ability to destroy as good as, likely better than, its predecessors.

All who not fans of factory farms might enjoy the Meatrix flash.

SA food is not safe, anti-GM expert warns

September 30 2005 at 11:24AM
By Irene Kuppan

The majority of South Africans are unaware that 30 percent of the country's yellow maize and soy bean crops are genetically modified.

This is just one of the concerns raised by international author Jeffrey Smith, who is in the country to deliver a series of talks on genetically modified food.

Smith was addressing a group of people on the topic at the Diakonia Centre in Durban on Thursday.

He has been researching the issue of genetic engineering for the past 10 years and has travelled to more than 20 countries speaking on the subject.

He is also author of the book, Seeds Of Deception: Exposing Industry And Government Lies About The Safety Of The Genetically Engineered Food You're Eating.

Smith said that genetic engineering involved taking a gene from one species and inserting it into another.

Smith said that most South Africans had no idea that the food they were eating had been genetically modified.

"South Africa is the only country in the world allowing its staple food to be genetically modified and as a result, is putting a large portion of the population at risk," said Smith.

He said that 30 percent of the country's yellow maize and soy bean crops were genetically modified, along with 10 percent of white maize crops.

Smith said that the genetically modified maize grown in South Africa is likely to have been inserted with a gene that would make it produce Bt-toxin, which is a pesticide.

"When this pesticide was fed to mice, the mice developed an immune response equal to that of cholera toxin.

They developed allergies, abnormal and excessive cell growth in their small intestines, and a greater susceptibility to allergies," he said.

Smith said the GM Bt-toxin in maize was hundreds and even thousands of times more concentrated than the spray form.

"Farm workers exposed to even the low dose Bt spray showed evidence of allergic sensitivity.

"Preliminary evidence found that 39 Filipinos living next to a Bt maize field developed skin, intestinal and respiratory reactions while the maize was pollinating," he said.

Smith said that farmers who fed their cattle 100 percent GM maize had difficulties.

"Twelve cows died on a German farm, and about 25 farmers in North America said their pigs became sterile, had false pregnancies or gave birth to bags of water."

Smith said that South Africans needed to take a stand and demand to know what goes into the food they are eating.

"We need the leadership of this country, the faith-based leadership, the labour leaders and those who protect the lives of those with HIV/Aids to put a stop to these genetically modified foods.

"Leaders have to go to the government and manufacturers, and tell them that we (the public) are going to get our congregations and organizations to stop eating GM foods, and ask for a list for those which are GM and those which are not," he said.

Smith said that only when the word was out and everyone knew what was genetically modified and what was not, would a revolution begin within the industry.

Journalism on the Deadbeat

2005-10-12T18:23:00.000-04:00

My first photoshop!

Ok, maybe I exaggerate. Journalism isn't quite dead, but the truth in mainstream journalism sure is. And then there's the blogs - a medium where people can express their take on the world at large with no influence of corporate profits, political manipulations or government controls (...for now). AND YES!, there's government control of media in the good ole' USof A!. A recent article (also below) from E&P reported on the new 'Shield Law' also known as the 'Free Flow Information Act' which seems to bring more government control to 'freedom of speech' and 'protection' to journalism therein. Right. The definition of 'free' in this act seems to correspond with the 'freedom' Bush seeks to bring to the world and the 'freedom of speech' that is being largely controlled. The paragraphs that really caught my attention were:

A key reason some journalists oppose the popular federal shield proposal is fear that giving Congress the power to define who is and isn't a journalist could lead effectively to the licensing of journalists.
In other remarks about the legislation at IAPA's 61st General Assembly, Lugar acknowledged that the legislation could amount to a "privilege" for reporters over other Americans.
"I think, very frankly, you can make a case that this is a special boon for reporters, and certainly for their role in freedom of the press," he said. "At the end of the day what we will come out with says there is something privileged about being a reporter, and being able to report on something without being thrown into jail.

Yes, there is something special about current day reporters. They lie. The only source of truth is coming from the internet, largely from the blogging community. However, the government isn't interested in protecting the truth. They are interested in protecting their own lies. Bloggers will likely have no protection in the coming times.

Ken Fisher at Ars Technica writes on this issue,

In all of this talk of privilege, there is a mounting fear in some journalism circles that the federal government may want to leverage this "privilege" with a federal licensing program of sorts, which is enough to make some people twitch. How else will this dilemma be solved? And two demerits to the person who pops up and says, "false dilemma!"

In one sense it is a relief that bloggers are 'probably not' journalist. Most MSM journalists are mentally and morally diseased government harlots. They have have a certain clientele who are not really looking for true love of knowledge. No, they're looking to satisfy an animal urge of self based pleasure. This is the pleasure which seeks to confirm the deranged illusion of the way they want to see the world - just to prove that 'they are right'. This is a view they've been lazily spoon fed their entire lives. There is no will to do research, to challenge belief systems, to really search for truth. And by sleeping with these media whores they get only what is natural - a diseased perception of reality.

There are some who are interested in real truth. Many have found the alluring and plastic image of corporate media is empty inside and hardly of any substance. An individual and networked search to verify what is true is the only way to real freedom.

It is obvious that at least part of the world is loosing their trust in the media and turning to the internet and bloggs for their news. Yahoo will begin running blogs along side corporate news stories (story below). It will be interesting to see where this goes.

Shield Law Sponsor: Bloggers 'Probably Not' Considered
Journos

Shield Law Sponsor: Bloggers 'Probably Not' Considered
Journos By Mark Fitzgerald

Published: October 10, 2005 4:17 PM ET

INDIANAPOLIS Bloggers would "probably not" be considered journalists under the proposed federal shield law, the bill's co-sponsor, U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar (R.-Ind.), told the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) Monday afternoon.

Lugar emphasized, however, that debate is not yet closed on how to define a journalist under the proposed law. "

As to who is a reporter, this will be a subject of debate as this bill goes farther along," he said in response to a question from Washington Post Deputy Managing Editor Milton Coleman. "Are bloggers journalists or some of the commercial businesses that you here would probably not consider real journalists? Probably not, but how do you determine who will be included in this bill?"

According to the first draft of the Free Flow of Information Act of 2005, the "covered person" protected by the bill's terms includes "any entity that disseminates information by print, broadcast, cable, satellite, mechanical, photographic, electronic, or other means and that publishes a newspaper, book, magazine, or other periodical in print or electronic form; operates a radio or television station (or network of such stations), cable system, or satellite carrier, or channel or programming service for any such station, network, system, or carrier; or operates a news agency or wire service." The legislation also covers employees, contractors or other persons who "gathers, edits, photographs, records, prepares, or disseminates news or information for any such entity."

A key reason some journalists oppose the popular federal shield proposal is fear that giving Congress the power to define who is and isn't a journalist could lead effectively to the licensing of journalists.

In other remarks about the legislation at IAPA's 61st General Assembly, Lugar acknowledged that the legislation could amount to a "privilege" for reporters over other Americans."

I think, very frankly, you can make a case that this is a special boon for reporters, and certainly for their role in freedom of the press," he said. "At the end of the day what we will come out with says there is something privileged about being a reporter, and being able to report on something without being thrown into jail."

Lugar said he was inspired to write the legislation by the jailing of New York Times reporter Judith Miller. "I've known Judy Miller for many years," he said, adding that they became close when she was reporting on his efforts to dismantle the former Soviet Union's nuclear arsenal.

