DAVID GILBERTSON: Why are police so rude? Because they are trained to be

Last week the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) published complaint statistics for 2009/10. And for senior officers – indeed for the public at large – they make uncomfortable reading.

For the second successive year the number of complaints increased by eight per cent, to record levels of almost 58,400, but within that headline figure there are trends that should give us all pause for thought.

Almost 50 per cent of all allegations related to rudeness, incivility and neglect of duty.

Cops nowadays: Almost 50 per cent of all allegations related to rudeness, incivility and neglect of duty

Even the interim Chair of the IPCC, Len Jackson, felt compelled to comment that ‘the number of rude and late complaints ... will require forces to develop an open dialogue with the public’. That is Whitehall code for: ‘This has got to change!’

No one who cares about the maintenance of law and order in this country could view these figures with anything but concern – they expose worrying issues that we ignore at our peril. It is not a trivial point of manners but a reflection of the extent to which policing has changed for the worse in this country over the past 25 years.

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• Police chief faces probe over 'bawdy' remarks

I witnessed these changes as they began in the late Eighties and as they accelerated over the Nineties and the past decade.

For 35 years, until I retired in 2001, I served in two forces and at the Home Office, at every rank from beat PC to Deputy Assistant Commissioner and HM Assistant Inspector of Constabulary.

I believe that we are now feeling the delayed impact of more than two decades of poor decision-making in policing.

Changing times: A policeman in the 50s helps a young child post a letter

Once upon a time the general public could confidently expect courtesy from their local constabulary. Particularly in the years following the Second World War, an easy accommodation emerged which had its roots in the continuing respect for authority figures that was the prevailing attitude of the time, and in recognition of the fact that civil society needed effective policing as crime rates soared.

This contract with the public lasted until the early Nineties when, under the dual pressure of economic and social change, a new generation of chief const¬ables and commissioners, who saw policing as a ‘business’ rather than a vocation based upon service, decided that things had to change.

The new policing, enthusiastically supported by successive Home Secretaries, was about targets, response times and ‘measurable perform¬ance’, lifted straight from the MBA syllabuses of the best univers¬ities.

Beat patrols on foot in uniform were not part of this brave new world; unless effectiveness could be measured and converted into a ‘bottom line’ cost it was of no use, and had to be scrapped. Police discretion was submerged under a tsunami of directions, guidelines and data-gathering.

Then 9/11 happened and it was decided that the police service was on the frontline in the ‘war on terror’. Almost overnight, we all changed from citizens to suspects. Terrorism legislation and spurious ‘officer safety’ policies led to the militarisation of policing and the greatest change in attitude that had taken place for a century.

Police officers, the majority quite young – the average age of an operational PC is under 24 – have been trained to believe that they are continually under physical threat and must therefore be continually on their guard. It is clear that a significant minority of officers see the public as their enemy and as a potential hazard to be dealt with aggressively.

There is no doubt that standards of behaviour and civility, across the whole of Britain, have changed for the worse over the past quarter century. Courtesy and good behaviour have been abandoned by many in our modern, ‘me’ society.

It is clear that a significant minority of officers see the public as their enemy and as a potential hazard to be dealt with aggressively

The police are products of that society; they attend the same schools, live in the same communities and have the same attitudes and prejudices as the best and the worst of us. But police officers should be held to a different standard of behaviour.

This change in attitude has to be set alongside the simultaneous withdrawal from day-to-day street patrolling that has taken place.

Once all young officers would spend their first few years getting to know local communities and local people by patrolling designated beats, tightly supervised with disciplinary sanctions by their sergeants and inspectors. That has been abandoned. Now new recruits, fresh from training which emphasises the primacy of their own safety over that of the public, learn from those senior to them, who also know no better.

A concerned officer recently gave me this extract from a force training programme – the tone is chilling. It says: ‘What the public consider rude is usually just no-nonsense commands and attitude. Unfortunately, when you try to reason with people, they take advantage. Therefore, when you need immediate compliance, you must use stern, unambiguous commands that require no interpretation on the part of the person being talked to. Through experience you must learn to command and dominate ALL interactions.’ The emphatic block capitals were in the original training notes.

So it is hardly surprising that of the 58,399 alleg¬ations of misconduct recorded by the IPCC last year, 11,576 were of rudeness and incivility. It is also deeply worrying and one would expect that the senior leadership of the police would be as concerned as you or I.

Bad rep: The police have never been held in lower esteem than they are today but David Gilbertson says the situation is not irretrievable

The official response from Deputy Chief Constable John Feavyour of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) , to his credit, acknowledges that a problem exists and encourages the public to complain if they consider that an officer’s conduct has been unsatisfactory so that ‘appropriate action’ can be taken. Sadly there is little evidence to show ‘appropriate action’, which should mean minor disciplinary sanction by middle managers, is ever effective.

I know from experience the default position for too many junior officers is to ‘close ranks’ and deny that anything improper has occurred.

The police have never been held in lower esteem than they are today but the situation is not irretrievable.

Firstly, there must be assertive leadership from those at the top. Most ACPO officers are educationally and socially quite different to their personnel yet they see it as their role to be cheerleaders for their officers rather than critical leaders.

Supervision and the main¬tenance of discipline, lost arts among today’s sergeants and inspectors, need to be relearned.

Lastly, and most importantly, there should be a programme of return-to-uniform foot patrols for all officers during the formative years of their careers to rekindle the skills of talking to people and appreciation of the value of mutual respect.

We are all better served if our police are approachable and courteous rather than granite-faced bullies.

Many officers, throughout the UK, want nothing more than to do the best they can for the public they serve, and are often embarrassed and disgusted by the behaviour of boorish colleagues.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1361052/DAVID-GILBERTSON-Why-police-rude-Because-trained-be.html#ixzz1FAcFioFy

Of course the greatest crime is a thought crime. It has always been that way. Free thinkers will be the highest form of criminal. Murderers, rapists, and thieves will be identified for employment by the state for waging war and controlling the masses through fear and intimidation.

Child brain scans to pick out future criminals

The seeds of criminal and anti-social behaviour can be found in children as young as three, scientists have claimed.

More researchers believe that violent tendencies have a biological basis and that tests and brain imaging can pick them up in children.

They argue that, by predicting which children have the potential to be trouble, treatments could be introduced to keep them on the straight and narrow. If the tests are accurate enough then a form of screening could be introduced in the same way we test for some diseases.

The theories were put forward by two leading criminologists at the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington.

Prof Adrian Raine, a British criminologist, argued that abnormal physical brain make-up could be a cause of criminality, as well as helping to predict it.

His studies have shown that psychopaths and criminals have smaller areas of the brain such as the amygdala and prefrontal cortex, both of which regulate and control emotion and behaviour. He also believes that a lack of conditioning to fear punishment, which can be measured in toddlers before disruptive behaviour is apparent, could also be a strong indicator.

Dr Nathalie Fontaine, who also spoke at the conference, argued that children as young as four exhibited “callous unemotional traits” such as lack of guilt and empathy that could also suggest future bad behaviour. Linking these features with “conduct problems” such as throwing tantrums could be a strong way to predict who could be anti-social in later life.

Both speakers said that identifying these issues earlier could be important in stopping children from becoming criminals.

Dr Raine, a former Home Office psychologist who works at the University of Pennsylvania, said therapy could include counselling to counteract innate behavioural problems and boosting the brain with drugs or foods rich in Omega 3.

Dr Fontaine, from Indiana University, said the work showed that punishment did not necessarily work and that reinforcing positive behaviour rather than punishing bad might be the solution.

“If we could identify those children early enough, we could help them as well as their families,” she said.

Dr Fontaine used data from more than 9,000 twins from the Twins Early Development Study, a survey of twins born in England and Wales between 1994 and 1996. Assessments of callous unemotional traits and conduct problems were based on teacher questionnaires when the children were seven, nine and 12. Information was taken from parents when the children were as young as four.

She found there was a correlation between risk factors at a young age and bad behaviour at an older age.

Dr Raine said he acknowledged the ethical implications of treating children before they had done anything wrong, but argued that “biological” causes of crime could not be ignored.

