Devin LaRue will be home soon

Hi, Just to let readers know that the owner of this blog, Devin LaRue, has been in the hospital for almost two months. He had open heart surgery and will be home in about a week.

Thanks all for keeping up the blog while he's recuperating from surgery.

Hail Devin! Get better soon!

Axis of Evil - U.S.

The War Party -- Zionism in NeoCon Foreign Policy (1/5)

“The struggle against evil is going to go on forever.” You got that right.



About this video

Connecting Israeli Zionist influence on America's Foreign Policy the BBC investigative journalism show Panorama aired The War Party on May 18th, 2003 right after the start of the Iraq War.

Key members of the Bush administration and the powerful American Enterprise Institute were part of a Israeli think tank called The Institute for Advanced Strategic & Political Studies (IASPS):

http://www.israeleconomy.org/index.php

In a report done in 1996, before the formation of PNAC, which was called "A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm" they listed Israeli goals and concerns:

REMOVING SADDAM HUSSIEN:

"Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq — an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right"

MIDDLE EAST STABILITY:

"Iraq's future could affect the strategic balance in the Middle East profoundly, it would be understandable that Israel has an interest in supporting the Hashemites in their efforts to redefine Iraq,"

CONTROL IRAQ, HELP ISRAEL:

"Were the Hashemites to control Iraq, they could use their influence over Najf to help Israel wean the south Lebanese Shia away from Hizballah, Iran, and Syria."

MANAGE AND CONSTRAIN US REACTION:

"To anticipate U.S. reactions and plan ways to manage and constrain those reactions, Prime Minister Netanyahu can formulate the policies and stress themes he favors in language familiar to the Americans by tapping into themes of American administrations during the Cold War which apply well to Israel."

Link to the full report:

http://www.iasps.org/strat1.htm

People interviewed or mentioned in this video that hold both USA and Israel citizenship and are Zionists:

Richard Perle

One of Bush's foreign policy advisors, he is the chairman of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board. Perle was expelled from Senator Henry Jackson's office in the 1970's after the National Security Agency (NSA) caught him passing Highly-Classified (National Security) documents to the Israeli Embassy. He later worked for the Israeli weapons firm, Soltam. Perle came from one the above mentioned pro-Israel think tanks, the AEI. Perle is one of the leading pro-Israeli fanatics leading this Iraq war mongering within the administration and now in the media.

Paul Wolfowitz

Former Deputy Defense Secretary, and member of Perle's Defense Policy Board, in the Pentagon. Wolfowitz is a close associate of Perle, and reportedly has close ties to the Israeli military. His sister lives in Israel. Wolfowitz came from the above mentioned Jewish think tank, JINSA. Wolfowitz was the number two leader within the administration behind this Iraq war mongering. He later was appointed head of the World Bank but resigned under pressure from World Bank members over a scandal involving his misuse of power.

David Frum

White House speechwriter behind the "Axis of Evil" label. He lumped together all the lies and accusations against Iraq for Bush to justify the war.

John Bolton

Former UN Representative and Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. Bolton is also a Senior Advisor to President Bush. Prior to this position, Bolton was Senior Vice President of the above mentioned pro-Israel think tank, AEI. In October 2002 he accused Syria of having a nuclear program, so that they can attack Syria after Iraq.

Meyrav and David Wurmser

Special Assistant to John Bolton, the under-secretary for arms control and international security. Wurmser also worked at the AEI with Perle and Bolton. Along with Colonel Yigal Carmon, formerly of Israeli military intelligence, co-founded the Middle East Media Research Institute (Memri),a Washington-based Israeli outfit which distributes articles translated from Arabic newspapers portraying Arabs in a bad light.

Eliot Cohen

Member of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board under Perle and is another extremist pro-Israel advisor. He wrote an opinion article in the Wall Street Journal openly admitting his hatred of Islam claiming that Islam should be the enemy, not terrorism.

Prominent members of the Bush administration not mentioned in the broadcast but who also hold both USA and Israeli citizenship and are Zionists:

Michael Mukasey
Michael Chertoff
Lawrence (Larry) Franklin
Douglas Feith
Henry Kissinger
I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby
Elliott Abrams
Richard Haass
Robert Zoellick
Ari Fleischer

Major Mall Maneuver

General Growth Properties Inc, the second largest U.S. mall owner, filed for bankruptcy protection on Thursday in one of the biggest real estate failures in U.S. history. Ending months of speculation, the Chicago-based mall owner, which listed total assets of $29.56 billion and total debts of $27.29 billion, sought Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection from creditors along with 158 of its more than 200 U.S. malls. General Growth's filing in the U.S. bankruptcy court in Manhattan makes it one of the largest non financial companies to succumb to the financial crisis in the U.S.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090416/bs_nm/us_generalgrowth_bankruptcy

As of the end of 2008, General Growth had $1.18 billion in past due debt and an additional $4.09 billion of debt that could be accelerated by its lenders. "Our core business remains sound and is performing well with stable cash flows," General Growth Chief Executive Adam Metz said in a statement. The hedge fund run by William Ackman also owns about 25% of General Growth Shares. Ackman, who has been urging General Growth to file for bankruptcy protection, described it as "a great company" with "phenomenal assets" at a conference on April 2. Ackman's Pershing Square Capital Management LP will provide General Growth with $375 million in financing to help run the company during the Chapter 11 process.

The Chicago-based company started when brothers Martin and Matthew Bucksbaum decided to expand the family grocery business and build a shopping center in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in 1954. General Growth's refinancing troubles in the frozen credit markets led to the firing of former Chief Executive Officer Bernard Freibaum in October. John Bucksbaum, who succeeded his father Matthew in 1999, stepped down as chief executive the same month, although he remained chairman.

Sounds like another scam is developing, as billions in "bailout" money might come their way. http://business.cbs3.com/freelunch2/?Account=cbs3&GUID=8568268&Page=MediaViewer&ChannelID=5894&Client=freelunch2
Rig the game, right Mr. Ackman?

Government-Bank Scheme

"No one pushed harder than Congressman Barney Frank to force banks and other financial institutions to reduce their mortgage lending standards, in order to meet government set goals for more home ownership. These lower mortgage lending standards are at the heart of the increased riskiness of the mortgage market and of the collapse of Wall Street securities based on these risky mortgages. Senator Christopher Dodd has played the same role in the Senate as Barney Frank played in the House of Representatives. [They] also voted for the very legislation that enabled contracted bonuses to be paid by companies like AIG that received government bailout money." --Thomas Sowell
http://www.theatheistconservative.com/tag/barneyfrank

"To force banks" is an exterior explanation obfuscating reality, since the U.S government is the agent of the Federal Reserve bankers in the first place, who intentionally engineered this upheaval while making it appear otherwise. Mr. Frank was one of their main political lackeys to implement their planned "recession" or "depression". The billions in "bail-out" money and bonuses received by these tycoons and their companies was reimbursement for their participation and collusion.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/26868968/the_dirty_dozen

"These two entities--Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac--are not facing any kind of financial crisis." --Barney Frank, 9-11-03. Mr. Frank was also involved in a homosexual relationship with Herb Moses, a senior executive at Fannie Mae.

Oddities: Reflections on Winged Humanoids

Oddities: Reflections on Winged Humanoids
By Scott Corrales
Institute of Hispanic Ufology
(c) 2009

American audiences have fallen under the spell of actor Hugh Laurie in his portrayal of the misanthropic physician Gregory House on Fox’s “House M.D.”, but fans of Mr. Laurie’s work will surely remember one of his memorable roles as an unnamed, uncredited scientist in the music video “Experiment IV” by the incomparable Kate Bush. The 1985 video, which is closer to a short subject film in its intensity, has Laurie falling prey to a winged humanoid monstrosity – a product of an experiment in sound gone awry – and the viewer only sees the terrified scientist’s reaction to the nightmarish entity, and the ultimate lapse into a catatonic state. The fear projected by the actor in that silent scene is gripping and stays with the viewer long after the video is over.

It is precisely this fear that is so well described in the Mexican reported just last week, when “El Heraldo de Chihuahua” published the story of a young man who had been terrified by a vast, winged humanoid form that kept pace with his Jeep even as he tried to outrun it (Mexico: Panic Over "Humanoid" in Chihuahua – March 27, 2009 – www.inexplicata.blogspot.com) We need only watch Hugh Laurie’s performance as the terrified scientist to imagine the expression on the student’s face as he was confronted by the apparition. An older person would probably have succumbed to a massive heart attack, which is precisely what happened to a Puerto Rican sugarcane cutter in 1995, when giant winged creatures were reported on the island, harbingers to the “Chupacabras” manifestations later that same year.

Despite their markedly different climatic conditions, steamy Puerto Rico and dusty northern Mexico share an unlikely common characteristic. For generations, ranging as far back as the 19th century, they have been the source of reports of winged entities of all sorts – not just “Thunderbird”-type manifestations, but flying anthropomorphic creatures that appear in waves. Popular tradition holds that such beings live in caves, whether in the hot dry Sierra Madre or limestone caves in the Caribbean karst region of northern Puerto Rico, which would offer great shelter for the creatures described. But what would they eat? Are they responsible for animal mutilations, or worse yet, reports of missing humans? It is likelier that we are dealing with a truly interdimensional phenomenon that is able to manifest itself “when the stars are right”, in true Lovecraftian fashion.

That said, one must hasten to add that these two locations cannot be said to have a monopoly on these creatures. The Mothman could not come from a more different location, and its background differs widely from that of its southern kin. Other winged humanoids are described as being headless, and the antiquity of these reports is attested by the fact that spellbooks from the late Roman Empire offer magical spells against the appearance of precisely such creatures.