The bill is necessary to help the United States regain its status as an "exemplar" of press freedom, Lugar told the IAPA. "Even as we are advocating for free press (abroad)... we'd better clean up our own act," Lugar said.
Mark Fitzgerald (mfitzgerald@editorandpublisher.com)
is E&P's editor-at-large.
Yahoo puts news, blogs side by side
By Eric Auchard Tue Oct 11, 1:24 AM ET
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO - news) said on Monday it will begin featuring the work of self-published Web bloggers side by side with the work of professional journalists, leveling distinctions between the two.
Yahoo News, the world's most popular Internet media destination, is set to begin testing on Tuesday an expanded news search system that includes not only news stories and blogs but also user-contributed photos and related Web links.
The move will further stoke the debate between media traditionalists who want to maintain strict walls between news and commentary and those who argue such boundaries are elitist and undervalue the work of "citizen journalists."
Blogs, short for Web logs, are easy-to-publish Web sites where millions of individuals post commentary from political analysis to personal musings, creating a grassroots publishing medium that challenges the authority of established media.
Yahoo said its move to combine professionally edited news alongside the work of grassroots commentators promises to enrich the sources of information on breaking news events.
"Traditional media doesn't have the time and resources to cover all the stories," Joff Redfern, product director for Yahoo Search said. "It really does add substantially to what you are looking at when you are looking for news."
Yahoo has, in effect, created a three-tier system for finding news that starts with the links to top ten stories and related photographs produced by mainstream news organizations on the main Yahoo News site.
Readers searching for further details will be taken to a second-level news site, which splits the page between news from 6,500 professional sources and links to the hundreds of thousands of blogs available from its syndication service.
Thus the expanded search stops short of blurring all lines between edited news and self-publishing.
"We do try to demarcate what is mainstream media and what is user-generated content so that there is no confusion there," Redfern said.
Those choosing to dig still deeper can click on "More Blog results..." to be taken to purely user-generated news from blogs, photos and links. This allow the user to search 10 million blogs listed on Yahoo's blo.gs blog tracking service.
The search includes links to many of the 42 million photos on the popular Flickr photo-sharing site, which Yahoo acquired this past spring, as well as to My Web, Yahoo's mechanism for allowing its users to learn from the Web searches of others.
FIGHTING TO DEFINE JOURNALISM
Robert Thompson, a media studies professor at Syracuse University, said it was important to preserve the distinctions between professional journalism and personal commentary.
He defined professional journalism as reporting which adheres to standards of accuracy and writing subjected to an editorial process, and all done with an eye to journalistic ethics, although he said journalism often falls short of these goals.
"There is a distinction between something that has gone through an editorial process as opposed to something put up by someone that has been through none of those processes," Thompson said.
But media critic Jeff Jarvis, author of the blog Buzzmachine (http://www.buzzmachine.com), said major Internet sites such as Yahoo and Google (Nasdaq:GOOG - news) continue to patronize bloggers by treating them as secondary sources of news.
Jarvis, who is a former TV critic for TV Guide and People magazines, mocked the notion that journalists live by a shared set of professional standards, that they are better trained or more trustworthy than the anyone-can-join blog movement.
"What made the voice of the people somehow less important than the paid professional journalist?" he asked. "You don't need to have a degree, you don't need to have a paycheck, you don't need to have a byline," Jarvis said.
"If you inform the public, you are committing an act of journalism," he declared.

An American in Chains

2005-10-12T00:41:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I wrote a little about the US military and their claims to God. There is no freedom of Religion in this country. If your Muslim your a 'terr'ist.'

It is also clearly becoming that any form of dissent is supporting 'terr'ism'.

The fundamental Evangelical Zionists are violent racists willing to do ANYTHING to further their agenda. The US government has no problem doing what it did to this man below. Think of what else it may be capable of.

An American in chains

James Yee entered Guantanamo as a patriotic US officer and Muslim chaplain.
He ended up in shackles, branded a spy. This is his disturbing story

My cell was 8ft by 6ft, the same size as the detainees' cages at Guantanamo.
Barely a week ago I had received a glowing evaluation for my work as the US
army's Muslim chaplain among the "Gitmo" prisoners. Now I was the one in
chains. It was my turn to be humiliated every time I was taken to have a
shower. Naked, I had to run my hands through my hair to show that I was not
concealing a weapon in it. Then mouth open, tongue up, down, nothing inside.
Right arm up, nothing in my armpit. Left arm up. Lift the right testicle,
nothing hidden. Lift the left. Turn around, bend over, spread your buttocks,
knowing a camera was displaying my naked image as male and female guards watched.

