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Feinstein And Rogers Try To Scare Americans With Ooga Booga Terrorism Threats

333587_Dianne Feinstein

By Mike Masnick | Techdirt | December 2, 2013

It appears that the heads of the Senate and House Intelligence Committees, Senator Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Mike Rogers, are recognizing that their strategy for keeping their co-dependent relationship with the NSA going is failing and that the American public and an increasingly large segment of Congress no longer believes their bogus claims. Perhaps that’s because every time they open their mouths, it takes all of about an hour before many of their claims are completely debunked, if not outright mocked for obviously being bogus. So their latest strategy? To basically yell “Ooga Booga Terrorists!” as loud as they can to try to scare people based on absolutely nothing.

Feinstein and Rogers did a little dance on Sunday political TV shows insisting that “the terrorism threat is increasing” and we’re all going to die if we stop trying to make sure the NSA actually, you know, respects the Constitution. Asked if we were “safer” now than a year or two years ago, Feinstein kicked off the FUD:

“I don’t think so,” Feinstein replied. “I think terror is up worldwide, the statistics indicate that. The fatalities are way up. The numbers are way up. There are new bombs, very big bombs. Trucks being reinforced for those bombs. There are bombs that go through magnetometers. The bomb maker is still alive. There are more groups than ever. And there is huge malevolence out there.”

And Rogers quickly followed:

“I absolutely agree that we’re not safer today for the same very reasons,” he said. “So the pressure on our intelligence services to get it right to prevent an attack are enormous. And it’s getting more difficult.”

Of course, Feinstein’s claim that “terror is up worldwide” is — as is so often the case with her (and Rogers’) claims about terrorism — sorta true, but highly misleading. Yes, recent stats show an uptick in terrorist attacks and fatalities in 2012 — but you can also see that it’s highly variable. Earlier in the year, before the 2012 numbers came out, people were commenting on the fact that terror attacks and fatalities around the globe had been on the decline since 2007. Terrorism is highly variable and dependent on a few big successful attacks. Furthermore, if we look at attacks on the US, we find that there have basically been next to none in the US since 2001. You could make the case that 16 people have died in US “terrorist” attacks since 2001 (including the 13 soldiers killed by Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood), but you have to have a very broad definition of terrorism to do so.

Nearly all of the “terrorist” attacks in that original report that Feinstein is obviously relying on, appear to take place in areas that are considered war zones: Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. And, um, I hate to bring this part up, but part of the reason why those are war zones is because, you know, the US invaded both places. This isn’t to say that there aren’t terrorists out there who would like to attack the US. There clearly are. But it seems highly misleading to make the claims that both Feinstein and Rogers are making here, as the “data” they’re talking about don’t show any heightened risk in the US at all.

Either way, this whole thing — having both appear together, both making vague “we’re all going to die” statements without any details to back it up combined with an exceptionally misleading use of statistics — suggests that this is the typical FUD. It’s Feinstein and Rogers shouting “terror” in a crowded theater, because they know that they’ve already lost public opinion on this, and are quickly losing Congress as well.

December 2, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , , | 1 Comment

Fresh perspective on JFK case; CIA owns mass media

By James Fetzer | Press TV | December 2, 2013

William Colby, the former director of the CIA, told us that the agency owns everyone of significance in the mass media. The onslaught of false and misleading reports during the 50th observance of the assassination of JFK provided stunning confirmation that he was correct. none of the national news anchors addressed the evidence.

As someone who has done extensive research on the death of the 35th president of the United States, including chairing or co-chairing (now) five national conferences, and having published three collections of studies by experts on different aspects of the case, it was painfully apparent. The alleged assassin did not even fire a single shot.

Here I want to summarize some of the most egregious examples of abuse of the media by major players, including CBS, which endorsed the “magic bullet” theory, and by Bob Schieffer, who is the host of “Face the Nation,” who may be the most blatant purveyor of false information of them all. Even interviewing a witness who personally observed two wounds to JFK, Schieffer simply ignores him.