“We could be ostriches and stick our heads in the sand but I believe we have to pursue the causes of crime at a biological and genetic level as well as at a social,” he said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/8339772/Child-brain-scans-to-pick-out-future-criminals.html

Why Nobody Trusts the Mainstream Media (video)

How PRs have taken over the media

Here’s an interesting article from The Guardian about “churnalism”: News articles that are solely based on press releases from companies releasing a new product. The same can be applied to government press releases that are cut and pasted to become “news”.

Churnalism or news? How PRs have taken over the media

As press releases and hoax stories flood newsrooms, the Media Standards Trust has found a way to sift fact from fluff

A new website promises to shine a spotlight on “churnalism” by exposing the extent to which news articles have been directly copied from press releases.

The website, churnalism.com, created by charity the Media Standards Trust, allows readers to paste press releases into a “churn engine”. It then compares the text with a constantly updated database of more than 3m articles. The results, which give articles a “churn rating”, show the percentage of any given article that has been reproduced from publicity material.

The Guardian was given exclusive access to churnalism.com prior to launch. It revealed how all media organisations are at times simply republishing, verbatim, material sent to them by marketing companies and campaign groups.

Meanwhile, an independent film-maker, Chris Atkins, has revealed how he duped the BBC into running an entirely fictitious story about Downing Street’s new cat to coincide with the site’s launch.

The director created a Facebook page in the name of a fictitious character, “Tim Sutcliffe”, who claimed the cat – which came from Battersea Cats Home – had belonged to his aunt Margaret. The story appeared in the Daily Mail and Metro, before receiving a prominent slot on BBC Radio 5 Live.

Atkins, who was not involved in creating churnalism.com, uses spoof stories to highlight the failure of journalists to corroborate stories. He was behind an infamous prank last year that led to the BBC running a news package on a hoax Youtube video purporting to show urban foxhunters.

The creation of churnalism.com is likely to unnerve overworked journalists and the press officers who feed them. “People don’t realise how much churn they’re being fed every day,” said Martin Moore, director of the trust, which seeks to improve standards in news. “Hopefully this will be an eye-opener.”

Moore said he accepted journalists often have a valid reason for using press releases, and will often need to copy and paste significant chunks, such as official statements and quotes. But he said that on many occasions reporters appear to be lifting press release text verbatim and adding little or no additional material.

In a typical example, the Express, Mirror and Sun all lifted of chunks of text from a press release last month on behalf of the Benenden Healthcare Society, which quoted a poll showing “British women spend more money on their looks than their health”. The Daily Mail copied 98% of the text directly from the press release. Similarly, the Mirror, Mail and Express all reproduced chunks from a press release by campaign group Migration Watch, criticising immigration rates under the previous Labour government. However, the Times made the greatest use of it, running an article that was 53% cut-and-pasted press release.

Other broadsheets, including the Guardian, Independent and Telegraph, are also shown to be “churning” press releases to varying degrees.

Interestingly, all media outlets appear particularly susceptible to PR material disseminated by supermarkets: the Mail appears to have a particular appetite for publicity from Asda and Tesco, while the Guardian favours Waitrose releases.

Moore said one unexpected discovery has been that the BBC news website appears particularly prone to churning publicity material.

“Part of the reason is presumably because they feel a duty to put out so many government pronouncements,” Moore said. “But the BBC also has a lot to produce in regions that the newspapers don’t cover.”

It was after a discussion with Moore that Atkins decided to spend last week seeding fictitious stories through the media. Atkins, who was the film-maker behind Starsuckers (a documentary that duped the tabloid press in 2009 with hoax stories), has planted a range of bizarre press releases across the media.

One involved the marketing of the “penazzle”, supposedly the male answer to the female beauty trend in crystal designs known as “vajazzles”, which appeared in the Sun and in a column by Guardian writer Suzanne Moore.

Another fake story about a “chastity garter”, which contains a text message-sending microchip to alert a woman’s partner if she is being unfaithful, became the “most read” story on the Daily Mail’s website. It was then reproduced by media outlets across the world, including morning TV news in the United States.

But it was Atkins’s bogus Facebook campaign calling for the return of the prime minister’s new cat, Larry, that has been most successful. Within 24 hours of the site having been created, the Mail ran the story under the heading: “But that’s my auntie’s cat: Man’s claim on ‘stray’ No 10 ratcatcher (… and there’s a Facebook campaign to get him back).” It also appeared in the Metro, under the heading: “Dear David Cameron: You’ve stolen my aunt’s cat, please return him.”

But the entirely made up story received most attention on Gaby Logan’s BBC 5 Live show, in a light-hearted slot before the 1 o’clock news.. Discussing the story with chief political correspondent John Pienaar, Logan joked that the dispute over ownership of Larry the Downing Street cat was likely to “run and run”.

click here for the video

A View From Space, Gary Bell: February 26, 2011

Age successfully with DHEA

(NaturalNews) It is commonly believed that our body withers and deteriorates with age. As we get older most of us struggle to maintain muscle mass, skin elasticity, & bone mass. We develop conditions such as osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, varicose veins, etc. New research has shown that our DHEA levels are the critical player in how successfully we age and by boosting DHEA naturally we can turn back the clock on the aging process.

DHEA (dehydroepiandrosterone) is one of the critical hormones that scientists are calling the `fountain of youth.` This hormone is made from cholesterol by the adrenal glands and is a precursor to 18 steroid hormones including the commonly known sex hormones estrogen and testosterone. Healthy DHEA production is critical for lean muscle development, fat burning, bone growth, skin health, and immunity.

Cholesterol (statin) lowering medications reduce DHEA content and therefore accelerate the aging process. This is one of the reasons why cholesterol lowering medications have been linked to all-cause early mortality. A DHEA deficiency significantly increases the risk of getting certain cancers (including breast, ovarian, prostate, and bladder), atherosclerosis, high blood pressure, Parkinson's disease, diabetes, nervous system degeneration, and other age-related conditions.

Our DHEA production naturally peaks between 20-25 years of age and then steadily declines. Many in our society see a sharp decline due to overburdened adrenals that are unable to synthesize adequate DHEA. This adrenal insufficiency syndrome is becoming more and more common due to an overstressed and malnourished American lifestyle.

High sugar and carbohydrate consumption increases blood sugar and insulin levels. Elevated insulin causes a decreased production of DHEA in the adrenals. Blood sugar imbalances also create critical vitamin and mineral imbalances that stress the adrenals and reduce DHEA production. Alcohol and caffeine consumption also decrease DHEA levels.

High stress and poor sleeping habits also cause increased cortisol (stress hormone) levels. When these issues become chronic they cause a phenomenon called `pregnenolone steal.` Pregnenolone is a byproduct of cholesterol metabolism that is necessary to produce both cortisol and DHEA. High stress causes this process to shift towards cortisol production. This shift essentially `steals` the necessary pregnenolone from the DHEA production pathway to produce more cortisol. This process depletes DHEA levels.

Many people rush out and look for DHEA boosting supplements; however, lifestyle factors that deplete DHEA levels should be addressed first. The most important factor includes reducing/eliminating adrenal stressors such as medications, stress, leaky gut syndrome, parasites and other infectious agents, chronic inflammation, physical nerve stress, nutrient deficiencies, poor sleep, & blood sugar imbalances.

An anti-inflammatory diet is a critical part to de-stressing the body and boosting DHEA levels. This diet should be very low in sugar and carbohydrates and very rich in phytonutrients and trace minerals from fresh, raw or lightly steamed vegetables. Powerful anti-inflammatory herbs such as turmeric, ginger, rosemary, thyme, oregano, & cinnamon should be generously consumed on a regular basis.

Healthy fat consumption is an essential part of creating cholesterol which is needed to produce DHEA. Healthy fat sources include coconut products, avocados, olive oil, nuts, seeds, & purified omega-3 fish oil supplements. Healthy protein sources to boost DHEA production include wild-caught fish, grass-fed red meat and free range chicken, turkey, and organic eggs.