It didn't matter that I was an army captain, a graduate of West Point, the elite US
military academy. It didn't matter that my religious beliefs prohibited me from
being fully naked in front of strangers. It didn't matter that I hadn't been
charged with a crime. It didn't matter that my wife and daughter had no idea
where I was. And it certainly didn't matter that I was a loyal American citizen
and, above all, innocent.
I was accused of mutiny and sedition, aiding the enemy and espionage, all of which carried the death penalty. I was regarded as a traitor to the army and my country. This was all blatantly untrue - as would be proved when, after a long fight, all the charges against me were dropped and I won an honourable discharge from the army.
I knew why I had been arrested: it was because I am a Muslim. I was just the latest victim of the hostility born the moment when the planes flew into the twin towers and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.
My real "crime" had been that I had tried to ensure that the suspected Taliban and Al-Qaeda fighters detained in the Gitmo cages were given every opportunity to practise their religion freely, one of the most fundamental of American ideals.
I had monitored the atrocious treatment meted out by the guards. And I had come to suspect that my appointment as the prisoners' chaplain was simply a piece of political theatre.
When reporters came to Guantanamo on the media tour, everyone had always wanted to talk to the Muslim chaplain. I had told them the things that the command expected me to say. We give the detainees a Koran. We announce the prayer five times a day. We serve halal food. Everything I said had been true. But it certainly wasn't the full story.
I HAVE NOT always been a Muslim. I am a third-generation American -
my grandparents left China in the 1920s - and as a child in New Jersey I
grudgingly attended Lutheran church services with my mother.
On holiday after graduating from West Point, however, I met a young woman who was intrigued by Islam. I began to read about it and eventually converted. Then, after the US army sent me to Saudi Arabia and allowed me to visit Mecca, I wondered why there were no Muslim chaplains in the US military.
My father had taught me as a boy that America promises all people an opportunity to lead an extraordinary life. By becoming a Muslim chaplain in the summer of 2000, after four years' study in Damascus, I saw myself fulfilling this opportunity. I had no idea what I was letting myself in for.
Six months after the September 11 attacks I was asked if I would like to work at Camp X-Ray, the new detention centre at Guantanamo
Bay. I said that it would be difficult: Huda, my Syrian wife, was still
adjusting to life in America and Sarah, our daughter, was in the throes of the
"terrible twos". It turned out, however, that I had no choice.
By the time I got to Guantanamo, Camp X-Ray was too small for the number of prisoners coming in. When I saw its remains I couldn't believe that humans were once held here. It looked like a cattle yard. There were hundreds of cages in rows. The only protection from the blistering sun was a tin roof. Dozens of enormous rodents crawled throughout the camp. I was told that these were banana rats and would attack if provoked.
The new prison, Camp Delta, consisted of 19 blocks, each holding 48 detainees in individual open-air cells with steel mesh walls. Like other military personnel, I was briefed that the detainees were among the most dangerous terrorists in the world. We were told that many of the prisoners were responsible for the attacks of September 11 and would strike again if given the opportunity.
I expected to come face-to-face with hundreds of Osama Bin Ladens, but most prisoners were friendly. There were approximately 660 from dozens of countries, including Britain.
An English-speaking Saudi detainee named Shaker was eating a military "Meal Ready to Eat" or MRE when I first met him. MREs often led to constipation. "Chaplain," Shaker called out. "You know what we call this lunch we eat every day? Meals that Refuse to Exit."
Shaker said that he had settled in London after marrying a British woman. They had
three children and his wife had given birth to his fourth child after he was captured. "My youngest son, we named him Faris, I've never seen," he told me. "My wife doesn't know anything about what happened to me and I'm so worried about her."
I got to know three men from Britain particularly well: Rhuhel Ahmed, Asif Iqbal and Shafiq Rasul. Ahmed, the most talkative, told me that they had grown uptogether in Tipton, near Birmingham. Their families were close and the men were like cousins. All three told me they had never committed a crime and that their arrests had been a serious mistake. The man in overall charge was Major General Geoffrey Miller, a slight but self-confident Texan in his late fifties. He was later sent to Iraq to make recommendations on improving intelligence collection at Abu Ghraib prison in the months before it became infamous for the maltreatment of its inmates.
If there was trouble with the prisoners, guards were supposed to restore order calmly. But Miller said when visiting Camp Delta or whenever seeing troopers around the base: "The fight is on!" This was a subtle way of saying that rules were relaxed and infractions were easily overlooked.
Miller was a devout Christian. In one of the first private conversations that he and I had, he invited me for a stroll under the watchtowers and told me that several of his friends and colleagues had been killed in the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon.
He had felt a deep anger towards "those Muslims" who attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon - such anger, he explained, that he had sought counselling with a chaplain. I appreciated his candour but I sensed there was a subtle warning behind his words.
THE WORST punishment for prisoners was a "forced cell extraction" by
a group of six to eight guards called the Initial Response Force. The troopers
called it IRFing.
I witnessed my first IRFing after a military policeman had performed the "credit card swipe" - pressing his fingers inside a detainee's buttock crack to look for a weapon. This type of physical contact is not acceptable under Islamic law and the detainee had pushed the guard away. But prisoners were not allowed to touch an MP and immediately eight guards were summoned.
They put on riot protection gear - helmets, heavy gloves, shin guards and chest protectors - before forming a huddle and chanting in unison, getting themselves pumped up. Still chanting, they rushed the block, their heavy boots sounding like a stampede on the steel floor. Detainees throughout Camp Delta started to yell and shake their cage doors.
When the IRF team reached the offending detainee, the team leader drenched him with pepper spray and opened the door to his cell. The others charged in. He was no match for eight men in riot gear. The guards used their shields and bodies to force him to the floor. With his wrists and ankles tied, he was dragged down the corridor to solitary confinement.
When it was over the guards high-fived each other and slammed their chests together like professional basketball players - an odd victory celebration for eight men who took down one prisoner.
IRFing was used with extraordinary frequency. Seemingly harmless behaviour could bring it on: not responding when a guard spoke or having two plastic cups in a cage instead of the regulation one. Invasive body searches occurred daily and were a constant source of tension leading to IRFing. I came to believe that the searches were done solely to rile the detainees. The prisoners had been locked in cages for
several months in a remote area of Cuba. What could they possibly be hiding?
Violent episodes were increasing. In one incident a guard had hauled
off a handcuffed detainee whom he was beating on the head with a handheld radio.
By the time I arrived the detainee had been taken to the hospital, but his blood
was fresh on the ground and what appeared to be large pieces of flesh were
soaking in it.
Bad as this violence was, many soldiers discovered a weapon far more powerful than fists: Islam. Because religion was the most important issue for nearly all the prisoners in Camp Delta, it became the most important weapon used against them.
Guards mocked the call to prayer and rattled doors, threw stones against the cages and played loud rock'n'roll music as the prisoners prayed.
Knowing that physical contact between unrelated men and women is not allowed under Islamic law, female guards would be exceptionally inappropriate in how they patted down the prisoners or touched them on the way to the showers or recreation. Detainees often resisted and were IRFed.
The guards knew that Muslims believe that the Koran contains the actual words of God and is to be treated with the utmost respect. I never heard of an incident where
a detainee hid anything dangerous in the Koran; doing so would be considered an
insult. Yet the guards shook the prisoners' Korans violently, broke bindings,
ripped pages and dropped thebook on the floor, all on the pretext of searching
them.
Some of the worst complaints that I received were about what was happening inside the interrogation rooms. Some of the translators - Muslim military personnel like me - told stories about female interrogators who would take off their clothes during the sessions. One would pretend to masturbate in front of detainees. She was also known to touch them in a sexual way and make them rub her breasts and genitalia. A translator who had witnessed this woman's behaviour told me that her supervisor had told her to tone down the tactics but had not disciplined her.
Translators with the Joint Intelligence Group (JIG) also confirmed that some prisoners were forced to prostrate themselves in the centre of a satanic circle lit with candles. Interrogators shouted at them, "Satan is your God, not Allah! Repeat that after me!"
I came to believe that the hostile environment and animosity towards Islam were so ingrained in the operation that Miller and the other camp leaders had lost sight of the moral harm we were doing.
I began to keep a record of the atrocities that I was hearing about. But the more time I spent on the blocks the more aggressive many of the guards became towards me. I was authorised to have unescorted access and to speak with detainees in privacy.
But guards eavesdropped on my conversations, standing very close and attempting to intimidate me. Most refused to move away. "I've been told to stay within one arm's length of you at all times," one guard told me.
When an administrative assistant in the navy chaplain's office showed me a slanderous and hatefilled diatribe against Muslims that was to be inserted into a weekly newsletter to hundreds of Christian military personnel on the base, I decided it was time for action.
It began, "Egyptian Muslim Mohammad Farouk hated Christians . . . in an attempt to obey the Koran and please Allah, Mohammad and his friends began to assault and harass Christians in their village . . ." It claimed that the Koran instructs Muslims
to espouse violence and hatred, the opposite of the truth.
Yet Vincent Salamoni, a Catholic priest who worked as the naval command chaplain, only grudgingly complied with the advice from the Christian chief chaplain on the
base not to distribute this material. Salamoni said that he felt it was necessary first to find out if the Koran did instruct Muslims to kill Christians.
In briefings to newcomers to the base, given with the express support of the operations staff, I tried to dispel the principal myth that all Muslims are terrorists. Little did I understand that by trying to educate my colleagues about the need for religious tolerance, I was encouraging them to suspect me.
Although I had been ordered to prepare the presentation by the command, the fact that I talked knowledgeably about Islam was enough to lead some of them to question my loyalty.
Captain Jason Orlich, an army reservist who had taught in a Catholic school before arriving in Guantanamo to take charge of intelligence and security for detention operations, sat in my briefing on his first day and asked: "Is he on our side or is he on the enemy's side?" As I was to discover muchlater from court documents, he made it his mission to keep an eye on me. Nor was I the only one under suspicion: Muslim colleagues - all loyal Americans - were spied on and bugged.
When I got together with other Muslim personnel on the base, our conversation routinely turned to what appeared to be open religious hostility.
Ahmad al-Halabi, a young airman who helped me with the detainees' library of religious books, told me that he had been given a copy of a CD widely circulated by the troopers. Among the images on it was a phoney Playboy cover showing Muslim women in provocative dress and poses, and another depicting Muslim men engaged in anal sex during prayer. He suspected that the disc had originated in the security section headed by Orlich, who appeared in several photographs on the disc.
All of us on the base knew that, like the detainees, we were likely to be under surveillance wherever we were. Watch what you're saying, soldiers would joke, because the "secret squirrels" are listening. We never knew exactly who they were, but the government agencies represented on the island included the FBI, Naval Criminal Investigative Service, Army Counterintelligence and the CIA. Nothing was off limits. Our e-mails were read, our telephone calls were monitored and everything we said had the potential of being overheard.
I had a feeling that our Muslim Friday prayers, attended by about 40 in a small room at the chapel complex of the camp, were under surveillance. Men in khakis and polo shirts - the common uniform of the FBI and CIA - would stand just outside, watching to see who came and went. I sometimes asked if they wanted to join us but they always declined, offering no explanation of their presence. A translator confirmed that a man sitting outside was an FBI agent he had worked with in interrogations.
WHEN I was given a larger apartment to live in, I called some of the guys to come over and share evening prayers in my spare bedroom. Afterwards we hung around in my living room and had sodas and snacks. Before long, evening prayers at my house became a frequent occasion and word spread among the Muslim personnel that anyone who wanted to join us was welcome. People started turning up with tasty Middle Eastern food. I did not realise what the repercussions would be.
Many months later I learnt the facts from court documents. People initially became
suspicious of me because of the presentation that I gave during the newcomers'
briefing. Stories quietly began to circulate about me and my fellow Muslim personnel. We were too sympathetic to the plight of the detainees and too critical of how the MPs treated the prisoners. We prayed together on Friday afternoons. Orlich even noted that Ahmad was seen to be "shadow boxing" as he left the chapel.
"I found that to be odd," Orlich told a military investigator.
The accusations were retold and exaggerated in back yards and on the beaches during the hot Cuban evenings, fuelled by boredom and discount vodka. Some troopers adopted names for us: "the Muslim clique" and, far more disturbing, Hamas, after the Palestinian organisation.
Did these soldiers truly believe the things they were saying about us and were they truly threatened by the fact that we practised our religion? Or were they just caught
up in the pervasive anti-Muslim hostility that defined the mission? I believe that those who accused us of being "radical Islamists" were unable to see that someone can be a Muslim and not be a terrorist.
Most of the Christian soldiers at Guantanamo practised their religion regularly and attended weekly services. Miller was rarely missing from the front row of the chief chaplain's service, which gave it an unstated command emphasis.
Three Christian chaplains hosted weekly Bible studies where soldiers met to discuss their faith. I am sure that they believed this made them better people and better soldiers and helped to ease the tremendous strain of life at Guantanamo. Why couldn't they see that we were simply doingthe same?
For months Orlich watched me and the other Muslims who regularly attended my religious services. He was particularly concerned with Ahmad whose "case" was assigned to Lance Wega, a young civilian agent from the Air Force Office of Special
Investigations.
Investigators twice surreptitiously entered Ahmad's living quarters. They took photographs of the house, copied his telephone records and mirrored the hard drive on his computer.
Microsoft was instructed to store Ahmad's e-mails and records of his internet activity without his knowledge.
"You are requested to not disclose the existence of this request to the subscriber or any other person," the letter to Microsoft stated. "Any such disclosure could subject you to criminal liability for obstruction of
justice."
Many Muslim personnel came to me to share concerns that things just didn't feel right. Staff Sergeant Mohammad Tabassum, a no-nonsense type of guy in his mid-forties, told me that he had been cleaning out a cupboard in his house on the base and discovered a listening device hidden inside.
Ahmad then told me that his security clearance had been suspended. He was the last person I thought would come under suspicion; he was a loyal American and an exceptional soldier, the best translator in the camp.
When Ahmad's tour of duty came to an end, he left with great excitement, heading for Syria to be married. He and his fiancée had been forced to postpone the wedding when his deployment at Guantanamo was extended. His mother, who had recently recovered from cancer, was to meet Ahmad at the airport in London and then fly with him to Damascus.
A few days after Ahmad left, however, we heard that he had been arrested in Jacksonville, Florida, when he got off the plane from Guantanamo. Nobody knew
why or what had happened to him.
After a few weeks news arrived that Tariq Hashim, an air force captain who had been on the same plane, had also been arrested. The FBI had taken both of them. Then we had heard that another member of our prayer group, Petty Officer Samir Hejab, a navy cook, had been arrested as he left Guantanamo at the end of his deployment.
Suddenly it seemed as if every Muslim at Guantanamo was being detained on reaching American soil. Were we all going to be arrested and jailed without explanation?
In the midst of this confusion, I decided that it was time for me to take a break from Guantanamo. Every trooper was allowed a short vacation and by late August I was ready for mine. I felt overjoyed at the idea of seeing my family again. But I also was
growing more concerned by the day that something suspicious was happening behind the scenes.
"Have you heard anything about Muslim personnel being arrested recently?" I asked Orlich.
He looked me in the eye. "Nothing," he told me.
"The situation is strange," I said to him. "There's a lot of rumours and I'm wondering if I'm next."
Orlich smiled and put his hand on my shoulder, "Now why would anyone want to arrest you, chaplain?"
I persisted: "Because I am the Muslim chaplain and the one who leads these three missing Muslims in prayer."
Orlich just laughed off my concerns.
My wife said she had my gun in one hand and two rounds in the other
I still don't understand how the misguided suspicions of a few inexperienced soldiers led to the ordeal that changed my life, tore apart my family and destroyed my career.
While my plane headed home to the US on September 10, 2003, representatives of at least five government agencies awaited me at the Jacksonville air station: FBI, Naval Criminal Investigative Service, US Bureau of Immigration and Customs
Enforcement, US Customs and Border Protection and Army Counterintelligence.
After my arrest I was sure that General Miller would order my release. He ran a tight ship and he was a tough leader, but he was a general and he would therefore be fair. But when I was at last arraigned at a pre-trial hearing, I was presented with a memorandum signed by Miller that stated: "Chaplain Yee is known to have associated with known terrorist sympathisers."
He added: "Yee is suspected of several extremely serious crimes, including espionage, which potentially carries the death penalty."
I was too cut off from the world to know that the news of my arrest had broken and that the government was slandering me in the press. There were reports that I had contact with Syrian government officials, that I was affiliated with Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, and that I had been found with maps of Guantanamo and names of the detainees and interrogators.
Sometimes I wondered if I would go crazy trying to deal with the situation and being locked in solitary confinement for what turned out to be 76 days. If it were not for my military training and my religion, perhaps I would have.
After a month I learnt that I was not going to be charged with spying, sedition or aiding the enemy after all but with the "slap on the wrist" charges of taking classified information to my housing quarters and of transporting classified material without the proper container. But my hopes quickly vanished when my lawyer told me that the army was saying that more serious charges might still be brought.
I discovered that I was in the same prison as Yasser Hamdi, an American-born Saudi who was allegedly captured fighting US forces in Afghanistan, and Jose Padilla, who was arrested in Chicago on suspicion of belonging to Al-Qaeda and participating in a plot to detonate a dirty bomb in the United States. Both were deemed enemy combatants. Did this mean I was, too?
At another pre-trial hearing, investigators claimed I was part of a spy ring. The press repeated false information from anonymous government sources that it was one of the most dangerous spy rings to be discovered in the US military since the cold war.
The army was doing far more harm to me privately. Martha Brewer, an agent with the Department of Defence Criminal Investigative Service, went to my apartment near Seattle and told Huda, my wife: "Your husband is not the person you think he is. He's having an affair with three women."
She produced photographs of me with female colleagues on social occasions at Guantanamo in what was clearly a desperate attempt to turn Huda against me. Although these photographs would have been acceptable to most people, Brewer clearly understood that given her traditions, Huda would be particularly upset to see me photographed with women. Huda later told me she was so distressed that some days she couldn't get out of bed and all she could do was cry.
On November 25, with no serious charges in sight, I was suddenly released from custody. But the same day news bulletins announced that I was being charged with adultery (a criminal offence in the military) and with downloading pornography on a government computer. By revealing the new charges on the day of my release from prison, the army had captured the story.
I called Huda and had one of the most difficult experiences of my entire ordeal. She told me that when she had learnt of the new accusations, she had searched out my Smith & Wesson .38 special handgun, which I kept on the top shelf in my cupboard, hidden from view.
"I'm holding it in one hand," she told me, "and two rounds in the other." "Put it down," I said firmly, fear rising inside of me.
"Tell me how to use it," she whispered. She said that she couldn't deal with this any longer and wanted to be free from everything - the media, the scrutiny, the idea that the United States government could be doing this to our family. It was not the first time that Huda had suggested a desire to die since my arrest, but it had never gone this far.
I didn't know what to do. She hung up and when I called back several times, she didn't answer. Finally I called the local police department. They sent officers to our
apartment, who took Huda to a nearby hospital against her will. She was released
after several hours, but the police kept the gun. I could not be with her. I was
forbidden to leave my military base.
In February last year my lawyers reached a deal with the army that the criminal charges would be dismissed and I would resign my commission with a recommendation for an honourable discharge from Miller and other senior officers. Even so, the military continued to whisper that I was indeed a threat to the nation but it was somehow in the interest of security to drop the case against me. Miller found me guilty of adultery and possessing pornography and formally reprimanded me. Two months later - by which time my case had become a cause celebre - I won an appeal against his decision.
After the charges against me were dropped and it became obvious that the government had erred, many newspaper editorials were written to demand that the military issue an apology.
Of course I want an apology, but it will not restore my marriage which has suffered irreparable damage from the vindictive claims that the military made. Nor will it give me back my job as a Muslim chaplain in the army - a job that allowed me to fulfil
my dream of serving both God and country.
Adapted from For God And Country by James Yee with Aimee Molloy to be published by PublicAffairs, a member of the Perseus Books Group, on November 3 at £14.99. Copies can be ordered for £12.09 with free delivery from The Sunday Times BooksFirst on 0870 165 8585
SotT Comment:
Imagine that: a third-generation American has his life destroyed for no other
reason than his religion - and this in the country that believes it is has the
most religious freedom of any nation in the world. When Yee did nothing illegal,
charges were fabricated and he was placed in solitary confinement for 76 days
while the US government worked on destroying his marriage. Men like James Yee
are the "terrorists" that everyone fears. What sort of a life can Yee possibly
have now?
The clearly racist, "patriotic", fundamentalist Christian fanatics
who are driving prosecutions under the blanket of the "War on Terror" certainly
will not have stopped checking up on Yee. He writes, "The military continued to
whisper that I was indeed a threat to the nation but it was somehow in the
interest of security to drop the case against me". In other words, the
harassment of Yee will no doubt continue. Where does he go? His life in the US
is in ruins. If he returns to the Middle East, he could be recaptured and more
false charges could be brought against him. Yet another US citizen's life has
been obliterated for nothing more than a bunch of lies told by the Bush
administration after 9/11.
After reading this account - and others before it
on past Signs pages - we must again ask the questions: Who are the real
terrorists? Who benefits from the senseless destruction of this innocent
American's life? And just how much longer are average Americans - and indeed the
citizens of many other nations - going to just sit back and pretend like
everything is okay in the Land of the Free?

