February 5, 2007
February 12, 2007
February 19, 2007
February 26, 2007
The circumstances surrounding the Browns, a New Hampshire couple convicted of federal income tax evasion, could turn on a dime.
Recently AFP interviewed Ed Brown, a Plainfield home owner who grew up in the Roxbury slums of Boston. He and Mrs. Brown, who is a dentist, are self-made people who worked hard for their lot in life, only to see it swept away by a government that takes in gargantuan sums of money via taxes on the domestic populace to pay enormous interest on the national debt (which cannot be repaid), much of which is due to America's endless military conflicts.
When AFP contacted Brown recently, he was living everyday life as best he can at the house he built on their 110 acres. His wife, who he said is in a state of arrest wearing an electronic ankle bracelet, is staying with a son in a neighboring state.
"The dental business died a week ago Tuesday," Brown told AFP. "My wife's a prisoner—like she's a flight risk!"
The two are supposed to be sentenced April 24, having each been convicted Jan. 18 in federal court in Concord for not paying income taxes since 1996. The government claims the Browns owe some $625,000.
"Everybody should say, ‘show me the law and I'll pay the tax,' " Brown told AFP. That is what he told federal authorities who can't seem to produce a copy of a law requiring payment of the federal income tax.
Filmmaker Aaron Russo's America: From Freedom to Fascism documentary interviews a number of former IRS agents and other authoritative people who say that the powers that be, when asked to provide a copy of the law, such as an enabling statute, that requires U.S. workers to pay federal income tax on their wages, come up empty-handed.
Russo concluded that if the federal income tax applies to anyone or anything, it applies to corporate capital gains, not the incomes of individuals, and that the IRS doesn't even define income.
The proverbial "tax man" came down on the Browns just as they had considered selling their home and acreage so they could live in a warmer climate. Notably, their property is across the road from 500 acres owned by Supreme Court Justice Steven Breyer.
But making the best of the winter weather, individuals and families with children have been over to Brown's place lately for sledding and skating—before and since the tax trouble began. Life still seems more or less normal, though Brown suspects that federal agents may eventually storm the house and arrest him, perhaps after the publicity on his and his wife's plight calms down.
As of Jan. 25, he said the publicity was still significant, with TV news crews continuing to pay attention. He also told AFP that while he has always paid the 54 other kinds of taxes levied on Americans—with property taxes hitting $14,000 a year on their home and $18,000 a year on their office building for the former dental business—he won't budge on the federal income tax.
For one thing, as already noted, no one can produce a copy of the law that requires payment of an unapportioned tax on the labor of Americans. Moreover, there are due-process issues whereby U.S. District Court Judge Steven McAuliffe apparently disallowed the Browns from bringing forth any evidence or witnesses they needed for defending themselves in court. Also, the issue of federal jurisdiction, or the lack thereof, comes into play, Brown pointed out.
Addressing some conventional media reports that characterized his home as a virtual fortress, or "compound" with a "lookout tower," Brown replied, "It's a deck, for crying out loud—an octagon-shaped compass deck."
Just below the elevated deck on the large, well-built house—which has solar-power capability and was off the grid from 1990 to 2003—is a reading room.
"We're very mainstream, middle-class people," said Brown, who noted that media reports suggesting he's "holed up" in his house are off base.
Some areas of the house have been boarded up to keep out blowing snow, so he is not "barricading" himself in the house, he explained.
The Union Leader seems also to have played the "antigovernment" card, even though many American patriots make a careful distinction by saying they are anti-corruption of government, not anti-government.
Notably, the Associated Press article in The Union Leader couldn't resist the highly charged word "compound," which conceivably could create a bunker mentality in the minds of readers and may quell public outrage if federal agents ever decide to forcibly enter Brown's home to arrest him. As the article claimed:
"A jury decided that the Browns plotted to hide their income and avoid taxes on Elaine Brown's income of $1.9 million between 1996 and 2003. Over 10 years, they also used $215,890 of postal money orders broken into increments just below the reporting threshold to pay for their hilltop compound and for Elaine Brown's dental offices."
U.S. marshals said on a couple occasions they had no plans to forcibly enter Brown's property and arrest him, though national media sources quoted marshals as saying that they "have to decide how to seize the Browns' assets, possibly including their home."
Citing a new twist in this case, a recent issue of The Boston Globe noted that federal agents "seized more than 30 weapons from the Brown house in May."
Brown commented by telling AFP, "They stole $15,000 worth of my guns and turned them over to a gun shop."
Brown was still at home on Jan. 25, preferring only to comment off the record about the situation.
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Even as the United States gets mired ever deeper in the bloody and explosive cauldron that has become Iraq, the very forces who were the primary movers behind America's entry into that disaster are now reinvigorating their push to achieve another longtime goal: the destruction of Iran. At the same time, there are some sensible voices of restraint - and perhaps unexpected ones at that - urging that the calls for war be rejected in favor of diplomacy.
Although - in the January issue of Vanity Fair, published by Zionist billionaire S.I. Newhouse, a leading financial backer of the Anti-Defamation League and other Israeli lobby front groups - a host of eminent neo-conservative pro--Israel stalwarts went out of their way to deny their culpability in instigating the war against Iraq, which everyone knows they did indeed do, these same elements are now gearing up to promote U.S. military action against Iran.
Their rhetoric of denial regarding their bellicose demands for a U.S. attack on Iraq echoes the same kind of noisy deception coming out of Israel from a host of Israeli academics, military strategists and others who are now attacking George W. Bush for the Iraq war, even though it was Israel and its neo-conservative allies inside the Bush administration that were most adamant about the need to not only attack Iraq but also bring down Saddam Hussein. This is a final goal that even the current president's own father, George H.W. Bush, decided not to pursue in the American attack on Iraq in the first Persian Gulf war of 1991.
Now, in the midst of denying their responsibility for the Iraqi quagmire, the neo-conservatives are openly preparing their propaganda campaign to induce American blood and treasure being deployed against Iran - not only to stop Iran's alleged progress toward nuclear weapons but, as in Iraq, to destroy the nation's current government.
In the November/December 2006 issue of Foreign Policy magazine, the small-circulation but highly influential publication of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a leading New World Order "think tank," well-known neo-conservative publicist Joshua Muravchik is calling for this fellow "neo-cons" to "admit their mistakes ..... and start making the case for bombing Iran."
Muravchik - who operates out of the American Enterprise Institute (which includes top neo-conservative mastermind Richard Perle among its chief tacticians) - says that "Make no mistake, President Bush will need to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities before leaving office." He goes on to say to his fellow war-mongers: "We need to pave the way intellectually now and be prepared to defend the action when it comes."
There is no question about it: the neo-conservatives are determined to destroy Iran, just as they destroyed Iraq. It's been one of their longtime geopolitical goals and they refuse to permit public dissatisfaction with what's happened in Iraq to deter them from accomplishing what they intend.
In the meantime, no less Bruce Laingen, the former charge de affaires for the U.S. Embassy in Iran - who was among the Americans who were held hostage (from 1979 until January 1981) following the Islamic revolution In Iran - is publicly calling for the Bush administration to put aside its inflammatory language and seek direct discussions with Iran. In a letter to the editor of The Now York Times published on Jan. 13, Laigen wrote:
The United States and Iran must talk. Not with the mutually negative public rhetoric that for the 27 years since the 1979 hostage crisis has eroded the trust needed for any diplomatic exchange; not indirectly, as we do now on the nuclear issue through our Security Council and European Union colleagues; but frontally and frankly as responsible powers with shared interests in a critically important part of the world.
The absence of dialogue has made no sense on any count - strategic, human historic, political, cultural. It has complicated our relationships with every other country in the region. We alone among the powers have chosen to signal in this way our reservations about Iran's conduct in the world arena.
Geography alone compels Iran's participation in helping deal with both Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention long-term regional security understandings in the Persian Gulf region. A host of other issues compel dialogue, including Iran's obligations vis-à-vis the former hostages.
Talking won't be easy. Formal diplomatic relations are a long way off. But we lose nothing now by joining directly with our allies and friends in direct soundings of Iran's intentions.
The fact that Laigen - who certainly knows quite a bit about Iran and its people and who obviously might have an axe to grind with the Iranian government - is saying such things (so contradictory to the views of the warmongering neo-conservatives) is something that Americans need to know about. But Laingen's sensible concerns have been sidelined by the mass media in America that prefers to help stoke up American fears of Iran, saying that the Islamic republic is somehow a threat to the United States( and, of course, Israel).
