July 7, 2008
July 14 & 21, 2008
Whole Body Health
July 28, 2008
One of the most frightening developments in the occupation of Iraq and the so-called "War on Terror" is actually something most of the American people have never heard of. In addition to the 150,000 troops on the ground in Iraq, the Bush administration has deployed a shadow army of some 100,000 contractors. Of these tens of thousands of heavily armed mercenaries that roam Iraq with impunity, among the most powerful of the companies involved is Blackwater USA, a secretive company headquartered in the wilderness woods of North Carolina.
It is headed by a bankroller of President Bush and his allies, Erik Prince. Blackwater considers itself the "Fed Ex" of the national security apparatus, but the reality is that Blackwater has become a prime player in the War on Terror and is nothing short of the Bush administration's Praetorian Guard.
Prince, 39, became an instant billionaire when his father, Edgar, passed away in 1995. He had developed Prince Manufacturing, a leader in automotive innovation over the years, and became best known for his invention and development of the lighted vanity mirror now found behind nearly every sun visor in every American car.
Blackwater USA largely operated in the shadows of the U.S. war machine, until the morning of March 31, 2004, when four Blackwater contractors were ambushed and killed in the city of Fallujah, Iraq. Their bodies were burned and dragged through the streets. Two of the mercenaries were hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River.
For most people, it was the first that they ever heard of private military contractors operating in Iraq. That was the day the war turned. Unlike Somalia, when the Clinton administration pulled out, the Bush Administration initiated a massive revenge attack. The American army laid siege to the city of Fallujah, killed hundreds of people, displaced tens of thousands of others and in the process inflamed the Iraqi resistance that haunts the American occupation forces to this day.
Unofficial estimates now claim over one million Iraqi civilians have died since the U.S. occupation in 2003.
The Bush administration came to power with a radical privatization agenda. "We see it in our schools, prisons, healthcare systems and law enforcement in the United States," says investigative reporter Jeremy Scahill, who has taken on exposing the Blackwater secrets with a vendetta. "The occupation of Iraq and the War on Terror have brought the greatest privatization of warfare in modern history."
Blackwater USA has become one of the most powerful private actors in the so-called war on terror, and it provides the Bush administration with an extraordinary amount of political cover. The deaths of Blackwater contractors and other mercenaries are not included in the total death count, even though estimates place it at around 1,000 killed In Iraq. Their injuries do not get calculated either, and their crimes do not get punished.
"What we have here is a revolving door" reports Scahill. "Blackwater and other companies benefit the Bush administration, and in turn the Bush administration and its allies in congress protect the shielded military contractors from any effective oversight, any effective accountability, and effective legal system. The operations are shrouded in secrecy, and people in Congress find it almost impossible to get any information about Blackwater and other companies in operation."
Illinois Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) expressed her frustration:
"We know virtually nothing about this. We think that about 40 cents of every dollar goes to private military contractors. We think about 800 of them have been killed in Iraq, but we don't know that, they're not even counted. We think that about 25,000 to 40,000 have been engaged in military activities and combat related activities, but we don't know, and we can't find out."
Blackwater USA has 2,300 men actively deployed in nine countries around the world. They have another 20,000 "contractors" at the ready. Scahill says that while Blackwater is operated in Iraq and Afghanistan, it increasingly has its sights set on deployments inside the United States. It is setting up a new facility in Illinois and another one in California.
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The Dean of a New England law school announced that the departure of President Bush next January may not provide him and his cronies with a sanctuary from justice. The message from Lawrence Velvel, dean and co-founder of the Massachusetts School of Law, is:
Where impeachment ends, an independent tribunal begins. Punishment of the guilty is being openly discussed by conference planners—including capital punishment.
As announced on the website After Downing Street.org, and confirmed for AFP by Dean Velvel, his assistant, Jeff Demers, and longtime publicist Sherwood Ross, a conference [see conference agenda on page 5—Ed.] is being called for by Velvel "to plan the prosecution of President Bush and other high administration officials for war crimes." It will be held Sept. 13-14 at the school, a small, respected institution in Andover founded in 1988 that resisted the regulations and standards of the American Bar Association and instead sought accreditation through the New England Association of Schools and Colleges.
Specifying what may shock readers of independent media—but which will never appear in the prostitute press—Velvel said the program "is not intended to be a mere discussion of violations of law that have occurred. It is, rather, intended to be a conference at which plans will be laid and necessary organizational structures set up, to pursue the guilty as long as necessary and, if need be, to the ends of the Earth" as stated in his column posted online June 24, on his "Velvel on National Affairs" blog.
"We must try to hold the Bush administration leaders accountable in courts of justice," Velvel said. "And we must insist on appropriate punishments, including, if guilt is found, the hangings visited upon top German and Japanese war criminals in the 1940s. America's chief prosecutor at Nuremberg, Justice Robert Jackson, said we were invoking principles that would govern our nation as well as our defeated enemies. We must attempt to make a truth teller of Jackson, instead of allowing our leaders to make a liar of him."
Velvel said this conference is intended to do away with the past practice of allowing U.S. officials responsible for war crimes (in Vietnam and elsewhere) to enjoy immunity from prosecution upon leaving office.
"President Lyndon Johnson retired to his Texas ranch, and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara (a longtime Council on Foreign Relations fixture who also served in that position under JFK) was named to head the World Bank; Richard Nixon retired to San Clemente, and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger [a Bilderberg luminary] was allowed to grow richer and richer," Velvel said, while citing former Kennedy/Johnson Secretary of State Dean Rusk as another unpunished wrong-doer.
"For Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and [torture advocate and Bush advisor] John Yoo to spend years in jail or go to the gallows for their crimes would be a powerful lesson to future U.S. leaders," Velvel said.
The issues to be handled at the conference include the nature of domestic and international crimes committed; which high-level Bush officials, members of Congress and federal judges are chargeable with war crimes; and which foreign and domestic tribunals can be used to prosecute them.
"It is for all these reasons that I have called the conference . . . entitled Planning for the Prosecution of High-Level American War Criminals. . . . The underlying law and facts will be discussed in the context of laying plans to pursue the guilty in courtrooms so that in the future there may be no more Vietnams, no more Iraqs," Velvel said. AFP interviewed Velvel June 24.
An "umbrella coordinating committee" also will be put together consisting of those from noted legal groups concerned about war crimes, including the American Civil Liberties Union and Center for Constitutional Rights.
New York attorney Carl Person questioned if this conference will lead to real results. He wondered if subpoena power will be achieved. "There is no convening authority. Nobody has to come to testify," he said, though he agrees justice should be sought.
Email Corresponding Editor Mark Anderson at truthhound2@yahoo.com.
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There is new evidence that American GIs are being held against their will in Southeast Asia more than three decades after the Vietnam War officially ended. A letter recently received by the father of a U.S. pilot, who went missing in action in 1971, could provide a key piece of information that proves American prisoners of war are alive and imprisoned in remote areas of South Vietnam.
Over the years, historians, researchers and independent journalists have made a compelling case that, during the Cold War, thousands of U.S. POWs were moved among Soviet, Chinese and North Korean labor camps, where they toiled and died under the worst conditions.
Families of POWs and MIAs say the U.S. government has turned a blind eye to the plight of these men, even going so far as to sabotage their efforts at finding out what exactly happened to their loved ones.*
But Joe Milliner's incredible story of his son, told at the June 20 meeting of the National Alliance of POW/MIA Families in Crystal City, Va., could change all of that. Documentation compiled by Milliner could finally force the country to come to terms with the fact that thousands of Americans were abandoned by the U.S.
There is confusion over what happened to Milliner's son, U.S. Army Warrant Officer William P. Milliner, when the helicopter he was co-piloting disappeared on March 6, 1971. What is known is that William, who was 20 years old at the time, was the co-pilot on an AH1G Cobra helicopter gunship. He was returning from a combat support mission over Laos when he disappeared in cloudy weather.