Killing for college

2005-10-10T14:44:00.000-04:00

Image thanks to The Propaganda Remix Project

"The most shocking fact about war is that its victims and its instruments are individual human beings, and that these individual beings are condemned by the monstrous conventions of politics to murder or be murdered in quarrels not their own." ~ Aldous Huxley

Growing up, I never seriously considered joining the military, that is until high school. In the beginning quarter of my first year of high school I had joined to take a class of which I hardly knew anything about. It was called JROTC and looked fun enough - they went camping, did lots of physical training and all the like. It stands for Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps. I didn't find until a little later that because there was a 'Junior' so there was a 'senior,' the college ROTC program. Well, I stayed with the program all during high school and did quite well with it (subjectively speaking). I got a couple of scholarships to different universities but the kicker was they were ROTC scholarships. Coming from a regular middle class family, we didn't have the money to pay for college - this seemed like a good opportunity.

Of course in the back of my mind there was always the question of war. What about war? I didn't want to kill anyone. And I certainly didn't want to be killed. When I was young I remember imagining what it would be like to be a soldier. This naturally lead to thoughts of war and the soldiers I'd be fighting. What would make them different then me? They have a family they love as well as their country they are serving - and it is really the interests of politicians we'd be fighting over - not real individual matters. Well the lure of college was enough to press all that back deep in my mind. If only for a little while. After the first semester of ROTC I quit the program. If I hadn't I'd likely be either in Iraq or in a body bag right now.