Whether the American people will be hornswoggled again and
tricked into supporting another senseless war remains to be seen.
But peace-minded people who want to preserve their country would
do best to listen to what Laingen - and not the neo-conservatives
- has the to say.
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After three days testing the waters in Iowa where caucuses
will open the 2008 presidential campaign, Rep. Tom Tancredo of
Colorado has formed an exploratory committee as the first step
in seeking the Republican nomination. Could this feisty congressman
from the West become the "wild card" of 2008 campaign?
Wherever Tancredo appears on the campaign trail, he is going to attract attention. His detractors are going to make certain of that. During a speech at Michigan State University, his critics catapulted the event into the national media by attempting to shout him down.
Public opinion polls have repeatedly shown there is broad support for closing the borders. Daily, America's newspapers and television news are overflowing with stories about new outrages created by unchecked immigration. These include everything from drug smuggling to government-backed proposals for increased social benefits such as Social Security, which cost citizen-taxpayers billions.
How many Californians are in favor of giving up to $400 or more a week to illegal alien farm workers who have lost work due to weather damaging the crops? How many Americans are angered by the Bush administration wanting to give illegal aliens Social Security benefits, thus hastening the additional draining of funds for American workers from the bankrupt system?
These subjects analysts say, translate into support for Tancredo, the presidential candidate who is clearly and unabashedly on their side.
Tancredo is also widely considered a likable and charismatic candidate. Here is a sample of Tancredo's rhetoric:
I believe that there is a void in the present panoply of people who are seeking the office. We need people who are going to offer the American people a sort of common-sense agenda... We need common sense about our culture. We need to protect it. Why is that a question? We need common sense about the need to have a single language in which we can all communicate.
We want something different from the Republican Party. The American people want somebody to absolutely state we are going in a different direction. We are going in a direction that establishes what should be the goals for every single American - Black, Brown, white or green. And that is a safe, secure America, with secure borders.
Tancredo is indeed the candidate for all of the Americans, who live along the border and are fed up with having their property invaded and trashed and feel unsafe. He is also the candidate of choice for the Minutemen organization, which has banded together by the thousands, at first just along the border and now all across the nation to take a daring and patriotic stand to halt the tide of illegal immigrants.
This means that Tancredo will not have an insurmountable difficulty in raising funds to keep the wheels of his campaign rolling.
Unleashing a broadside against Bush's so-called "guest
worker plan," Tancredo told the Conservative Political Action
Conference. "It is the employer community which sees profits
from cheap labor, and the hell with the impact on the American
taxpayer. The conservative movement can either be the voice of
principle, or it can be the voice of the Chamber of Commerce,
but it cannot be both.
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The campaign to make the official language is gaining momentum, with new legislation soon to be proposed and states impatiently passing their own laws. "There's been such strong support and it's gaining momentum," said Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa).
King is soon to reintroduce his English Language Unity Act. It has been delayed, he said, by Speaker Pelosi's "first 100 hours." Nancy Pelosi has us under martial law," he said.
In the last session of Congress, King drafted similar legislation and collected 160 co-sponsors, placing the bill in the top 2 % of co-sponsored legislation. The bill does not prevent private businesses or individual from using multilingual material but prohibits federal funds being spent on such efforts.
States have generated momentum in Congress by acting on their own. English-language laws have been introduced by state legislators in Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey and Oklahoma. Similar legislation is expected to be introduced in other states.
"This is the strongest push for official English legislation that I have seen in the last 15 years," said Mauro Mujica, chairman of U.S. English. "I hope the jump-start that this issue has received will pay dividends in the near future by making English the official language and knocking down linguistic barriers that divide our society."
The issue has been building since former President Bill Clinton ordered federal bureaucracies to publish government documents in several languages, mostly Spanish. The Democratic Congress then mandated that ballots and official voting instructions be printed in a foreign language if 10% of residents spoke that language. The absurdity of someone unable to understand English voting intelligently in a U.S. election was not addressed.
AMNESTY FORCES MUSTER
Patriotic voters scared lawmakers out of approving amnesty for illegal aliens in the last Congress but the fight goes on. Amnesty advocates are mustering their forces.
President Bush, who favors amnesty with much Democratic support and some Republican hostility, has forced his choice, Sen. Mel Marinez (R-Fla.) on the Republican National Committee in the new role of "general chairman." Martinez is a Cuban-born advocate of amnesty who, of course, says amnesty isn't amnesty but "comprehensive reform." Demands for a secret ballot were denied so the White House cold exercise maximum and Martinez carried on a voice vote.
Meanwhile, the coalition Alliance for Immigration Reform 2007 announced its formation, placing the power of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Service Employees International Union and the nation's largest Hispanic group behind a unified lobbying group to get amnesty approved this ear in the guise of "comprehensive reform."
Coalition leaders said they want to get "immigration reform"
that would grant illegal aliens already here with "a path
to citizenship" passed this year to keep it from becoming
an issue in the 2008 presidential contest. The Senate approved
an amnesty measure last year but it was killed in the House where
Republicans approved "borders only" legislation without
amnesty.
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Ask any average American what he or she knows about the origins of Terrorism, and the most likely answer would be something about terrorism being "Arab" or "Muslim" in nature with names linked to such as those of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda or - in previous years - Yassir Arafat and the PLO.
However, ask these same Americans about Rabbi Meir Kahane, Irv Rubin, Mordechai Levi or groups such as "Kach" or the Jewish Defense League (JDL) and the Jewish Defense Organization (JDO), and the most likely result will be a blank stare, total non-recognition.
But the truth is that terrorism is the business of people and organizations such as these, and not just according to "anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists." but also by official sources including those no less in stature than the government of the United States.
Recently, in fact, the U.S. Court of Appeals rejected the petition by Kach a violence-prone, pro-Zionist Jewish group - that its name be removed from the list, as designated by the State Department, of "known terrorist organizations."
Kach was a political party formed in Israel in 1971 by the now-infamous Rabbi Kahane that has operated in Israel, Europe and the United states for over 30 years. Its violent activities in Israel and abroad are well known, the most famous of which was the machine-gunning to death of 29 Palestinians by one of Kahane's followers as they peacefully prayed in the Al Ibrahim Mosque in 1994.
Kahane was born in Brooklyn, the son of an Orthodox rabbi and follower of Ze'ev Jabotinshy, considered by many in-the-know as the "founding father" of Jewish terrorism. Jabotinsky's teachings and activities led to the creation of Israel's two most famous terrorist organizations, the Stem Gang and Irgun, that in the early days were responsible for the deaths of thousands of civilians both Arab and British.
Learning not only how to talk the talk of terrorism, but how to walk the walk from Jabotinsky, his spiritual father, Kahane formed the JDL in 1968. The JDL maintained close ties with not only with the Colombo crime family in New York, but also with Israel's Mossad. Within a few years of creating the JDL, Kahane was arrested and convicted of a number of violent criminal activities, including the manufacture of explosives. Kahane eventually moved to Israel, where he formed the Kach Party, with members to this day who boast of their responsibility for countless acts of terror against Palestinian civilians.
Here in the United States, Kahane's absence obviously did not have any measurable effect on the vitality of the group he formed. Decades before words such as "al Qaeda" became part of the lexicon of the average American household, the JDL, by now headquartered in Los Angeles, was listed as the "second most active terrorist organization" by the FBI and has since that time remained on the Justice Department's top-ten list of "most dangerous terrorist organizations" operating within the United States.
Since its inception the JDL has been will known for acts of extreme violence, including shootings, bombings and physical assaults on persons and organizations deemed "threatening" to Israel's existence. In recent years, its activities (or suspected activities) have included the murder of Alex Odeh, the West coast regional director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, as well as the planned bombings of a Los Angeles mosque and the office of an Arab-American congressman from California, Darryl Issa.
Another individual linked with the JDL, Robert Jacob Goldstein, was arrested in Florida for conspiring to blow up as many as 50 mosques in the United States.
In 2002, Irv Rubin, the violent, loud-mouthed former longtime director of the JDL, was charged with masterminding the planned bombings of the mosque and congressional office in California.
Following his trial and sentencing, Rubin died in a bizarre incident that authorities ruled "a suicide." On Nov. 4, 2002, Rubin somehow managed to slash his own neck with a prison-issued razor blade before throwing himself over a rail and falling 18 feet to the prison floor.