The Watchman and the Winged Ones

On August 31, 1967, José Padrón, a watchman at a construction site in San Luis Potosí, was about to turn in for the night within the cramped confines of the site’s guardhouse. At around 1:00 a.m., he found himself stirred from his slumber by a noise --- someone or something large was making its way around the motor pool. Bears are not uncommon in northern Mexico, so one could have come down from the mountains to forage. Intruders, whether ursine or human, did not worry Padrón in the least: the latter were usually small-time thieves after spare parts for quick resale, or local adolescent vandals.

But when the watchman stepped out of the tin-roofed guardhouse, the last thing he was expecting to see was a vast, winged shape heading toward him, striding like a giant. It was the set of wings that etched itself into Padrón’s mind. He would later described them as comparable to those of a small aircraft, and the noise was apparently made as the creature tried to fly away from the construction site.

Outmatched by the intruder, the watchman ran for the precarious safety of the guardhouse, from which he did not emerge until the following day, when Enrique Rueda, the site’s supervising engineer, found the watchman cowering inside. We can only assume that Rueda listened dispassionately to Padrón’s account of the events, wondering how much pulque – fermented maguey juice – the man had consumed before passing out. But any doubts in the engineer’s mind were dispelled when he saw footprints not far from the guardhouse.

When measured, the indentations on the sandy ground measured slightly over twelve inches across and were six inches deep – requiring a force estimated at nearly six hundred pounds to create, by Rueda’s reckoning.

With the possible exception of the repeated sightings of West Virginia’s Mothman, events of this kind appear to be a one-off event: the witnesses see the entity once and never again. But night watchman José Padrón was to have the dubious pleasure of a repeat visit from the winged humanoid on the following night...and on this occasion, it brought a friend.

Stifling his panic, Padrón took a long, hard look at the entities, which left numerous footprints behind as they made their way around the construction site, in search of food, building materials for an unimaginable eyrie in the mountains, who knows. But the initial winged creature and his mate eventually flew into the darkness, heading toward the San Miguelito Mountains. Padrón was able to add an extra detail that perhaps dovetailed with engineer Rueda’s calculations of the creature’s weight: the ground shook as the creatures took off from the premises. Other evidence suggested that a mesquite branch had been snapped in two as one of the creatures flew by, no small feat considering the strength of the tree. No samples of hair or feathers were in evidence, either.

Prudently, the supervising engineer ordered that the night watch be increased to twelve unarmed men.

Hector Urdiales, a member of Mexico's Cosmos A.C. paranormal research foundation, decided to lead an investigation on Easter Week, 1984 to a seldom-visited area located behind Monterrey's Cerro de la Silla, an enormous, irregular-shaped hill dominating the city. Stories of a monstrous winged being prowling the area had come to Urdiales' attention. Accompanied by a friend, the explorer stopped at a roadside general store on the road to San Roque, N.L. where he interviewed the owner, who was among the many witnesses to the creature. They followed his indications as to where to camp and mount their watch.

Nothing unusual happened during their first day and night on in the area. On the following morning, while combing the banks of a stream running through a copse of savins, Urdiales and his companion made a chilling discovery.

The grass at the base of one of the trees by the stream was covered in the fly-covered blood and entrails of an unknown animal. Closer inspection revealed that the savin's entire trunk was streaming with blood flowing from above. Hesitantly they followed the trail of blood with their eyes until they came upon a surreal sight: some twenty feet off the ground, a large boar had been split open and spitted to a tree limb. Fear washed over the researchers, since they realized that the tall savin lacked the strong lower limbs which would have assisted a human to deliver the grisly cargo to such a dizzying height; nor could their minds conjure up any feline predator strong enough to drag a two-hundred pound boar up a cactus. Only a carnivorous winged predator having the wingspan and talons needed to attack that kind of prey could have possibly been responsible for the carnage.

On July 20, 1994, a farm worker at Rancho El Sabino in Monterrey was heading back to his house to have lunch at around eleven o'clock in the morning. As he walked past a nearby graveyard, the farm worker noticed something emerge from a another footpath at a distance of some hundred feet: as he got closer, he realized that he was looking at a half-human, half-avian creature which seemed indifferent to the startled human's presence. The creature continued to walk, chicken-like, down the footpath until it reached a crossroads. The birdman then flexed its enormous wings and turned down another path. By the time the farm-worker reached the same intersection, the aberrant figure was now half a mile ahead of him until he lost it from sight altogether.

Mexican UFO researcher and author Luis Ramírez Reyes makes the following statement in his book Contacto:Mexico (Diana, 1996): "When I learned that Norma Bancroft-Hunt' book Les peuples du Totem presents a sculpture of the conmemorative image of an Owlman--known as Tlingkit among the Yakutat--which according to legend, lived until its death in Icy Bay in 1890 due to a fall from a tree. Its body was never found, since it was devoured by crows, but a totem pole was subsequently carved out of the tree from which it fell. The image reminded me of the gigantic owl which appeared before me as a young man when I lived with my family in the city of Chihuahua in the early Sixties. It gave me such a fright that I ran and hid in my bedroom [...]. Most impressive of all was its size, which was approximately 1.50 meters (5 ft.) tall." Again, we see Chihuahua mentioned as a place where such unusual occurrences appear to be common.

It isn’t often that researchers of the paranormal get to have a close look at their subject of interest, and whenever there are exceptions, these tend to be significant. One such case involves the director Mexico’s Fundación Cosmos, A.C., Ing. Marco Reynoso, a distinguished UFO researcher and MUFON state director for Nuevo León. In the fall of 1979, Reynoso was a harried engineering student trying his best to deal with a heavy course load and work on his dissertation. One night, leaving the university earlier than usual, he arrived at his parents’ house – a rambling, high-ceilinged old manse of the kind common in Mexico – whose kitchen can be clearly seen from the main entrance.

All was dark; Reynoso’s father never got back from work before ten o’clock and his mother was out visiting neighbors. The only light came from a single bulb in the kitchen, casting enough light to show the kitchen table, which was located next to a window covered by a curtain.

Making his way to the kitchen to grab a bite to eat, the future ufologist noticed movement behind the curtain, but thought it was the normal action of the wind blowing through the open window. Then suddenly, a figure stepped out from behind the curtain: it was a humanoid figure, covered in glossy black hair and standing some thirty centimeters tall with outstretched bat wings. The curtain partly covered its face, so Reynoso was unable to make out any features. Fearlessly, he thought to use the curtain as a means to ensnare the strange apparition and pin it down, but the cloth drapes were suddenly sucked toward the open window, toppling objects on the table surface, and the bizarre creature vanished. Running out to the courtyard, he tried to see if he could find the intruder to no avail.

That’s when fear crept in: “I was completely certain that it was no optical illusion,” says Reynoso, “nor any known animal. The contrast between the kitchen and its contents, which were all white, and the blackness of the creature, left no mistake as to what I had seen. That event changed my life completely, since it highlighted the interest for the unknown I’d had since age 8.” The experience prompted him to join his first UFO research group, in whose files he found another case similar to his own, witnessed by a woman from another Monterrey neighborhood.


South American Oddities

But these events cannot be safely relegated to the 1960s: in the early years of the present decade, the South American republic of Chile found itself besieged for a number of months by a situation similar to what had been experienced in Puerto Rico in 1995 – sightings of winged humanoids, followed by the predatory “Chupacabras”

On April 29 2000, farm worker Jorge Pino reported seeing a strange creature at 8pm under full moonlight. He described as standing 1.50 meters and resembling “a big monkey with , clawed arms, enormous fangs, and wings.” The farmhand sent his mastiff is sent to attack the terrifying presence, and the animal returned to its master with a bloody neck to show for its troubles. Within weeks, farmers from Tucapel and Huepil were engaged in earnest discussions about something they called el pájaro (The Bird) whose manifestations were accompanied by unusual luminous phenomena and animal mutilations. In early May of that year, as livestock deaths continued to mount, an officer of the Chilean state police reported seeing something like “a giant bat” engaging in depredations near the city of Angol. Possibly the closest encounter with one of these entities occurred on May 5, 2000, when Prof. Liliana Romero heard a noise in the courtyard of her building shortly after midnight. Peering through a window to ascertain the cause of the disturbance, she was startled to see “an immense man, standing two meters tall, his shoulder blades split as though by a pair of wings.”

The most intriguing case of the Chilean wave of events occurred in the Summer of 2003, when researcher Jaime Ferrer of the Calama UFO Center made known the story of a young student known only as “Diego”, a resident of Calama who made frequent trips to the desert community of San Pedro de Atacama to visit his grandfather. In these visits he was usually accompanied by this two closest friends, known only as Jonathan and Carlos.

Around 21:00 hours on July 23, as the young men were ready to sit down to frugal dinner, they were startled by the howing of the local dogs, who ran to and fro in a frantic effort to get away from something. The visitors to the small rural house were further alarmed by violent blows rained against the door less than a quarter of an hour later: something very large and strong was clawing at the door, trying to get to them. “Terror seized them,” wrote Ferrer in his report, “ and the youngsters feared for their lives.”

Huddling under blankets and praying fervently that the rickety wooden door would somehow withstand the pounding, Diego heard his grandfather’s voice saying that it was safe to come out, and that “it” had gone away. Or had it?

The three visitors went outside for a look, trying to recover from their fright, when they noticed that “it’ was standing among the pear trees, standing at least a meter and a half tall, with outspread wings that measured three and a half feet on each side.

Ferrer writes that “it was covered by glossy black skin, very clean and hairless. It appeared as though it had recently emerged from the water, but without being wet. It had a large head and a small beak, presenting a sort of crest which was apparently missing a piece from a fight. Its eyes were immense and completely black, but sparkled brilliantly. They thought it was a prehistoric being, since its wings had a strong resemblance to those of
pterodactyls or bats, featuring bone-like protuberances which form the
skeletal frame of the wings. Its legs were sturdy and had powerful claws
like those of a carrion bird, but much stronger.”