These kids are manipulated to murder each other for the goals of corporate and government fascism. And by fascism I mean the United States! I know other countries recruit and even do mandatory military time for their youth. However, I don't live over there. I live here and this is what I know. The US manipulates kids to kill for college money. This manipulation is further enhanced by creating and ingraining since childhood this superior ideology that we are God's people, God is on our side, we are one nation under God and so on. I mean how stupid can a people get??? Well, one can easily fight the enemy when the enemy is godless or worse. Remember General Bokin saying the US was fighting a war against Satan?

What insanity.

Week in Review

2005-10-10T00:32:00.000-04:00

I missed last week's review... sorry.

Here's a look at this past week. I don't doubt the newspapers may be having difficulty deciding what exactly is front page - well, that would be if all these things would be reported - some things you can't ignore.

These articles are from the Signs of the Times daily compilation of articles (with the exception of two or three).

Britain recruited terrorists, Meacher claims

Australia to urge new counterterrorism measures in Indonesia

Kiss of Death
Does Zarqawi have an infinite supply of lieutenants/deputies/aides/associates/second-in-commands/etc., or do we just arbitrarily declare that every 100th insurgent we capture or kill is "a top aide" to Zarqawi?

John Pilger blames Basra on the British

Bush will veto anti-torture law after Senate revolt

White House denies Bush God claims

Protest is criminalised and the huffers and puffers say nothing

University of Arizona Professor Reported to FBI for "Hating" America

Bush administration found involved in illegal 'covert propaganda'

New York subway terror threat remains uncorroborated, concerns ease

Peace march coincidences

Deadly bacteria detected during anti-war march

Bird flu jumps transmission barrier in humans

U.S. may use military quarantine to contain flu

Security fears as flu virus that killed 50 million is recreated

Asia Scrambles to Contain Dengue Virus

Mysterious illness claims four more lives in Toronto

South Asian quake toll nears 20,000

Guatemala mudslide: 1,400 feared dead

Earthquake shakes Israel

Quake shakes city

Strong quake rocks Aceh

Earthquake Rattles Three Argentine Provinces

Earthquake strikes the South Pacific island of Tonga – no injures or damage

Typhoon, quake leave Taiwan shaken, stirred

2 die, thousands flee as El Salvador volcano erupts

Aleutian volcano begins to quake

Huge Alaska landslide gets attention of seismologists

Early Blizzard Knocks Out Power in West

Green light in sky was likely a meteor

Professor Hyde and the Education System

2005-10-09T19:15:00.000-04:00

Earlier this week I had a meeting with Professor K about the progress of my internship at work (its also a school externship) . I walked in right on time and saw him sitting in the lounge. We customarily greeted one another, and I noticed immediately that he was wearing his Mr. Hyde persona. I felt a twang of discomfort run down my neck and through my shoulders on reading his tense, unemotional face. However, my unease quickly faded as he looked at his watch and acknowledged I was on time. 'Maybe this won't be so bad,' I thought to myself. ...ummm WRONG!

We sat down and he asked for my progress log. '...the progress log? OH DAMN! the progress log, I forgot the progress log!' Well, this was obviously a good noose to hang me with even if I did have all the information needed for the log. My neck is still aching. Not to mention the spinning of my head. It was like a the confusion voodoo spin doctor had come to wreak havoc on the actual effort I have put into this project. I wasn't able to formulate why I was so shocked at what he said during the meeting until I thought about our last meeting. The direction he gave me then was the COMPLETE OPPOSITE of what he was giving me now! AAHHHAAHAHAAA! I'm gonna have to meet with him again and flatten out this stuff cause all the prior two weeks worth of work has been based on the previous opposite directions.

Speaking of 'education' the Signs of the Times have put out an excellent podcast on this issue this weekend. It's worth listening to as well as reading the supporting material.

I was going to post some excerpts from the articles referenced, but I could do them no justice in doing that - you'll have to go to the podcast to check them out if interested.

One thing I am sure of and have been for some time,

The Public school system was not created for education!

Earthquake in South Asia

2005-10-09T13:03:00.000-04:00

When I went to bed two nights ago the 7.6 Earth quake in South Asia had been reported to have taken hundreds of lives. Now it is between twenty and thirty thousand people that have been killed. It's hard for me to comprehend all this suffering and such huge loss of life.

Here's some photo's from a slideshow on Yahoo.

Passage of the Energy Bill

2005-10-08T12:09:00.000-04:00

I found this video of the recent passage of the energy bill over at the crooks and liers blog.

Looks like democracy at work. Well W's type of democrazy anyway - you know the war is peace and freedom is slavery kind.

vanity

2005-10-07T21:18:00.000-04:00

The only consistancy with my vanity, however hypocritical it may be, is it never ceases to shock me and it is always present when I'm certain it isn't. It doesn't matter the topic or the level of information I've processed or thought I have - vanity is always there. Where ever vanity is present, lies lurk not far behind. It is a manifestation of something false within. What is it in me that triggers this destructive self love? The most ignorant man alive certainly can be most vain (we can take a peek inside the White House to verify this he he) but so can the most intelligent of scientists - perhaps vanity demonstrates our level of developed (or undeveloped) level of empathy, how we communicate with our conscience.

I think its interesting that I react most vainly (or so I think) when I see a level of vanity in another. Pretty funny. Some say that which we despise in others is what we despise in ourselves. I think it makes sense that the outer programs we react most to are those which are the most ingrained in us - it is interesting the relationship that exists there. It would seem that vanity is also a part of a larger system - that which seeks to destroy another. Maybe it is a mask of our own fear and cowardness. It can be amazing how many masks we wear.

It's ironic, the momments we seem the most honest are when we see how much we lie.

Week in Review

2005-09-24T18:29:00.000-04:00

This is the first edition of Week in Review by Shadows of the Cave. This weeks collection of news is almost entirely (except for one article) from the daily collection of news articles from Signs of the Times. It used to be that anyone of the below articles could have been the news story of the month, perhaps year. Now these stories are happening at such an increased frequency and of large magnitude that it we might miss reading these signs (particularly so because the MSM does not report many of them). If you think I might have missed some stories please email me. I also trying to focus on reports of events. I think commentaries can be extremely useful in analyzing these events but they are not part of the purpose of this review at this point in time. This is a work in progress; please bear with me.

Gold settles at new 17-year peak

Federal Reserve Boosts Interest Rates

Sony to cut 10,000 jobs worldwide

Europeans Drop Harsher Stance on Iran

About 200 go on hunger strike in Guantanamo

Cleric says al-Zarqawi died long ago

Official: British troops freed in jailbreak
The official said two unknown gunmen in full Arabic dress began firing on civilians in central Basra, wounding several, including a traffic police officer. There were no fatalities, the official said.
The two gunmen fled the scene but were captured and taken in for questioning, admitting they were British marines carrying out a "special security task," the official said.

Who's Blowing Up Iraq? New evidence that bombs are being planted by British Commandos

Police forcibly break up Cindy Sheehan rally
The New York City Police Department forcibly broke up this afternoon's rally for Cindy Sheehan, moving in as Cindy was speaking at about 3 p.m. in Union Square.

Sheehan's Anti-War Campaign Now in D.C.

EXCLUSIVE: UP IN FLAMES
Tons of British aid donated to help Hurricane Katrina victims to be BURNED by Americans

Military May Play Bigger Relief Role

Rita crashes into Gulf Coast
The storm crashed into the U.S. Gulf Coast with 120 mph (193 kph) winds and punishing rains as a Category 3 hurricane.

Increase in Major Hurricanes Linked to Warmer Seas

World has slim chance to stop flu pandemic

Indonesian Capital May Be Facing a Bird Flu Epidemic (Update1)

Many people report symptoms of electromagnetic radiation sickness, WHO

Strong earthquake jolts Japan
The magnitude-5.9 quake struck at 02:30 GMT and was centred near Kunashiri island, the agency said.

Strong Earthquake Again Rocks Aceh
The quake, measuring 4.8 on the Richter scale, was felt by residents in the province's capital, Banda Aceh, and in the districts of Aceh Besar, Aceh Jaya, and West Aceh at 10.00 pm, the news agency quoted Head of Mata Ie Geophysics and Meteorology agency Syahnan as saying.

Earthquakes Up to 4.9 Strike Near L.A.