Other lifestyle factors that are critical for healthy DHEA levels include regular sun exposure and/or supplementation to maintain vitamin D (25-OH) levels between 70-100 ng/ml. Regular high intensity exercise is also very important for improving intracellular anti-oxidant capabilities while boosting anti-aging hormone secretions. Getting 7-9 hours of sleep regularly by going to bed early (10-11pm ) will allow for the adrenals to effectively heal and repair from lifestyle stress.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/031419_DHEA_aging.html#ixzz1EuM1Ai1o

Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming [Unabridged]

Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming [Unabridged]
by Naomi Oreskes (Author), Erik M. Conway (Author), Peter Johnson (Narrator)
Publisher: Audible, Inc (November 16, 2010) | ISBN n/a | ASIN: B004CJN6XI | Language: English | Audio CD in MP3/64Kbps | 380 MB

The U.S. scientific community has long led the world in research on such areas as public health, environmental science, and issues affecting quality of life. Our scientists have produced landmark studies on the dangers of DDT, tobacco smoke, acid rain, and global warming. But at the same time, a small yet potent subset of this community leads the world in vehement denial of these dangers.

Merchants of Doubt tells the story of how a loose-knit group of high-level scientists and scientific advisers, with deep connections in politics and industry, ran effective campaigns to mislead the public and deny well-established scientific knowledge over four decades. Remarkably, the same individuals surface repeatedly some of the same figures who have claimed that the science of global warming is "not settled" denied the truth of studies linking smoking to lung cancer, coal smoke to acid rain, and CFCs to the ozone hole. "Doubt is our product," wrote one tobacco executive. These "experts" supplied it. Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, historians of science, roll back the rug on this dark corner of the American scientific community, showing how ideology and corporate interests, aided by a too-compliant media, have skewed public understanding of some of the most pressing issues of our era.

download link: http://www.filesonic.com/file/119199261/009333-Merchants_of_Doubt.rar

February 24: Bank Wars on Conspiracy Cafe

What's it all about the turmoil in the Middle East? Follow the money trail to the rising influence of Islamic Banking where money IS NOT created out of thin air and usury is still a sin. In Tunisia Ben Ali's son-in-law El Materi opens the first home grown Islamic bank. The Tunis Financial Harbour to vie for $1.5 trillion in investments. The Central Bank cartel of the Rothschilds is under threat. Regime change is required. Seven of the top ten Islamic Banks are in Iran. Rothschild's puppets say bomb, bomb, bomb Iran. Soros funded organizations behind the colour revolutions past and present. American professor wrote the book on non-violent regime change. Protests leaders trained and equipped by the banksters. Rumour Gadaffi shot, gravy train filmed leaving Tripoli, was there a double Gadaffi left behind, pipeline routes fought over, Middle East leaders stroked, CIA man in Pakistan part of elite team delivering WMD to Al Qaida, End of the fiscal road in Washington, massive asian arms race, 7/7 inquest counsel a shill, Gulf still a threat, they're watching your privates at missing your weapons with the scanner at the airport, TV patent controls your mind, will you be the Borg? On Conspiracy Cafe it's BANK WARS in the Middle East.

Follow this ancient Chinese tradition to prevent chronic disease

(NaturalNews) The healing capacity of green tea has been understood and cultivated by the Chinese for more than 5,000 years. Western medicine has been very slow to embrace the many health benefits attributed to drinking green tea, as it has been with many super foods known to lower the risk of chronic disease. Researchers now have conclusive scientific evidence that green tea can protect the brain against developing Alzheimer`s disease and can play a vital role in protecting the body against cancer. Health-minded individuals can take advantage of the ancient Chinese tradition of drinking green tea each day to naturally protect their health.

Green tea contains compounds known as catechins (EGCG) that are powerful antioxidants known to scavenge free radicals and lower the risk from many illnesses. In the past, scientists have been unable to validate the specific effect of these catechins once they are broken down in the body through digestion. We now have confirmation that EGCG becomes more potent when subjected to post-digestive enzymes in the stomach.

Scientific research conducted at Newcastle University and published in the journal Phytomedicine explains how our body activates green tea compounds to provide enhanced disease protection. Lead researcher Dr. Ed Okello found "when green tea is digested by enzymes in the gut, the resulting chemicals are actually more effective against key triggers of Alzheimer's development than the undigested form of the tea."

The most common form of dementia is Alzheimer`s disease that is known to be a progressive and irreversible disorder resulting in loss of cognitive function. It is widely accepted that the disease is the result of damage from hydrogen peroxide free radicals and an inability to efficiently clear amyloid beta proteins that form brain plaques.

In this study, researchers showed that compounds in the post-digestive tea extract were able to selectively bind with toxic chemicals in the brain and protect the delicate neurons and synapses that are essential to learning and forming new memories. Dr. Okello explained: "green tea has been used in Traditional Chinese medicine for centuries and what we have here provides the scientific evidence why it may be effective against some of the key diseases we face today."

In addition to being a powerful neuroprotective agent, green tea compounds are effective anti-cancer agents. The study authors were able to show that the digested tea catechins were able to slow the growth of tumor cells in an experimental cancer model. A strong association has always existed between green tea consumption and lowered risk from cancer, and this study provides conclusive evidence of the healing power of this natural agent.

Green tea has stood the test of time for more than five millennia and is finally validated as a critical tool in our health management regimen. Most adults will want to drink 2 to 4 cups of green tea each day to take advantage of the healing benefits of this natural functional food.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/031340_green_tea_disease_prevention.html#ixzz1EuLpbMsf

Canada's Illuminati Spy Agency's Building

Canada's Illuminati Spy Agency's Building

A reader writes: The Canadian spy agency's building is a triangle with an inverted cross below it? Don't they ever get tired of this baloney?

Makow comments: Intelligence agencies are the primary instrument of Illuminati subversion. This picture of CSIS's new building on Blair Road in Ottawa confirms it.

Army of Fake Social Media Friends to Promote Propaganda

Does a code of ethics still exist in Intelligence firms? Does it disappear behind closed doors, dirty deeds done in the dark and used against the American people who are supposed to be free to express themselves?D

By Darlene Storm

Feb 23, 2011 2:03 PM

It's recently been revealed that the U.S. government contracted HBGary Federal for the development of software which could create multiple fake social media profiles to manipulate and sway public opinion on controversial issues by promoting propaganda. It could also be used as surveillance to find public opinions with points of view the powers-that-be didn't like. It could then potentially have their "fake" people run smear campaigns against those "real" people. As disturbing as this is, it's not really new for U.S. intelligence or private intelligence firms to do the dirty work behind closed doors.

EFF previously warned that Big Brother wants to be your friend for social media surveillance. While the FBI Intelligence Information Report Handbook (PDF) mentioned using "covert accounts" to access protected information, other government agencies endorsed using security exploits to access protected information.

It's not a big surprise that the U.S. military also wants to use social media to its benefit. Last year, Public Intelligence published the U.S. Air Force social media guide which gave 10 tips for social media such as, "The enemy is engaged in this battlespace and you must engage there as well." Number three was "DON'T LIE. Credibility is critical, without it, no one cares what you have to say...it's also punishable by the UCMJ to give a false statement." The Air Force used the chart below to show how social media influences public opinion.

The 6th Contracting Squadron at MacDill Air Force Base sought the development of Persona Management Software which could be used for creating and managing fake profiles on social media sites to distort the truth and make it appear as if there was a generally accepted agreement on controversial issues. "Personas must be able to appear to originate in nearly any part of the world and can interact through conventional online services and social media platforms." What happened to don't lie and the Uniform Code of Military Justice?

Everything revealed after Anonymous leaked emails from private security firm HBGary Federal is disturbing on many levels. However, the Daily Kos said with the Persona Management Software it would take very few people to create "an army of sockpuppets" which could distort the truth while appearing to be "an entire Brooks Brothers riot online."

So again I ask, what happened to number three . . . the rule about not lying that was also "punishable by the UCMJ to give a false statement"?

President and CEO of Plessas Experts Network, Inc, Kirby Plessas pointed out some of the unethical and potentially illegal activities that Aaron Barr's leaked emails suggested like "Chumming and baiting" which sounded like "entrapment of some sort." There would be no warrant for the data collected on individuals which could then be stored for how long? "THIS is the entire reason Intelligence Oversight was created - to avoid this sort of thing from ever happening again."

According to Redacted News, the leaked emails showed how names can be cross-referenced across social media sites to collect information on people and then used to gain access to those social ciricles. The emails also talked of how Facebook could be used to spread government messages:

Even the most restrictive and security conscious of persons can be exploited. Through the targeting and information reconnaissance phase, a person's hometown and high school will be revealed. An adversary can create a classmates.com account at the same high school and year and find out people you went to high school with that do not have Facebook accounts, then create the account and send a friend request.