The Paranormal Angle

Earlier it was mentioned that these creatures are often described as being “headless” – a description offered a few times in the Mothman reports of 1966-67. In fact, some sketches depict the entity thus. It is curious to note that the rituals of the ancient Coptic church (one of the oldest branches of the Christian faith) contain explicit prayers against the presence of "headless demons", such as the one appearing in the Zereteli-Tiflis collection, described as "a text containing a spell to provide protection against headless demons and powers that are bothering the person invoking angels and archangels". Another such amulet invokes the virgin Mary's protection against a headless dog: "because I am having a clash with a headless dog, seize him when he comes and release me..." (Ancient Christian Magic: Coptic Texts of Ritual Power, Princeton: 1999). One wonders if this orison would have worked against the bat-winged, headless "Mothman" of West Virginia or a similar entity seen landing on a field in Britain in 1965. Or even the Iberian Peninsula: Salvador Freixedo mentions a 1963 case from the Andorran town of Comarruga involving Mr. Sesplugues, a hotelier, who was driving toward Tarragona with his wife on a cold November evening. The drive was uneventful until “they saw a creature crossing the road at a distance of one hundred fifty meters, which they described as being generally man-shaped, but headless.”

Even the oceans are not safe from these visitations: on August 10, 2004, Puerto Rico’s El Vocero tabloid ran a story about castaways from the Dominican Republic. Seventy-nine people boarded a fragile vessel in the hopes of reaching the Puerto Rico, and after twelve days at the mercy of the wind and the waves, only thirty-seven survived to tell the tale...a tale of the horrors of the elements, and of the supernatural. When interviewed by the newspaper, one of the undocumented survivors told reporters that a "monster" with vast wings appeared before them. Filled with panic and fear, they began to read a book of the New Testament they carried aboard their yowl, but that the pages of the holy text vanished mysteriously from their hands.

Chilean researcher Osvaldo Muray covered a story of apparent demonic possession in the high-rise community of Juanita Aguirre outside of Santiago de Chile. A young lay preacher known only as “N.U.” became the subject of this possession event following a strange occurrence: one evening in the early 1990s, a friend stopped by to visit N.U. and spoke to her from the street level, while N.U. looked out her window. According to Muray, the friend noticed something very strange: a very strange bird was watching their conversation from the topmost branches of a pine tree close to the building. Between the light and the shadows, the person on the ground realized that the bird was not a bird at all, but a winged human. When interviewed, the friend told Muray that his “sixth sense” told him something was seriously wrong, and he advised N.U. to close her window and go to bed. He himself raced back to his automobile and headed home.

Conclusions

This is by no means an exhaustive listing of cases that have occurred in Latin America involving “winged weirdoes”, and they represent but a fraction of the recorded cases in the Americas. What are we to make of these entities? Are they real in the sense that a horse or a bear are real, or are they merely physical manifestations of something that comes in (“when the stars are right”, of course) from another level of reality? One can well ask what is it about our dimension that compels these entities to appear, and speculation on the subject ranges from an inevitable attraction to places where tragedies have occurred, entities that appear as byproducts of black magic operations and are unable to “return” to their place of origin. It has been argued that they “slip in” with the UFO phenomenon, perhaps swept along as these lights or objects enter and leave our dimension. The mystery remains.

The Six African-American Presidents

By Joan d’Arc




Abraham Africanus I. [from old catalog]. Main Title: His secret life. Library of Congress, LC Control Number: 12007713.


Barack Obama is not the first African-American President of the United States. According to several books, at least five, if not six, former Presidents of the United States had African ancestry. Let’s begin with one of the more, well, black and white examples:

Warren G. Harding, who held office from 1921 to 1923, reportedly never denied his African ancestry. A family genealogy written by William Chancellor, professor of economics and politics at Wooster College in Ohio, identified African ancestors on both sides of Harding’s family tree. Indeed, Harding was an Alumni of Iberia College (now known as Ohio Central College), which was founded to educate fugitive slaves. It is claimed that the Justice Department bought up and destroyed all copies of the genealogy.

In her book, Warren G. Harding U.S. President 29 (Death by Blackness), Harding’s descendant Marsha Stewart writes, “While growing up, we were never allowed to talk about the relationship to a U.S. President outside of family gatherings because we were ‘colored’ and Warren was ‘passing.’ In 1884 he was a teacher at the local ‘colored school’ in Marion, Ohio, until he crossed the color line and became the 29th President of the U.S. Biographies written about Harding are quick to note his parents were descendants of Ohio pioneer families with English and Dutch ancestry when, in reality, both of his parents were Negroes whose ancestors escaped through the Underground Railroad.” Chillingly, she claims, “he may have lost his life because of it.” (Amazon.com).

In his book, The Strange Death of President Harding, former FBI Agent Gaston B. Means claims Harding was poisoned on a trip to Alaska with his entourage. Means had been hired as a private detective in 1921 by Mrs. Harding. Harding died during his third year in office and was succeeded by Vice President Calvin Coolidge. After his death a series of scandals judged his presidency among the worst in American history.

Andrew Jackson, the 7th President from 1829 to 1837, was the son of an Irish woman and a Negro slave. According to the Virginia Magazine of History (Vol. 29) Andrew Jackson Sr. died long before Andrew Jr. was born, although mainstream history books claim he was born only three weeks after his father’s death. It is claimed that after her husband’s death, Elizabeth Jackson moved to the Crawford farm in South Carolina and that one of the Negro slaves on the farm was Andrew’s father. Both David Coyle’s book Ordeal of the Presidency and the Virginia Magazine of History make the compelling claim that Andrew Jackson had an older brother who was sold into slavery in the Carolinas. Although it is known that poor white children were kidnapped, tanned and sold into slavery in the 17th and 18th centuries when white slavery was rampant (see, Michael Hoffman, They were White and They were Slaves), it is unlikely that this brother was a “white slave” at this late date.

Thomas Jefferson, the 3rd President from 1801 to 1809, was the son of a part Indian woman and a Virginia mulatto father, according to Thomas Hazard in his book The Johnny Cake Papers, written in 1867. In addition, writing in 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro With Complete Proof, Joel A. Rogers claims, “Thomas Jefferson, third President of the United States and father of the Declaration of Independence, was the father of a large number of mulatto children. His wife protested loud and long to no avail."

According to Samuel Sloan in The Slave Children of Thomas Jefferson, when his mother, Jane Randolph Jefferson, died on March 31, 1776, Jefferson went to “psychopathic lengths” to destroy all of her papers, portraits and personal effects in order, perhaps, to hide the details of his heritage.

Although it has not been proven that Thomas Jefferson himself had black heritage, there has been a persistent rumor that he did sire several children with Sally Hemings, one of his 200 slaves. According to web article, “Thomas Jefferson's Black Children,” the rumor began in 1802 during his presidency when someone claimed Jefferson had fathered children by one of his slaves. Jefferson didn't respond. But in 1873 a man named Madison Hemings told a newspaper that Jefferson was his father. Sally Hemings claimed Jefferson was the father of all six of her children. A man named Dr. Eugene A. Foster claims to have tested Jefferson's descendants and Hemings' descendants, finding they both had Jefferson as a forefather.”

William Jefferson Clinton, the 42nd President, is alleged to be a descendent of one of the slave children of Thomas Jefferson. According to a web article entitled “President Clinton’s Unknown Father,” Clinton is a descendant of Thomas Jefferson Blythe, one of the slave children of Thomas Jefferson. Thus, if we discount Thomas Jefferson himself as being African-American, we need to consider his descendent Bill Clinton, as a black man.

Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President from 1861 to 1865, was the illegitimate son of an African man, according to his mother, Nancy Hanks, writes Joel A. Rogers. Indeed, Lincoln’s Presidential opponents made cartoon drawings of him as a Negro and nicknamed him “Abraham Africanus the First.” William Herndon, Lincoln's law partner, said that Lincoln had very dark skin and coarse hair, and also made the claim that his mother was from an Ethiopian tribe; although his mother claimed it was the father who was African. In his book The Hidden Lincoln, Herndon wrote that Thomas Lincoln could not have been Abraham Lincoln's father because he was sterile from childhood mumps and was later castrated. Herndon, of course, had a reputation for making unfounded charges, but according to Wiki.Answers.com: Question: “Was Abraham Lincoln an African-American?” Answer: “Yes.”

Calvin Coolidge, the 30th President from 1923 to 1929, often claimed his mother was dark because of mixed Indian ancestry. According to Dr. Auset Bakhufu in Six Black Presidents: Black Blood, White Masks, by approximately the year 1800 New England Indians had intermarried with African-Americans and there were hardly any pure Indians left. According to Bakhufu, Coolidge's mother's maiden name was Moor. In Europe the term Moor was given to all African peoples just as the term Negro was used in America.

Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th President, grew up in Hawaii, raised by his white grandmother. Some doubt Obama’s American citizenship. According to Obama's paternal grandmother, as well as his half-brother and half-sister, Obama was born in Kenya, not in Hawaii.


References

Bakhufu, Auset. Six Black Presidents: Black Blood, White Masks, Pik2 Pubs. (1993).

Coyle, David, Ordeal of the Presidency (1960).

Means, Gaston B. The Strange Death of President Harding, University Press of the Pacific (2001)

Rogers, Joel A. 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro With Complete Proof, Helga M. Rogers (1980).

Stewart, Marsha, Warren G. Harding U.S. President 29 (Death by Blackness), Conquering Books (2005).

Vaughn, Leroy. “The Five Black Presidents of The United States Of America,” www.computerhealth.org/ebook/5blkpres.htm, from the book, Black People and their Place in World History.