The military reportedly dispatched a search-and-rescue team to locate William and the pilot of the helicopter, John F. Hummel. Tragically, the two were never located, and the Army eventually gave up looking for them. Over the years, the Milliner family has never given up hope that their son would be found. As with many families of missing soldiers, the U.S. military has been unhelpful, some would even say willfully obstructing honest inquiries into what happened to lost loved ones.
However, recent events have renewed the Milliner's faith that William is alive and is being held in Southeast Asia against his will, possibly as a slave laborer. The first occasion came as a result of a classified document, which was given to Milliner by a source inside the Pentagon who is sympathetic to MIA-POW families.
The official document was dated Oct. 4, 1989, and reports of a Thai businessman who said U.S. citizens, including a "William P. Milliner," are being held in a dangerous "no-man's land" controlled by thugs and warlords in a mountainous region in Laos.
A Thai businessman said he could secure William's release if the U.S. government were willing to pay a ransom. According to Milliner, U.S. officials shot down any discussion of a reward, effectively killing off any hopes of freeing the American.
Were it not for his friend at the Pentagon, Milliner said the classified account of the exchange between U.S. officials in Thailand and the unnamed businessman was slated to be archived for 50 years and would not be released—even to family members—until 2039.
Since that time, Milliner says that there have been sporadic sightings of his son, including another U.S. document that claims warlords were seeking only $1,800 for the release of his son.
But the most compelling piece of evidence arrived just last year in the form of a letter from a doctor who had been working in Cambodia. According to Milliner, the physician's account proves to him that his son is still alive somewhere in the jungle.
In September 2007, Milliner says, he received an unsigned letter from someone claiming to be a physician working in Cambodia and Laos.
The doctor wrote that, in early September 2007, he had treated an American man with certain tell-tale wounds. The doctor said that the patient was suffering from a poor amputation of his arm. He also described certain scars that matched other sightings of William that the Milliners have collected over the years.
The doctor said he was unnerved by the extent of secrecy surrounding this patient. He had been driven through the jungle for what he described as a long time, and he was allowed to bring just a few medical instruments and medicine—but no assistants.
The doctor wrote that the guards kept a close watch over this patient. However, in a free moment, the man said in perfect English, punctuated by some Vietnamese, that he is an American being held against his will.
Milliner received that letter in September of last year. Since
then, Milliner says he believes the doctor now fears for his life
and has gone into hiding. Over the years, he says, presumptive
Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and
Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) have both undermined efforts to help
Americans who are still being held against their will. McCain
and Kerry have both weighed in against offering reward money for
the release of U.S. citizens who may still be in captivity in
Laos, Vietnam, China and North Korea, said Milliner.
——
*For more read Perfidy: The Government Cabal That Knowingly Abandoned
Our POWs and Left Them to Die by Sgt. John Top Holland and Fr.
Patrick Bascio. Softcover 225 pages. Price: $25 for one copy.
$19 per copy for active and retired U.S. military. Order from
AFP, 645 Pennsylvania Avenue SE, Suite 100, Washington, D.C. 20003.
Call 1-888-699-NEWS toll free to charge. No S&H inside the
U.S.
Christopher J. Petherick is AFP's founding editor. He now runs BRANDYWINE HOUSE BOOKS & MEDIA, P.O. Box 638, Cheltenham, MD 20623. Toll free: 1-866-656-7583. www.BrandywineHouse.us.
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Most of the countries of the 27 European Union (EU) nations were happily proceeding with the ratification of the new EU constitution based on the successful historical recipe dictated by the U.S. in 1913 when the Internal Revenue Service and "Federal" Reserve were established: no publicity, no votes and the usual arm-twisting and manipulations in the background in order to ratify something that would surely cause a major debate in any country if brought out into the open.
Fortunately for nationalists worldwide, the lesson of 2005 was not learned by the local New World Order boys. In 2005, both in France and the Netherlands, voters rejected a European constitution. The new Treaty of Lisbon is almost fully identical to the prior documents, carried in the dark, without voting allowed in any of the 27 nations but Ireland.
A few main points from the Treaty of Lisbon:
• The creation of the office of a European president. This was opposed by the smaller countries of the continent and forced through by the bigger ones. The result will be a much stronger centralization of power and more domination by the larger nations. The new president will be elected for a 2.5 years, for a maximum of two terms. The present system is based on a six-month presidential term in rotation.
• A single position will be created for EU foreign affairs and security policy—a further shift toward centralization.
• The number of EU Commissioners will be reduced. By 2014 only two-thirds of the EU countries will be represented by commissioners. Again, the smaller nations will be left out.
• Member states will be forced to hand over jurisdiction to the EU in many domestic and judiciary affairs.
•The right to veto some legislation by individual members will be revoked.
• Of 440 provisions of the treaty rejected in 2005, only two were changed.
• The European motto, "United in Diversity," remains the same.
All the minor changes in the proposed constitution were cosmetic. For example, the term "European foreign minister" was replaced with the Orwellian "High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy." Also, the term "European regulations" replaced "European laws."
EUROPEAN ECONOMIC WOES
The average EU citizen has a lot more to worry about than a EU constitution that will change his future world order; he is under great pressure right now. The average household in the United Kingdom is spending around $2,000 (U.S.) a year for natural gas. This is expected to increase by 40 percent by the end of next winter. Fuel prices seem to be rising out of control, directly inflating food prices and transportation costs.(However, Bilderberg is trying to put a cap on rising oil prices.)
During the recent temporary fuel shortage in the UK, caused by Shell truck drivers going on strike, a gas station captured national headlines by raising fuel prices to $14 (U.S.) a gallon. The same drivers consider the $9 (U.S.) a gallon price a bargain.
Besides the record fuel prices, the UK is setting new records in abortions: 200,000 abortions in one year in the UK and Wales. Scotland is excluded. Scotland is trying to be excluded from more and more UK affairs. Its independence movement is strong and getting stronger every day. It seems 301 years of British rule were one year too many for that nation.
IRISH CITIZENS CAUSE CHAOS
The direct result of the Irish rejection is total and unmitigated chaos in the EU. Reactions of member state leaders are ranging from: "We need to learn from the Irish example" to "Ratify or get out." There is uncertainty and no easy solution on the horizon; it seems democracy in the EU reached its natural limitations.
Copies of the Lisbon agreement were handed out on the streets of Ireland before the vote. The results were "No"—53.4 percent and "Yes"—46.6 percent. Grassroots organizations and even some Irish political leaders were campaigning actively against the Lisbon treaty.
Would that more European nations followed the lead of Ireland and the Netherlands in rejecting the imposition of a New World Order on European soil.
George Kadar is a European bureau chief for AFP.
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Are you an unintentional anti-Semite? The U.S. State Department's "Office of Global Anti-Semitism" in its 2008 report to Congress warns not just of conscious, intentional anti-Semitism but of another lurking form of potential bigotry: unintentional anti-Semitism.
This consists of criticisms of Israel, which, though true, might be manipulated by others to Israel's detriment. To avoid assisting Israel's enemies, the State Department recommends that every comment about Israel (including its leaders and military) first be scrutinized for whether it could put Israel in a bad light. If so, it shouldn't be said. Only then can we consider ourselves "free from anti-Semitism."
What if you defy the government and go ahead and speak truthful criticisms of Israel, knowing that Israel's detractors will probably use it against her? According to the Office of Global Anti-Semitism, one who assists anti-Semites is an anti-Semite.
However, people who don't face reality hold back part of the truth. They consider too much truth to be potentially dangerous. Christian Evangelical leaders believe they protect Jews from possible persecution by censoring truth about Jewish supremacism and creation of Christian-persecuting hate laws. In reality, protection of Jewish anti-Christian activists empowers them to flourish and expand their corruption of society.
This, in turn, only increases criticism and resentment of all Jews—most of whom are innocent of such evil. Many bitterly resent the Anti-Defamation League, architect of hate laws, for the bad reputation it gives the Jewish people.