Under the mutual friend decision, which is where most people can be exploited, an adversary can look at a targets friend list if it is exposed and find a targets most socially promiscuous friends, the ones that have over 300-500 friends, friend them to develop mutual friends before sending a friend request to the target. To that end friend's accounts can be compromised and used to post malicious material to a targets wall. When choosing to participate in social media an individual is only as protected as his/her weakest friend.

Lots of people have multiple online aliases, Facebook or Twitter accounts for both business and private life. What most bothers me is the lying and seemingly unethical means to an end. Although the government says it doesn't approve of censorship, etc, when its secrets come to light, it seems to be Okay with recommending underhanded tactics.

Secretary Clinton delivered a speech called, "Internet Rights and Wrongs: Choices and Challenges In A Networked World." To help promote and support Internet freedom, the State Department intends to award $25 million in grants. While that is great news, the EFF reported, "For every strong statement about preserving liberty, freedom of expression, and privacy on the global Internet, there exists a countervailing example of the United States attempting to undermine those same values."

Secretary Clinton later told "This Week" anchor Christiane Amanpou that most Americans "are in favor of human rights, freedom, democracy. We know that ultimately the most progress that can be made on behalf of human beings anywhere is when those individuals are empowered, when they have governments that are responsive." Clinton added, "At the same time, we recognize that this process can be hijacked. It can be hijacked by both outside and inside elements within any country."

So while the U.S. government can talk a good talk, what it does and what it says often doesn't seem to jive. Gasp, I know, it's not a big shocker but sometimes I find that utterly frustrating. The President wanted an Internet Kill Switch, the FBI keeps pushing for backdoors on all-things-Net. What happened to a code of ethics? Does it disappear behind closed doors, dirty deeds done in the dark and used against the American people who are supposed to be free to express themselves?

http://www.pcworld.com/article/220495/army_of_fake_social_media_friends_to_promote_propaganda.html

Lindsey Williams Exclusive: Nwo to Target Iran & Saudi Arabi Next, Oil to Hit $200 a Barrel 1/5

Canada, U.S. agree to use each other’s troops in civil emergencies

Canada and the U.S. have signed an agreement that paves the way for the militaries from either nation to send troops across each other’s borders during an emergency, but some are questioning why the Harper government has kept silent on the deal.

Neither the Canadian government nor the Canadian Forces announced the new agreement, which was signed Feb. 14 in Texas.

The U.S. military’s Northern Command, however, publicized the agreement with a statement outlining how its top officer, Gen. Gene Renuart, and Canadian Lt.-Gen. Marc Dumais, head of Canada Command, signed the plan, which allows the military from one nation to support the armed forces of the other nation during a civil emergency.

The new agreement has been greeted with suspicion by the left wing in Canada and the right wing in the U.S.

The left-leaning Council of Canadians, which is campaigning against what it calls the increasing integration of the U.S. and Canadian militaries, is raising concerns about the deal.

“It’s kind of a trend when it comes to issues of Canada-U.S. relations and contentious issues like military integration. We see that this government is reluctant to disclose information to Canadians that is readily available on American and Mexican websites,” said Stuart Trew, a researcher with the Council of Canadians.

Trew said there is potential for the agreement to militarize civilian responses to emergency incidents. He noted that work is also underway for the two nations to put in place a joint plan to protect common infrastructure such as roadways and oil pipelines.

“Are we going to see (U.S.) troops on our soil for minor potential threats to a pipeline or a road?” he asked.

Trew also noted the U.S. military does not allow its soldiers to operate under foreign command so there are questions about who controls American forces if they are requested for service in Canada. “We don’t know the answers because the government doesn’t want to even announce the plan,” he said.

But Canada Command spokesman Commander David Scanlon said it will be up to civilian authorities in both countries on whether military assistance is requested or even used.

He said the agreement is “benign” and simply sets the stage for military-to-military co-operation if the governments approve.

“But there’s no agreement to allow troops to come in,” he said. “It facilitates planning and co-ordination between the two militaries. The ‘allow’ piece is entirely up to the two governments.”

If U.S. forces were to come into Canada they would be under tactical control of the Canadian Forces but still under the command of the U.S. military, Scanlon added.

News of the deal, and the allegation it was kept secret in Canada, is already making the rounds on left-wing blogs and Internet sites as an example of the dangers of the growing integration between the two militaries.

On right-wing blogs in the U.S. it is being used as evidence of a plan for a “North American union” where foreign troops, not bound by U.S. laws, could be used by the American federal government to override local authorities.

“Co-operative militaries on Home Soil!” notes one website. “The next time your town has a ‘national emergency,’ don’t be surprised if Canadian soldiers respond. And remember — Canadian military aren’t bound by posse comitatus.”

Posse comitatus is a U.S. law that prohibits the use of federal troops from conducting law enforcement duties on domestic soil unless approved by Congress.

Scanlon said there was no intent to keep the agreement secret on the Canadian side of the border. He noted it will be reported on in the Canadian Forces newspaper next week and that publication will be put on the Internet.

Scanlon said the actual agreement hasn’t been released to the public as that requires approval from both nations. That decision has not yet been taken, he added.

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/story.html?id=403d90d6-7a61-41ac-8cef-902a1d14879d&k=14984

U.S. & Canada Agree to Common "Perimeter"

The move toward a North American Union received another big boost last week as President Barack Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper met in Washington, D.C. to hammer out a deal on creating a common “perimeter” around the two countries while diminishing the role of the nations’ shared border and developing a biometric system to track North Americans. The two leaders, touting the plan as a move toward security and prosperity, signed a four-page declaration supposedly committing the two countries to working together on a wide range of issues. According to news reports, the final agreement was the product of many months of work.

The meeting also resulted in the creation of a “Beyond the Border Working Group,” which will be charged with the declaration’s implementation and with reporting to the U.S. President and the Canadian Prime Minister in the next few months and on a regular basis after that.

“Security” and “prosperity” were, as usual, two of the main focuses. “To preserve and extend the benefits our close relationship has helped bring to Canadians and Americans alike, we intend to pursue a perimeter approach to security, working together within, at, and away from the borders of our two countries to enhance our security and accelerate the legitimate flow of people, goods, and services between our two countries,” the declaration states. It also praises the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.

“We intend to work together in cooperation and partnership to develop, implement, manage, and monitor security initiatives, standards, and practices to fulfill our vision,” the document notes, without a reference to the legislatures of either nation.

“We also recognize that cooperation across air, land, and maritime domains, as well as in space and cyberspace, our enduring bi-national defence [sic] relationship, and military support for civilian authorities engaged in disaster response efforts and critical infrastructure protection, have all contributed significantly to the security of our populations,” it says, adding that increased information-sharing and working with all levels of government and the private sector is high on the agenda. Bringing in third countries — Mexico, perhaps? — and international institutions is part of the plan, too.

Essentially, the declaration commits the two governments to work together on everything from health, security, the economy, terror, fraud, and pandemic preparedness to countless other areas where the U.S. government does not even possess constitutional authority to act within the 50 states. Constitutional constraints are not mentioned at all in the document.

The so-called “Agreement Between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States of America on Emergency Management Cooperation,” last updated in 2008, will apparently be “a cornerstone” of the efforts. While not mentioned by name, the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, signed by the Bush regime with the governments of Canada and Mexico, bears striking similarities to the new deal.

Next, the document covers a new area: biometric tracking and identification of North American citizens. “We intend to work toward common technical standards for the collection, transmission, and matching of biometrics that enable the sharing of information on travellers [sic] in real time,” the agreement explains. The two regimes also “expect to work towards an integrated Canada-United States entry-exit system.”

In addition, the U.S. and Canadian governments will be looking to “integrate” their efforts and develop “joint facilities and programs” within and beyond the perimeter being erected around the two countries. “Harmonizing existing programs” is also part of the deal.

Law enforcement will be “harmonized” between the nations as well, according to the declaration. “We intend to build on existing bilateral law enforcement programs to develop the next generation of integrated cross-border law enforcement operations that leverage cross-designated officers and resources,” it states. Making cyberspace “safer” for North American citizens — while extraordinarily vague — will also be a priority.