The “Magic Bullet” Theory

CBS, for example, featured a father/son combination who claimed to have vindicated the “magic bullet” theory by modeling the neck with a block of soap. Blocks of soap, however, are a poor substitute for a human neck, because they do not include the vertebrae of the neck. As long as JFK had a backbone, it cannot possibly be correct.

The “magic bullet” is crucial to the official account because, as Michael Baden, M.D., the head of the HSCA medical panel has observed, if there was no “magic bullet” then there had to have been at least six shots from three directions and hence multiple shooters and a conspiracy. It was the crux of the Warren Commission’s “lone assassin” scenario.

But we have the shirt and the jacket he was wearing, which have holes about 5.5″ below the collar to the right of the spinal column. The autopsy diagram shows a wound at the same location. So does the President’s personal physician’s death certificate and the mortician’s description. We know that the “magic bullet” theory is false.

Reenactment Photographs

Even the Warren Commission’s own staff located a wound there during its reenactments. There is a small patch on the stand-in for JFK and a much larger patch for the wound to his back. There are multiple reenactment photos that show the staff’s presumptions of wounds at those locations.

One shows a young Arlene Specter holding a pointer showing the trajectory that the “magic bullet” had to have taken if the theory were true. Below his hand by several inches, you can see the patch, which means that a photo intended to illustrate the “magic bullet” theory actually refutes it instead.

We also know that Gerald Ford (R-MI), then a junior member of the Warren Commission, had the description of the wound altered from “his uppermost back” to the “back of the neck” in order to make the “magic bullet” theory more plausible. But it is not only provably false but anatomically impossible.

The Mantik CAT Scan

David W. Mantik, M.D., Ph.D., created a CAT scan of a patient with similar check and neck dimensions and plotted the trajectory the “magic bullet” is supposed to have taken. So it turns out to be an anatomical impossibility, because cervical vertebrae intervene. Hence, the use of a block of soap!

I presented a lecture at Cambridge on the “magic bullet” theory, which was subsequently published in an international, peer-reviewed journal under the title, “Reasoning about Assassinations”. Anyone can download it on-line. I find it embarrassing that so many in the media appear to be so massively ignorant of the most basic evidence in this case.

But of course it is more feigned than real. I also published an article about the CBS appearance on Veterans Today under the title, “The JFK War: CBS endorses the ‘magic bullet’ absurdity”, which is typical of the quality of coverage by the media. When CBS stands by a provably false and anatomically impossible account, something is very wrong.

The “Face the Nation” Scandal

Among the egregious remarks coming from Bob Schieffer, host of “Face the Nation”, a prominent Sunday morning news discussion show on CBS, was that “It was an easy shot!”, referring to the shots that Lee Oswald is alleged to have taken from the 6th floor of the School Book Depository. But the fact of the matter is they were anything but.

No one has been able to replicate the shots attributed to Oswald, who, I can confirm, was a mediocre shot, having supervised recruit training at the USMC Recruit Depot in San Diego and marksmanship training in Edson Range in Camp Pendleton. He barely qualified on the rifle range in 1959 and there is no indication that he continued shooting.

The best sniper in the US Marine Corps, Gunny Carlos Hathcock, made repeated attempts at Quantico to replicate his shooting without success. And Jesse Ventura, an expert shot, tried to do it with a far superior Mannlicher-Carcan and scored one hit in three replications of 3-shots firing at stationary targets. Check out his “Conspiracy Theory” program on JFK.

No “Convincing” Evidence

During a conversation with Larry Sabato, a prominent political commentator from the University of Virginia, he said “as yet no one has shown me (Schieffer) evidence to convince me that he–that there was anybody else connected.” And he asks Sabato why that is, and Sabato dutifully replies that it is difficult to accept the minor cause of the major effect.