Magnitude 6.1 - KURIL ISLANDS

Magnitude 5.0 - ETHIOPIA

'Fireball' lights up night sky

necessary suffering

2005-09-16T21:53:00.000-04:00

Every time I search the news to see the roots of destructive events all over the planet I get this deep depressing shock which maintains its own coals for a while. Whether its the avian flu, new manifestations of climate change and the criminal acts that follow (via Katrenia non-responce and murder of the poor black population in New Orleans) or ignored displacement of the 5,000 families in Tel Afar, . Reading real news put together from excelent sourse such as Sings of the Times always gives a much needed wake up call; however there is something very deep that I think occurs when you take an active roll in doing your own research. These emotions of dispare are difficult but it coincides naturally when one looks the true nature of this world, or so I think. People are suffering much more than I am at this moment. And what are the solutions? Drugs, faith in fairy tales, dependence, a hike on a beautiful mountain, etc. These things do nothing and serve exactly that - nothingness - the entropic black hole thats been destoying truth since time ever after. This of course is a valid and important part of the universe and serves in providing many lessons as painful as they subectively seem.

Our love, hope and faith is perverted. All thats left are the false representations we think we know of. In Beezlebubs Tales to his Grandson, Gurdjieff writes that it is the conscience that is the only nondistorted source we can access that might lead to our evolution. I agree with him. By experiencing empathy for the suffering of humanity one might get fed up enough with all the lies, distruction and manipulation that one might be motivated to try and learn what one can do. And that seems to be the very thing to do - to learn.

Demanding imprisonment

2005-09-11T20:24:00.000-04:00

September 24th. I wonder how many Americans will be participating on this latest march on Washington. I'll be there.

The maddness, insanity, and pure heartlessness of the US government continues to shock me. All those who have died in Katrena, how many as a result of the intentful distruction brought on by FEMA and Bush's gang of butchers? This past week so many have been awed in disbelief by what they are calling 'incompetiency.' I can't call it such. I think these people are extremely competent. Their business is in distruction. Distruction of truth, distruction of freedom, distruction of human lives. They are not where they are because they are looking to better humanity - they are there because they have in the past and will continue to go to any means necessary to implement plans of total domination and control. This lust for greed and power is, I think, rarely seen for exactly what it is. Yes, I think they are extremely competent in their pursuits - namely that of control. These psycopaths will continue to murder thousands in order get it. As a result of all these 'mistakes', people have more than asked for a totalitarian state to be erected - they have demanded their chains; the Bush administration has been more than happy to satisfy this demand. Its what they've been seeking all along.

Supply and demand

2005-07-23T13:26:00.000-04:00

The law of supply and demand is seems a natrual regulation of how the world deveolpes. Yes. Now look at the world. Take off the blinders and really look. This cannot happen at one moment; its a process. One cannot say I want to see the world as it is and expect immediately to 'see the world.' There are too many blockages we all have. The'se are called by esoteric tradition 'buffers'. These buffers provide the normative world with the supply the world demands. And what sort of supply is this? It is a seemingly endless supply of lies, manipulation, dependance, apathy, ignorance, lust, hatred, selfishness, laziness, and on. Why? Because it is demanded.

A public 'education'

2005-06-08T23:39:00.000-04:00

It's only been about five years since my escape from the US Public School System Prison. I spent my 13 'early' years enslaved and oppressed by this demonic herd of pigs, cattle, and sheep known in code as 'administrators', 'teachers' and 'fellow students' (not even going into the dispicable actions of govenment involved - a little on that later). Yes, this is where we send our hope of the world to 'learn.' How many kids, or adults for that matter actually enjoy knowledge? Well, the method of 'teaching' (decoded to 'force feeding') information might have something to do with it. Learning can be really fun and it is, in my opinion, the only hope for the hope of the world. If we can learn our lessons, perhaps there might be some hope for humanity. Sure seems like a difficult task considering that since the dawn of man we have fought, killed, destroyed in endless cycles. Is there a way out of this repeating cycle of doom? Perhaps. As one of my favorite 6th density thought forms say, "Learn!" This takes some effort in increasing our capacity. It really is like swimming upstream at times. We are programmed and continue to be programmed to be completely reactionary and often quite stupid! I think most 'intellectuals' are even quite stupid! Yes, this seems illogical. And for saying such, one might call me quite stupid! Well, I'd agree. I think and do plenty of stupid things and would likely be classified under this all encompassing category of stupidity. But as such, I mean we do not learn our lessons - we repeat them, over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and ov... oh sorry I got stuck in a cycle. It was stupid. But it does seem that there is an intentful force which keeps humanity dumbed down; that keeps us from learning.

Today at SotT I found this article:

Mental Health Screening in Schools Signals the End of Parental Rights
Nancy Levant

In the 2005-2006 school year, all parents will receive written notice of new
policies from your children's schools. Many schools will ask you to sign
permission slips, allowing school counselors or or “advocates” to conversations with your children. You will be told how your local schools are now involved in vision and dental screenings, learning disabilities and speech impediment screenings, and other acts of kindness, but watch for the small print or the extra little blurb, which states that your children will also be evaluated for emotional wellness. Watch for wording like "happiness indicators" or "family participation."
The fact is that our president has mandated that every American child, age 3 through 18, is federally ordered to be evaluated for mental health issues and to receive 'enforced' treatment. Welcome to President Bush's New Freedom Initiative and New Freedom Commission on Mental Health. Welcome to life-long profiling and drug addictions, New Freedom-style.
52 million students and six million adults working in schools, according to this
commission, will be tested and should flush out at least 6 million people, or
shall we say new customers, who will then be mandated to receive "treatment."
What treatment does our president's commission have in mind? The newest drugs in the pharmaceutical pipelines, of course. The commission recommends "specific
medications for specific conditions."
One of the state-of-the-art treatments, and most expensive, is an implanted capsule - yes, that's right, implanted. The capsule delivers medication into a childÂs body without the child having to swallow a pill or the need for parental permission for dispensation.
The New Freedom Commission named the Texas Medication Algorithm Project
(TMAP) a model treatment plan. Medical algorithms are a flowchart-style
treatment indicator. If you have A symptom and B symptom, take C medication.
TMAP began with the University of Texas, big pharma, and the mental health and
corrections system in Texas. The American Psychiatric Association concurs that
TMAP is brilliant.
However, the New Freedom Initiative and Commission is a political-big pharma marriage. Many companies who supported TMAP were also major contributors to BushÂs re-election funds. For example, Eli Lilly manufactures olanzapine - one of the drugs recommended in the New Freedom plan, and furthermore, George Herbert Walker Bush was once a member of Lilly's board of directors. Our current President Bush appointed Lilly's chief executive officer, Sidney Taurel, as a member of the Homeland Security Council. Eighty-two percent of Lilly's $1.6 million in political contributions in 2000 went to Bush and the Republican Party. Do tell!
Texas Algorithm grossed over 4 billion dollars in 2003 and olanzapine is Eli Lilly's top selling drug. A 2003 New York Times article by Gardiner Harris claims that 70 percent of olanzapine sales are paid for by government agencies, such as Medicare and Medicaid. And lo and behold, guess who is now able to bill Medicaid for health services? Public schools, of course, as they are now under the big pharma-political profits/pay-back umbrella once they adopt screening policies. Public schools can now be paid to screen and drug your kids.
Now, if you ever wonder, ever again, if public-private partnerships care about people, then you need a brain transplant. Your children are now the legislated guinea pigs and lab rats for the pharmaceutical companies who bought and paid for our president's campaign. Favors are now returned to those companies in the form of enforced, juvenile customers, their health, and their future drug addictions.
But wait, there is more. The New Freedom Commission also calls for enforced treatment. That means that parents have no rights to refuse the treatment recommenced by TMAP and other drug dispensing corporate-bureaucratic apparatuses. And as the mental health bureaucracy is also involved in this financial game of insidious cruelty, parents and families are also to be investigated via the result of their children's screenings in schools. In other words, schools are now the across-the board, or shall I say nation, diagnostic tool for big pharma and child control.
And there's more. The U.N. Agenda 21 has also called for total intrusion into schools and children lives. No more religion, no more individuality, no more real education, no more real grades, no more real teaching, no more teacher respect for parents, and no more truth from teachers or principals. This sounds very familiar and very political to me. And I've said it before, and I will say it again: if you are of a religious ilk and you refuse to allow your children to be abused by our "educational system", the stage is being set for you to lose physical custody of your children. I suggest that you read this: Rethinking Orphanages for the 21st Century by Richard McKenzie, ed
Still got your kids in public schools? Shame on you, and may God bless your poor children and forgive you.
Websites for Wisdoms:
www.newswithviews.com/Devvy/kidd64.htm
www.newswithviews.com/Eakman/beverly26.htm

Have you wet your pants in fear yet? Well, if not then maybe you'll get a chance later on when the entire nation is drugged up, drooling and peeing their pants in a puddle of state sponsered stupidity and deception. Exageration? Not really. Is the idea of putting children in private schools a solution? I don't know. Perhaps it could help if only a little. Not everyone can afford to do this and GWB is gaining quite the far reaching hand. No doubt there will be millions of amazingly talented kids that are going to be tested with new drugs and we might only imagine the results. These psychopaths care about money, not health. If you have a child that is assigned mentally deranged, it may be a sign that he/she actually sees or feels the effects of what is actually going on in the world (as opposed to the fantacy fairy tales people hide in). Is it worth seeing your love of creation with glazed eyes and prozac muscle induced fake smiles (ohhh how creepy!) All for corporate profits and keeping the population DUMB!