“Thomas Jefferson’s Black Children,” http://www.keynews.org/archives/a_jefferson.htm


“President Clinton’s Unknown Father,” http://www.anusha.com/billsdad.htm


Addendum

From Wiki.Answers:

Question: Was Warren G Harding of African descent; is he black?
Answer: You tell me. Who knows.



Question: Was Abraham Lincoln an African-American?
Answer: Yes.



Question: Was Andrew Jackson part black?
Answer: Yes... His mother was a white woman from Ireland and had him with a black man. His Father's other children (who were black) were sold into slavery.



Question: Was Thomas Jefferson black?
Answer: He wasn’t black.... but there is serious evidence that he had kids with one of his slaves.



Question: Was Bill Clinton a black man?
Answer: No, he was white. Still is, matter of fact!



Yes, but if he’s a descendant of Thomas Jefferson …. Well, you tell me!

Rethink Afghanistan

What is REALLY bringing down the economy?

$185 billion already spent on the War in Afghanistan.

For what?

Cost of War, part 3 of the Rethink Afghanistan documentary by Brave New, delves into the financial costs of this broadening war.

As we pay our tax bills, it seems an appropriate time to urge everyone to Rethink Afghanistan, a war that currently costs over $2 billion a month but hasn't made us any safer. Everyone has a friend or relative who just lost a job. Do we really want to spend over $1 trillion on another war? Everyone knows someone who has lost their home. Do we really want spend our tax dollars on a war that could last a decade or more?





or see all three videos here:


http://rethinkafghanistan.com/videos.php

The Art of Taunting, revised/expanded/complete

The final chapter in my "Orwellian Notes" series of investigative articles evolved to a format of satire to preserve perspective on insanity...

Lots of new, frighteningly real new information derived from reliable sources by the former special forces operations and intelligence sergeant and retired civil investigator in his alter ego 'penucquem'

Point shaving arguments before the Supreme Court to benefit corporations, releasing highly trained sociopathic killers into society that should be in jail for life for wars crimes, Bible study freaks that just happen to be American commanding generals plot prophecy fullfillment to achieve Armageddon, and much, much more from the author who has escaped multiple assassination attempts and survived to post this... Many thanks to paranoidsonline ;)

The article title (above) is the link to Orwellian Notes Part 3

Wings are for Freedom!

Good one Damien!

Like I said earlier, it’s 1995 all over again. They're coming for the "right wing" again.

1995 Clinton White House Memo: “Bill Cooper is the most dangerous talk show host in America.”

Only thing now is there are more internet “talk show hosts” and we all (most of us) understand that the “left wing” or “right wing” is a contrivance which serves to divide and conquer. Don’t fall for it. Wings are for freedom! Use them properly.

Refresh your memory. History spins in a spiral. It's Deja Vu all over again. This all happened 15 years ago circa Ruby Ridge, OK Bombing.

The Legacy of William Cooper

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2829245257205113781


P.S. I also want to point out that what Bill Cooper is talking about in this video is a document found in a copy machine at Boeing called Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars, which was later discovered to have been written by Hartford Van Dyke.

http://www.paranoiamagazine.com/vandykeletters.html

Cooper’s quote: “a nation or world of people who will not use their intelligence are no better than animals who do not have intelligence. Such people are beasts of burden and steaks on the table by choice and consent.”

People still don’t get that Cooper didn’t write this.

It comes from:

Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars
(Excerpt and Introduction)
Operations Research Technical Manual (TM-SW 7905.1)
By Hartford Van Dyke

http://www.paranoiamagazine.com/silentweapons.html

Homeland Security

"A newly unclassified Department of Homeland Security report warns against the possibility of violence by unnamed "right-wing extremists" concerned about illegal immigration, increasing federal power, restrictions on firearms, abortion and the loss of U.S. sovereignty and singles out returning war veterans as particular threats."

http://washingtontimes.com/news/2009/apr/14/federal-agency-warns-of-radicals-on-right/

"The nine page document was sent to police and sheriff's departments across the United States on April 7." Homeland Security spokeswoman Sara Kuban said the report is one in an ongoing series of assessments by the department to "facilitate a greater understanding of the phenomenon of violent radicalization in the U.S. Since its inception in 2003, the Department has focused primarily on radicalization of Muslims and the prospect of homegrown Islamist terrorism."

It appears now that the government is becoming more inclusive in who they categorize as "enemies of the state." The "war on terror" (which has been officially retired) was instituted as a means to gradually shape the U.S. into a communist-style police state. The 'muslim threat' has been utilized as an ulterior stratagem to eventually encompass and criminalize non-Muslim American citizens as terrorist blocs; i.e., those who oppose the state's continual unfolding tyranny. As each year progresses the power of the state will inevitably increase, due to "terrorism" committed, desired or allowed by the state itself and then blamed on real or fictitious people, just like 9/11. They are now intending to incorporate wholesale, non-muslims into their 'terrorist' classification, for they are possibly aware their upcoming sociopolitical plans for America could encounter some "resistance" from "patriots" who are in violation of the "Patriot Act". Thus in theory at least, they can preempt any mass action or armed rebellion on the part of outraged protesters. (I doubt it, for how a nation addicted to alcohol, drugs, porn, TV, and sports can revolt should be explained).

"A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude." --Aldous Huxley

Their anti-terrorist and surveillance measures are not about "prevention" but about power. Once attained, it can only expand until all are sufficiently enslaved, according to the ideology of the plutocratic oligarchy which governs the western world.

"We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness; only power, pure power. The more the Party is powerful, the less it will be tolerant; the weaker the opposition, the tighter the despotism." --Orwell, 1984

The Israel Lobby Controversy

The Israel Lobby Controversy
Elite Factionalism or Elite Conspiracy Theory?

“The criticism surrounding The Israel Lobby paper was sparked by the fact that two card-carrying members of the American intellectual establishment finally pointed out the elephant in the room.”

by Will Banyan


The publication in March 2006 of The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, as a working paper for the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and as an article in the London Review of Books, aroused much comment in the American media and academia -- most condemnatory. The authors, academics John Mearsheimer from the University of Chicago, and Stephen Walt from Harvard University, have had their work widely dismissed as being both conspiratorial and anti-Semitic.

"[T]his paper is anti-Semitic" declared Professor Eliot Cohen from Johns Hopkins University, in the Washington Post (April 5, 2006); nor was it "research in any serious sense," claimed Marty Peretz in The New Republic, but "the labor of obsessives with dark and conspiratorial minds." According to Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz, the authors shared with white supremacist David Duke "the same interest in vilifying Jewish leaders and spouting conspiracy theories about Zionist plots against American interests" (Dershowitz 41). Even Stephen Zunes, a left-wing critic of U.S. support for Israel, implied that in subscribing to an "exaggerated claim of Jewish clout," Mearsheimer and Walt were "flirting with anti-Semitism" (Zunes 2006a, 15).

At the same time, there were some observers who were clearly overjoyed at the appearance of The Israel Lobby as it seemed to confirm their belief that the U.S. is, in fact, ruled by a "Zionist Occupation Government," or some other sinister Jewish cabal. David Duke, for example, praised it for having "told the truth about the proverbial gorilla in the room: the Zionist lobby and its enormous political and media power" (Duke 2006). The Israel Lobby, claimed a commentator for Rense.com, left "absolutely no doubt that Israel not only controls our entire government, our Pentagon, our foreign policy and our political parties, but our media as well" (Lang 2006).

Missing from these critiques and the praise - most of which represented the paper as a conspiratorial account of Jewish influence over U.S. foreign policy - was any acknowledgement of Mearsheimer and Walt’s careful caveats to the contrary. Some were explicit: "the Lobby’s activities are not a conspiracy of the sort depicted in tracts like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion." To be sure, Mearsheimer and Walt attribute to the Lobby an "ability to manipulate the American political system," but they stress that it is not "a unified movement with central leadership," but an ethnic lobby; one of many, though arguably the most successful (Mearsheimer and Walt 14-16).

According to Walt, the firestorm of criticism surrounding The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy was not sparked by what they said, but by "the fact that two card-carrying members of the American intellectual establishment finally pointed out the elephant in the room" (Washington Times, August 29, 2006). But why did they say it?

Aside from viewing The Israel Lobby controversy as confirming the unpalatable anti-Semitic nightmares of David Duke and others, there are from a conspiratorial perspective at least two more plausible ways of interpreting the storm.

The first is to see The Israel Lobby as a well-crafted attempt to divert blame for the costly debacle that the invasion of Iraq has become from the rest of the Establishment, especially the oil lobby, to the age-old scapegoat, the Jews (Zunes 2006a; Peretz 2006). In this counter-narrative Israel is the victim. Consider Zunes’ commentary on Israel’s recent attack on Lebanon - a military adventure he suggests Israel instigated "largely at the behest of the United States" - where Israel is painted as a U.S. "proxy in the Middle East." Zunes contends this use of Israel "corresponds to historic anti-Semitism" with the ruling elite using the Jews as the "most visible agents of the oppressive social order," who were always "convenient scapegoats" when the elites were seeking to redirect the anger of the restive masses. So now the scapegoating continues, evident in the blame placed on the "Zionist lobby" by Establishment critics (Zunes 2006b).

The second and more plausible interpretation (in this author’s opinion) is that the Mearsheimer-Walt paper is another salvo in an ongoing struggle between competing elites for control of the War on Terror. Rather than the U.S. power-elite being a monolithic entity, the increasingly shrill dispute over The Israel Lobby paper reveals that the fissures at the highest levels of the food chain have become deep and suppurating.