“They tried to invest it with meaning by saying, it’s the CIA, it’s the anti-Castro Cubans, it’s LBJ. It’s this one, it’s that one. But as you say, you have to go by the evidence and we’re still waiting for evidence beyond that of Lee Harvey Oswald, who was clearly guilty”. But I have confronted Sabato with proof that the situation is completely different.

Since I taught twice at UVA, I submitted a response to the student newspaper, The Cavalier Daily, which was published with the title, “JFK: Truth or Conspiracy?”, featuring a three part panel showing the fist-sized wound that was observed at Parkland, the enormous missing 1/3 of the skull at Bethesda, and the tiny wound from the HSCA, which I challenged him to explain. He has not replied.

Two wounds widely broadcast

In fact, two wounds were widely broadcast over radio and television following the assassination: a small puncture wound to the throat and a blow-out to the back of the head, both of which were fired from in front. If you go to “See it now” for the NBC coverage, for example, you can confirm this for yourself. Chet Huntley was reporting about them both.

Astonishing, Bob Schieffer had one of the Parkland physicians who had treated JFK at Parkland on his show, Dr. Ronald Jones. And Jones told Schieffer that, when he entered Trauma Room #1, he “noticed a small hole in the front of the neck that I estimated to be a quarter of an inch. And I knew he had a large wound to the back of his head”.

Instead of jumping on this first-person report of those two wounds, both of which had been fired from in front, Schieffer simply ignores them and says, “And he was alive at that point but just barely”. This coming from a prominent newsman who claims that he has never seen any evidence Oswald did not do it alone–even when it is presented on his own show!

Oswald was framed for the crime

The weapon was known as “the humanitarian rifle” in World War II for never harming anyone on purpose. This weapon had a misaligned sight and had to be rebuilt before any experts would even attempt to fire it. And its bolt action was so difficult it took the scope off the target each time it was fired, which meant it consumed additional time to reacquire the target.

We also know from Marina, his wife, that Lee admired President Kennedy and bore him no malice. More recent research, moreover, has confirmed that a man whose image was captured in a famous photograph taken during the shooting standing in the doorway of the Book Depository was Lee Oswald. He had neither motive nor means nor opportunity.

Students as long ago as Harold Weisberg, WHITEWASH II (1966), have maintained that Lee was in the doorway. Vince Salandria, Mark Lane, Gerald McKnight and many other experts have agreed. Evidence that is archived at the “Oswald Innocence Campaign” establishes his location. Since he was in the doorway, he was not also on the 6th floor.

The Backyard Photographs

Jim Marrs, the author of CROSSFIRE (1987) and I have proven that the backyard photographs that were used to frame Oswald were fabrications with his face pasted on someone else’s body. The chin is a block chin and not Lee’s more tapered chin, with an insert line between chin and lower lip. And the finger tips of his right hand are cut off.

Jack White, the legendary photo and film analyst, observed that the newspapers he is holding have dimensions that are known and therefore can serve as an internal yardstick. Using that measure, it turns out that the man in those photos is only 5’6″ tall, too short to be Oswald, who was 5’10”. They either used a stand-in who was too short or else made the papers too large when they faked the photos.

Anyone can review our proof at “Framing the Patsy: The Case of Lee Harvey Oswald”. And see “JFK believe it or not: Oswald wasn’t even a shooter!” by Richard Hooke or “Part 1: A National Security Event – Oswald didn’t do it” and “JFK Part 2: A National Security Event – How it was done”, for further proof of how they framed an innocent man.

Other examples abound

Tom Brokow on NBC cut off Robert Groden discussing the shooting of Officer J.D. Tippit, when Groden began to explain that the four cartridges found at the scene had been ejected from one or more automatics, while Oswald had a revolver. It is absurd to image Lee could shoot a policeman four times and then remove the incriminating casings.

The first officer on the scene initialed them. There were two of one make (Western) and two of another (Remington). Later, as happened in this case, those casings were replaced by four casings from a revolver, but now there were three of one make and one of the other. And none of them had the officer’s initials. It was that blatant a frame.