Shortly thereafter, Rubin's second in command, Earl Krugel, was convicted of his role in Planning the terrorist attacks and was sentenced to 20 years imprisonment. As part of his plea deal, he divulged what information he had pertaining to the JDL's role in the murder of Odeh in 1985, but three days after he arrived in a federal prison in Arizona he was murdered, and thus these secrets died with him.
In an age where the American government bends over backwards to protect Israel from any unfavorable public exposure to its deeds, one must wonder why - through two of its powerful organs, the State Department and the U.S. Court of Appeals - it is so willing to break with tradition in maintaining the "terrorist" status of these various Jewish organizations.
A superficial examination of the facts on the ground explains a lot.
Extremist groups such as Kach, and its twin sister, the JDL, which utilize violence to achieve their aims, have been - at least by appearances - a thorn in the side of the organized Israel lobby for many years. As a result of the public profile their criminal acts have created, the monsters created by Kahane are treated as the black sheep of the Zionist family for having brought to much bad attention to their more "respectable" siblings of the group, namely the ADL and the World Jewish Congress (WJC).
As it is the job of organizations such as the ADL and WJC to keep Americans focused on "Islamic terrorism" and to maintain Israel's status as an innocent country constantly on the defensive and in need of American military and monetary might, performing these magic tricks is made all the more difficult when groups such as the JDL and Kach are prowling about, blowing things up and shooting people.
Americans should count every small blessing that comes along,
as the saying goes, and thus be grateful for the fact that at
least one part of this broken system appears to be working, even
if it is only by accident.
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With its recent success destroying an orbiting space satellite on Jan. 11 China has now emerged as a world superpower, capable of challenging the U.S. military on a global scale. In effect, China has projected beyond a doubt its ability to completely disrupt America's space-based snooping and war-making capabilities.
According to U.S. officials the Chinese displayed a new capability by shooting down one of its own aging weather satellites with a ground-based intermediate-range ballistic missile system 537 miles above Earth, considered to be a low-Earth orbit, but where most satellites and manned space missions travel.
The Chinese feat of shooting down a satellite they had launched in 1999 was revealed in the highly authoritative aerospace magazine Aviation Week and Space Technology.
American Free Press had already revealed in its Dec. 4 and 11, 2006 issue that the Chinese have developed a laser system they can deploy to "blind" U.S. spy satellites. This was confirmed by the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office, the intelligence agency that oversees spy satellites.
The Pentagon now warns that the Chinese are developing a laser anti-satellite system to blind or damage imaging satellites.
With the destruction of an orbiting satellite, China has demonstrated it has the power to put U.S. spy satellites and probably global positioning satellites out of action. These critical satellites enable the U.S. military to identify and home in on enemy targets with missiles and smart bombs.
A retired Air force officer, who was attached to the top secret National Security Agency, told American Free Press: "Clearly, the chickens have come home to roost as a result of the massive Chinese spying effort at U.S. national laboratories and defense installations over the past three decades, which have given them the ability to ‘accuratize' their guided missiles and develop new high-tech weapons systems."
The Russian RIA Novosti news agency quoted retired Russian Col. Gen. Leonid Ivashov, the former chief of the Russian Defense Ministry's International Military cooperation Department, as saying the Chinese missile system that took down the satellite was modeled after the soviet IS-1 missile, which was designed to destroy satellites and developed during the 1970s.
The Russians are also concerned about China's new technology. Maj. Gen. Byacheslav Fateyev, another Russian military expert, called it "hooliganism" and warned "it shows Beijing has a strong capability.
According to Wenran Jiang, who heads the China studies program at Canada's University of Alberta, Chinese military leaders are paying close attention to Washington's information warfare efforts, including the development of high-tech weaponry to "destabilize the enemy's communications and control systems."
Both the United States and the Soviet Union conducted tests of ASAT, or anti-satellite, systems in the 1980s, but they were discontinued when the strikes led to widespread debris fields in space that threatened other satellites. The last U.S. test was in 1985.
Chinese downing of the old satellite created hundreds of pieces of junk large enough to pose dangers for a decade or more to spacecraft or satellites passing through the debris field.
"The Chinese are developing more capable long-range conventional
strike systems, and short- and medium-range ballistic missiles
with terminally guided maneuverable warheads able to attack U.S.
carriers and air bases," said outgoing U.S. director of Intelligence
John Negroponte.
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In a move that many grassroots activists believe signals a coming trend, two states have put taxpayer-financed toll roads up for sale to foreign companies. More disconcerting is the fact that these have the potential becoming a massive network of toll roads facilitating free trade throughout North America under the framework of the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA.
In Indiana, foreign interests are obtaining the first lease agreement with a state government to privately operate an existing toll road—paying $3.8 billion for a 75-year lease to operate the Indiana Toll Road.
In addition, the historically significant Pennsylvania Turnpike also may be headed to the proverbial auction block, as confirmed by American Free Press. But apparently it's not a done deal.
AFP reported last December that Pennsylvania state Rep. Richard Geist had planned to introduce House Bill 1 to sell the Pennsylvania Turnpike to private investors. The Indiana Toll Road deal prompted Hoosiers to send scores of "Ditch Mitch" bumper stickers critical of Gov. Mitch Daniels's unwavering support of the sale. It involved a deal between the state and ITR Concessions LLC, a partnership of the Cintra Company of Spain and the McQuarie Bank of Australia.
McQuarie and Cintra, as AFP previously noted, also are involved with the highly controversial Trans-Texas Corridor, a planned toll road system that would ripple through the Texas countryside, gobbling up large tracts of land. It would largely be used for trucking foreign merchandise to the United States. A number of safety and security concerns have been raised.
In Pennsylvania, Geist, a Blair County Republican, is employed as a "consulting engineer-legislator," according to his official web site. He is the ranking minority member of the Transportation Committee. Democrat Joseph F. Markosek is the chairman.
A spokesman for Markosek told AFP on Jan. 29 that, as it turns out, House Bill 1 was active in the previous legislative session but the bill died when the session ended at the close of 2006. Look for the bill to surface with a new number in the 2007 session.
According to the Jan. 16, 2007, Patriot-News, the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC), an agency of the state government, "hired a team of well-connected Harrisburg insiders to fight any proposal to sell or lease the turnpike."
However, Bill Capone, the PTC's communications director, claimed that's not true. He said the PTC only has been involved in the governor's study of the critical lack of state transportation funding concerning mass transit, toll ways and possibly converting non-toll ways into toll roads. Proposed remedies include leasing or selling the turnpike to raise state revenues.
Though the toll way's actual construction was not financed until the time of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's "New Deal," the Pennsylvania Turnpike's origins can be traced back to the days of Washington, according to the PTC.
"President Washington publicly favored the establishment of roads to promote the westward expansion of our nation," notes a passage on the PTC's web site. "In 1791, the legislature of the Pennsylvanian Commonwealth approved a statewide transportation plan and a year later created the Philadelphia and Lancaster Turnpike Company."
The company's charter called for constructing a 62-mile long-surfaced road, providing successful transport for settlers and their goods over muddy territories. After 1800, the route of the future Lancaster Turnpike was replaced by a canal, and then replaced in the 1880s by the early stages of a railroad. A series of decisions and changing national transportation needs over the years led to today's turnpike, now in its sixth decade of service.
"The original 160-mile route," the PTC's web site
adds, "has been expanded to 514 miles, carrying 156.2 million
vehicles a year at a toll of just over 4.1 cents a mile. . . .Today,
the Pennsylvania Turnpike, part of Interstate 76, can be recognized
as the first of a new breed of American toll
ways in the interstate highway system."
But it's not as if only existing toll ways are under consideration. New ones, with up to six lanes in each direction, are envisioned for the Trans-Texas Corridor, which seems wellsuited as a linchpin for fastening together the United States, Canada and Mexico under the umbrella of a "North American Community."
China has a big interest in the toll ways because of its commercial
shipping in Pacific and Atlantic seaports. Some imported goods
can be routed away from West Coast ports, to be unloaded off ocean
vessels at cheaper Mexican ports and transported by truck and
rail through Mexico into Texas
and beyond by Mexican trucks and drivers.
Kansas City, Mo.—despite being 1,000 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border—has been dubbed a major hub, including as a customs inspection location, for the goods and raw materials transported through the area on existing rail lines and toll ways, and on the new ones that may be built, forever altering the physical, economic and political landscape of these United States.