Rather than being a crude attempt to unfairly smear a single ethnic lobby, there really is an Israel Lobby (as AIPAC’s own website proudly attests), which has been successful (despite some exaggerations), and not surprisingly its agenda is opposed by elements in the Establishment. The paper suggested that the usual suspects in most conspiratorial accounts of the "New World Order" -- the Council on Foreign Relations, Trilateral Commission and Bilderbergers -- have some serious competition when it comes to influencing American foreign policy.

Continuing on with the argument raised in an earlier piece (Banyan 2006), it is the contention of this article that while the Mearsheimer-Walt article perhaps overstates the influence of the Israel Lobby, it exposes an aspect of elite factionalism missing from most mainstream and alternative narratives of the seemingly endless War on Terror.



Continue reading at:

http://www.paranoiamagazine.com/israellobby.html

Waking up Canadian!

The new law

A new law will come into effect on April 17, 2009, amending the Citizenship Act. The new law will give Canadian citizenship to certain individuals who lost it and to others who will be recognized as citizens for the first time. This includes people who lost their citizenship as minors as long as they were born or naturalized in Canada or born outside Canada to a Canadian parent in the first generation born abroad. Citizenship will be automatic and retroactive to the date of loss or the date of birth, depending on the situation. All individuals who are Canadian citizens at the time the law comes into effect will keep their citizenship.

Until the new law comes into effect, the current law will apply. This means that people who will become citizens under the new law are not citizens yet. Once the new law comes into effect, these people may apply for proof of citizenship.


http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/media/facts/lost.asp


Guess who might be waking up Canadian?

Yeah, me!

Ritual Abuse Conference August 14-16, 2009

A conference to help survivors of severe child abuse (ritual abuse) and torture will be held on August 14 - 16, 2009, between 8 - 5 PM Saturday and Sunday at the DoubleTree Hotel near Bradley International Airport, 16 Ella Grasso Turnpike, Windsor Locks, CT 06096 (between Hartford, CT and Springfield, MA). This conference will help educate survivors of this abuse and their helpers. Pre-registration is preferred. For information write S.M.A.R.T., P. O Box 1295, Easthampton, MA 01027-1295 E-mail: smartnews@aol.com, conference information is at: http://ritualabuse.us/smart-conference/”

Jesus is Dead Again (A Cautionary Tale)

by Francis D. Grabau

Right on schedule, as usual, once a year during Holy Week on the "Good Friday" which precedes his glorious Ressurrection the following Monday. Yep, "they" nailed him to a cross again around 3:00 PM Jerusalem time. If you are or ever were an old fashioned Roman Catholic you know these things because you were taught that all people are living as ONE in "The Mystical Body Of Christ" and time is nothing but a "veil" which Christ has come to tear asunder. So Jesus is just finished with his agonizing hang on the cross for being a dangerous and homelessly vagrant (loud-mouth) criminal. And, of course, it was the State that ordered the execution -the State of Rome under the reign of Emperor Tiberius. All the phony Christians wallow today in the nearly 2000 year old movie called "The Passion of the Christ" ...a gory saga all about torture, violence, blasphemy, and murder while they pretend to be "sorry" about the whole thing since he died "for their sins". Fact is, they could give a shit -especially the American Phony Christians among them- just as they could give a shit about their current (Saviour) President's blasphemous lies concerning our ongoing torture, violence, and murder of the common people of Iraq, Afghanistan, or Pakistan or, ...well -just fill in the blank.

It hurts, I know that you know that we all know these truths. We are Guilty as charged whether or not we personally tow the Jesus line because we Americans are members in good standing of the new Christian American Empire called the CCC in honor of the KKK where the Trinity of politically correct C's indicative of the mystical bond between Corporate, Christian, and Capitalist stand in for and replace the otherwise obviously dreadful K's that we like to pretend no longer exist. Hey, it's Easter, slice the ham, eat the yams, snort a brew. Forget about the crown of thorns. Death and taxes never go away, right? Yeah, sigh, let's relax with our family and kids and sink back into our comfortably tired apathy. After all, after the Fall we are nothing more than lazy sinners descended one by one from Adam and Eve. Wall Street wants you to remember this whole economic collapse is your fault or your neighbors. The all seeing Eye at the top of the Pyramid Dollar knows you guys have been living on bad credit! Besides, whether you think you believe it or not -we all murdered Jesus.

Christians love their tape-loop, that instant replay meme allowing them to unsheath the double edged sword of their sado-masochistic appetite for pain, suffering, and universal injustice because, I suppose, we're a very odd group of self-deceived zealots. Hey, it's Good Friday so the more blood and gore, the more pain and lying we can stack up today the Gooder this Good Friday will be. Yummy yummy we got God in our tummy. Digest it fully, this is the day that commemorates and exults pain, torture and bloody death. The most agonizing day in the politically enforced Christian calendar round. It all attests to the Glory of their Bloody God, of his Father, and of the Dysfunctional Spirit that comprises the third part of this Trinity (pyramid scheme) of Aloof Sadists.

They used to illustrate the Holy Trinity for us as kids in school reading the Baltimore Catechism. It was usually drawn as a Triangle-Pyramid with an All-Seeing Eye at the top. Today internet conspiracy folks recognize that drawing as the symbol of the Illuminati, a vaguely defined amalgam of Bilderbergers, Skull & Bonesmen, World Bankers, Knights of Malta, Freemasons, Talmudists, Jesuits and only God knows who else since the list is very long and frustrating to contemplate, but the single unifying theme they all share is that they are the Illuminated Ones, Superior, Chosen People. All washed in the Blood of the Lamb. Of course Jesus was a male so it really should read, -washed in the Blood of the Ram. But that smacks of the Golden Fleece and they sure can't afford to give their game away with that phrase, now can they!

Break out the colorful baskets full of shredded celophane, the jelly beans, the bunny rabbits and the plastered phony smiles. Easter is coming! I know you all realize what I'm talking about, I just need to do an Exorcism to puke this wicked pablum fed to me as a child out of my system. And you do, too, because it's still being fed to us everyday of our lives. But how are we supposed to do that when these crazed sadists are still running the whole planet and you know there's going to be yet another Easter egg hunt on the White House lawn where the Obama Holy Mulatto Family (see, Christians ain't racist -unless they distrust Lord Obama!) are growing their newly planted organic garden ... though Michelle and Barack were certainly not around lately to water and tend their PR Plot since they were fully occupied preaching to all of Europe and hobnobbing with Queens, Presidents, and Heads of States. All the Ceasars plotting the death of all the rabble rousing Street Christs.

The Christos, you know, is (literally means) the Annointed One bathed in the River Jordan by the Prophet, John the Baptist. Today this Jordan River is fully contaminated with goodies like depleted Uranium and the Chosen People have built dams on both its major tributaries as well, so the river is pretty much a cesspool of radioactive filth by the time it reaches its termination in the appropriately named Dead Sea. Christians love Uranium, they refine and enrich it into something they call "Yellow Cake" before they turn it into bombs and bullets with which to kill each other. Well, no suprise there I suppose because the Chosen People of the Annointed One can't ever seem to get enough of bathing each other in blood, -though they do go especially out of their way to torture and kill all the Non-Chosen Ones who cannot abide their Radiantly Glowing God. Sort of like Capitalist Nations looking down on their poorer 'Third World' relatives by way of toxic loans from the International Money Fund and the World Bank. Who ever would have thought that a poor and homeless street fighter would be invoked as justification for such mad activities? Jesus, the ragman, consorting with the likes of fishermen and whores, arguing with tax collectors, denouncing High Priests in the Sanhedrin has become the God of the Christian bankers and bomb makers who think he wants them to trash everything and everyone who stands in the way of his promised Armageddon. Meanwhile they go ahead and get while the gettin is good, praise Jesus!

Christianity, you see, is a Death Cult and its Roman Catholic branch is currently ruled by a Nazi Pope with the name of Ratzinger (pronounced Rats + Singer). Centralized Authority is the core teaching of the Death Cult framed around the monstrous abortion of Jehovah-Yaldaboath-Yahweh who rampages like a deranged madman throughout the pages of their Holy Book. They claim he's the Father of their Jesus. I know this sounds bizarre, but I'm here to tell you this kind of thinking pervades all of Christianity. Obedience to the Father God and his Book of fetishistic conundrums. It's a stifling spell of s&m rituals climaxing in Dad's torture and murder of his "only begotten son" by way of his Chosen People acting as his holy instruments justifying his culminating act of global corporate lust, the Apocalypse! The God who cannot find fulfillment until all life on the Earth, and the Earth herself is destroyed in an orgy of pestilence, bio-warfare, pain and horror brought about by his faithful followers and their devotion to his virtual reality, cyber-dragon, chemtrail Atomic Death. Our job in his one man show is to MAKE IT SO, as Captain Pickard would say. That's how the Gospel of the "Good News" works and ends!

American Christians made great headway in this regard half a century ago when they dropped their "Fat Man" (Jehovah) and "Little Boy" (Baby Jesus) thermonuclear bombs on the heathens in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The infamous "Fiery Mushroom Cloud" (think Moses and his 'burning bush') indicative of a very bad psychoactive hallucinogen trip has become the Seal, the Imprimature of their God's righteous wrath. That's why we need the cuddly pastel eggs of the Easter Bunny gathered all about us in order to mask from ourselves and our tiny tots the sad state of our sick souls. See, when Armageddon comes the Corporate Christian Capitalists are gonna be caught up in a big MGM musical and wisked off to their Easter Parade on Heaven's Fifth Avenue. They'll be all in clover and when we look them over they'll be the finest creatures in the Easter Parade! Everybody else is going to Hell in a basket for all eternity. They win, we lose. That's what happens if you reject their bloody Jesus. Talk about Nightmare On Elm Street, this filthy Christian Porno flick beats 'em all! I think a great antidote for the mad trance of Corporate Christianity is Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece of black humour, Doctor Strangelove: Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb! It's the perfectly realized CCC Anthem. A veritable exaltation of the Holy Trinity.