Evangelicals think that by only speaking well of Jews they are beyond the reproach of ever being labeled anti-Semitic. Wrong. The State Department says that if Christians believe the New Testament account that Jewish leaders had Christ crucified they are the very worst kind of anti-Semites: "classical" anti-Semites. That's what Hitler was.
To please both Jews and the government, evangelicals must now fulfill two criteria: Never say true but unflattering things about Israel and abandon belief in the New Testament.
Will evangelicals accommodate the State Department's new requirement of philo-Semitic correctness? Countless followers of John Hagee already do. They agree with his book, In Defense of Israel, that the New Testament testimony that Jews killed Christ is an anti-Semitic lie that birthed the holocaust.
Yet, an increasing number of Americans are no longer content to be insulated from truth. Many visiting the Internet and www.truthtellers.org in particular are rediscovering an enormous reality: We don't have to fear the whole truth. Truth can be trusted entirely. Truth doesn't beget error and evil; rather, it bears the good fruit of knowledge, wisdom, moderation, and guidance in a darkened, confused world.
Rev. Ted Pike is director of the National Prayer Network, a Christian/conservative watchdog organization. This article has been shortened for space. The entirety of this article is available at www.truthtellers.org. Please visit the site.
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Upon hearing that Christian missionaries had been in the area passing out copies of the New testaent (that he referred to as "propaganda") deputy Mayor Uzi Aharon of Or Yehusa went up and down the streets of the town, barking out orders that the offensive material" should be brought forth by the town's inhibitants. Working in tandem with the deputy mayor were Jewish religious students who went door to door collecting the religious writings. Once collected the books were dumped into a pile, doused with gasoline and set ablaze in a parking lot near a synagogue.
The initial news stories concerning this raw display of anti-Christian bigotry originally featured an unrepentant deputy mayor saying it was a "commandment" for Jews to burn such materials, adding that he did not denounce the burning of the books, but rather those who dared distribute such material with the Jewish state. Later however as the story began to grow legs in foreign media outlets, the formerly bold and brash deputy mayor was backpedaling, saying he "respects" the New Testament and would "never do what had been done to the Jews in the past," evidently referring to the burning of Jewish books during the World War II era.
Predictably, the Jewish press in America censored the event. Not a peep was heard from any of the heavy hitters, meaning Pastor John Hagee, Rod Parsley or Pat Robertson. Calls and emails by American Free Press newspaper to their offices asking for their opinions on this outrage were not returned.
What is most interesting in this latest incident is the fact that it serves as prime facie evidence vindicating what critics of Judaism have alleged for years, that the Talmud - in addition to depicting Jesus as a sorcerer and His mother as a prostitute - commands the burning of Christian bookss.
As of this moment the government of Israel is doing nothing, saying it is a "local matter," despite the fact that there are laws forbidding the destruction or desecration of any religious item any particular group holds sacred. In addition, no formal apologies have been offered to the world's Christians by Israel or any of her spokesperson as would have been demanded by the Zionist state had a similar event transpired where Jewish books were burned in a Christian or Muslim country.
Anti-Christian bigotry in Israel is by no means something new. From its embryonic days, Christianity and its followers were considered public enemies.
When the Jewish state was resurrected from its 2,000-year-old grave during the 20th century and Zionist/Marxist Jews went on the rampage in Palestinian villages, Christians and their churches were firebombed and treated with the same kind of visceral hatred as took place in Russia after the Bolsheviks took over.
When the Christian patriarch complained about Jewish abuse of the Christians of Palestine in the name of then Pope Paul VI, Israel (through on of her intermediaries) responded with "Your Pope is a foolish man. If the Pope has a army, let him send it."
Recently a Christian teenager in Israel was almost killed when a package exploded. It was sent to his home by Jewish extremists associated with the terrorist groups "Kach" and the Jewish Defense League exploded. In 2007 Jewish terrorists set a Christian church on fire in Jerusalem. In March 2006, a Jewish couple - pretending to be Christian pilgrims - entered the Church of the Annunciation in Nazareth, pushing a baby carriage filled with explosives with the obvious intention of killing scored of Christian. They were attacked and subdued by the church-goers before they could carry out their plans. Although hundreds of similar events have been chronicled, little or no attention is paid to it by the controlled press in America.
The Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith (whose activities include spying on Americans and aiding and abetting those stealing U.S. defense secrets) reluctantly issued a statement condemning the book burning incident for fear of having its organically anti-Christian agenda exposed.
Despite the fact that it publicly called for "respect for the sacred texts of all faiths," the ADL has been the most active organization in the world in seeing laws antighetical to Christianity passed in various countries, in addition to referring to the New Testament as "classical anti-Semitism" and the cause of all Jewish persecution these last 2,000 years.
This latest incident involving the burning of several hundred
copies of the New Testament, while being a shock to some, should
not be to those paying attention, as brave voices have warned
of this situation for some time.
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Federal agents arrested 390 workers at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville, Iowa in what U.S. officials called the largest raid of its kind in U.S. history.
In laying the legal groundwork for a massive raid of the country's largest kosher slaughterhouse, federal authorities cited claims that illegal narcotics production took place at the factory and hundreds of illegal immigrants wer employed there, including several of the rabbis responsible for kosher supervision.
With Agriprocessors producing more than half of the nation's kosher meat, the raid has prompted fears of a disruption in supply. Though the plant is back in operation, it was unclear if Agriprocessors could meet its normal production capacity with hundreds of its workers in federal custody
Founded by Brooklyn butcher Aaron Rubashkin, Agriprocessors produces kosher meat and poultry marketed under the labels Aaron's Best and Rubashkin's. When the news broke,members of the Hewish Conservative movement's Hekhsher Tzedek Commission condemned the company, saying that keeping kosher requires more than just adherence to ritual matters, but also sensitivity to the environment and respect for workers and animals. The Hekhsher Tzedek initiative is in part a response to past allegations of misconduct at Agriprocessors. In one alleged instance, a Hasidic Jew duct-taped a worker's eyes and then hit him with a meat hook.
Agriprocessors has come under fire before for its labor practices, as well as health and safety violations. In March, authorities fined the company $182,000 for violations at the plant. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has clandestinely videotaped a controversial kosher slaughter practice used at the plant. *
The raid, which required federal authorities to rent an expansive fairground in nearby Waterloo to house detainees, prompted the U.S. District court for the Northern district of Iowa to temporarily relocate judges and court personnel to the site because the facilities in Cedar Rapids and Sioux City were inadequate.
"There have been other operations where more people have been arrested," Tim Counts, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman, told JTA. "But as far as we can determine, this is the largest single-site operation as far as number of arrests goes."
The raid follows a six-month investigation involving more than a dozen federal agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Agency, the Internal Revenue Service, and the departments of Labor and Agriculture.
Three Isralis and four Ukrainians wer among the detainees held on charges of being in the country illegally, Counts said. Most of those taken prisoner are from Guatemala and Mexico.
Agriprocessors said in a statement Tuesday that it "takes the immigration laws seriously" and intended to "continue to cooperate with the government in its investigation."
In the affidavit filed as part of the 60-page application for a search warrant, additional details were revealed of the government's investigation of Agriprocessors.
The affidavit says that 697 plant employees are believed to have violated federal laws.
According to the document, a former supervisor at the plant - identified only as Source #1 - told invvestigators that some 80 percent of the workforce was illegal.
Source #1 also claimed to have discovered active production of the drug methamphetamine at the plant and reported incidents of weapons being carried there. Methamphetamine, more commonly known as "crystal meth," is illegal. The sale of this drug in the cities of the United States has ruined tens of thousands of lives.
Much of the information the government collected appears to
have come from former employees of Agriprocessors who were detained
by police on unrelated charges. Sources related similar stories
of presenting fraudulent documents and social Security numbers
when seeking employment with the company.