And it appears that Congress and the Canadian Parliament will have little to no say in the matter. “Responsibility for ensuring inter-agency coordination will rest with the Prime Minister and the President and their respective officials,” according to the agreement.

President Obama and Prime Minster Harper held a press conference to announce the progress after signing the agreement last week. “The United States and Canada are not simply allies, not simply neighbors,” Obama said. “We are woven together like perhaps no other two countries in the world.” After some jokes, he continued.

“We’ve had a very successful day,” the President announced. “First, we agreed to a new vision for managing our shared responsibilities — not just at the border but beyond the border. That means working more closely to improve border security with better screening, new technologies and information-sharing among law enforcement, as well as identifying threats early. It also means finding new ways to improve the free flow of goods and people,” he said, noting that a new council had been created. “We've directed our teams to develop an action plan to move forward quickly.” Again, no mention of Congress.

Then he broached the subject of bringing other governments on the American continent into the fold. “Finally, we discussed our shared commitment to progress with our partners in the Americas, including greater security cooperation,” Obama said, noting that he was going to Latin America soon. He closed with some remarks about Egypt and gave the floor to the Canadian Prime Minister.

“Today, President Obama and I are issuing a declaration on our border, but it is, of course, much more than that. It is a declaration on our relationship,” Harper said, alternating between English and French. “Over the past nearly 200 years, our two countries have progressively developed the closest, warmest, most integrated and most successful relationship in the world. We are partners, neighbors, allies, and, most of all, we are true friends.”

He noted that in an age of “grave dangers,” the U.S. and Canada share similar interests and values as they face “common” challenges and threats. “So we commit to expanding our management of the border to the concept of a North American perimeter,” he said. “The declaration marks the start of this endeavor, not the end; an ambitious agenda between two countries.”

When asked about national sovereignty by a reporter, Harper dismissed the concerns, saying the declaration was not about sovereignty. “We share security threats that are very similar on both sides of the border. We share an integrated economic space where it doesn't make sense to constantly check the same cargo over and over again — if we can do that at a perimeter, if we can decongest the border, that's what we should be doing,” he declared. “If we can — if we can harmonize regulations in ways that avoid unnecessary duplication and red tape for business — these are things that we need to do.”

In response to the same question, Obama also brushed aside concerns. “We've already made great progress just over the last several years on various specific issues,” he commented. “What we're trying to do now is to look at this in a more comprehensive fashion, so that it's not just border security issues, but it's a broader set of issues involved.” Both leaders said they were committed to defending their nation’s values.

Ironically, most of the resistance to the newest scheme is coming from Canada, where concerns over sovereignty have sparked a fierce backlash. Countless politicians from different parties across the spectrum have lined up to express concerns about the deal. Commentators have suggested the issue could even play a crucial role in the next Canadian election.

The Canadian press referred to the agreement as the most significant change in U.S.-Canada relations since NAFTA. Several high-profile Canadian publications applauded the arrangement, while an assortment of others attacked it as a plot against Canadian sovereignty and values. The U.S. press, on the other hand, barely mentioned it.

Both governments deliberately tried to avoid scrutiny of the matter in the press and in their legislatures, as a government public-relations document leaked by The Toronto Star this week revealed.

The new agreement proves yet again that, as The New American has reported extensively in recent years, a Council on Foreign Relations-backed North American Union — modeled after the European Union — is silently being erected with no input from citizens or their legislatures. A great deal of progress has already been made, and unless serious efforts to halt the move arise soon, it may be too late to undo the damage.

Talk of creating a North American legislature is already in the press and on politicians’ minds. NAFTA tribunals routinely overrule American courts. And with the implementation of a “common perimeter,” the goal of an unaccountable North American Union is one step closer to fruition.

http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/world-mainmenu-26/north-america-mainmenu-36/6274-us-a-canada-agree-to-common-perimeter-biometric-tracking

Scientists warn of $2,000bn solar ‘Katrina’

The sun is waking up from a long quiet spell. Last week it sent out the strongest flare for four years – and scientists are warning that earth should prepare for an intense electromagnetic storm that, in the worst case, could be a “global Katrina” costing the world economy $2,000bn.

Senior officials responsible for policy on solar storms – also known as space weather – in the US, UK and Sweden urged more preparedness at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington.

“We have to take the issue of space weather seriously,” said Sir John Beddington, UK chief scientist. “The sun is coming out of a quiet period, and our vulnerability has increased since the last solar maximum [around 2000].”

“Predict and prepare should be the watchwords,” agreed Jane Lubchenco, head of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “So much more of our technology is vulnerable than it was 10 years ago.”

A solar storm starts with an eruption of super-hot gas travelling out from the sun at speeds of up to 5m miles an hour. Electrically charged particles hit earth’s atmosphere 20 to 30 hours later, causing electromagnetic havoc.

Last week’s solar storm may have been the biggest since 2007, but it was relatively small in historical terms.

It caused some radio communications problems and minor disruption of civil aviation as airlines routed flights away from the polar regions, said Dr Lubchenco.

A more extreme storm can shut down communications satellites for many hours – or even cause permanent damage to their components. On the ground, the intense magnetic fluctuations can induce surges in power lines, leading to grid failures such as the one that blacked out the whole of Quebec in 1989.

The 11-year cycle of solar activity is quite variable and the present one is running late, with the next maximum expected in 2013.

The peak was not expected to be very strong but that should not cause complacency, said Tom Bogdan, director of the US Space Weather Prediction Center.

The most intense solar storm on record, which ruined much of the world’s newly installed telegraph network in 1859, took place during an otherwise weak cycle. An 1859-type storm today could knock out the world’s information, communications and electricity distribution systems, at a cost estimated by the US government at $2,000bn.

In terms of terrestrial vulnerability, the biggest change since the 2000 peak is that the world has become more dependent on global positioning system satellites – and not just for navigation. The world’s mobile phone networks depend on ultra-precise GPS time signals for their co-ordination.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/67444b2c-3d13-11e0-bbff-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1EbrpJQ4d

A View From Space, Gary Bell: February 19, 2011

The Deception and Numerology of Egypt 2011

The events leading up to the ousting of Hosni Mubarak on 2/11/2011 is a historic event under the eyes of the deluded. Mubarak stepped down from a 29 year rule over Egypt, and now the country is controlled from the high command of the armed forces, headed by the defense minister. Demonstrators in central Cairo protested 18 days that began on January 25. Deciphering through the dualities of the world

and comprehending that this world is controlled by the occult illuminati that stages these events is crucial. The events that occurred in Egypt are surrounded with occult numerology.

Occult Numerology:

Mubarak Ruled Egypt for 29 years. 2+9=11
18 days of protest reduces as 6+6+6=33:33:33
Protests began 1/25/2011 adds to 12 that reduces to 6+6 or 33:33
Mubarak steps down 2/11/2011 = 11:11:11:11,
The same day as the Anniversary of the Iran Revolution and Release of Nelson Mandela.

President Obama described the Egyptian people as an inspiration to the world for carrying out a non-violent revolution, adding: “Egypt will never be the same again.”

Exactly, Egypt wont be the same, the Egyptians can expect a government that will support the New World Order.

For sixty years Egypt has been a military dictatorship backed by a nasty secret police force. Finally, no doubt reluctantly, the army leaders have brought Nasser’s system to an end.

Why is the media teaching that idea? Do you really think Egypt is going to share the income from tourism with the local people and retire their secret police force that terrorizes the common Egyptian?

On the surface Washington and Cairo seem to be worlds apart, but appearances can be deceiving. Both regimes rely on state terrorism, deception, propaganda, election fraud, the suppression of political parties, and violent repression to stay in power.

The real Muslim Brotherhood is not the fanatical sheikh with his equally fanatical following, nor is it even the top mullahs and ayatollahs who lead entire movements of such madmen; Khomeini, Qaddafi, General Zia are exquisitely fashioned puppets. The real Muslim Brothers are those whose hands are never dirtied with the business of killing and burning. They are the secretive bankers and financiers who stand behind the curtain, the members of the old Arab, Turkish, or Persian families whose genealogy places them in the oligarchical elite…..and the Muslim Brotherhood is money.