I'm not joshing you, folks, just think about it. The terribly talented Peter Sellers acts out all three of the pivotal roles in the film:

1. Group Captain Lionel Mandrake, a British exchange officer.
2. President Merkin Muffley, the American Commander-in-Chief, who resembles Adlai Stevenson
3. Dr. Strangelove, the wheelchair-bound ex-Nazi nuclear war expert: a pastiche of ex-Nazi scientists such as Wernher von Braun; nuclear strategists such as Herman Kahn; and particularly Edward Teller, "father" of the hydrogen bomb; Guenter Wendt; and perhaps even Manhattan Project principal John von Neumann.

This is the fitting image of the Christian Holy Trinity or Three Persons In One God, as the Roman Catholic Christians would have it. Let's play Medieval Theology, you know -How Many Angels Can Dance On The Head Of A Pin? Which of these Three Pictures depicts the Father, which the Son, and which the Holy Ghost?


Email your answers to God@yahoo.com and remember, there is only ONE correct answer and the winner gets to play the role of Major T.J.King Kong undertaken in the film by the venerable cowboy actor Slim Pickens who rides the bomb to its destined target triggering instantaneous Apocalypse Now, Yee Hah!



Don Grabau is

http://www.starpathvisions.com/

"Everything’s Disappeared" - Bob Dobbs

“I said Dad, don’t bring that into the house. It’s gonna change the whole structure of the family! It’s gonna change the whole neighborhood.” - Bob Dobbs

Wooops. There goes the neighborhood….


Turn off the Television Mosaic Mesh!

Dr. Shine and Dee Dee

Now that’s empowerment!

Panic Over "Humanoid" seen in La Junta, Guerrero (Chihuahua)

Source: El Heraldo de Chihuahua
Date: March 27, 2009

Panic Over "Humanoid" seen in La Junta, Guerrero (Chihuahua)

Newsroom - Cuauhtémoc, Chihuahua - The Man Bat, who seems to have popped out of some fiction movie, is a real creature that caused a young student from the local university--and a resident of La Junta -- to panic. It is a being witnessed by several locals who have described it as a winged humanoid with a fur-covered face and a height of 2 meters.

This all coincides, by the way, with the killings of sheep by decapitation in several ranches. The young man, a non-smoker, non-drinker and non-drug user, is called ? and does not want his name in print.
And he has not yet recovered from the experience that evening - Friday, March 6 at 23:50n hours, as he left Universidad Regional del Norte and headed home to La Junta.
However, when he reached Puente Sin Nombre, he was forced to hit the brakes and make an emergency stop. There was a shadowy bulk on the asphalt, looking like a hunched-over man , perhaps covered by a blanket.

Upon approaching, the still unknown figure rose to its full height, leaped forward twice, unfurled enormous bat-like wings that probably covered the width of the lane, and took to the air.

The young man in question - a serious and outstanding student in his coursework, didn't think twice. He floored the accelerator of his Liberty, burning rubber as he tried to flee from the unknown.

A desperate, fifteen minute chase ensued. The strange creature flew with the power of its rear wings, which were smaller, keeping abreast of the vehicle and peering through the passenger window.
The fear became more intense, and the youngster only thought to call home via his cell phone. His mother answered the phone, and she asked why she could hear the noise of a vehicle trying to reach full speed.

His voice broken by tears, the witness tried to describe that a man, or perhaps a winged animal, was chasing him. His first notion was that it was an apparition, a shaped assumed by Death, and it prompted him to scream in despair: " I'm going to die! I'm going to die!"
He now says that it could have been a hallucination of sorts, but upon reflecting on the entity that chased him for over 15 minutes, he feels shivers again. And he says: "No, it was no illusion." This is the closest brush he has had with fear.

The description is somewhat vague, but the image haunts him when he is unable to sleep. A man with red, bloodshot eyes, standing 2 meters tall, judging by the full length of the Liberty. Two pairs of wings, one large, another small, which allowed it to achieve unimaginable speed; small kangaroo-like hands that it held loosely and without strength, which repeatedly struck the glass of the passenger side window. Its face was covered by some sort of fur, with a protruding dome-shaped forehead and those bloodshot eyes.

This creature was seen in the vicinity of Cimbraplay, near Saenz Guerrero, where several sheep were found dead in recent days at three different ranches. They had all been slain in the same fashion: a large cut to the neck and another on part of the tail.
Another family also claims having seen it in the Mesa de Gonzalez segment of the road to San Juanito, and provides a similar description. With regard to that night, the mother says: "I had never heard him like that, and much less seen him in the state he arrived: shivering, pale and in the midst of a nervous breakdown."

The young man is well thought of in his school and it is said that they are already looking into the presence of this mythic being. The legend of the Man-Bat of La Junta appears to have been born as well.

It Appears Again Near the Cemetery

"I saw the Santa Muerte (Holy Death)." These words were spoken in the most serene tone that one could have after such a bitter experience. It was a remark made by Ivonne, and it never left the household. She shared it with her mother and husband. No one else.

It wasn't until now that they realize that the entity matches the description of the Man-Bat seen in the La Junta region, and which reappeared only days ago at the graveyard gate.

Ivonne (not her real name) is a young mother who dropped off a friend in a sector of La Junta after spending time with her at home, near the new highway to Guerrero. The time was 9:00 at night when she was coming back along the old road that passes by the cemetery.

It was at that time that it saw an enormous figure at the graveyard gate. It resembled a long statue and looked like a person covered in a blanket or a black cape. She felt a shiver and accelerated her truck. She thought it was la Santa Muerte and that she was probably going to die on the road between the graveyard and her home.

Upon returning, she told her mother and husband what she'd seen, and said that it was perhaps the Holy Death, but she was very serene about it, and matters remained at that -- a remark that reemerged when they read about the first event in El Heraldo, in which a college student described his traumatic experience.

The description given in the El Heraldo del Noroeste article led her to believe that it was the same thing that she'd seen, and her mother and husband agreed on this.
Upon visiting the cemetery gate, she noticed that the creatures height was truly impressive, given that the gate's archway measures 4 meters from the ground, and the witness states that as she drove past, the [creature's head] nearly touched the top of the gate.

The college student estimated [the creature's] height at some 2 meters, based on the fact that when it chased him for 15 kilometers, its body's length covered the length of the Jeep Liberty he was driving at the time.

The Legend of the Man-Bat has continued yielding narratives: residents of La Junta now say that there is another youngster who also saw this mysterious, supernatural presence. However, they say that the impression was such that this fellow is currently hospitalized somewhere due to a nervous shock. This story has yet to be confirmed.

More Reports: Creature Seen Trapped In Hail-Proof Netting, Talk of a Possible Photograph

A month after the first manifestation or eyewitness account, in this community and its vicinity, some 40 miles from Cuauhtémoc, more stories are being told. It appears to be a fear that is becoming widespread or else a reality that its becoming generalized. Children have also seen it.

It is said that in the downtown area two children went out for a drink of water from the pump in the middle of the back yard. That's when they saw an enormous bird gliding around. Fear caused them to return to the house running and panting.
A young woman claims having heard a noise like the squealing of a mouse, strange sounds on the roof and the flapping of wings.

However, an even closer encounter occurred in Huerta El Rosario, surprisingly close to the first apparition in the vicinity of Puente Sin Nombre, where a watchman heard sounds he'd never heard before.

On the ATV he employs to cover the full extent of the farm, he reached the point where he thought the noises emanated from. What he saw was simply indescribable and the only command his brain issued at the time was to flee at full speed. The red-eyed creature was trapped by the hail-stone preventive netting and was struggling to escape, which it surely managed to do, as it wasn't there the next morning.

The story and remarks are the result of paranoia, perhaps, but everyone is starting to wonder about the existence of a photo that someone took. At least this is what a Public Safety officer has said, but he could not be reached to corroborate the story.
Furthermore, 20 kilometers away, at El Baje or Agua Caliente, a witness to the impressive flight of this being simply collapsed from a heart attack. It is said that he is being treated in one of the region's hospital, but his identity is being concealed for the time being. If found, he would still be in no condition to discuss his encounter.

(Translation (c) 2009. S. Corrales, IHU. Special thanks to El Heraldo de Chihuahua and Ana Luisa Cid)

Mexico: State of Chihuahua Terrorized by "Man-Bat"

Source: www.analuisacid.com and El Heraldo
Date: April 10, 2009

Mexico: State of Chihuahua Terrorized by "Man-Bat"
A Report By Ana Luisa Cid

***Creature has wings and its face is covered in fur***

According to information supplied by Ing. Francisco Prieto Torres, residents of La Junta, Guerrero (Chihuahua) have reported the appearance of a "Man-Bat".

They describe it as a very tall entity, standing some 2 meters tall, with two pairs of wings (one pair larger than the other). Its face is covered in fur and has red, bloodshot eyes. Also reported are a pair of small, kangaroo type hands that it held loosely, as though it lacked any strength in them.

The main witness is a young student at Universidad Regional del Norte, whose name is being kept confidential, and who claims that the strange humanoid chased him for 15 minutes on the evening of March 6.

The witness was driving a Liberty back to his home after his studies, when he saw a bulk on the roadway asphalt resembling a hunched-over man who seemed to be covered in a blanket. The figure suddenly stood up, taking two leaps forward and displaying a set of wings similar to those of a bat. The young man floored the accelerator in an attempt to flee, but the strange creature flew with great power, keeping abreast of the vehicle and looking in through the passenger window.

"Those were 15 minutes of maximum despair," he said.