* PETA
video of Agriprocessors inhumane slaughter of cattle. (Courtesy
of Webmaster)
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If you are a weekly reader of the print edition of American Free Press - and if you are not familiar with the website americanfreepress.net on the Internet - you may not be aware that AFP is now making available shor videos that are being broadcast and circulated internationally via email.
The videos feature commentary by AFP editors and correspondents such as Jim Tucker, Michael Collins Piper, Mark Anderson and Pat Shannan.
Produced by a supporter of AFP, the videos focus on a wide variety of issues and are designed to promote AFP and its populist and nationalist message to millions of people who access the Internet on a regular basis but who are not subscribers to the print edition.
Although formally posted on the Internet video site known as youtube.com (where they can be found by searching the term "afpsupporter") the videos are also freely accessible by anyone who goes to the official AFP website at americanfreepress.net.
Why not check them out for yourself?
And if you like, you can attach them to your own emails and send them to friends and family who need to hear the message that these brief but informative videos impart.
Or, you can download them from your computer onto DVD and send them to people by regular amil.
In addition, there are other special videos - from other sources - that we know that you'll also find inteeresting.
Here's a listing of some of the special AFP video presentations
that have been posted:
• Bilderber Exposed: AFP Managing Editor Jim Tucker talks
about the secretive Bilderberg group.
• Bilderberg Found: Jim Tucker returns to describe how Bilderberg
tried to hide its whereabouts this year. Although a phony story
was floated saying theat Bilderberg had already met in Greece,
Tucker tracked Bilderberg down right in the D.C. area.
• John McCain's Ties to Organized Crime: Michael Collins
Piper outlines the little–known link of the Republican presidential
candidate's family.
• the trilateral commission: AFP Correspondent Michael Collins
Piper explores the history of David Rockefeller's foreign policy
pressure group.
• New Call to Impeach Bush: AFP Correspondent Mark Anderson
describes a new effort by a New Hampshire state legislator.
• Pat Shannan Speaks: Pat talks bout the media's efforts
to suppress major new stories, including the insurgent "Ron
Paul Revolution."
• Michael collins Piper responds to Supporters of Israel:
The AFP correspondent takes on his critics who object to Piper's
criticisms of Israel's efforts to drive the United States into
a war against Iran.
To view any of these videos - or to help AFP distribute via
email to friends, family etc., please visit our website at www.americanfreepress.net.
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It now appears that Barack Obama is constitutionally ineligible for the office of president. John McCain's eligibility was established in 1964, when courts ruled Sen. Barry Goldwater was eligible although he was born in Arizona when it was a territory, not a state. McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone when it was a U.S. territory.
And, even as the controlled media
continues to ignore the ineligibility of Obama, it will not go
away. While few doubt that the Democrats will manage to pull off
his nomination, all remain poised to view the legal performance.
The first hurdle will be having Obama produce his birth certificate, which so far he has refused to do, and prove that he was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961, as he has always claimed. There is speculation that his American mother hay have brought him to Honolulu shortly after his birth in Kenya, but no proof of that has been shown.
According to the law on the books at the time of Obama's birth, the office of president requires that a candidate be a natural born citizen if the child was not born to two U.S. citizen parents. Since he was not, should it be proven that Obama was not born in Hawaii, as claimed, he is ineligible without furter debate. But assuming that he was born there, he has another problem.
According to a legal researcher who has contacted AFP, U.S. law very clearly states: "If only one parent is a U.S. citizen at the time of one's birth, that parent must have resided in the United States for a minimum of 10 years, five of which must be after the age of 16." And therein lies Obama's new problem.
Barack Obama's father was never a U.S. citizen.
Interestingly, there isn't much paperwork on the Marriage of Obama's parents, and this has a few researchers speculating that it never took place at all. On page 27 of Obama: From Promise to Power, David Mendell writes: "Obama later confessed that he never searched for the government documents on the marriage, although Madelyn (Obama's maternal grandmother) insisted they were legally married." He also notes that Obama's father apparently was not legally divorced from his first wife back in Kenya at the time, a point of contention that ultimately led to their separation. This also would suggest that there may never have been any legal marriage by Obama's parents at all, but the Constitution does not ban an illegitimate child from the White House, al long as he was born inside the U.S.
Obama's mother was born in Kansas and was only 18 when Obama was born. This means even though she satisfies the citizen requirement for 10 years, she was not a citizen for at least five years prior to Barack Obama's birth. In essence, the mother alone is not old enough to qualify her son for automatic U.S. citizenship. At most, two years elapsed from his mother turning 16 to the time of Barack Obama's birth when she was 18. His mother would have needed to have been 16 + 5 = 21 years old at the time of Barack Obama's birth for him to be a natural-born citizen. Barack Obama was already three years old at the time his mother turned 21.
Technically, Obama should have been naturalized as a citizen, but that, of course, would disqualify him from holding the office of president. If these allegations are accurate, America could install in January of 2009 a new president who is not even a U.S. citizen, neither born nor naturalized.
It should be demanded that Obama produce his 1961 Hawaiian birth certificate.
If he cannot satisfactorily do so, he should be deemed immediately
ineligible to hold the office of president.
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When Bush took over in 2000, the national debt was $5,674 billion. However, since Sept. 29, 2006, the debt has increased by $1.6 billion per day. Making matters worse, the cost of the Iraq war is bleeding America to death. Bush finances it with high-interest "payday" loans, selling Treasury bills to China—which now holds $4 trillion in IOUs. Your personal debt load is $31,100.53. You indirectly pay for the neo-con war every time you pay for gas, electricity, food and every other commodity that has increased in price. By the time Bush leaves office the national debt will be a staggering $10 trillion.
American Free Press warned America what would happen—even before Operation Iraq Liberation (OIL). Two years ago, AFP first reported on plans for the Green Zone, the "Emerald City" of the New World Order's Mideast empire. Now it appears these greedy madmen named their project "green" as a sick "inside joke": they planned to line their pockets with endless payoffs of greenish Federal Reserve notes.
In 2003, after "Mission Accomplished," the Federal Reserve sent over $4 billion in cash to Iraq. It loaded tons of U.S. dollars onto palettes and flew them on military aircraft to the Green Zone—where it promptly disappeared down a black hole and into unknown pockets.
The first estimate to reconstruct Iraq's infrastructure—after "we" destroyed it—was $2.4 billion. Actual costs quickly jumped to $30 billion and have been rising ever since. After several years, less than 10 percent of the needed work was done. No-bid "sweetheart" contracts. "Cost plus," with no incentive to save; U.S. companies charged millions for what Iraqi companies would do for thousands; U.S. contract workers paid $60,000 and far more. Money unaccounted for: $18 billion.
According to investigative journalist and author T. Christian Miller, in his book, Blood Money: Wasted Billions, Lost Lives, and Corporate Greed in Iraq, contractors boasted they could steal the taxpayers blind; it was "open season" on your money.
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Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFIDs) are finding their way into and onto humans in many ways. There are several ways government and commercial entities are looking to profit through impressive ID and Global Positioning System (GPS) technologies. Verichip Corp. successfully marketed "Hugs" Infant Protection System to hospitals in 2005. Since then, infants at many major hospitals receive ankle bracelets something like what many people on probation are currently required to use.
The ankle bracelets were marketed as a remedy for hospital infant abduction. When a child is removed from the infant care area of the hospital, an alarm sounds. About 230 infants are abducted every year from U.S. hospitals. The Hugs system saved one child in 2005. This may be a good idea, but it lays the groundwork for later RFID tagging on children and elderly for "safety reasons." Some unverified Internet sources report that U.S. and European governments have plans to implant RFIDs in every newborn instead of using ankle bracelets.
A Rhode Island school plans to electronically track the movements of students using Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFID). Microchips will be attached to the students' backpacks next year. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and other civil liberties groups say the RFID chips are an invasion of privacy. "Encouraging the placement of RFIDs on young children, even in this limited and questionable context, can only have the unintended effect of acclimating them to being monitored by the government in other contexts and wherever they go, as if it were perfectly normal and appropriate," the ACLU said.