To voice your views on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, call Rep. Geist at (717) 787-6419 or (814) 946-7218, Rep. Markosek at (717) 783-1012 or (412) 856-8284, and the Turnpike Commission at 800-331-3414. Call Pennsylvania Sens. Robert Casey (D) at (202) 224-6324 and Arlen Specter (R) at (202) 224-4254.
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Rep. Ron Paul's (R-Tex.) Entry into the presidential sweepstakes is sure to add spice to a bipartisan gang of rather full wannabes. Paul is an adamant opponent of the war in Iraq and charges that the "war on terror" is being used to curtail civil liberties. He voted against the repressive "Patriot Act" in 2001 and 2005, is opposed to a military draft and endorses an American withdrawal from the UN.
His strength has traditionally been from conservative and libertarian Republicans, but since 9-11 he has gained wide-spread support in central Texas from liberal Democrats who share his opposition to Bush's wars.
And in this case, Paul may show remarkable strength in presidential primary states where crossover votes are allowed, and he can be expected to pick up Democratic voters who oppose the wars.
Paul supports elimination of the income tax, most cabinet-level departments and the Federal Reserve. He advocates a return to a gold standard.
His campaign slogan may very well be borrowed from his 2004 congressional election - "the Taxpayers' Best Friend."
John Berthold, president of the National Taxpayers Union, says the Texas congressman "has always proven himself to be a leader in the fight for taxpayer rights and fiscal responsibility. No one can match his record on behalf of taxpayers."
"Ron Paul is a true friend of small business," said Jack Harris president of the National Federation of Independent Business. "He is committed to a pro-small-business agenda of affordable health insurance, lower taxes, tort reform and elimination of burdensome mandates."
The congressman is strongly behind securing America's borders and is against illegal immigration.
Paul is pro-life, but he is against federal efforts to either ban or legalize abortions, insisting that abortion is a state issue. He is against the death penalty. He does not believe the federal government should be involved in the homosexual "marriage" issue.
He has also voted against legislation to help catch "on-line child predators," which is going to cost him many votes. He believes the proposed law is unconstitutional and responsibility should be with parents, not the government.
Some say his vote against awarding the Congressional Medal of Freedom to black "civil rights" activist Rosa Parks, as well as Pope John Paul II and Mother Teresa, may come back to haunt him. According to Texas Monthly, when he voted against the medal for Parks and was criticized for it, he challenged his colleagues in the House to personally contribute $100 each to finance minting the medal. No one did, and Paul observed, "It's easier to be generous with other people's money.
Paul may have some difficulty raising campaign funds from wealthy donors in New York and Los Angeles.
"This is going to be a grassroots level or it's not."
In 1987 Paul ran for president as the candidate of the Libertarian Party, coming in third after Republican George H. W. Bush and Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, the Democratic nominee. Running against both huge party machines, he garnered a respectable 431,750 votes.
Paul joined the Libertarian Party as a lifetime member in 1987, a status that he has not renounced. Although he has only been elected to Congress as a Republican, he maintains good terms with the Libertarians and addressed their national convention in 2004.
Libertarian spokesman George Getz said Paul has received thousands of campaign contrubutions from Libertarian Party members across the country in his congressional runs. In 2004 71% of his contributions came from out of state, with 92.5% coming from individuals. In 2006, 96.8% came from individuals.
Paul, a native of Pittsburgh, is licensed to practice obstetrics and gynecology. He served in the Air Force from 1965-68 during the Vietnam War, and in 1968 he and his wife, carol, moved to Surfside beach, Tex.
Contributions can be sent to: Paul for President, 837 W. Plantation
Drive, Clute, TX 77531.
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Robert A. Pastor, a leading figure in the Council on Foreign Relations, has urged surrendering U.S. sovereignty to a North American Union that would erase borders among Canada, the United states and Mexico. This goal of creating a "North American Union" similar to the European Union was widely known, and Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) And colleagues have introduced legislation to block it. (For more on this subject, see AFP's Spotlight on Congress, Jan. 29, 2007.)
Pastor participated in a secret meeting of bureaucrats, bankers and international financiers from the three countries in which plans for a North American superstate were drawn. He helped draft the secret plan based on the CFR report which he helped write.
Pastor is director of the Center for North American Studies, vice president of International Affairs and a professor at American University in Washington. He is author of the book Toward a North American Community; Lessons from the Old World to the New.
But it is significant that the CFR, the propaganda ministry for the shadowy organization known as bilderberg and companion groups, dared have a leader appear on the "Lou Dobbs Tonight" Show on CNN Jan.25 and acknowledge these goals. Pastor's comments confirmed that what Bilderberg and other powerhouses have long dismissed as a "conspiracy theory" is instead a conspiracy fact.
Bilderberg is an annual gathering that draws together the world's leading bankers, corporate heads, politicians and power brokers. Every year the secretive group meets to discuss the most important issues of the day and to influence world events.
When asked to comment on a recent CFR report, titled "Building a North American Community," which Pastor contributed to, he told CNN: "The council report (sic) feels we could take greater advantage if we were to deepen economic integration, if we can secure ourselves better, not only at our borders, but also by thinking about a continental security perimeter as well."
Dobbs asked why the press was excluded from a meeting last September wherein the merger plans were laid out by bureaucrats from each nation in a manner to avert congressional interference.
"The leaders of the three groups decided they wanted to keep the discussions active and vigorous, and therefore confidential," Pastor replied.
Pastor admitted that George Shultz, secretary of state under President Ronald Reagan, attended the meeting. He failed to mention that Schultz represented Reagan at previous Bilderberg meetings.
Bilderberg's secret impact on the entire world has been documented for more than 50 years, first by Liberty Lobby, then its weekly journal, The Spotlight, and now in American Free Press. By infiltrating Bilderberg, readers were given early warning of the downfall of Lady Thatcher as prime minister of Britain, President Bill Clinton's invasion of Czechoslovakia and President bush 41's breaking of his pledge to not raise taxes, among others.
You can obtain Jim Tucker's Bilderberg Diary from AFP for $25.
Call 1-888-699-NEWS to charge to Visa or MasterCard.
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The Pentagon recently reported that it now spends roughly $8.4 billion per month waging the war in Iraq, while the additional cost of our engagement in Afghanistan brings the monthly total to a staggering $10 billion. Since 2001, congress has spent more than $500 billion on specific appropriations for Iraq. This sum is not reflected in official budget and deficit figures. Congress has funded the war by passing a series of so-called "supplemental" spending bills, which are passed outside of the normal appropriations process and thus deemed off-budget.
This is fundamentally dishonest: if we're going to have a war. Let's face the costs - both human and economic - squarely. Congress has no business hiding the costs of war through accounting tricks.
As the war in Iraq surges forward, and the administration ponders military action against Iran, it's important to ask ourselves an overlooked question: Can we really afford it? If every American taxpayer had to submit an extra $5,000 or $10,000 to the IRS this April to pay for the war, I'm quite certain it would end very quickly.
The problem is that government finances war by borrowing and printing money, rather than presenting a bill directly n the form of higher taxes. When the costs are obscured the question of whether any war is worth it becomes distorted.
Congress and the federal Reserve bank have a cozy, unspoken arrangement that makes war easier to finance. Congress has an insatiable appetite for new spending, but raising taxes is politically unpopular. The Federal Reserve, however, is happy to accommodate deficit spending by creating new money through the Treasury department. In exchange, Congress leaves the Fed alone to operate free of pesky oversight and free of political scrutiny. Monetary policy is utterly ignored in Washington, even though the Federal Reserve System is a creation of Congress.
The result of this arrangement is inflation. And inflation finances war.
Economist Lawrence Parks has explained how the creation of the Federal Reserve bank in 1913 made possible our involvement in world War I. Without the ability to create new money, the federal government never could have afforded the enormous mobilization of men and materiel. Prior to that, american wars were financed through taxes and borrowing, both of which have limits. But government printing presses, at least in theory, have no limits. That's why the money supply has nearly tripled just since 1990.
Tor perspective, consider out ongoing military commitment in Korea. In Korea alone, U.S. taxpayers have spent $1 trillion in today's dollars over 55 years. What do we have to show for it? North Korea is a belligerent adversary armed with nuclear weapons, while south Korea is at best ambivalent about our role as its protector. The stalemate stretches on with no endin sight, as the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the men who fought in Korea give little thought to what was gained or lost. The Korean conflict should serve as a cautionary tale against the open-ended military occupation of any region.
The $500 billion we've officially spent in Iraq is an enormous sum, but the real total is much higher, hidden with the Defense Department and foreign aid budgets. As we build permanent military bases and a $1 billion embassy in Iraq, we need to keep asking whether it's really worth it.