This report has been made known on local radio and in the print media, such as El Heraldo de Chihuahua.

Ing. Francisco Prieto has already located the place where the young man's father works and he wishes to interview him himself. If this is achieved, he will be forwarding the materials to me to make the entire ordeal known. It should be added that the family is known for being respectable and are held in high esteem in the community. Local radio has reported that that a photo of the "Man-Bat" exists, although no further details have been provided.

Other Witnesses

Angela Mendez and Viviana Ledezma are two women who claim to have heard the humanoid squealing amid the screns of an apple grove near the Miñaca Cemetery.

The Authorities

A joint mission was undertaken by members of the Police and Civil Defense of the Municipality of Guerrero in the State of Chihuahua. Socorro Rodriguez Erives reported that after researching several locations it was not possible to find the whereabouts of this strange entity. According to initial reports, the flying entity had its lair in the caves of the mountainous area of the Miñaca region. Despite their best efforts, no trace of the creature was found. Many think that it was just a myth, while others associate it with "Mothman"
I will continue to report on this situation when word is received from Ing. Prieto Torres, who is looking into this Mexican case.

(Translation (c) 2009, Scott Corrales, IHU. Special thanks to Ana Luisa Cid, Francisco Prieto Rivera and El Heraldo de Chihuahua)

Getting a Death Grip on Memory

By Norman Solomon, Truthout.org

A headline in The New York Times announced a few days ago: "Brain Researchers Open Door to Editing Memory." This news ran above the fold on the front page.

"Suppose scientists could erase certain memories by tinkering with a single substance in the brain," the article began. Readers quickly learned that it's starting to happen: "Researchers in Brooklyn have recently accomplished comparable feats, with a single dose of an experimental drug delivered to areas of the brain critical for holding specific types of memory ..."

Big deal.

American media outlets have been pulling off such feats for a long time.

The scientists trying to learn how to wipe out "specific types of memory" are lagging way behind.

Don't need to remember the vast quantities of napalm, Agent Orange and cluster bombs that the US military dropped on Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in the 1960's and 1970's? Or the continuing realities of burn victims, dioxin poisoning and unexploded warheads?

Don't want to consider the many thousands of civilians killed by Salvadoran death squads, Guatemalan troops and Nicaraguan contra guerillas during the 1980's, courtesy of US taxpayers?

Don't care to recall the Pentagon's estimate that the Gulf War in early 1991 killed 100,000 Iraqi people during a six-week period?

Forget about it! That's what selective memory is for.

Prefer not to recollect how the US government trained and armed President Reagan's beloved "freedom fighters" in Afghanistan - including the likes of Osama bin Laden and other fundamentalist mujahedeen - for their insurgency against the Soviet occupiers in the 1980's? Rather not remember how those "freedom fighters" became "terrorists"?

Hate that particular gray? Then wash it away!


Continue reading this fantastic article at:

http://www.truthout.org/041009J

End the American Occupation of Iraq!!!

The demonstrators in Firdos Square were mostly young men, jubilant despite the pouring rain. Halfway up the decaying green concrete sculpture that replaced the towering image of Saddam Hussein, high school student Karar Abdul Hussein, himself symbolic of the new Iraq, clambered up to get a better view and wave an Iraqi flag.

"We were so happy when they brought down the statue, but now we want the occupation to end. The Americans are very tough against the Iraqis," he says after being persuaded to climb back down and talk.

"This is not democracy," says Nahab Nehme, a hospital worker, holding one end of a pro-Sadr banner. "When America came, they didn't do anything for Iraq - they moved Saddam out, but he was their servant, and the people who are in power now are their servants, too."

"We demand that President Obama stand with the Iraqi people by ending the occupation to fulfill his promises he made to the world," Ali al-Marwani told the crowd.

"No, no to America; no, no to Israel," the demonstrators chanted, an echo of protests organized by Saddam Hussein before the war. Supporters also burned an effigy of former President George W. Bush.

"God unite us, return our riches, free the prisoners from the prisons, return sovereignty to our country ... free our country from the occupier, and prevent the occupier from stealing our oil," read Sadr's message.

http://www.truthout.org/040909R

Tin Foil Hat Crowd

Attention "Tin Foil Hat Crowd" . . . It's 1995 all over again.



Glenn Beck and the rise of Fox News' militia media
by Eric Boehlert


After a night of drinking, followed by an early-morning argument with his mother, with whom he shared a Pittsburgh apartment, 22-year-old Richard Poplawski put on a bulletproof vest, grabbed his guns, including an AK-47 rifle, and waited for the police to respond to the domestic disturbance call his mother had placed. When two officers arrived at the front door, Poplawski shot them both in the head, and then killed another officer who tried to rescue his colleagues.

In the wake of the bloodbath, we learned that Poplawski was something of a conspiracy nut who embraced dark, radical rhetoric about America. He was convinced the government wanted to take away his guns, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported. Specifically, Poplawski, as one friend described it, feared "the Obama gun ban that's on the way" and "didn't like our rights being infringed upon." (FYI, there is no Obama gun ban in the works.) The same friend said the shooter feared America was "going to see the end of our times."

We learned that Poplawski hosted his own (failed) Internet radio show and that he visited the website of 9-11 conspiracy backer Alex Jones, who has been hyping the threat of a totalitarian world government for years. More recently, Jones has been warning listeners like Poplawski about The Obama Deception (that's the name of Jones' new documentary DVD) and how President Obama is bound to destroy America.

Who's Alex Jones? Even according to some conservative bloggers, the anti-government, anti-Obama talker is a "freak" who's popular with "the tin foil hat crowd." Like with Poplawski, apparently.

Jones might be a "freak," but he has recently been embraced -- and mainstreamed -- by Fox News, as part of the news channel's unprecedented drive to push radical propaganda warning of America's democratic demise under the new president.

During a March 18 webcast of FoxNews.com's proudly paranoid "Freedom Watch," Andrew Napolitano introduced a segment about "what the government has done to take your liberty and your property away." And with that, he welcomed onto the show "the one, the only, the great Alex Jones," who began ranting about "exposing" the New World Order and the threat posed by an emerging "global government." "I appreciate what you're exposing," Napolitano assured his guest.

Waving around a copy of his Obama Deception, Jones warned Fox News webcast viewers about Obama's "agenda" for "gun confiscation" and the new president's plan to "bring in total police-state control" to America.

Jones also noted with excitement that Fox News' Glenn Beck had recently begun warning about the looming New World Order on his show, just like Jones had for years. "It is great!" cheered the conspiracist. (Like Jones, Beck recently warned viewers that "the Second Amendment is under fire.") Concluding the interview, Fox News' Napolitano announced "it's absolutely been a pleasure" listening to Jones' insights.

We don't know if Poplawski tuned in to watch Jones' star turn for Fox News last month. But is there any doubt that Fox News is playing an increasingly erratic and dangerous game by embracing the type of paranoid insurrection rhetoric that people like Poplawski are now acting on? By stoking dark fears about the ominous ruins that await an Obama America, by ratcheting up irresponsible back-to-the-wall scenarios, Fox News has waded into a territory that no other news organization has ever dared to exploit.

What Fox News is now programming on a daily (unhinged) basis is unprecedented in the history of American television, especially in the form of Beck's program. Night after night, week after week, Beck rails against the president while denouncing him or his actions, alternately, as Marxist, socialist, or fascist. He felt entirely comfortable pondering whether the federal government, under the auspices of FEMA, was building concentration camps to round up Americans in order to institute totalitarian rule. (It wasn't until this week that Beck was finally able to "debunk" the FEMA conspiracy theory.) And that's when Beck wasn't gaming out bloody scenarios for the coming civil war against Obama-led tyranny. In just a few shorts months, Beck raced to the head of Fox News' militia media movement.

Just prior to the Pittsburgh massacre, Beck's often bizarre on-air performances, in which his rants against the Obama administration's dark forces were mixed in with his tearful proclamations of love of country, had turned him into a highly rated laughingstock. "That is a shaky cat," Dennis Miller recently giggled while describing Beck. MSNBC's Joe Scarborough broke into hysterics after a montage of Beck's most weepy moments. And TV satirists have had a field day at the Fox News host's expense. (Stephen Colbert: "Crank up the crazy and rip off the knob!")

But I'm not sure people should be laughing.

Continue reading here:

http://mediamatters.org/columns/200904070009?f=h_top

Mercury square Neptune Obama Bulletin Final Notice

This is a "tough-love" message from Francis D. Grabau concerning "The People Of The Lie."

More of Obama's DECEIT and further evidence that what I've called the American Public's "Obama-Trance" is dangerous, real, and about to totally enslave and victimize those Americans still persisting in seeing Barack Obama as a "good" man with "good" intentions. NO HE IS NOT. This DECEIT he regularly indulges in (both personal self-deceit and deceit toward the public) "appeared" to be a possibility with his Natal Mercury+Sun square Neptune but it is now PROVEN to be the case and despite the concrete in-your-face actions Obama keeps taking too many Americans persist in wanting to PRETEND he's NOT DOING what, in fact, HE IS DOING.

This man is far more dangerous than G.W.Bush.

What I'm saying here may sound hard and offensive to you, but consult the links I'm providing and think about it ...if you still need to. And if you still do need to think on these things I suggest you also question your mental state for signs of severe denial and willful delusion. I'd also suggest that you are seriously depressed.

I've explained my astrological analysis of Obama here:

http://starpathvisions.com/Barack%20Obama%27s%20Astrological%20Birth%20Chart.html

and

http://starpathvisions.com/Obama-Neptune%20Trance%20Formation.html

People, use your reason, open your eyes, stop grinning at the bullshit image (totally media-Hollywood created) of Barack, Michelle, and those two daughters as good people. The simple fact is that they are NOT ... these folks are total sell-outs, droids, -they've been hired as shills and enjoy the role. Please open your eyes and stop condemning those of us who are saying what is factually true: Barack Obama is a Corporate President and that last election was NO revolution and produced NO change at all beyond the merest of superficial appearances.