The RFID chips will be accessed via satellites through tiny GPS systems within the chips. The school will be able to follow the children anywhere. It is likely, though, that young people will just choose to leave their backpacks at school when they do not want to be followed. School officials may then contend for further invasion of privacy, and require RFIDs to be worn on clothing, or possibly injected.
In 2007, about 200 Alzheimer's patients were implanted with non-GPS RFIDs in a market test done by Verichip. The devices held medical information that could be scanned with a special reader. Many more Alzheimer's patients and people suffering with dementia have been implanted since the 2007 pilot program. Soon after the market testing by Verichip, sample RFIDs were handed out at the Alzheimer's Community Care 2007 Educational Conference. In a 2007 Fox News report Verichip offered free RFID tagging for any interested party that wanted to tag an elderly parent.
Currently Verichip is reported to charge about $200 for the implant. The United Kingdom has concrete plans to implant RFID chips into prison populations. Other nations have been reported to use RFIDs on prisoners, including Sweden and several South American nations. The initial plans are to inject prisoners with RFIDs that can be read by a scanner, with limited access and limited amounts of information. UK Officials said they will soon implant chips with GPS capabilities to monitor a prisoner's location at any given time.
IBM recently applied for a patent regarding a system that would not only place RFIDs on all clothing items, but also track those items of clothing on a global scale. The patent implies that all clothing sold would have "globally unique" RFID tags in them in the future. The information would primarily be used for marketing purposes, but the government could also use such technology. "The exact identity of the person or certain characteristics about the person can be determined [through the use of this technology]," the patent said. "This information is used to monitor the movement of the person through the store or other areas . . . tracking information can be used to provide targeted advertising and to improve existing store systems and tracking systems."
The RFID information could easily be used with credit card information for identification. The power and scope of the proposed database would certainly have civil rights implications. Goodyear began using RFIDs in tires in 2003, and all other major tire manufacturers have tested, or are using, RFIDs in tires to prevent tire counterfeiting, reports RFID Update, an industry RFID website. The RFIDs could easily be used to track tires anywhere in the country by private or government interests. Plans are underway for a global tire recognition program, all in the name of stopping tire counterfeiting.
Hitachi created an RFID chip that is smaller than a grain of sand. The .002-inch-by-.002-inch chip can be imbedded in paper, and could be used to track just about anything. The chips do not have GPS capability, but can store a 38-digit number that can be read by a hand held scanner. This chip is 60 times smaller than the first generation Hitachi micro-RFID. The former smallest of the small, the Mu-chip, measures in at .4 millimeters by .4 millimeters and could fit on the tip of a pencil. The Mu-chip is already used to track and identify items and prevent forgery of concert tickets.
"Invisible tracking brings to mind science-fiction- inspired uses, or even abuses, such as unknowingly getting sprinkled with smart-tag powder for Big Brother-like monitoring," Associated Press said. The prediction that microchips will be able to interface with nerves and implanted in the brain in the next 30 years was recently put forth by a UK government think tank. The microchips predicted would be able to give sensory input, allow a sort of mind-to-mind communication (like an implanted cell phone) and allow direct to the brain marketing. This Orwellian prediction opens the door for direct mind control in true 1984 fashion.
Mike Finch is an intern reporter for AFP. He has a master's degree in journalism and is working on his Ph.D. in communication.
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Israel's massive military exercise in the Mediterranean, seen as a dry run for an attack on Iran, has generated frightening predictions that the United States would pay a terrible price in blood and treasure.
Iran responded July 9 by test-firing nine ballistic missiles that can strike targets within 1,250 miles. They can hit Israel and other American allies like Bahrain, Turkey, and Greece.
In Iran, there is a widely held belief that the U.S. would not only approve an Israeli strike, but also lead it. A senior Iranian general said U.S. involvement would lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of American soldiers. A leader of Iran's Republican Guard Corps warned that "martyrdom units" across the globe would strike at American and Israeli interests in a war of terror that could last years. Other threats included targeting the Israeli Dimona nuclear plant and causing havoc in the Straits of Hormuz that sees the flow of 20 million barrels of oil a day.
Some experts say the loss of that much oil for even a short period would drive the price to over $10 a gallon.
Many Israeli experts who want the U.S. to go to war with Iran argue that Iran does not have the military capabilities to fend off sustained attacks from sea and air. That ignores the fact that Iran possesses the means to attack U.S. forces throughout the region, using its special units and surrogates such as Hezbollah, Hamas and Shiite sympathizers in Arab states. In Iraq, it could generate untold chaos with the backing of the Mahdi Army of Muqtada al Sadr who has already pledged that his militia would support Iran. Many Shiite elements within the Iraqi army might turn on U.S. troops that they now work closely with. Iran might even do a deal with the Taliban and al Qaeda, by supplying them with chemical or biological weapons to attack U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
Iran also has the capability to strike Israeli cities with long-range missiles, carrying conventional or biological/ chemical warheads and to attack U.S. shipping in the gulf. While its air power and air defenses are superior to what Saddam Hussein had, they would of course be no match for the U.S. However, Israel is concerned that if Russia sells Iran a new air defense missile system, the deal could seriously hamper an air attack, especially if the Israeli air force acted alone.
Many pro-Israel figures in the United States have been lobbying for years for the U.S. to launch a sustained attack on Iran. In Israeli newspapers and in selected journals in the U.S. they continue to argue that Iran does not have the capability to retaliate in any significant way against the U.S. The argument was made recently by Patrick Clawson of the Near East Policy Institute in Washington. He claimed Iran was much too weak to respond to a massive U.S. assault. He was trying to convince policymakers that a strike against Iran would be easy. Behind his rhetoric is a shrewd recognition that Israel is not capable of delivering a knockout blow to Iran.
The Israeli air force would be restricted to one airborne assault and even with 100 aircraft, some of them providing fighter support and refueling, it would not be possible to take out all Iran's nuclear sites. For the Israelis it would mean a 2,500-mile trip and one they could not repeat without risking much of their aircraft .
Iran, with help from North Korea, has been creating dummy nuclear sites for years and may have as many as 100. Israeli and U.S. intelligence do not have an accurate list of all Iranian nuclear facilities. Some may be buried so deep in hardened mountain locations they may not be vulnerable to the latest bunker-busting bombs.
Men like Clawson believe in launching a sustained, possibly 10-day air and sea assault on Iran's industrial and military infrastructure, thereby damaging the country so much economically it would have to accept a UN-brokered ceasefire or the present Iranian regime would collapse. The U.S. could launch several thousand sea, air and land based cruise missiles and also deploy stealth bombers, using the island of Diego Garcia as a staging post. If there was no adequate response from Iran, the bombing could be extended for weeks. In the meantime, Israel would use the opportunity to invade Lebanon to finish off Hezbollah.
The problem with some of these calculations is that they are based on crude assumptions that Iran will capitulate and that it will jettison its nuclear ambitions. They ignore the fact Iran is a nation with almost 3,000 years of history and will not be easily intimidated. Israel's campaign in Lebanon in 2006, when it thought shock-and-awe tactics would force Hezbollah to back down, fell apart. In the end, Israel withdrew with a bloody nose. Hezbollah and the Iranian military are familiar with the fact that overwhelming force may win battles but may not end wars.
Israel would like the U.S. to attack Iran because it has the military might to set back the Iranian economy for a decade. That fails to take account of the effects such action would have on the Middle East, as well as U.S. troops and interests around the world. It could breed a new generation of terrorists and weaken some of the Arab regimes like Saudi Arabia that would feel the heat of a Muslim backlash if they allowed their air space to be used for an attack on Iran. There can be little doubt Pentagon analysts are familiar with the risks of a war with Iran.