Congress should at least fund the war in an honest way so the
American people can judge for themselves.
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American supporters of Israel can be justly proud. As a consequence of their substantial political clout, through the aegis of their lobby groups that have such a tremendous impact on the conduct of U.S. foreign policy, massive U.S. foreign and giveaways to Israel made possible by members of Congress who are overwhelmingly loyal to the interests of Israel have made that tiny - yet powerful - Middle East state a genuine world powerrhouse, all a direct result of massive multi-billions of dollars in transfusions of U.S. treasury giveaways.
All of this not to mention the fact that U.S. military aid to Israel - supplemented with direct grants of U.S. military technology (and direct grants of U.S. military technology (and direct theft of U.S. technology by Israeli spies operating on American soil) - has made little Israel by far the most powerful single state in the entire Middle East.
In fact, American taxpayers are both directly and indirectly subsidizing Israel's nuclear weapons powerhouse, said to be perhaps the fifth largest in the entire world.
Just a few tacts about Israel's status were leaked to the American public in an unusual advertisement that appeared in a recent edition of The New York Times.
Sponsored by the American Technion Society (ATS) which is a support group for the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Israel (described as "among the world's leading science and technology universities), the advertisement brags, in a headline, that "Israel's Only Natural Resource is the Brainpower of its People."
The advertisement, which is a pitch for financial contributions to help the ATS help Israel, through the work of the Technion-Israel Institute of technology, reads as follows:
Without oil, without enough water and with landmass the size of New Jersey, Israel is focused on developing its only natural resource the brainpower of its people.
Israel has become a world leader in science, technology and medicine. It has more technology-based start-up companies per capita than any other country; more companies on Nasdaq than any country except the United States and Canada; and a standard of living that places it firmly among First World Nations.
The high-sounding rhetoric of this advertisement belies the truth. People who know of the massive U.S. financial support for Israel - particularly in the wake of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the assumption to power of his successor, Lyndon Johnson, who was primarily responsible for energizing U.S. foreign aid to Israel - cannot help but not that the ATS advertisement fails to mention that it has been U.S. taxpayer support that has helped Israel blossom.
Any other nation that received the kind of unqualified U.S. financial backing that Israel has enjoyed could almost certainly brag of the same accomplishments attributed to "the brainpower of its people."
The ATS's foreign principal in Israel, by the way, also happens to be a major fount of financial resources directed toward Israel's program for assembling and maintaining Israel's officially non-existent, but nonetheless substantial, arsenal of nuclear weapons of mass destruction, the singular source of conflict in the Middle East today, often cited as the very reason why other Middle east nations - from Iraq to Syria and on to Iran and SSaudi Arabia - have evinced interest in building their own nuclear weapons arsenals.
What makes the ATS fund raising for Israel so notable is that ATS - which is helping a foreign university which is an agency of a foreign nation - is that ATS is, bu its own admission, a not-for-profit organization with 501(c)3 status granted by the Internal revenue Service. Thus, this means that contributions to the ATS are eligible as charitable deductions to a public charity. And American supporters of Israel - who include many top-level billionaires and millionaires - can reduce their annual contribution to the IRS by making giant contributions to help their favorite foreign notion and its nuclear arsenal.
So while Americans suffer at home, with middle class families
unable to send their kids through college, senior citizens unable
to buy medicine and many people unable to afford basic health
care, as roads and bridges crumble, and young Americans are dying
in Iraq (and possibly soon even in Iran) to protect Israel - and
while disease and starvation and homelessness remain sore spots
on the American scene - struggling Americans who have trouble
paying their own taxes are actually directly paying the bulls
for Israel's domestic and military advances and doing so indirectly
as well, as super-rich supporters of Israel get tax breaks through
their donations to an American tax exempt organization that subsidizes
life in Israel to the point that Israel (in reality, a welfare
recipient) is thriving. That, American taxpayers are told, is
what American democracy is all about. "We have to pay our
taxes to keep the world safe." And that includes subsidizing
Israel.
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This news article is copyrighted and cannot be reproduced here,
but it can be read on the Internet at:
http://www.vdare.com/roberts/070130_failure.htm
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House Republicans have vowed to resist the unbecoming alliance between President bush and democrats who seek to grant amnesty to illegal aliens and fight for legislation to protect the southern border. Andk in defeating an amendment to a pending minimum wage bill, Democrats did a disservice to both border protection and low-wage Americans.
"The president worked hard to get a Congress that agrees with him on this and now he's got it," said Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), responding to bush's latest call to legalize millions of illegal aliens in this country through "comprehensive reform," his euphemism for amnesty. "His congress" was a reference to the Democrats' takeover of congress in the November election. "But we're going to fight him on this," Tancredo vowed. Tancredo is also running for president.
When bush repeated his amnesty call in the State of the Union message, more Democrats than republicans rose to applaud. Tancredo called bush's words the "same dong, second verse."
Bush's amnesty proposal was "empty and implausible," said Rep. Sam Johnson (R-Rex.). "I'm sensing a real lack of commitment to combating illegal immigration." he said. "Our borders are out of control. Illegal aliens are running free across the borders."
Bush was eulogized by Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) As "a leader on this issue."
The President claims this is not amnesty, but the very definition of amnest is changing someone's status from illegal to legal," said Rep. Ed Royce (R-Calif.). "As a matter of national security, we need an immigration system that is sound, and this one is not."
As an amendment to a bill to raise the minimum wage, Sen Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) Proposed to dramatically increase civil fines on employers who hire illegal aliens. Democrats quashed this, hurting both border protection and low-wage Americans.
Less than 4% of workers earn the minimum wage, and few of these are heads of households. Most are student or children working for pocket money. Many are illegal aliens. Even burger-flippers make $10 an hour while, if passed, the minimum wage would increase to $7.50.
But millions of illegal aliens work for the minimum wge or,
especially in the case of Wal-Mart, for less. These millions of
illegals depress the bottom wages for honest but poor Americans.
Thus the defeated amendment would have added border protections
and lifted wages among the poorest of American citizens.
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Patriots should pressure their Congressmen to make sure the President's free trade fixation does not survive past June.
There is mor hope the new Democratic-controlled Congress will refuse to renew President bush's free trade authority, which expires June 30. Under such authority, the administration can negotiate "free trade agreements' which congress can vote up or down but not change. Such authority resulted in NAFTA under President Bill Clinton and CAFTA under Bush.
Capitol Hill staffers say the issue is likely to be determined by voter sentiment. If enough senators and House members hear from voters outraged at the drain on American jobs generated by the "free" trade agreements, the president will lose his authority, they said. Then Congress could alter such agreements, which would have to be approved again by participating nations.
Opposition to such trade authority will be bipartisan - lawmakers from both parties have constituents who have been economically injured by "free trade" and are demanding "fair" trade. Hundreds of thousands of good-paying manufacturing jobs have left to take advantage of poor countries where wages are low, and they are unburdened by "fringe" benefits such as paid vacations and insurance.
During House hearings Jan. 30, Democrats said they are unlikely to approve pending trade deals with Peru, Panama and Colombia unless the administration agrees to tighten labor and environmental protections in those countries. On the same day, bush was calling for his trade authority to be extended in a speech to Caterpillar Inc. In East Peoria, Ill. Caterpillar is a major exporter of tractors and other heavy equipment.
"We've had a tremendous loss of manufacturing jobs," said Rep. Sander Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of a subcommittee on trade. There was much discussion of lost jobs during a Ways and Means hearing the same day. Democrats expressed much skepticism about bush's trade deals.
"The administration's policy has been far too passive in enforcing trade agreements, in breaking down unfair barriers to U.S. products and in establishing rules that raise the standards of living in the United States and around the globe," Levin said.
Approving such trade deals "requires a great seal of trust,"
said Ways and Means chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), implying
that the Bush administration is not trustworthy. "Congress
must have some key assurances before it is willing to extend this
leverage."
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Former House Speaker New Gingrich threw his considerable weight behind an effort in Congress to make English the official language of the United States and end the expensive practice of printing welfare applications, ballots and other documents in Spanish and other foreign languages. It is laso a measure of the momentum building that Gingrich wants to be present.
Gingrich said public pressure will ultimately force lawmakers to pass the legislation, sponsored by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) even in a democratic-controlled Congress.