After JFK’s assassination America’s shadow government rose to greater heights, and shrouded its criminality from the American people by using totalitarian tactics, manipulating the media, filling the public discourse with propaganda and misinformation, and mastering the same techniques of repression and state terrorism that the Egyptian government is currently using against the Egyptian people who are demanding freedom and a complete overhaul of their tyrannical government.

Two instrumental techniques of repression used by the governments of Egypt, America, Iran, and other dictatorial governments:

1) The Use of Agent Provocateurs: Mubarak’s regime is using agent provocateurs to cause chaos on the streets of Egypt, loot stores and other buildings, and intimidate anti-government protesters. This deceptive technique is used by many tyrannical states to portray average protesters as criminals and looters, which then causes distrust in the entire society about the legitimacy of the protesters’ grievances, and prepares the situation for a government crackdown on protests and civil-liberties. Many governments practice this technique, including Iran, the United States, Israel, England, and Canada. In 2007 at the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America summit meeting in Montebello, Quebec, the police went undercover, dressed as anarchists and carrying rocks, to instigate violence and disunity at protests. So as we see images of members of the Egyptian police wearing regular clothes and hitting people we should remember that Egypt is not unique. Our so-called democratic governments in the West have allowed this type of deceptive and anti-democratic behavior by our police forces on numerous occasions.

2) Press Censorship, And The Shutdown of Communication: The shutdown of the Internet and cell phone service in Egypt was one of the first things that Mubarak’s regime did in anticipation of the huge protests in Alexandria and Cairo on Friday, January 28. It is critical for repressive regimes to control the flow of information during a period of civil unrest, and keep its citizens from communicating and coordinating with each other via the internet, social network tools, and cell phones. Sens. Other regimes, from China to Iran, and even the United States also like the option of shutting down the internet. Senator Joseph Lieberman and Senator Susan Collins have introduced an Internet “Kill Switch” Bill in the Senate, which hands tyrannical powers to the President of the United States to shut down the internet during a “national cyber emergency.” While the language of the bill has been toned down in some ways by a Senate committee, it still gives the President the dictatorial power to shut down the internet, and thereby silence dissenting voices, with the justification that the government has to take aggressive action to deal with a “cyber-emergency.”

America is Still Under a State of Emergency:

On September 14, 2001, President George W. Bush declared a national emergency with respect to the terrorist attacks of three days earlier. The National Emergencies Act of 1976 requires the President to renew this state of emergency on an annual basis if he wishes it to remain in effect. Bush renewed it every year he was in office, and now President Barack Obama has extended it for the second time during his term.

The United States of America, therefore, is now entering its 10th year under a continual state of emergency — on the basis of a small number of (admittedly spectacular) terrorist attacks that took place in the space of a few hours back in 2001 and a handful of failed attempts since.

So-called national emergencies are a boon for governments, and particularly for heads of state. The “national emergency” in 1933 Germany occasioned by the firebombing of the Reichstag spurred the German parliament to grant Chancellor Adolf Hitler supposedly temporary dictatorial powers; we all know how that turned out. Egypt has been operating under a state of emergency since 1967 (except for a brief period in 1980 and ’81). Its government has taken advantage of its emergency declaration to lock up thousands of political prisoners indefinitely, to create a kangaroo court system for those it bothers to try, to prevent criticism of the regime, and to suspend other constitutional rights.

Many of the Egyptian government’s abuses have occurred in the United States on a smaller scale, justified by such personages as Bush Justice Department official John Yoo on the basis of the ongoing national emergency. If our national emergency is allowed to stand for another 30-plus years, imagine how entrenched and expanded these policies would become.

When the President declares a national emergency, wrote Harold C. Relyea, specialist in American national government with the Congressional Research Service, he “may seize property, organize and control the means of production, seize commodities, assign military forces abroad, institute martial law, seize and control all transportation and communication, regulate the operation of private enterprise, restrict travel, and, in a variety of ways, control the lives of the American citizens.”

The Middle East is a region of youth. More than 70% are under 30. Many of them are unemployed. The majority are poor. In Egypt, the elite among these who are well educated joined forces with other younger Egyptians to sustain the rebellion of Tahrir Square. Yet, they are very deluded of the bigger picture that all governments are controlled by a shadow government that will continue to enslave the culture of Egypt.

Sources:
Washington Blog—State of Emergency
The New American—The Nine-year “Emergency”

Kevin Libin: Alberta’s dangerous database

When the RCMP were caught many years ago burning down a barn belonging to a family of Quebec separatists — after a judge refused to grant the force permission to wiretap their meeting — Pierre Trudeau shrugged off the incident.

If Mounties burning down barns was illegal, the prime minister said dismissively, perhaps he should make it legal for them to burn down barns. Mr. Trudeau had a sharp legal mind and so he surely understood the difference between something being illegal and something being wrong. Even if he was being deliberately provocative in public, privately Mr. Trudeau knew full well torching people’s property isn’t wrong strictly because it’s illegal. It is, of course, illegal because it is wrong.

That is a difference apparently lost on the Alberta government. The province is quietly putting together a database for police that is every bit as dangerous to citizens’ liberties as giving police the unwarranted right to destroy private property. The project is called, rather ominously, TALON — as in The Alberta Law Officers’ Network — and it will, according to the solicitor general’s department, allow police quick access to information about “persons of interest.” The trouble is, TALON is designed to keep track not just of Albertans’ criminal records, but also, according to the Calgary Herald, any “speculations, unproven allegations, investigation theories, details of 911 calls — virtually any record of a citizen’s contacts with the police” anywhere in the province. Any officer will be able to dial it up without a supervisor’s permission, warrant, or cause. It is, in other words, a record of any old thing that authorities consider worthwhile keeping track of that can be accessed at any time for any reason by any officer. That kind of police-state-style record keeping might be otherwise ruled unlawful because it is so plainly an unjust violation of citizens’ privacy. To get around that, the province appears to be prepared to simply make gross intrusions perfectly legitimate.

Canadians already tolerate a certain amount of monitoring of personal information by police in the name of fighting the bad guys. The Canadian Police Information Centre (CPIC) keeps track of criminal records, pending charges, and lists any acquittals and discharges. Questions for the firearms registry go much deeper, including not only what guns a person owns, but also his or her financial circumstances, personal romantic relationships and any history with mental illness.

But databasing unproven allegations, 911 calls and “theories” appears to be new territory. The average citizen stopped by an officer can be compelled to volunteer a lot of information (notice that officers at drunk-driving checkpoints routinely ask you what you’ve been up to that evening) that could, quite conceivably, find its way into the database. And at least CPIC requires officers to furnish a valid reason for running someone’s name through a check. Not TALON.

And the more intelligence authorities compile on us, the more vulnerable we all are to having such confidential things read by people who have no right to see them, whether inside or outside government organizations. One Albertan health-care worker was recently caught repeatedly tapping into the medical file of her boyfriend’s ex-wife. In Ottawa, an employee with the Canada Revenue Agency a few years back was found digging around the financial affairs of women he met on the Internet. We know CPIC is accessed illegally hundreds of times a year. And MP Garry Breitkreuz has been trying for ages to get the RCMP to take seriously evidence that gun thieves are hacking into the firearms registry to research their targets. Concentrating any and all citizens’ interactions with police into a centralized, real-time database is, as useful as it may be for police, just this side of a very tenuous line of leaking it on the Internet.

Canada’s privacy commissioner has, in fact, been extremely strict with Internet firms like Google and Facebook who dare to record personal Internet habits of their users for purposes of marketing them products and services.

But according to Wayne Wood, a spokesman for Alberta’s privacy commissioner, there is no “mandatory requirement” for public bodies like the solicitor general’s office to consult with the commissioner about privacy concerns, and, the only material obligation the government has to a citizen with this kind of intelligence file is not to share it with third parties.

The province has requested input from the privacy commissioner on the TALON database, Mr. Wood says, but the “privacy impact assessment” that his office provides will, in the end, be non-binding on the government.

Albertans had better hope that they have less to fear from law enforcement agencies misusing their private data than they do from Mark Zuckerberg. The province has been discreetly building the TALON project for five years now, has committed $65-million to it, and is reportedly nearly finished building its “top-secret” headquarters, so it may not be inclined back off its plan regardless of what the privacy commissioner has to say.