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Death and destruction are two words that have become synonymous with Iraq and Afghanistan, courtesy of George W. Bush's War on Terror. Yet, an equally bloody and violent war is being waged much closer to home, only miles across the U.S. border.
Fueled by the multi-billion dollar drug industry, Mexico is now the most dangerous place on Earth. Worse, the bloodbath threatens to spill over into the U.S., especially if our sovereignty is erased by impending American Union legislation.
The carnage precipitated by ruthless drug barons has escalated to such heights that it's become a national emergency. On June 27, hit men toting semi-automatic weapons leaped from two speeding cars and killed six policemen in Sinaloa. A day earlier, senior officer Igor Labastida was slain in a Mexico City restaurant after being ambushed by assassins. Labastida knew he was a marked man because his name was included on a hit list posted by local drug gangs.
A month earlier, on May 8, Mexico's chief of police was shot nine times, while on May 1, the nation's top federal agent in the organized crime division was murdered. According to The Economist, other notables killed that same week were "a top official in Mexico City's police force; the second-in-command in Juarez, and the administrative head of the Estado Mayor, a military body charged with protecting the president." In all, more than 100 people were murdered in a single week due to narcotics-related violence.
Illegal drugs have become a $20 billion per year industry, with approximately 90 percent of all cocaine (300 tons) consumed in the U.S., and 80 percent of methamphetamines, passing through Mexico. To protect their interests, the gangs have resorted to some of the most blood-curdling tactics imaginable. In mid-June, four decapitated skulls were discovered in a plastic cooler alongside a roadway in Durango. An attached note read, "This is a warning." This ghastly occurrence wasn't the first. To intimidate citizens and the law, gangs often leave dismembered corpses and severed heads in very public places to show that they mean business.
Two beheaded bodies were uncovered in Ciudad Juarez (near El Paso, Tex.), and other gangs have been known to blindfold and hood their victims before killing them. Even gorier, after a victim's head is chopped off, the skull is either placed atop a fence post, stuffed in a garbage bag or, in one instance, rolled out onto the dance floor of a crowded discotheque. It doesn't stop there. Other types of torture include beatings, pulling teeth, chopping off arms and legs, strangulation, or wrapping people in duct tape and dumping them along a highway.
To combat this carnage, Mexican President Felipe Calderon dispatched 30,000 federal troops into those areas most plagued by the cartels. One of the major problems, however, is that many of the police officers have either been bribed, deal drugs themselves, or have been recruited into the gangs via the promise of big money. The gangs even post flyers for ex-army veterans, and one—the deadly Los Zetas—is comprised of Mexican military "special forces" soldiers who learned their death squad skills at the infamous School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Ga.
Undaunted by Mexico's corrupt law enforcement officials, anywhere from 1,600 to 2,500 drug murders have already taken place this year. The violence is so rampant that security consultant George Friedman has called it "psychological warfare." He added, "The drug gangs want to demonstrate a sense of overwhelming power, and the killings, the threats, the messages are a very public demonstration of what they are capable of."
One gang, referring to itself as "The Squadron of Death," is posting hit-list videos on YouTube. Another has taken to hanging banners in town squares with the names of police officers they plan on exterminating. To date, over 450 government officials and policemen have been killed in 2008, including mayors, federal lawmakers, and a consumer protection advocate. One police station was machine gunned and bombed with grenades. The attackers were well-prepared, garbed in body armor, camouflage military uniforms, and sporting AK-47 rifles.
In addition, the drug cartels have established training camps in which inductees learn the latest brutalization techniques. In Juarez, police located a mass grave holding at least 36 bodies, along with numerous severed heads, arms, and torsos. Also on the rise are the serial killing and sexual abuse of women across the country.
Rep. Henry Cuellar (R-Tex.) says dozens of U.S. citizens have been kidnaped in Mexico. "There are 60 missing Americans today in the Nuevo Laredo area, and there has not been a single arrest or prosecution," he said. Those who have been recovered tell of being held hostage in metal cages by masked men. Daniel Escobedo was recently driving across the border from El Paso, when armed men performed a car jacking, then beat, shocked, and burned him while negotiating a ransom. Some kidnappers have demanded upwards of $300,000 from families for the return of loved ones. In Phoenix, Detective Reuben Gonzales reports they "investigated more than 350 kidnappings last year, a 40 percent increase."
Despite the urgency of this violent situation, the Bush administration has characteristically done little, if anything, to warn Americans of the danger, including issuing travel alerts.
Mexico has become a war zone, and if the NAFTA Superhighway ever becomes a reality, the blood will wash across into this nation at an even more alarming rate. As Government Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino stated that the drug cartels "have a clear objective to intimidate, frighten, paralyze society, and with that, force the federal government to retreat." In light of this grisly war being waged so close to home, allowing southern U.S. borders to remain open is treason.
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Newsweek - one of the big three "news" magazines - has demonstrated beyond question that tthe American media is determined to cover up the organized crime origins of the fortune that set John McCain's political career in motion and made him one of the richest men in Congress.
On June 30, Newsweek published a glowing cover story
about McCain's secnd (and current) wife, former Cindy Hensley,
featuring a glamorous 
cover
photo of Mrs. McCain, followed by eight full pages of friendly
reportage, including another glamour photo of the attractive woman
draped across two pages. Mrs. McCain, so it seems, may be a candidate
for sainthood.
Although Newsweek said Mrs. McCain's family "is deeply rooted in Arizona," and that her late father, Jim Hensley, "was one of the most prominent men in the state," who was "a World War II bombardier ... shot down over the English channel," - in other words, a war hero just like McCain - Newsweek did not even hint of the racketeering and corruption (and murder) associated with Hensley and his patrons in his rise to power.
Newsweek said Hensley borrowed $10,000 to start a liquor business" which became one of the largest Anheuser-Busch distributorships in the country and pointed out that the vast Hensley influence and fortune (worth $200 million) "got McCain access to money and connections" after he divorced his ailing first wife and married his then-mistress, Cindy Hensley, and settled in Arizona where he first ran for office in 1982. What Newsweek chose not to mention is what AFP previously reported:
McCain's father-in-law got his start as the top henchman for Kemper Marley, how, for 40 years until his death in 1990, was the undisputed political boss of Arizona, acting as the behind-the-scenes power over both the Republican and Democratic parties. But Marley was more than a politician. He was the Meyer Lansky crime syndicate's chief Arizona operative, front man for the Bronfman family - key players in the Lansky syndicate.
During Prohibition, the Canadian-based Bronfman family supplied and thus controlled the "spigot" of liquor funneled to local Lansky syndicate functionaries in the United States, including al Capone in Chicago.
After Prohibition, Lansky-Bronfman associates such as Marley got control of a substantial portion of Liquor and beer distribution across the country. In fact, Marley's longtime public relations man, Al Lizanitz, revealed it was the Bronfman family that set Marley up in the alcohol business.
However, in 1948, 52 of Marley's employees (including Jim Hensley," the manager of Marley's company) were prosecuted for federal liquor violations. Hensley got a six-month suspended sentence and his brother Eugene went to prison for a year.
In 9153, Hensley and (this time) Marley were prosecuted by federal prosecutors for falsifying liquor records. But a young attorney, William Rehnquist, acted as their "mouthpiece" (as mob attorneys are known) and the two got off scot-free. Rehnquist later became chief justice of the Supreme Court and presided over the "fix that made George W. Bush president in a rightly disputed election.
The story in Arizona is that Hensley took the fall for Marley in 1948 and Marley paid back Hensley by setting him up in his own beer distribution business. Today Newsweek implies Hensley's company was a "mom and pop" operation that became a big success, but the real story goes to the heart of the history of organized crime.
Hensley's sponsor, Marley, was also a major player in gambling, a protégé of Lansky lieutenant Gus Greenbaum who, in 1941, set up a national wire for bookmakers. After Lansky ordered a hit on his own longtime partner, "Bugsy" Siegel, who was stealing money from the Flamingo Casino in Las Vegas - which was financed in part by loans from an Arizona bank chaired by Marley - Greenbaum took Siegel's place in tending to Lansky's interest in Las Vegas.