"You find a way to bring ti to the House floor every two years," Gingrich said during a Jan. 24 press conference. "And then those elites in government will be forced to answer, ‘Are you with 85% of the country or are you against 85% of the country?' this is not a Republican or a Democrat Issue."
America "cannot be held together without common unifying language and that is the English language." Gingrich said. "Without a common language and culture, America risks breaking apart into factionalized subgroups, each claiming their own unique identity and their own unique rights in a way which will destroy the most successful, integrated society in the history of the human race."
The English-only proposal also requires more education in American
history, culture and constitution for immigrants to become ditizens.
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There are signs of rebellion in several state legislatures
against the Real ID Act, the federal law that springs from the
disputed findings of the 9-11 
Commission.
Liberal and conservative groups are gearing up for a fight in the coming months to keep this contentious measure from creating the first-ever national ID card in U.S. history. The Real ID Act is supposed to be implemented in May 2008, creating new national drivers licenses to function as a virtual national ID.
According to a Christian Science Monitor report, legislators in at least 15 states "are pushing bills and resolutions that urge noncompliance with the 2005 Real ID Act. The law . . . sets minimum standards for verifying the identity of license applicants, and stipulates what information must be stored on machine-readable cards."
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) regulations on Real ID Act implementation, while not yet published for public view, reportedly have been sent to the Office of Management and Budget in Washington. These guidelines are about one year overdue, according to Dr. Katherine Albrecht, an expert on radio-frequency identification, or RFID, interviewed Feb. 13 by American Free Press.
The Real ID Act, according to Dr. Albrecht, standardizes, and essentially nationalizes, all state drivers licenses. The DHS regulations will specify what information these new licenses - or national ID cards - will contain.
At a conference covered by AFP, constitutional scholar William Taylor Reil summarized that the proposed Real ID "is a different drivers license - in its form and content."
He added that it's anybody's guess what information could be encoded in the ID's magnetic strip. There very likely will be a fingerprint and/or other biometrics and surely a high-resolution photograph on the card. The strip itself could contain one's financial history or medical history. Reil said the medical information would be "an easy sell," since many could be convinced that such potentially sensitive information should be readily accessible in the event of injury in a car accident. Thus, privacy concerns would take a back seat and the public could be prodded into having considerable amounts of personal information on their card.
Dr. Albrecht, coauthor of Spychips: How Major Corporations and Government Plan to Track Your Every Move With RFID, said that it's too early to say for sure whether remotely trackable RFID tags will be attached to the national ID cards under the Real ID law. But U.S. passports issued by the State Department since October 2006 contain shortrange readable RFID tags. And she said the DHS issues "U.S.-visit Visas" that have RFID tags with a 20-foot tracking range, given to those entering the United States from other nations.
The concerns over a national ID license raised by legislators in Maine, Wyoming, Montana, New Mexico, Missouri, Massachusetts and several others reportedly were sparked by a September study by state government associations that pegged the cost of Real ID implementation at $11 billion - much more than the $100 million Congress said. The Monitor noted Congress has allocated $40 million.
Many spot another unfunded or under-funded mandate. Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wisc.) acknowledged that this issue is bringing liberals and conservatives together "in the middle" to protest the concept of a national ID.
The question is whether the groundswell of citizen opponents and skeptical state legislators - in the 15 months remaining until the planned Real ID Act implementation - can defeat the whole idea, in a nation that has yet to embrace the totalitarian concept of a full-fledged national ID card loaded with personal information.
Not Copyrighted. Readers can reprint and are free to redistribute
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Pennsylvania Avenue SE, Suite 100 Washington, D.C. 20003
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Once thought to be solely the domain of America-first, patriot types now it seems that even well-educated leftists are willing to put political differences aside and join ranks with their rival "conspiracy theorists" on the right in suggesting there is something rotten in Washington.
What's more, some of these individuals are even willing to go so far as to hint that interested parties at the highest levels of the U.S. government would be willing to perpetrate act of terror on American soil to justify the more insidious agenda of widening the present war in the Middle East to include Iran.
In Brzezinski's words, he noted that: "The plausible scenario for a U.S. military collision with Iran would involve Iraqi failure to meet the benchmarks, followed by accusations of Iranian responsibility for the failure...then, some provocation in Iraq or a terrorist act in the U.S. that would be blamed on Iran would culminate in a defensive U.S. military action against Iran that Plunges a lonely America into a spreading and deeping quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan."
In other words, the former national security advisor is describing precisely the situation as it exists in Iraq right now. Iraq has not met the "benchmark" as Brzezinski put it in terms of achieving the stability it needs to function as a viable political intity. Civil war is raging resulting in as much as 100 deaths a day. For the most part Iraq is a xauldron of daily, cyclical violence that shows no signs of letting up anytime soon, and particularly since by appearances it has descended into extreme religious sectarianism between Shiite and Sunni Muslims.
Those paying close attention to the warnings of former President Carter's national security advisor should consider what he has said against the backdrop of other recent events as well.
In the last few weeks several Iranian diplomats were seized by American forces in Northern Iraq and in the aftermath of this five Americans were killed execution-style in an event painted by the pro-war Zionist media in America as an apparent retaliation.
Added to this are the disturbing and conveniently timed claims coming out of the Bush White House recently that Iran has been responsible for supplying anti-American "insurgents" with high-tech military hardware.
What makes it all the more interesting is that in this case it isn't some wild-eyed backwoodsman making such serious allegations, but none other than the former national security advisor to U.S. President Jimmy Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski. In his recent public testimony before the senate Foreign Relations committee, Brzezinski delivered a scathing attack against the present administration's "war on terror" not only for the obvious failure that it is, but as well for what it could become. "Undertaken under false assumptions," he said, "The war in Iraq is undermining America's global legitimacy. Its civilian casualties are tarnishing America's moral credentials, and driven by imperial hubris, it is intensifying regional instability." Not limiting his remarks to the obvious problem taking place in the present, he also painted a frightening picture of what may lie ahead in the future. Speaking of the desperation on the part of those responsible for bringing about this conflict, he - slipping into his old role of national security soothsayer - predicted in so many words that such desperadoes would be willing to engineer some sort of terrorist event against American interests in order to justify widening the war to include Iran. |
Watch Out For False Flag Terror Former Carter National security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski (left) and former NATO Supreme Allied Commander for Europe and retired U.S. Army general Wesley Clark (right) attended a meeting in the office of Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev.) before a news conference at the U.S. Capital. Congressional Democratic leaders, who heard Brzezinski testify before them recently on the war in Iraq and other national security matters, predicted that america would "blame Iran" for its Iraq failure giving Bush and crew the justification it needs to attack Iran. |
But more disturbing than these are the broader actions of Bush and company in regard to Iran and what appears to be the Zionists' desire to initiate the next phase of the war for Israeli hegemony in the Middle East. At present the largest build up of naval assets in the area is under way since the war began against Iraq almost four years ago. American servicemen and women home in leave have had their R&R halted and were ordered to report back to duty immediately. Iranian airspace is repeatedly violated by U.S. drones sent to do aerial reconnaissance and to test the effectiveness of Iran's early warning defense systems. The United States has been funding and training revolutionary groups (in this case, Iranian communists) who are and will be used as a "fifth column" in further destabilizing Iran if and when hostilities break out. At least 50% of the additional 21,000 surge troops recently sent to the area are being stationed along the Iran-Iraq border. Iranian financial system are being attacked through U.S. sanctions, hindering the Islamic republic's ability to prepare for or deal with any future acts of war against her.
More troubling and indicative of what lies ahead though is
the rhetoric coming out of Israel. Usually cautious about the
kind of revealing language used (so as not to let the cat our
of the bag that the United States is Israel's high-=tech attack
dog) high-profile figures no less in stature than Ehud Olmert
and Benjamin Netanyahu are shoving their mugs in front of every
media outlet possible and calling for U.S. military action against
Iran, Jewish newspapers everywhere in the world are working overtime
trying to contradict the deluge of "anti-Semitic conspiracy
theories" that the U.S. government is Zionist-occupied territory
while at the same time screeching day and night that the United
States must attack Iran. Israeli assets in the Christian Zionist
community including false prophets Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell
and John Hagee, as well as secular assets such as Rush Limbaugh
and Sean Hannity, are mobilizing the deluded sheep of their respective
flock to press members of Congress into supporting military action
to protect Israel.
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The ongoing effort to spark an American war against Iran has long been in the making. It is part of a policy of so-called "rogue state rollback" - a plan, organization at the highest levels of the Zionist lobby in America - that has new seen the first drive toward its fulfillment with the attack on Iran's longtime Arab enemy, Iraq. Now, incredibly enough, Iran is the target - despite the American quagmire in Iraq.