The solicitor general’s office maintains this is all about fighting increasingly sophisticated organized crime networks, as if the problem with justice in this day and age has only to do with a paucity of glaringly unreliable hearsay and false accusations.

Already, authorities in Alberta have some pretty wide latitude to sidestep rights in their battle against the gang menace: the province’s Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods initiative, for instance, permits police to seize for 30 days any homes and businesses merely suspected of being used for illegal activities.

Of course, it’s all in the name of protecting Albertans. What terrible things might befall this province’s citizens if it weren’t for authorities legalizing these increasingly intrusive tactics, we are left to only imagine. That’s because, for some reason, the government never seems to tell us.

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2011/02/14/kevin-libin-alberta%E2%80%99s-dangerous-database/#ixzz0qR4N1nj5

The City: Magnet for Disaster

When it comes to bad stuff the sky’s the limit. It’s gonna happen, eventually…one way or another. And it could be real bad.

And when bad stuff happens, you’re better off being somewhere else.

Where?

Generally, bad stuff seems to happen most often in cities. Why is that? Cities are where most people live. It is where governments are. And it is where the labor force is most specialized.

There are no subsistence farmers living in cities. Nor do urban populations “live off the land.” Instead, they depend on complex networks of commerce. The typical city dweller produces neither food nor energy. He sits all day in an office — completely dependent on others to provide power and food. Then, he goes home — still completely dependent on the division of labor for his most important needs.

Progress can be described as the elaboration of the division of labor. In man’s most primitive state, specialization is extremely limited. From what we’ve been told, the early man was the hunter. Early woman gathered…that’s about the extent of it.

As the tribe grows larger, specialization increases. One person might tend the fire. Another might be in charge of making clothes or arrows.

The advent of sedentary agriculture and towns caused a big leap forward in human progress and, not coincidentally, the division of labor. Some townspeople went out to tend the fields. Others began to focus on woodworking…or iron mongering…or making weapons…or clothes. Some played cards and hung around at bars. There was soon a homebuilding industry…and, not long after, merchants, prostitutes and bankers…and even shyster lawyers and tax collectors.

As the division of labor expanded, the average person became richer…and more dependent on others. In order to eat, someone else had to plant…and till…and harvest…and hunt…and gather. And then, when agriculture became mechanized, he depended on faraway people who produced oil and gasoline…and people who built tractors and combines…and bankers who financed industries and factories. And, of course, he was more dependent on money too. In the days when he bartered, money was no threat. Then, when he traded only with gold and silver coins, there were no monetary breakdowns…no hyperinflations…and no financial crises.

As the 20th century progressed, more and more people gave up agriculture, moved to cities and took part in other industries. Today, cities may have millions of residents — like Bombay with 14 million…or Sao Paulo with 20 million…or Mexico City with even more. All of these people are dependent on vast, stretched lines of communication and commerce.

Even the farmers themselves are now dependent on these sophisticated networks of commerce. They depend on money…and what it will buy. Agriculture has become monocultural. That is, a farmer is likely to produce only wheat. Or only rapeseed. Or only barley. Or only cattle. Gone are the chickens around the farmhouse and the pig in the back pen. If the system of transport and trade breaks down — or the money itself goes bad — thousands of farmers could go hungry too.

There are black swans all over the place, waiting to be discovered. And when a black swan appears, people in the cities seem to suffer most.

In the hyperinflation in Germany in 1923, for example, farmers had so much food they ran out of storage space. But they wouldn’t sell it to city slickers. The mark was losing value so fast, farmers preferred to hold their crops off the market, knowing that the price was soaring…and that if they sold, the money they got would soon be worthless.

People in the cities, meanwhile, were starving. Soon, gangs roved the countryside, raiding rural barns and houses…and occasionally killing farmers who tried to resist.

Plagues hit city dwellers hard too. Proximity seems to be a curse when an infectious disease appears.

And, of course, in time of war and revolution, cities tend to be the battlegrounds.

Advancing armies are rarely polite. But even if they are advancing through the countryside, they are usually advancing towards cities, which they attack. In the old days, cities were besieged, starved out, and then, when they were taken, the attacking soldiers were given three days in which to sack the cities. In other words, they had three days to commit whatever mischief and mayhem their imaginations suggested.

When bad stuff happens, progress goes into reverse — so does the division of labor. When an economy goes backward, much of the specialization that developed during the boom years turns out to be uneconomic, or unaffordable, or unwanted. People may be willing to pay someone to park their car when they are flush. But when they are broke, they will park their own cars.

As the division of labor goes backward, people also find they need to tend to their own food and energy needs. Here is where it gets very tough for people who live in cities. They have no stores of mason jars with food from their own gardens that they have canned themselves. They have no hams hanging in the barn or stocked away in the larder. They have no animals on the hoof that they can slaughter. They get no eggs from the chickens they don’t have…and they can hardly go into the local park and shoot squirrels to make a pie.

Instead, they are out of luck.

Generally, when the black swans come out you are better off in the country — with country-boy skills and old-time farms supplies.

We once met a fellow who had a keen appreciation for apocalypse. He was sure it was coming. So, he moved to Arkansas where, he said, “I’m protected by 300 miles of armed hillbillies.”

That’s something else to think about. Not only do you have to worry about food and energy, you also have to worry about your neighbors. If you have a nice little vegetable garden next to a large apartment complex, for example, you might have a hard time protecting your crops. And don’t count on fattening a calf in Central Park during a famine.

You need to be somewhere else. Where?

Regards,
Bill Bonner

February 17: JOUSTING CONSPIRACIES ON CONSPIRACY CAFE

Massive hack attack on Canada, Finance, Treasury and Defence targeted, citizens harassed in terror agenda while critical infrastructure is left unguarded, Harper bus comes to Toronto for crime bill dog and pony show, Port Officer confirms nukes, Conspiracy Cafe reported suspicious 'crate' going to the Olympics last year, terror trainer for London bombing US informant, false flag terror list omits George's information, Hmmm! Operation Mockingbird part deux - controlled opposition,Richard Syrett's Conspiracy Shill Ron Craig, George's taping erased exposed Craig as a disinformation agent with his own words, Is he CIA as well? How come he produces and directs The Conspiracy Shill? Food price inflation the weapon of regime change, the Masonic sign in Egypt, 2 Mubaraks, nipples squeezed at the border, Royal Navy goes down the drink, how the master criminals launder their money. On Conspiracy Cafe we joust Conspiracy En Garde!

Terrorist Who Trained London Bombers Was Working For US Government

Listen up Glenn Beck: “Radical Islam” is a creature of the US military-industrial complex

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Monday, February 14, 2011

While talking heads like Glenn Beck continue to invoke the threat of radical Islam, they habitually ignore the blindingly obvious, that radical Islam is a creature of the US military-industrial complex. Case in point – the terrorist who trained the London bombers was a US informant and has been freed after serving only four and a half years of a possible 70-year sentence.

Citing his “exceptional co-operation,” in working with US authorities, a New York Judge released Mohammed Junaid Babar despite him pleading guilty to five counts of terrorism, an outcome that has, “Raised questions over whether Babar was a US informer at the time he was helping to train the ringleader of the 7 July tube and bus bombings,” reports the London Guardian.

Babar admits to consorting with high level “Al-Qaeda” terrorists, as well as “providing senior members with money and equipment, running weapons.” He also set up a training camp in Pakistan in 2003 where alleged 7/7 ringleader Mohammad Sidique Khan learned bomb-making techniques.

“Graham Foulkes, a magistrate whose 22-year-old son David was killed by Khan at Edgware Road underground station in 2005, said: “People get four and a half years for burglary. They can get more for some road traffic offences. So for an international terrorist who’s directly linked to the death of my son and dozens and dozens of people to get that sentence is just outrageous.”

But Babar’s release makes perfect sense given the fact that he was likely working for US authorities as an informant while training one of the alleged London bombers.

“A remark from the sentencing judge that Babar “began co-operating even before his arrest”, has raised the possibility, supported by other circumstantial evidence obtained by the Guardian, that he may have been an informant for the US government before his detention by the FBI in April 2004,” writes the Guardian’s Shiv Malik, who in a separate article goes into greater depth on how, “Babar may have been working for the US security services while pretending to be a jihadi – allegations that could imply serious failures to prevent the 7 July bombings.”