A woman across the street, Acquilla Clemons, who had observed the shooting, reported that two men had shot Tippit and that neither of them looked like Oswald. So they simply did not call her as a witness. The best report about the Tippit shooting may be found in Groden (1995)’s “The Search for Lee Harvey Oswald,” if you can track it down.

Michael Shermer and the LA Times

Yet another example comes from The LA Times, where Michael Shermer authored an Op/Ed piece maintaining that conspiracy theories derive from a psychological need to explain how a comparative unknown could have murdered JFK. I replied that perhaps we do not believe a lone gunman took him out with three lucky shots because it is not true.

The evidence of conspiracy is overwhelming. The man in Mexico City looks nothing like Lee Oswald, for example. J. Edgar Hoover sent a memorandum to his Agents-in-Charge informing them that someone was there impersonating Lee Oswald. If that is all you know of the assassination, you know enough to conclude it was a conspiracy.

And Waggoner Carr, the Attorney General of Texas, discovered that Lee was working as an informant for the FBI, that he had informant #179 and that he was being paid $200 right up to the day of the assassination, which may explain why the American government claims it cannot find the W-2 (tax) forms for the alleged assassin of our 35th president.

For those who want more, see “What happened to JFK–and why it matters today” (2011) and the videos from the Santa Barbara conference. The public skepticism about Oswald as the lone shooters is not explicable on the basis of psychology but by logic and evidence, which appears to be unknown to Shermer, The LA Times, and our national media.

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December 2, 2013 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , | Comments Off on Fresh perspective on JFK case; CIA owns mass media

Cleanup of Radioactive Bomb Waste in South Carolina: The Endless Project

By Noel Brinkerhoff | AllGov | December 2, 2013

It has been 17 years since the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) began cleaning up the Cold War-era nuclear weapons plant, Savannah River Site, in South Carolina, and at the current pace, it may be another 30 years before the work is completed.

That fact does not sit well with state officials who are now threatening to levy an enormous fine on DOE for not keeping to its original deadline of fixing the mess by 2023.

A key aspect of the project, which started in 1996, is to turn liquid radioactive bomb waste into a solid that can be safely stored for millennia while its radiation decays.

It’s important to make this conversion sooner rather than later because the toxic waste now sits in huge underground tanks (that hold anywhere from 750,000 to 1.3 million gallons each) that have been in use since the 1950s.

If the federal government takes until the 2040s to finish the remediation, it means the tanks will need to hold up for 90 years.

“I don’t know what the tanks’ design life was intended to be, but it’s not for infinity,” Catherine B. Templeton, South Carolina’s top environmental official, told The New York Times.

“We have to get that waste out of the tanks so it’s not Fukushima, so you don’t have the groundwater interacting with the waste and running off,” she added, referring to the radioactive water flowing from the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan and into the ocean.

To prod the DOE into moving faster, the state is threatening to impose $154 million in fines for failing to finish the project in nine years.

Energy officials say the slowdown couldn’t be helped, what with the budget cuts from sequestration and other decisions by Congress that reduced the amount of money flowing to the Savannah cleanup operation.

“There’s only so much to go around,” Terrel J. Spears, DOE’s assistant manager for waste disposition at the site, told the Times. “We can’t increase the budgets. Now we have to balance the budgets.”

To Learn More:

South Carolina Threatens Washington Over Cleanup (by Matthew Wald, New York Times)

Nuclear Weapons Site Reportedly Fails Security Tests (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)

The Government Project that is $6 Billion Over Budget and 10 Years Late (by Matt Bewig, AllGov)

December 2, 2013 Posted by | Environmentalism, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | 1 Comment

Media Dictionary: Arab-Israeli Conflict

By Mazin Qumsiyeh

A handy dictionary/rules book for anyone writing on the Middle East issues in the mainstream media. To get published as a news journalist, it seems you have to follow these rules.