In 1948 Greenbaum was murdered in a mob "hit" that set off a series of gang wars in Phoenix, but Marley survived and prospered as did his protégé, Jim Hensley, whose fortune sponsored McCain's rise to power.
McCain's father-in-law also dabbled in dog racing and expanded his fortune by selling his track to an individual connected to the Buffalo-based Jacobs family, key Prohibition-era cogs in the Lansky network as distributors for Bronfman liquor.
Expanding over the years, buying up racetracks and developing food and drink concessions at sports stadiums, Jacobs enterprises were described as "probably the biggest quasi-legitimate cover for organized crime's money-laundering in the United States."
In 1976, Hensley's mentor - Marley (at the height of his power) - was the key suspect behind the contractt murder of journalist Don Bolles who was investigating the mob in Arizona, but Marley was never prosecuted.
All of this is well known in Arizona, but Newsweek is working to keep the story contained.
In 2000, when McCain first ran for president, The Spotlight brought the facts to a national audience for the first time. AFP has since reported on this and many Internet outlets have picked the story up, bu do not mention AFP as the source. McCain's mob ties were also outlined in the book, The New Jerusalem (available from AFP for $20) which has had considerable distribution here and abroad.
Since McCain's career was sponsored by the Landky-Bronfman
syndicate, it is no coincidence McCain recently traveled to London
where Lord Jacob Rothschild of the international banking empire
raised money among American expatriates on McCain's behalf. Rothschild
has long been allied with the Bronfman family as major patrons
of Israel.
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Canadian bill C-51 would put natural remedies such as vitamins and herbs in the same regulatory category as pharmaceuticals. If the bill passes, it would dangerously increase government oversight and power regarding natural remedies. "The increased powers and the changes proposed by bill C-51 give Canadians—informed Canadians—a very great cause for concern," Conservative Member of the Canadian Parliament James Lunney said in testimony before parliament.
"Given the tools that are in C-51. . .could ensure that a lot of good products do not see the light of day." The "tools" Lunney referred to are greatly increased powers given to the minister of health, Tony Clement. The bill would require applications for all clinical trials, allow Clement to categorize natural remedies and require prescriptions for them, require licensing for all natural remedies, and potentially allow entities like the World Health Organization or Codex Alimentarius [a United Nations globalist creation pushing to tightly regulate what you can and cannot consume] to impose regulations on Canada without regard for the opinions of the voting population or their representatives.
"We're seeking to gain the new authority to reassure the public that the government can, and will, act to protect health and safety as early as possible," Minister Clement said in an April press release. Clement would do this by "allowing products, persons or establishments to be registered and licensed." Lunney said that vitamins, proteins, minerals and herbs have always been "public domain." This legislation would place such remedies in the same category as prescription drugs. Canadian pharmaceutical companies have been strangely silent on the legislation, columnist Alan Cassels of Common Ground magazine said. "How can we explain tight lips [of Canadian pharmaceutical companies] around the biggest change to the Canadian drug relations in half a century? I can't answer for sure, but let me hazard a guess: It's because they like it. They like it a lot," Cassels said. "Let's face it—any law that kicks sand in the face of a competitor by blinding him with bureaucratic red tape is a pretty sweet deal."
But Cassels sees even more in the bill that drug companies will likely love: increased speed in drug approvals, Big Pharma control of after-market testing and an allowance for public advertising. Now Canada's airwaves will also have drug commercials that the U.S. has had for years. "DTCA (Direct to Consumer Advertising) is the jewel crown of pharma marketing—a potentially $500 million per year ad market in Canada that can transform a ho-hum or even dangerous drug into a blockbuster, through the power of persuasive ads," Cassels said.
While the drug companies have more freedoms with this bill, the natural remedy industry has fewer. The current process for registering a product with the government is so cumbersome that Lunney estimated 20,000 to 30,000 natural remedies are awaiting approval, and have been for years. C-51 will just provide more red tape. Lots of it. "It seems products like Red Bull [a so-called energy drink] gets an NPN (approval) fairly readily . . . but natural health products that could have a real impact on serious sickness seem to have a hard time getting through," Lunney said.
Mike Finch is an intern for American Free Press. He specializes in alternative health and energy issues. He has a Master's degree in journalism and is working on his Ph.D. in communication. Mike presently lives with his wife in Virginia.
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If there are any infants, age two or younger in your family, and you have any say-so at all, don't let anyone - not even the doctor - give the child any over-the-counter cough medicines.
In the United Kingdom, various authorities have announced that all over-the-counter cough medicines are "unsuitable" for children younger than age two; and they did so upon the advice of the U.S.FDA.
A selection of antihistamines, anti-tussives, expectorants and decongestants found in such cough medicines are associated with a risk of serious adverse events caused by dosing errors in infants due to their small size. The Centers for Disease Control in the U.S. attributed three infant deaths and an estimated 1,519 visits to hospital emergency rooms for children who had been given cough medicines in 2004 and 2005.
Cough medicine overdose is common in children younger than age 12, and 5.7% of hospital emergency visits for adverse drug events were caused by cough and cold medicines.
According to The Lancet, April 5, 2008: "The effectiveness of cough medicines has not yet been proven in children of any age. The fact that the U.S.A. and UK are still deliberating whether these medicines are suitable for older children is remarkable, considering that the January 2008 Cochrane Review of randomized controlled trials spanning the past 40 years concluded that there is no good evidence for or against the effectiveness of over-the-counter medicines in acute cough. The Lancet recommends these medicines be removed from sale altogether.
There are plenty of homeopathic cough medicines available.
And, while the establishment, including The Lancet, goes
out of its way to denigrate homeopathy, many people find them
satisfactory and safe.
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Consumers for Dental Choice has teamed up with Moms Against Mercury (MomsAgainstMercury.org) to sue the FDA and its commissioner, Andrew Von Eschenbach. The lawsuit, entitled, Moms Against Mercury et al. V. Von Eschenbach, Commissioner er al., was concluded with a reluctant agreement by the FDA to change its website on the issue of mercury and to reclassify mercury as a danger to humans within one year, following a period of public comment.
The FDA has, for decade, insisted that mercury fillings pose no health threat whatsoever to children. While dismissing hundreds of studies showing a clear link between mercury amalgam fillings ("silver fillings") and disastrous neurological effects in the human body, the FDA denied the truth about mercury and effectively protected the mercury "filling" racket that has brought so much harm to so many people.
For over 100 years, a cabal of mercury mongers made up of the American Dental Association, mercury filling manufacturers and indignant dentists have reaped windfall profits by implanting toxic filling into the mouths of children, all while insisting that mercury - one of the most toxic heavy metals known to modern science - posed no health threat whatsoever.
Today, that reign of terror could be at an end. Thanks to the tireless, multi-year efforts of people like Charles Brown of the National counsel for Consumers for Dental Choice (ToxicTeeth.org), the FDA has now been forced to acknowledge mercury is a cancerous poison - a fact so fundamental that, by any measure of honest science, it should have admitted decades ago.
The FLA stonewalling on this issue has been nothing less than a circus of politically-motivated denials, much like Big Tobacco executives swearing under oath that "nicotine is not addictive." In similar style, the FDA insisted for decades that mercury was not toxic. Both statements, as any sane person can readily conclude, are the outbursts of lunatics. Sadly, those lunatics somehow remain in charge of our nation's food, drugs, cosmetics and dental care, meaning that any real progress to protect the people must come from outside the FDA.
Remarkably, the FLA website no longer claims mercury is harmless. The language has now been changed in dramatic fashion, reading: "Dental amalgams contain mercury, which may have neurotoxic effects on the nervous systems of developing children and fetus(es)."