My little sister is in her first year of high school. ...She sometimes looks or talks to me in ways to suggest I might be a little mmm 'off' ..or 'crazy' you might say. I'd be happy if that was the case. Then I could feel better that the world is not going 'off the deep end', I could feel that my family will be safe, I could think 'good' thoughts and write bed-time stories. These would be lies. I want to wake up from my sleep. I've grown quite the distaste for lies (if ya hadn't noticed) over the past couple of years. And the only way we can defeat our lies is by seeing them for what they are and facing them head on.

The Arrogant American

2005-06-07T23:55:00.000-04:00

I grew up feeling proud of America. I had deep emotions in saying the pledge of allegience in class. I was patriotic before it was in style. I remember the waves of emotion running up and down my spine when I sang or heard the star spangled banner. That was then. Now I stare in interest and slight amazement at people standing and hypnoticaly repeating in unison these things. Reminets of 1984... An article titled Arrogant Nation was posted today at Signs of the Times said:

(...)
But how did things get to such a point? What was it that allowed our
country to have become so arrogant? Was it our taming of The West? Was it our near annihilation of The American Indian, the original inhabitants of this
country? Was it our ability to have been so successful in an enslavement of The
African American people? Was it our capacity to have economically ravaged
Central America and The Caribbean? Was it our capacity for technological
development? How about our having bombed Viet Nam and Cambodia into near
stone-age oblivion? Then there was our war with Iraq in 1991, and the fact that
we were able to kill 350 Iraqis for every American soldier who died. And what
about our ability to have been so good at polluting the earth's atmosphere
setting the stage for a rather tragic warming of the world? Or the fact that
four percent of the world's population has been so successfully able to have
consumed 35% of the world's wealth? And what about the fact that we, no doubt,
have the greatest military force in the history of the world, one that could
destroy the entirety of the human race several times over? And what about our
willingness to have thumbed our noses at nearly every institutional effort to
resolve some of the world's most grave problems (The World Court, The Kyoto
Treaty on Climate Change, The Anti-Ballistic Treaty with Russia, The 2001 UN
Conference on Racism, as well as other international attempts to resolve pending
world problems). And finally, we can bask in the glory of having been so
successful in bringing peace, prosperity and security to a democratic
Iraq!
(...)

Why is the US so arrogant? Why is any particular person arrogant and what creates that? As the author above suggests the US has been built on and continues to grow from its foundation of destruction. Any good house needs a strong foundation; the US was created on the grounds of freedom and democracy- there might of even been a few who really believed in 'freedom for the people.' A good lie only survives from living off of a good truth. Welcome to the United States of America, the biggest and best liar of modern history. Democracy my arse.

Dictionary.com defines arrogance as:
"overbearing pride evidenced by a superior manner toward inferiors "

Certainly without a doubt a major characteristic of America(ns). There is a bumper sticker on a building I pass most everday which is also on many American vehicals that says, "The Power of Pride." Indeed. Very powerful. But I think only in mantaining illusions. I think this is ment to be a unifier of togetherness, but there is no unity in lies. There is this percieved ownership of a communties accomplishments - one can see this with sports fanatics (I've never understood why people take possesion of a group of peoples activities that occur within a fairly local distance and experience a wide range of emotions from this...pretty interesting) But from this I think we can see that this identification with dominance is where Americas pride comes from. America is proud they dominated (ephamism for maimed, tourchered, slaughtered, butched, murdered, stole from, etc.) American Indians, African slaves, Mexicans in the U.S.-Mexico War, the Phillipines in the Spanish American War, the Japanese in WWII (and this unthinkable act of devistation of the nuclear bomb is even celebrated today in the US - Victory Day, how incredibly sad and appauling), and so on and on. I didn't include the Germans in WWII because the US in not responsible for 'beating' them, the Russians are. They suffered over 27 million deaths in that war, they were in the battles; the US came in at the tail end after commiting genocide in Japan. The Russains played the bigger part, but Americans not surprisingly like to identify and take credit for accomplishing all. [I left out and information about WWI because that is an area of history I have not studied, but as Amercia is pretty consistant I cannot imagine things being any different; I've also left out current events and Vietnam as those are things which I'd like to cover induvidually].

There so much for Americans to be proud of and to be so arrogant about.

2005-05-19T17:36:00.000-04:00

A little effort

Talents

2005-05-19T16:30:00.000-04:00

For the kingdom of heaven is as a man traveling into a far country, who called
his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods. And unto one he gave five
talents, to another two, and to another one; to every man according to his
several ability; and straightway took his journey. Then he that had received the
five talents went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents.
And likewise he that had received two, he also gained other two. But he that had
received one went and dug in the earth, and hid his lord's money. After a long
time the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them. And so he that
had received five talents came and brought other five talents, saying, Lord,
thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold, I have gained beside them five
talents more. His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant:
thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many
things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord. He also that had received two
talents came and said, Lord, thou delivered unto me two talents: behold, I
have gained two other talents beside them. His lord said unto him, Well done,
good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will
make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord. Then he
which had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew thee that thou art
an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and gathering where thou hast not
strawed: and I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, there
thou hast that is thine. His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and
slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I
have not strawed: thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the
exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury.
Take therefore the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents.
For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundantly: but
from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. And cast ye
the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and
gnashing of teeth (Matthew 25:1430).

As some may note, I'm not too keen on modern Christianity. However, there are some good things in the Bible and I think the above quote is one of them. I just finished classes for the year. Two D's, two B's and an A. There was really one one class I put any effort into and I can only say that the amount of real effort lasted err.. about 18 hours. I think I am not focused on what I am looking to 'do'. To find what one can do; it's a difficult thing. One of my main problems is that I spread myself thin trying to do many things at once. This way I never really do any thing.

Distractions come fairly easy to take over my will. Not that I or anyone really has much of it. But back to the talents. I know I am good at things, however I am weary to apply them to things perhaps a fear of using them to serve the destructive force, perhaps a fear of looking badly, or some other one. The classes that I got a D in wasn't because I did poor work, it was because I didn't do some work at all. I identify quite a bit I found when I work myself up into putting these projects I don't do off. One one hand I say that I don't want to exert my mind in a direction that seeks how to make 'corporations' better (because mostly that is the focus of the University I attend) but on the other I think even if it was a project I didn't object to I would still put it off. I do have elements of laziness in my personality that dominate from time to time. These are things I could work on no matter the situation. Also, I don't know how possible it is right now for me to not work with a force that is that of our human entropic nature; this is difficult work (making efforts against human nature) and I think one has to have the basic skill sets devoid of common distractors such as laziness before one can seriously say that they are able to fully immerse in such work; but perhaps that is all part of it.

Nightmares

2005-04-30T14:22:00.000-04:00

Its been a while since I've had a nightmare but I had one last night. It think it was influenced from watching those clips about sex rings in the military and government. Ever have dreams of just this creepy and dominate evil being present? Thats whats its like and I get the same type of feeling when I think about some of the people in this world. Organized evil is more frightening to me, perhaps because of the level of intent behind it - perhaps at some level all evil is more organized than one might think. The truth is nessecary to face, as John Kaminski wrote in his lastest article:

But when I try to, I think of that series of photos taken at a checkpoint in Iraq in which triggerhappy U.S. troops shot first and asked questions later, later to find six terrified and bleeding children in the car that rolled to a stop. I think of that little bleeding girl screaming over her butchered parents, and U.S. soldiers wearing masks to hide their identities from the photographer. That little girl is my boss. And the rage I feel at the people who put her in that position, I'm telling you, is simply more than you want to hear. Why do I do what I do, and how can I stand what I have to look at? I work for that little girl, and if you don't too, then you have a problem with me.

That picture of that little girl remains in my mind when I think about what is going on this this world as well. It haunts me when I'm reminded that Americans don't care. What a sick world.