This man, Obama, is NOT A FRIEND OF DEMOCRACY ... will you just keep falling for his rhetoric and media image and refuse to WITNESS what he's actually doing? For Christ's sake, even Bill Moyers (the ever polite) is beginning to get it!
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04032009/watch.html

I've tried pointing out that Americans, -ALL Americans are these days under a "Finger Of God" or "Yod" configuration indicating extreme adjustments needed in our Mercury-Neptune functions collectively as a People ...that means Reason (Mercury) in stressful relationship to Imagination (Neptune). It's also a Reason vs Glamor problem, a Reality vs Escapism issue. To continue, as so many of my friends do, to praise and defend Obama is to self-victimize. He is party to the destruction of this Nation, and he is a willing, knowing, DELIBERATE partner in this work. He's actively destroying the economy with Bank Bailouts and he's extending the Police State legislation beyond what Bushco accomplished and -he's a LIAR. That's it, plain and simple, Barack Obama is a LIAR. Do NOT trust this man. I cannot be any clearer, and I will not soften this truth because Obama's actions speak for themselves. He's a feel-good stooge for folks who want to "feel good" as they surrender their minds to escapist avoidance. To support him is to support deceit. Got it? YOU are responsible for what he's doing and you are aiding and abetting it unless you SPEAK OUT IN OPPOSITION AND DENOUNCE it/him. It is imperative that we all wake up and actively speak these truths to each other before we fall into total stupor!

Sorry, pardners, them's the sad facts! And I don't want to hear another whining word about how I'm being "negative" and "cynical" or depressing. To be negative, cynical, and depressing is to play along with Obama's LIES just because you want to pretend, to indulge yourself in the lie that you're actually "feeling good".

Don Grabau

ps ... It feels very "lonely" out here ....If you have already come to these same conclusions yourself I would very much appreciate hearing you say so, but I'm under the distinct impression that most of you are still supporting Obama and his Rahm Emmanuel, Corporate America Presidency.


Monday April 6, 2009 14:33 EDT
Submitted by davidswanson on Tue, 2009-04-07 14:05.
Commentary from Glenn Greenwald
New and worse Secrecy and Immunity Claims from the Obama DOJ (DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE).

When Congress immunized telecoms last August for their illegal participation in Bush's warrantless eavesdropping program, Senate Democratic apologists for telecom immunity repeatedly justified that action by pointing out that Bush officials who broke the law were not immunized -- only the telecoms. Here, for instance, is how Sen. Jay Rockefeller justified telecom immunity in a Washington Post Op-Ed:

Second, lawsuits against the government can go forward. There is little doubt that the government was operating in, at best, a legal gray area. If administration officials abused their power or improperly violated the privacy of innocent people, they must be held accountable. That is exactly why we rejected the White House's year-long push for blanket immunity covering government officials.

Taking them at their word, EFF -- which was the lead counsel in the lawsuits against the telecoms -- thereafter filed suit, in October, 2008, against the Bush administration and various Bush officials for illegally spying on the communications of Americans. They were seeking to make good on the promise made by Congressional Democrats: namely, that even though lawsuits against telecoms for illegal spying will not be allowed any longer, government officials who broke the law can still be held accountable.

But late Friday afternoon, the Obama DOJ filed the government's first response to EFF's lawsuit (.pdf), the first of its kind to seek damages against government officials under FISA, the Wiretap Act and other statutes, arising out of Bush's NSA program. But the Obama DOJ demanded dismissal of the entire lawsuit based on (1) its Bush-mimicking claim that the "state secrets" privilege bars any lawsuits against the Bush administration for illegal spying, and (2) a brand new "sovereign immunity" claim of breathtaking scope -- never before advanced even by the Bush administration -- that the Patriot Act bars any lawsuits of any kind for illegal government surveillance unless there is "willful disclosure" of the illegally intercepted communications.

In other words, beyond even the outrageously broad "state secrets" privilege invented by the Bush administration and now embraced fully by the Obama administration, the Obama DOJ has now invented a brand new claim of government immunity, one which literally asserts that the U.S. Government is free to intercept all of your communications (calls, emails and the like) and -- even if what they're doing is blatantly illegal and they know it's illegal -- you are barred from suing them unless they "willfully disclose" to the public what they have learned.

There are several notable aspects to what happened here with this new court filing from Obama:

(1) Unlike in the prior cases where the Obama DOJ embraced the Bush theory of state secrets -- in which the Obama DOJ was simply maintaining already-asserted arguments in those lawsuits by the Bush DOJ -- the motion filed on Friday was the first response of any kind to this lawsuit by the Government. Indeed, EFF filed the lawsuit in October but purposely agreed with Bush lawyers to an extension of the time to respond until April, in the hope that by making this Obama's case, and giving his DOJ officials months to consider what to do when first responding, they would receive a different response than the one they would have gotten from the Bush DOJ.

That didn't happen. This brief and this case are exclusively the Obama DOJ's, and the ample time that elapsed -- almost three full months -- makes clear that it was fully considered by Obama officials. Yet they responded exactly as the Bush DOJ would have. This demonstrates that the Obama DOJ plans to invoke the exact radical doctrines of executive secrecy which Bush used -- not only when the Obama DOJ is taking over a case from the Bush DOJ, but even when they are deciding what response should be made in the first instance. Everything for which Bush critics excoriated the Bush DOJ -- using an absurdly broad rendition of "state secrets" to block entire lawsuits from proceeding even where they allege radical lawbreaking by the President and inventing new claims of absolute legal immunity -- are now things the Obama DOJ has left no doubt it intends to embrace itself.

(2) It is hard to overstate how extremist is the "soverign immunity" argument which the Obama DOJ invented here in order to get rid of this lawsuit. I confirmed with both ACLU and EFF lawyers involved in numerous prior surveillance cases with the Bush administration that the Bush DOJ had never previously argued in any context that the Patriot Act bars all causes of action for any illegal surveillance in the absence of "willful disclosure." This is a brand new, extraordinarily broad claim of government immunity made for the first time ever by the Obama DOJ -- all in service of blocking EFF's lawsuit against Bush officials for illegal spying. As EFF's Kevin Bankston put it:

This is the first time [the DOJ] claimed sovereign immunity against Wiretap Act and Stored Communications Act claims. In other words, the administration is arguing that the U.S. can never be sued for spying that violates federal surveillance statutes, whether FISA, the Wiretap Act or the SCA.

Since EFF's lawsuit is the first to sue for actual damages under FISA and the Wiretap Act, it's arguable whether this immunity argument applied to any of the previous lawsuits. What is clear, though, is that the Bush DOJ, in any context, never articulated this bizarre view that all claims of illegal government surveillance are immunized in the absence of "willful disclosure" to the public of the intercepted communications. This is a brand new Obama DOJ invention to blanket themselves (and Bush officials) with extraordinary immunity even when they knowingly break our country's surveillance laws.

(3) Equally difficult to overstate is how identical the Obama DOJ now is to the Bush DOJ when it comes to its claims of executive secrecy -- not merely in substance but also tone and rhetoric (at least in the area of secrecy; there are still important differences -- no sweeping Article II lawbreaking powers and the like -- which shouldn't be overlooked). I defy anyone to read the Obama DOJ's brief here and identify even a single difference between what it says and what the Bush DOJ routinely said in the era of Cheney/Addington (other than the fact that Bush used to rely on secret claims of national security harm from Michael McConnell whereas Obama relies on secret claims filed by Dennis Blair). Even for those most cynical about what Obama was likely to do (that's me, Don Grabau)or not do in the civil liberties realm, reading this brief from the Obama DOJ is so striking -- and more than a little depressing -- given how indistinguishable it is from everything that poured out of the Bush DOJ regarding secrecy powers in order to evade all legal accountability.


Every defining attribute of Bush's radical secrecy powers -- every one -- is found here, and in exactly the same tone and with the exact same mindset. Thus: how the U.S. government eavesdrops on its citizens is too secret to allow a court to determine its legality. We must just blindly accept the claims from the President's DNI that we will all be endangered if we allow courts to determine the legality of the President's actions. Even confirming or denying already publicly known facts -- such as the involvement of the telecoms and the massive data-mining programs -- would be too damaging to national security. Why? Because the DNI says so. It is not merely specific documents, but entire lawsuits, that must be dismissed in advance as soon as the privilege is asserted because "its very subject matter would inherently risk or require the disclosure of state secrets."

What's being asserted here by the Obama DOJ is the virtually absolute power of presidential secrecy, the right to break the law with no consequences, and immunity from surveillance lawsuits so sweeping that one can hardly believe that it's being claimed with a straight face. It is simply inexcusable for those who spent the last several years screaming when the Bush administration did exactly this to remain silent now or, worse, to search for excuses to justify this behavior. As EFF's Bankston put it:

President Obama promised the American people a new era of transparency, accountability, and respect for civil liberties. But with the Obama Justice Department continuing the Bush administration's cover-up of the National Security Agency's dragnet surveillance of millions of Americans, and insisting that the much-publicized warrantless wiretapping program is still a "secret" that cannot be reviewed by the courts, it feels like deja vu all over again.

This is the Obama DOJ's work and only its work, and it is equal to, and in some senses surpasses, the radical secrecy and immunity claims of the Bush administration.

See more weblinks which Don attached to his email:

http://www.killinghope.org/bblum6/aer65.html

http://www.counterpunch.org/blum08072008.html

http://www.johnpilger.com/page.asp?partid=522