Definitions:

Caught in the Crossfire: When Palestinian civilians are killed.

Retaliation: When Israeli army or settlers kill Palestinians.

Escalation: Any act of violence or resistance by the Palestinians.

Murdered: When Israeli Civilians are killed.

Brutal/cowardly/ghastly: adjectives describing attacks on Israelis.

Self defense: Any act of violence by Israelis.

Terrorism: Any act of violence by the Palestinians.

Civilians: Armed settlers are civilians when killed. Try to avoid using this term for Palestinians.

Neighborhoods: Areas inhabited by Israeli settlers.

Positions: Any Palestinian towns and villages especially when bombed by helicopter gunships or raked with large caliber machine guns.

Tragedy: Any Israeli death.

Deserved: Any Palestinian death.

Squatters: Palestinian natives.

Democratic ally: Synonym for Israel.

Disputed Areas: Any Palestinian or Arab land occupied by Israel in defiance of International law.

Anti-Semite: Person condemns Israeli violations of Palestinian civil and human rights.

Victims: Any Jewish Israeli.

Attacker: Any Palestinian engaging in any form of resistance.

Targets: Palestinian buildings, homes, offices – What the Israeli military designates as military targets.

Attack/bombing/murder: Acts the Palestinians commit when directed at Israelis.

Clashes: This is a difficult term to understand but is generally used when Palestinians die.

Measures (e.g. Economic measures, security measures): Any acts the Israelis commit (blockades, collective punishment, shelling neighborhoods, starving a population etc).

Security: Anything the Israeli government chooses to do. This can include land confiscation, extra-judicial killings, home demolitions, destruction of groves, uprooting trees, blockades etc. The term security is reserved for use only with the word Israel or Israeli and must never be applied to Palestinians. Lashing out: A term reserved for Palestinians and acts they commit against Israelis.

Under siege: Again a term for use by the Israelis as in Palestinians have put Israelis under siege. Exact meaning depends on the circumstances. Never use for Palestinian towns or villages.

Rules:

When to use Passive voice: If the violent action is committed by Israelis (e.g. 2 Palestinians were killed, one of them a 9 year old).

When to use active voice: If the action is committed by Palestinians (e.g. Palestinians killed a Jewish child, Palestinians kills teenager).

While reporting about Israelis: “2 Israelis were injured”, while reporting about Palestinian use the verbs claimed, say etc. “Palestinians say woman dies of teargas inhalation in West Bank” (e.g. Ha’aretz)

Names: Must be included for any Jewish victims, always avoid names for Muslim or Christian victims but use numbers in stead (remember in the passive voice, e.g. 2 Palestinians died in clashes).

When an Israeli is killed: It is important to note his or her profession, where he/she is from and was going, whether or not he/she is religious, and whether or not he/she is an immigrant from the U.S. or Russia. If the dead person is survived by a spouse and children, this should be noted. If the victim is a youngster, the school they attended should be mentioned, and their friends’ feelings should be noted. in general, people who knew the dead person should testify to their humanity.

When a Palestinian is killed, they should not be personalized in any way.

When an Israeli is killed, it is useful to include graphic descriptions of the death scene – the covered body, the fragments of flesh, the path of flowing blood, etc.

Please ensure that your local media editor/journalist receives this list.

Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD

December 2, 2013 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Comments Off on Media Dictionary: Arab-Israeli Conflict

13 Palestinians Killed, 374 Kidnapped, In November

kidnap_child

By Saed Bannoura | IMEMC | December 1, 2013

The Ahrar Center for Detainees Studies and Human Rights issued its monthly report Sunday revealing that Israel soldiers shot and killed 13 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza in November, while more than 374 Palestinians, including eight women, have been kidnapped.

Ahrar said that, similar to previous months, the southern West Bank district of Hebron witnessed the largest number of Israeli violations, while the army also kidnapped 95 Palestinians.