Back to the videos. The woman in it was married to a Marine Colonel (i think) and talks about those members of certain clubs, faternities, and organizations and how their innitiation was to have homosexual sex with, I think someone higher up in the organization. For those initiated, they would move up in the ranks very quickly and very highly. The names she names are telling. The end of the second video is telling as well and is in line with a lot of other research I've read. I think what she says is very likely based in truth. Her story falls in line with the Gannon scandle, some of the information about Hunter Thomas and his recent death, all the ritual abuse occuring all over the world - I think this thing is bigger than I can even imagine.

critical mass

2005-04-30T00:11:00.000-04:00

How deep does the rabbit hole go? It would seem to me that the Gannon scandle it just the tip of the iceburg, a gigantic iceburg. I just posted a couple of video clips in the video section about the homosexual ring within the top military and govenment ranks. These pschopaths have no end to what they seem capable of. I spent most of the day reading about ritual abuse and the detention camps set up in Amerika. What a sad state of affairs. And how many ignore and are turing their backs to what is happening to us. How much longer will people be able to have their backs turned; it seems at the rate of events getting bigger and bigger every day, that at some point there will reach a critical mass and people will not be able to turn their backs on the truth as it will be right in front no matter where one turns. But for now as things do get nastier, and occur more often, it also seems we have quite an easy time forgetting.

When I began serious investigating into the truth a couple of years ago many of the things I found seemed distant and 'over there'. As time goes on and the search continues I've found things within myself and in my immediate surroundings that have been ...well... shocking. Truth, I think can only be found if one is searching in all directions. This proccess has shown me the impact of what Gurdjieff calls buffers. As humanity covers up its lies, deception and pain, so do we as individuals. Our society is a reflection of us. We are liars. We are responsible for what is happening in the world. The cruity of the world is always and more and more becoming an aparent part of my observations of this place I live in, that I am a part of. I wonder how much time is left till the massive pile of poo hits the fan.

A University Education

2005-04-28T17:54:00.000-04:00

I recently returned to college. My heart is not into it and so I am in a place I'd never thought I'd be. This degree I think might help, even if only for a little bit to help me move overseas. The return to school certainly gave me additional shocks. In on of my classes the topic of 'why do they hate us' came up briefly. People actually said 'because of our freedoms'. I was speechless...sorta. I did have to sputter some substance of thought in spite of my baffelment. It is shocking to hear first hand a large group of people choosing to accept such stupidity as a part of their 'thinking'. How self involved is our culture when our response to people HATING us is because of our independence!! AND HOW UTTERLY FALSE!! First of all Americans do not have the flag waving freedoms we think we have. Have ya checked out the Patriot Act and the Domestic Security Enhancement Act (Patriot Act II) recently?!?!? How bout the police state that is our reality? Look around. Second, has anybody even considered that they 'hate' us (in part) because of our support of their people's slaughter via the Nazi Israeli death camps called the West Bank and Gaza??

2005-02-15T03:24:00.000-05:00

USS Maine

On Feb. 15, 1898 USS Maine suffered explosion killing 260 men - evidence
for explosion was inconclusive and contradictory yet US newspapers
demanded war with, "Remember the Maine, To Hell with Spain!" The
mud-slinging, yellow journalism is considered to have been a strong
impetus for the Spanish-American War. However, the Navy had just
expanded and had plans drawn up a year prior to attack the Spanish in
the Philippines. Commodore Dewey had also been given general orders to
attack the Spanish in the Philippines in December of 1897. Specific
orders were not ordered until after the USS Maine explosion. Congress
declared war on Spain in April 1898.
The theory of manifest destiny is also considered to have influence on
the Spanish American War. In 1845 John O'Sullivan coined the term
writting, "it was the nation's manifest destiny to overspread and to
possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the
development of the great experiment of liberty and federated
self-government entrusted to us."
In 1976, under a new investigation by Admiral H. G. Rickbover, it was
concluded that the USS Maine's explosion was an internal 'accident'
caused by a coal fire opposing the 1898 finding by U.S. Naval Court of
Inquiry that a mine blew up the Maine. This is also interesting given a
coal mine explosion occurred in China today killing 206 people.
The parallels between the events leading up to the Spanish American War
and the current 'War on Terrorism' and the War in Iraq are quite
interesting. In 1998 the PNAC already having plans to attack Iraq wrote
to Clinton trying to persuade him to do so, the events of 9/11,
patroitic slogans such as 'Never Forget', corruption of US and world
journalism, Bush's Inauguration speech of spreading freedom and liberty
to the world - these all have seemingly interesting parallels with plans
to attack the Spanish a year before any hostilities occurred, the USS
Maine explosion, patriotic slogans such as 'Remember the Maine',
corruption of US media through yellow journalism, and manifest destiny.

happy thanksgiving

2004-11-15T03:12:00.000-05:00

I think people assume that because life has gone as it has that life will go on in the same manner. Part of the problem is that people don't see the world as it is or as it has been. Illusions of comfort rule any thought. We are pleasure seekers. Addicts. Take for instance the myth of America. Founded on Freedom and Democracy? No, this country was founded on the brutal slaughter of millions of American Indians. And in a couple of weeks we'll get together with our families and rejoice in merriment over what? Cause some nice Indians gave us some corn? And then we raped, poisoned, burned, and murdered them. Thanksgiving is a feast of vainglorious gluttony. As we can never stuff our fat mouths with enough sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce, we also can never get enough of what others have and we want. This wonderful nation is founded on blood and survives only on the continuous destruction of other and its own people. It is a viscous and endless pit of egocentric consumption.

So life will go on like this. To what extent? There is more violence and war than ever. And people think humanity is more evolved now than in the past??????????? Any knowledge that has been gained in the past few millennia is used to further implement more controls, more violence, more destruction. Modern man follows systems that do not make human beings better. Religion, science, education have done NOTHING. Only to create more ignorance.

more on this later.

Ignorance

2004-11-12T23:08:00.000-05:00

First, I'd like to thank Riverbend, the blogger from Baghdad Burning . Her dedication to informing people about what is happening in Iraq is beneficial to the world. She is a little bit of light shining through the massive devastation occurring in her country.

I don't know where to start.

I can't believe how ignorant most of my fellow Americans are. Throughout the day I listen to conversations about 'I just bought a new Ford Ranger; the heated leather seats are amazing' or others of a similar nature. What is amazing is the level of chosen stupidity and ignorance most Americans have developed. Ignorance is learned, how ironic. Not only are the things we focus on shallow and meaningless, our attention span is a monster out of control. We are one massive ADD collection of people hyped up on mood altering drugs. Reality is just to painful to look at for most. Its just easier to focus on the meaningless accumulation of things rather than the way humanity really functions. I know of many who measure how much 'God' loves them by their 'blessings' of material wealth. The fact most likely is that their wealth has most likely come either through the direct or indirect suffering of others. I do believe that a 'God' exists which 'rewards and punishes' but I don't perceive that god in the same light as most. This vengeful god is more likely a representation of pure evil than anything else. A wolf in sheep's clothing. I see the religious right of 'Christian' fundamentalists as a cult of Satan worshipers. And their actions prove it.

The religious Reich in America leads the storm of blood-shed through stupidity. If I hear that Bush won because of his 'moral values' one more time I may loose control of my bodily functions and start vomiting convulsively. Brutal murderers do not have morals. Pyscopaths do not have morals. For a look at what Bush's moral values have accomplished take a look here: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2604.htm
here:
http://www.robert-fisk.com/iraqwarvictims_mar2003.htm
or in the pictures section at
www.robert-fisk.com

I'd say America is run by insanity but in truth reality is even more scarier than that. The mentally ill don't come close to the blood lusting nature of the psychopathic in office right now.

But people like that don't just come in to power accidentally. It seems American society is designed to create such people and advance them. This is an uncaring country. How many times have you heard, 'It's not personal, its business'? What this means is 'I am addicted to material luxury so much, I will annihilate anyone's life who gets in the way of my physicality fix.' And this is the american way of life. We go to school to learn and build this system of greed and material success. Who ever gets in our way, well, its not personal, its business. An so the corporations are built within the same structure of a psychopath. Neither are likey to have souls. Lies, manipulation, stepping on anyone to raise to the top, saying one thing while doing the opposite...This is our 'democratic' system as well.

For an indepth look at the psychopathic operation of American culture I suggest to read this:
http://www.cassiopaea.org/cass/official_culture.htm

This is my perception of reality. I may be wrong in part or in whole. It is just what I think is most likely to be true given the facts I have at this time. Over time new evidence can come into the picture and I may change my opinion. However, given the mountain of information that exists about all the above, I highly doubt I am wrong.

First post

2004-11-12T22:59:00.000-05:00

I'll start out with a little about my self. I'm 23 and live in America. I am not a patriot. I think most of my post will be about politics, human nature, and reality in general. I think most of humanity is asleep. I am saddened by the current world and I don't think it will be getting better any time soon.