The Guardian article describes how a top US terrorism lawyer has seen sealed evidence in the case which “suggests Babar could have been working for the US authorities before his arrest in April 2004.”

“Having reviewed the court transcript himself, bereaved father Graham Foulkes said: “There’s a hint from one or two of the sentences [in the transcript] that do strongly suggest [Babar's] co-operation was going well beyond his official arrest. And it looks as if the Americans may well have known in detail what Babar was up to in Pakistan [at the time] and that is a very, very serious matter.”

The fact that Babar has served less than 5 years for playing a crucial role in attacks which killed 52 people and injured hundreds more clearly indicates that he is being rewarded by US authorities for his involvement in the 7/7 bombings.

Lest we forget that the the so-called mastermind behind the 7/7 London bombings, Haroon Rashid Aswat, was a British intelligence asset. Former Justice Dept. prosecutor and terror expert John Loftus revealed that the so called Al-Muhajiroun group, based in London, had formed during the Kosovo crisis, during which fundamentalist muslim leaders (Or what is now referred to as Al-Qaeda) were recruited by MI6 to fight in Kosovo.

The revelations about Babar once again underscore the myopic and ludicrous assertions of people like Glenn Beck, who constantly invoke the threat of radical Islam, particularly in the context of recent events in Egypt, while failing to point out that radical Islam is being fostered and fomented by the US military-industrial complex.

Almost every single major terror plot over the last decade plus blamed on “radical Islam” has had the combined or individual fingerprints of US, British, Canadian and Israeli intelligence agencies and federal law enforcement bodies all over it.

9/11

Every single shred of evidence concerning the alleged 9/11 hijackers points to the fact that they were patsies controlled by informants working for the US government.

The US Special Operations Command’s Able Danger program identified the hijackers and their accomplices long before 9/11, but when the head of the program, Colonel Anthony Shaffer, tried to pass the information on to the 9/11 Commission, he was gagged and slandered and the vital information his team had passed on was ignored and buried.

Curt Weldon, Former U.S. Republican Congressman and senior member of the House Armed Services Committee, documented how the US government tracked the hijackers’ movements before 9/11.

Louai al-Sakka, the man who trained six of the hijackers, was a CIA informant. A number of the other alleged hijackers were trained at US air bases. In the months prior to 9/11, alleged hijackers Khalid Almidhar and Nawaf Alhazmi were renting rooms in a house owned and lived in by an FBI informant.

In a 2002 article entitled The Hijackers We Let Escape, Newsweek’s Michael Isikoff and Daniel Klaidman documented how, “The CIA tracked two suspected terrorists to a Qaeda summit in Malaysia in January 2000, then looked on as they re-entered America and began preparations for September 11.”

The fact that there were numerous Al-Qaeda affiliated terrorists involved in the pre-planning stages of 9/11 is unsurprising given former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds’ testimony that Bin Laden was working for the US right up until the day of 9/11.

On the very morning of 9/11, the money man behind the alleged hijackers, Pakistan’s ISI Chief Mahmoud Ahmad, was meeting with U.S. government and intelligence officials.

Indeed, even after 9/11, the so-called spiritual leader of the very hijackers who allegedly slammed Flight 77 into the Pentagon, Anwar al-Awlaki, was himself invited to dine with Pentagon top brass mere months after the attack.

UNDERWEAR BOMBER

Al-Awlaki was later involved in directing the underwear bomber, who was allowed to board the plane by order of the US State Department aided by a well-dressed man who got Abdulmutallab on the airliner despite the fact that he was on a terror watch list and had no passport. Eyewitness and Delta 253 passenger Kurt Haskell subsequently blew the whistle to state that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was given the bomb by the US government to create a pretext for the implementation of naked body scanners and boost the TSA’s budget.

FORT HOOD SHOOTING

Fort Hood shooter Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan repeatedly communicated with alleged Al-Qaeda leaders for nearly a year before his rampage. The FBI knew Hasan was sending emails to terrorists, but they did nothing, allowed him to remain on a U.S. Army base, and even invited him to participate in Homeland Security exercises. Hasan was also being handled by US agent Al-Awlaki.

FORT DIX

Lawyers in a case relating to the much vaunted 2007 terror plot to attack Fort Dix and kill “as many soldiers as possible” concluded that FBI informants were the key figures behind the operation and that the accused, six foreign-born Muslims, were merely bungling patsies. US agent Al-Awlaki was again involved in training the would-be terrorists.

TORONTO PLOT

The “Toronto 18″ terrorists turned out to be “a bunch of incompetent guys who were primarily misled by a delusional megalomaniac”. The explosive fertilizer material the terrorist cell apparently planned to use was in fact purchased by an informant working for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, agents of which had radicalized the group. US agent Al-Awlaki was again involved in the plot.

PORTLAND PLOT

The man accused of attempting to blow up a Christmas tree in Portland’s Pioneer Courthouse Square, Mohamed Osman Mohamud, was a befuddled patsy, groomed and radicalized from start to finish by the FBI as part of a radicalization and entrapment program. Shortly after news of the attempted bombing broke, it emerged that the FBI had provided Mohamud with a fake bomb, van, and cell phone (to be used as a detonator) in the incident, as well as thousands of dollars in cash at every step of the plot.

MUMBAI MASSACRE

The man accused of being the mastermind behind the 2008 Mumbai massacre, David Headley, was a US government informant and was also at one time on the payroll of the Central Intelligence Agency.

SHOE BOMBER

Hundreds of terror suspects have been convicted in civilian federal courts, including convicted shoe bomber Richard Reid who attended the Finsbury Park Mosque in North London. The Finsbury imam at the time was Abu Hamza al-Masri who began working with British Security Services in 1997.

MIAMI PLOT

In the media-lauded Miami terror case in 2007, the supposed ringleader Narseal “Prince Marina” Batiste “had heard of Al-Qaeda, but wasn’t sure what it stood for. The FBI instigators made Batiste swear loyalty to al-Qaida; then had him call on his local buddies to form an ‘Islamic army’ in Miami. None had military training. Some could barely read. But Batiste assured the group in the midst of its collective marijuana buzz of greatness ahead,” wrote Saul Landau.

These were the men who comedian John Stewart referred to as “seven dipshits in a warehouse” after Attorney General Alberto Gonzales had ludicrously told the press that the group of semi-retarded gang-bangers had planned to “wage a ground war against America”.

NEW YORK SYNAGOGUE BOMB PLOT

A group of so-called Muslim terrorists were busted in New York for supposedly planning to blow up synagogues in the Bronx and shoot down military airplanes flying out of the New York Air National Guard base. The men were provided with fake explosives and inactive missiles by an FBI informant, reported the Christian Science Monitor. Two of the ringleaders of the “deadly” plot which was endlessly hyped by the media turned out to be semi-retarded potheads, exactly as we had predicted would be the case due to the innumerable past cases with the exact same modus operandi.

I could go on for pages and pages listing details of ever major terror plot since and indeed before 9/11 that were blamed on “radical Islam” yet in fact turned out to be completely contrived by the FBI, CIA, Canadian or British authorities.

It is a glaring and manifestly provable fact that radical Islam is being manufactured and provoked by the US military-industrial complex in order to provide itself with an enemy to justify billions every year in weapons sales along with giant federal government slush funds that enrich the coffers of public-private partnerships while crushing the constitutional rights of American citizens.

Glenn Beck is completely accurate when he says that radical Islam represents a direct threat to the future of freedom in the west. The ultimate “clash of civilizations” is a very real possibility. But by deliberately obscuring the fact that radical Islam is a creature of the US military-industrial complex, a bastard child of the new world order that is being strengthened by our own governments to be used as a weapon against us, Beck and others who regurgitate the same rhetoric are misleading Americans into thinking that radical Islam itself is the new world order, when in fact radical Islam is merely a tool of the new world order, being from its very inception completely owned and controlled by the US military-industrial complex.

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Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a fill-in host for The Alex Jones Show. Watson has been interviewed by many publications and radio shows, including Vanity Fair and Coast to Coast AM, America’s most listened to late night talk show.

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