The Center stated that eight Palestinian women, including two teenagers, were among the kidnapped in Hebron. All kidnapped women, except the two young women, were released later on.

In occupied Jerusalem, soldiers kidnapped 85 Palestinians, including a journalist identified as Mohammad Abu Khdeir, who works for the Al-Quds daily; he was taken prisoner at the Ben Gurion Airport after concluding a visit to Egypt.

In Jenin, the army kidnapped 47 Palestinians, while 45 Palestinians were kidnapped in Nablus, 34 in Bethlehem, 30 in Ramallah, 18 in Qalqilia, 10 in Tulkarem, and one Palestinian has been kidnapped in Jericho.

Israeli soldiers also kidnapped nine Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, including three who allegedly tried to cross the border fence.

The Israeli Navy continued its attacks and assaults against the Palestinian fishermen in the Gaza Strip, and kidnapped four fishermen in Palestinian waters after the soldiers opened fire on them and their boats.

Soldiers also kidnapped a Palestinian patient from the Gaza Strip after he headed to the Erez terminal on his way for medical treatment at a hospital in Jerusalem. Israel granted him a permit to head to Jerusalem, but the soldiers still kidnapped him.

Ahrar added that soldiers also kidnapped a Palestinian from Gaza after he allegedly approached the border fence and “hurled a grenade” at an Israeli military vehicle.

In Jerusalem, soldiers kidnapped two Palestinian women, both teachers, and a young woman was kidnapped at an Israeli military roadblock near the northern West Bank city of Tulkarem. She is a college student from Nablus.

As for Palestinians killed by Israeli military fire in November, Ahrar said that Israeli soldiers shot and killed 13 Palestinians, including four from the Gaza Strip.

The four killed in Gaza have been identified as Rabee’ Baraka, 23, Khaled Mohammad Abu Bakra, 35, Mohammad Rashid Dawoud, 26, and Mohammad Issam Al-Qassam, 23; all were killed after the army bombarded Gaza on November 1st.

In the West Bank, detainee Hasan Toraby, 22, from the northern West Bank city of Nablus, died of cancer at the Al-‘Affoula Hospital after Israel failed to provide him with the needed medical treatment, and only moved him to hospital after having a very serious deterioration in his health condition.

On the night of November 7, resident Bashir Habaneen, 28, a university teacher from the northern West Bank city of Jenin, was shot and killed by soldiers at the Za’tara roadblock, south of the northern West Bank city of Nablus.

On the same night, Anas Al-Atrash, 22, from Hebron, was killed at the Container roadblock, near Bethlehem.

On November 26, soldiers assassinated three Palestinian from the southern West bank city of Hebron. The three have been identified as Mohammad Nairoukh, Mahmoud Najjar, and Mousa Fansha.

On November 28, Mahmoud Awwad, 24, from the central West Bank city of Ramallah, died of serious injuries he suffered in March. He was shot in the head and remained in a coma until his death.

On the same day, a Palestinian child identified as Nour Mohammad Affana, 14, died at an Israeli military roadblock as the soldiers closed the roadblock and prevented an ambulance, transporting her to a hospital in Bethlehem, from crossing.

On November 30, Israeli officers shot and killed Antar Al-Aqdra’, 24, from Qablan town, as he was working in the Petah Tikva area, north of historic Palestine. Twelve workers were taken prisoner.

Furthermore, Ahrar said that Israeli soldiers have escalated their attacks and assaults against Palestinian political prisoners, forced several detainees into solitary confinement, and denied family visits to dozens of detainees.

Palestinian researcher, former detainee and the head of the Ahrar Center, Fuad Al-khoffash, said that Israel’s violations, including deadly attacks and arrests, are ongoing, while extremist Israeli settlers carried out dozens of attacks, as part of organized assaults against the Palestinians, their lands and property, in the occupied West Bank, and occupied Jerusalem.

December 2, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , , | Comments Off on 13 Palestinians Killed, 374 Kidnapped, In November