"Rogue states" is an inflammatory term that has been used by Israel and its lobby in America - as well as by those who tout the imperialist propaganda line - to describe such largely Islamic countries as Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Sudan and other countries that are perceived as threats to Israel.
The war against "rogue states" is all part of the effort to set in place a "new World order" in which no nation can retain its national sovereignty in the face of American military might held in the hands of a war-like "Israel-contric" combine of influence at the highest levels of the American government and supported by the major media.
The scheme for "rogue states rollback" is, in fact, part of a long-range plan by higher-ups in the international policy making elite, specifically the hard-line supporters of Israel.
This plan for "rogue states rollback" - specifically targeting Iraq and Iran - was first enunciated on May 22, 1993, in a then-secret speech by a former Israeli government propagandist, Martin Indyk before the Washington Institute on Near East Affairs, a private, pro-Israel pressure group. At the time, the small, maverick American newspaper, The Spotlight, was the only publication to reveal this plan for aggression.
What made Indyk's strategic plan for war so explosive was that when Indyk outlined the policy, he was serving as President Clinton's hand-picked Middle east policy "expert" on the National security Council.
Born in England and raised in Australia, Indyk took up residence in Israel but was later given "instant" U.S. citizenship by special proclamation of Clinton just hours after Clinton was sworn into office on Jan. 20, 1993 - one of Clinton's first official acts. Later this former Israeli propagandist was appointed to serve as U.S. ambassador to Israel, his obvious conflict of interest notwithstanding.
Within a year, the thrust of Indyk's plan for war against Iraq and Iran was formally promoted by the powerful New York-based Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). It was also publicly announced, at the same time, as an official policy of the Clinton administration, although it had been in the making for over a year.
An Associated Press report, published in the Feb. 28, 1994 issue of The Washington Post, announced that W. Anthony Lake, President Clinton's National security Advisor, had laid out a plan for "dual containment" of Iraq and Iran, both of which Lake labeled "out-law" and backlash" states.
Lake's comments as reported were from an article by Lake just published in the March/April 1994 issue of Foreign Affairs, the quarterly journal of the Rockefeller-financed CFR, and American affiliate of the London-based Royal Institute for International Affairs, a policy group funded by the European Rothschild family longtome supporters of Israel.
On Oct. 30, 1993, the Post frankly described the CFR as "the nearest thing we have to a ruling establishment in the United states," saying that they are "the people who, for more than half a century, have managed our international affairs and our military-industrial complex." Twenty-four top members of the Clinton administration - along with Clinton- were CFR members.
There was a minor difference in the policy as set forth by Lake: Iraq was first targeted for destruction. Iran would come later.
Lake said the Clinton administration supported Iraqi exiles who wanted to overthrow Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Lake said that although Iran was what he called the foremost sponsor of terrorism and assassination world wide," the Clinton administration saw the possibility of better relations with Iran.
In early 1995 the then-newly elected Republican House Speaker, Newt Gingrich, long a vocal advocate for Israel, gave a little-noticed speech in Washington before a gathering of military and intelligence officers calling for a Middle East policy that was, in his words, "designed to force the replacement of the current regime in Iran...the only long-range solution that makes any sense."
That the then-de facto leader of the "opposition"
Republican Party endorsed this policy was no real surprise since,
at that time, Gingrich's wife was being paid $2,500 a month by
the Israel Export Development company, an outfit which lured American
companies out of the United States into a high-tech business park
in Israel.
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"While Jewish communal leaders focus most of their current lobbying efforts on pressing the United States to take a tough line against Iran and its nuclear program, some are privately voicing fears that they will be accused of driving America into a war with the regime in Tehran."
With that amazing admission - presented here unedited in any way - one of the most distinguished Jewish community news in America - the New York-based Forward - ackknowledged on Feb. 2 that it is the leaders of American Jewish organizations who are pushing bellicose U.S. policies against Iran that are being carried out by the Bush administration.
This confirms what American Free Press has been saying from the very beginning.
Forward admitted that what has been referred to as "the Jewish lobby" fears a "public backlash" from Americans who do not believe that a war against Iran is in America's best interests and that many Americans now believe(or are increasingly starting to believe) the argument - put forth even before the United States invaded Iraq - that it was pro-Israel before the United States invaded Iraq - that it was pro-Israel advocacy groups that were largely responsible for the ongoing debacle in Iraq.
However, according to Forward those whom it described as "Jewish groups" are now trying to convince the American public of the validity of their own pet conspiracy theory that Iran is not only a threat to Israel - their primary interest - but also to the West and even "pro-American Sunni Muslim states in the region."
In other words, pro-Israel Jewish groups in the United States are actually saying that Muslim states such as, for example, Saudi Arabia - a longtime target of Israeli ire - need to be protected, too. Evidently, since saudi Arabia is indeed fearful of a powerful Iran - nuclear-armed or otherwise - Israel and its proponents now believe tht they can make it appear as though a U.S. attack on Iran is more than just "another war for Israel."
Forward even cited Jess Hordes, an official of the Washington office of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), who claimed that "it is a fact that Iran is a danger to the whole world." Hordes claimed that this rhetoric is not intended to "hide our concerns about Israel," but his protests ring hollow since it is clear that it has been the pro-Israel lobby's concerns about Iran that have been driving current American policy toward Iran just as it was that same lobby's concerns about Iraq that drove American policy toward that now-vanquished Arab republic.
Forward itself went so far as to admit, in candid terms, that "many advocacy efforts, even when not linked to Israel, carry indelibly Jewish fingerprints" and that "Jewish groups are indeed playing a lead role in pressing for a hard line on Iran."
(For more on the Zionist origins of the ongoing plan to attack Iran as part of a broad-ranging effort to defend the interests of Israel, see the accompanying story.-Ed.)
Citing a recent speech in Israel by Malcomm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Forward noted that Hoenlein is particularly distressed that many highly placed individuals of some renown - ranging from former President Jimmy Carrter to retired Fen. Wesley Clark (who said that "New York money people" were behind the push for war against Iran) to former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter and professors Stephen Walt (of Harvard) and John Mearsheimer (of the University of chicago) - have all questioned the power of the Israeli lobby in dictating U.S. policy toward Iran and Iraq.
In addition, former Secretary of State Colin Powell is said to have alleged that "the JINSA crowd," referring to the Jewish Institute for National security Affairs, played a major part in stoking up the U.S. invasion of Iraq, which Powell long vehemently opposed but later supported, resulting in his own loss of public credibility as a consequence.
Hoenlein and other leaders of the wealthy and powerful Jewish community are now echoing earlier suggestions, previously put forth by their colleagues, that key figures in America's policy-making elites are now openly criticizing Zionist power in America. This, according to Hoenlein, "is a cancer that starts from the top and works its way down. It poisons the opinions among elites which trickle down into society.
Forward noted that two Israeli authors, Michael Oren and Yossi
Klein Halevi, associates of the shalem Center, a Jerusalem-based
think tank, say that Iran, in Forward's assessment of their
claims, is "the main threat to Israeli survival, regional
stability and to the entire world order." Forward
points out that, "This theme has been echoed in publications
and press releases put out by most major Jewish groups, including
[the American Israel Public Affairs Committee] and the Conference
of Presidents."
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On Jan. 5, liberal Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (DTexas) reintroduced so-called "hate crimes" legislation in Congress. The bill is numbered H.R. 254. "Hate" crimes laws-the brainchild of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) of B'nai B'rith-are found in states and locales across America, but this new measure in Congress would enact a federal hate crime statute.
Essentially, hate crimes laws would add additional criminal penalties upon anyone convicted of a crime against an individual when that crime, according to the proposed legislation, is "motivated by the actual or perceived race, color, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender, or disability of the victim."
In short, although there are already laws against shooting someone and killing them-it's called murder-if a perpetrator is found to have committed that crime because of an alleged bias against the victim, it would now be considered a federal crime because of that bias. There will be at least an additional 10 year federal penalty applied, even if - for example - someone only punched another person. If death results in the course of such a so-called "hate" crime being committed, a life sentence in prison is provided for under this federal legislation.
This is "thought control" legislation and a piece of police-state-style social engineering disguised in the mask of "fighting hate." And it constitutes not just a toe in the door, but a veritable jackboot, for, in other countries where the ADL and its allied groups have forced the enactment of hate crimes laws, legislation outlawing even criticism of minorities has traditionally followed.
The new hate crimes measure is entitled "The David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act" - or, as it's being popularly called by its proponents, "David's Law." The law is named in memory of a young man who was brutally murdered, sodomized with a lead pipe by his attacker who apparently committed the crime against Ray because Ray was a homosexual.
A hate crimes measure was approved by the House of Representatives in the previous Congress, despite the fact that Republicans were in control of the House at that time. And what many do not realize is that the single use of a racial pejorative, for example, such as the so-called "n" word, can be construed as "evidence" of a "hate" crime, even though nasty words are often traded by people engaged in simple fisticuffs.
Or, if a black youth, fighting in the street with a Latino schoolmate, used a racial slur offensive to Latinos, that black youth could be held responsible for a federal "hate" crime if he struck the Latino in the course of using the inappropriate slur.
Rev. Ted Pike, who has been spearheading
opposition to the federal hate crimes laws-and who has done so
successfully in the past-points out that, in other countries,
so-called hate crimes legislation has been the toe in the doorway
for additional "thought control" legislation aimed at
limiting freedom of speech in general.
For example, if an individual, citing Biblical exhortations against homosexuality, is found to have offended the sensibilities of homosexuals, then that person may be punished for having done so. This is happening today in Canada, in France and in any number of other countries where "antihate" legislation is in force. Or, if someone criticizes the policies of the Anti-Defamation League or the state of Israel, they may be found to have offended Jewish supporters of Israel and therefore punished for having done so.
The fact that Arab-American organizations have repeatedly joined the ADL-led chorus demanding hate-crimes legislation in America is rather thought-provoking, considering the fact that Arab Americans who frequently criticize Israel would be among the first targeted by the kind of thought control legislation that has traditionally come in the wake of the kind of "hate crimes" legislation that the ADL is now trying to have enacted at the federal level in the United States.
Now, in the judgment of Pike, because the Democrats are in control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate, there will be an even greater push to get the legislation enacted.
That's why Pike is urging those who oppose this insidious legislation to redouble their efforts to block H.R. 254 so that it never reaches the floor of the House. H.R. 254 has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee, and Pike suggests that people contact all members of the committee and urge that they oppose the legislation.
Pike suggests that you keep your message short and to the point: "Please don't vote for the David Ray Hate Crimes Prevention Act, H.R.254. Hate laws have taken away free speech in Canada and many European countries."
You can write all of the representatives in question (as well as your own representative and every member of the House) in care of the following general address: U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515. To telephone members of the House, you may use the regular number for the U.S. Capitol switchboard at 1-(202) 224-3121. Or there is a toll free number you may use: 1-877-851-6437.
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There is really only one word that can describe the latest propaganda coming out of the White House with regard to the "slam-dunk" evidence that Iran is arming insurgents with high-tech weaponry, and that one word is "desperate."
As if on cue, Zionist-controlled news outlets across the Western world are now showcasing photos of "seized" weapons that puppets of Israel are claiming were manufactured in Iran and shipped across the border into Iraq for the purpose of attacking American assets. They point to the recent spike in American deaths attributed to these armor-piercing weapons as well as to the downing of 4 U.S. helicopters in the last few weeks.
The problem with this new "damning evidence" implication Iran's involvement is glaring to all except those who have been blinded by the powerful spell cast by the warlocks and warlords of the Zionist agenda - Iran is a nation that uses neither the Latin alphabet nor the Gregorian calendar with which these munitions have been stamed. English - the language used on these pieces of ordnance - is not Iran's official language. Iran's language is Farsi, its alphabet is Arabic and its calendar is Jalaali used in the Muslim Middle East.
Besides this, Iran is not run by a bunch of illiterate, uneducated camel jockeys as the Zionist-controlled media infrastructure in America would have all believe. If Iranians are smart enough to build nuclear weapons (as the neo-conservatives in America and Israel are screeching out to the world on a daily basis) then they are smart enough to know how the clandestine world if intelligence works and would therefore engage in something known as "preventative maintenance." Therefore, if the Iranian government was truly arming the resistance in Iraq, it would be smart about it and mark these munitions with nothing, leaving people scratching their heads as to where these items were manufactured, or better yet, Iranian weapons makers might mark them with Hebrew letters and numbers so as to throw the blame on the one entity in the region which is truly benefitting from all the unrest - Israel.
More than this though, Iranians know they cannot pick a fight with America and survive, much less win.
But the world should not be surprised at this latest magic act on the part of the neo-conservatives in pulling a Gorilla out of a black hat and calling it a rabbit. After all, they did manage to pull off schemes much more grand in their size and scope in order to convince gullible Americans to send their sons and daughters off to fight and die for the benefit of this foreign, hostile power known as Israel.
One merely needs to consider the evidence that has come to light with regard to Israel's involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks as well as the mountain of other pieces of information that leads any reasonable person to conclude that a larger and darker agenda was at work that day.
What should be troubling to those who follow this present business known as Armageddon is the spirit of seeming desperation that pervades the whole exercise of setting up this next war with Iran. Experts in the area of foreign policy both past and present are calling "foul" on this one. The fact that Bush and his backers are willing to go to what are obviously ridiculous lengths indicates that they are not of sound mind, or worse, that the situation is much more desperate than the average watcher of these events is led to believe.
With America tied down in Iraq and with Iran's semi-modern missile defense system, there is really only one military option for the United States a massive bombing campaign and the use of nuclear weapons as Vice President Dick Cheney has already indicated. The results of this would be apocalyptic for the world's economy, and America would in no way be immune.
So the world is left to ponder which cities in the West are
targeted for nuclear destruction by Israel if her demands are
not met. Is this the reason why Bush and his cohorts are willing
to go to such desperate lengths in executing Israel's wishes of
seeing Iran destroyed?
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This news article is copyrighted and cannot be reproduced here,
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http://www.vdare.com/roberts/070211_putin.htm
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Two weeks ago I discussed how Congress and the administration use our fiat money system to literally create some of the funds needed to prosecute our ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. We've already spent more than $500 billion in Iraq, mostly throgh supplemental spending bills that are not part of the normal appropriations and budget process. But with cost soaring, and no end to the war in sight, yet another supplemental spending bill must be passed soon - and both parties in Congress are only too willing to provide the money under the guise of supporting the troops.
Never mind that the American people
showed their dissatisfaction with the war in the fall elections.
Congress lacks the political will to stand up to the administration
and assert its power over the purse strings, and too many vested
interests in the defense sector benefit from the supplemental
bills. A cynic might even suggest that many Democrats want the
war to drag on, despite their supposed opposition, to damage the
president politically and benefit them in 2008. But whatever the
reason, the money for war keeps flowing.
Defense Department officials will ask Congress for the next supplemental bill in coming weeks. The amount requested is likely to be at least $140 billion. If we stay in Iraq beyond 20007 - and the administration has made it clear that we will - the bill to American taxpayers easily could top $1 trillion in another year or two.
I doubt very seriously that most Americans think the war in Iraq is worth $1 trillion. Even those who do must face the reality that the federal government simply doesn't have the money. Congress continues to spend more than the Treasury raises in taxes year after year, by borrowing money abroad or simply printing it. Paying for war with credit is reckless and stupid, but paying for war by deprecating our currency is criminal.
Even the most modest suggestions for controlling spending in Iraq have been rejected. Some in Congress argued that reconstruction money should be paid back when Iraq's huge oil reserves resume operation. Another idea was to find dollar-for-dollar offsets in the rest of the federal budget for every dollar spent in Iraq. But the administration adamantly opposed both ideas. Budget cuts are unpopular, andthe profits from Iraqi oil will never compensate American taxpayers.
The mentality n Washington is simple: avoid hard choices at all costs; spend money at wil; ignore deficits; inflate the money supply as needed; and trust that the whole mess somehow will be taken care of by unprecedented economic growth in the future.
We have embarked on the most expensive nation-building experiment in history. We seek nothing less than to rebuild Iraq's judicial system, financial system, legal system, transportation system, and political system from the top down - all with hundreds of billions of U.S. tax dollars. We will pay to provide job training for Iraqis; we will pay to secure Iraq's borders; we will pay for housing health care, social services, utilities, roads, schools, jails, and food in Iraq. Indoing so, we will saddle future generations of Americans with billions in government debt.
The question of whether Iraq is worth this much to us is one
Congress should answer now - by refusing another nickel for supplemental
spending bills.
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