There's still a lot of fudging there. The careful use of the word "may" means the FDA still won't admit mercury is neurotoxic, but it "might" be. This is the FLA way of stonewalling on this issue, even as it lost its lawsuit. For any FDA officials who don't yet think mercury is toxic to the human nervous system, I invite them to chug a few milliliters of the substance themselves and find out what the effects might be.
Speaking of people going mad with mercury, that's the history of the term "as mad as a hatter." As explained by the online encyclopedia Wikipedia: "There is scientific evidence behind the meaning of insanity. Mercury was used in the process of curing felt used in some hats. It was impossible for hatters to avoid inhaling the mercury fumes given off during the hat making process." Hatters and other men in such mills died early due to neurological damage from the mercury. They also exhibited confused speech and distorted vision. As the mercury poisoning progressed to dangerously high levels, suffers could also experience psychotic symptoms, such as hallucinations.
Despite this lawsuit victory, please keep in mind that the FDA has not agreed to immediately ban toxic mercury fillings. They have merely agreed to consider reclassifying mercury at some future date - a commitment they will probably break, given their history of lying about mercury and refusing to do what they've agreed to do on this and other subjects.
The good news is more and more dentists are now practicing
mercury-free dentistry, and I strongly recommend that if you need
to see a dentist in the future, insist on seeing one that has
given up using mercury.
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Scientific medicine was designed to be capital intensive. Requirements for teaching it have increased costs beyond the capability of students to support the homeopathic schools with tuition and fees. As a result, schools - unable to supplement their income from other sources like grants and bequests - have been forced to close or consolidate. In 1910 the number of medical schools was reduced from 166 to 131. Only 63 were left in 1929. In the 1930s and 1040s, 11 homeopathic schools closed. After 1930 even the respected Hahnemann Medical College of Philadelphia, originally begun to foster homeopathic treatments, was teaching allopathic medicine except for one or two classes on homeopathy.
New laws gave the AMA the power to control what the schools taught. Curricula were heavy in the sciences, but there was only minimal training in nutrition and pharmacology. Physicians who used to make up their own remedies began to rely on pharmaceutical company formulations and for information on uses of drugs. Production of physicians was substantially reduced. Competing medical sects were emasculated.
Evidently our present unsatisfactory situation came about because the frustrated allopathic monopolists of the 1820s found a way to put themselves back in the driver's seat. They convinced upper and middle class people that they were scientists who could bring the benefits of science to their patients. At least $300 million ($600 million according to Coulter's Divided Legacy) contributed by wealthy donors, supplemented by an unknown amount funneled through the JAMA by the pharmaceutical industry and other advertisers, helped them regain control. At a time when $1 bought a 10-hour work day, this was anirresistible flood that carried the orthodox physicians back into power for almost 100 years.
Once in control, efforts to reduce competition and increase income have been unceasing. Physicians who practice alternative medicine, in competition with regular physicians, are subject to harassment. In the state of Washington about 30% of them are being harassed atthis time. Those who make substantial advancements in medical science often find the Federal Government moving against them. The FDA and FTC have used taxpayer money to suppress new technology in a number of cases. Even state legislators have cooperated, in cases where other means failed.
The purpose of the new licensing laws was to protect the public but monopoly medical care, according to reports, has been killing about 200,000 of us every year and promises to bankrupt the country. These laws have been used to prevent free public access to less lethal, more effective and less expensive therapies. As Daniel Haley so eloquently wrote in Politics in Healing: "we don't need government protection from things that can't hurt us."
Medical science should be a search for the truth and many medical scientists have spent their livesin this search. Unfortunately, scientific medicine, as practiced by the medical monopoly during the last century, has rejected the discoveries of a number of medical scientists. Too many promising technologies have been consigned to the dust bin of history. As a result, medical services are much more expensive than they should be and lower in quality than they could be. Less suppression and more competition can make people healthier at lower cost.
One hundred years of suppression of advancements in medical science is enough. Even physicians have been victimized. Their expensive schools don't teach them about the suppressed science and give them inadequate training in nutrition and therapeutics. We can do without the high prices and poor care. Lets recover and apply the suppressed technology and reward, rather than discourage, innovations that promise lower costs and better quality care. We need to replace the medical monopoly with laws guaranteeing freedom of choice in medical care.
Again in 2008, as in the 1830s, orthodox medicine is killing
lits of people and creating lots of invalids. The exorbitant price
of $2 trillions a year is too much. We owe it to ourselves and
our descendants to reintroduce competition into the medical marketplace.
Forcing the repeal of the Medical practices Act will be a good
start! The Access to Medical Treatment Act proposed in the 2000
session of Congress might also be resurrected.
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Big Pharma is constantly finding new ways to destroy the natural supplements market, in much the same way that the American Medical Association still seeks to destroy the chiropractic industry (for which it was later found guilty of conspiracy in U.S. courts). The latest attack against vitamins comes from an FDA petition filed by Medicure Pharma Inc., which has astonishingly asked the FDA to ban the sale of Vitamin B6.
Vitamin B6 is a naturally-occurring nutrient found in numerous vegetables, nuts and whole grains. It's crucial for healthy blood cell function, and it's used in over 100 enzymatic reactions involving protein metabolism. It's also an essential nutrient for expectant mothers, and growing children.
So why would a pharmaceutical company petition the FDA to outlaw the sale of this essential nutrient? It's simple: Big Pharma wants to market its own form of Vitamin B6 and call it a "drug."
Medicure Pharma Inc.,has been studying the clinical effects of Vitamin B6 (which they call "MC-1") on humans. This is part of a process for receiving FDA approval on MC-q as a "drug," and then marketing this drug through the conventional medical system (and selling it at markups that can reach 500,000 times the cost of the actual ingredients).
This was reported by The Alliance for Natural Health. You can read about this Vitamin B6 issue (along with links to a petition) at: www.anhcampaign.org.
Obviously, it is in the financial interest of Medicure Pharma Inc. To not only receive FDA approval for their "MC-1" version of Vitamin B6, it's also crucial to eliminate the competition. After all, if people knew MC-1 was just Vitamin B6, it's they could go out and buy it on their own, for a fraction of the price of a prescription drug. This is mst likely why Medicure Pharma petitioned the FDA to outlaw Vitamin B6 supplements. This is the easiest way to eliminate the competition and guarantee massive profits.
So what's the logic behind banning Vitamin B6? It's simple: Medicure Pharma wants to declare Vitamin B6 to be "adulterated" because it contains a drug. Which drug does it contain? Well, MC-1, of course.
Bitamin B6 is a naturally-occurring vitamin, but if a drug company gets FDA approval on Vitamin B6 (with a different name), then that ver same drug company can petition the FDA to ban Vitamin B6, claiming it contains their drug.
The very same thing happened with red yeast rice.
A few years ago, drug companies discovered that red yeast rice (a natural supplement) contains powerful, natural compounds that balance cholesterol levels. These compounds are called lovastatins.
Drug companies ripped off the lovastatin molecules from red yeast rice, then patented them. Once they achieved FDA approval for their "statin drugs," it was easy to file a petition requesting the outlawing of red yeast rice, claiming the supplement was "adulterated" with drugs. Which drugs? Statin drugs, of course - the very same drugs that were isolated from red yeast rice in the first place.
This is why the FDA has been on a terror campaign to outlaw red yeast rice supplements. They've sent warning letters to online retailers and threatened numerous companies with legal action. The point of all this is to eliminate red yeast rice from the marketplace because it competes with statin drugs. And it's the exact same strategy now being following by Medicure Pharma in its attempt to get the FDA to ban Vitamin B6.
Medicure Pharma, by the way, is in financial trouble. It recently received notice from the American Stock Exchange that it would be "delisted" because it no longer meets the minimum requirement for shareholder equity vs. ongoing fiscal losses. In other words, the company is losing too much money and has too little shareholder equity to stay listed in the American Stock Exchange.
This might explain its decision to petition the FDA to outlaw the sale of Vitamin B6. If consumers were unable to buy the vitamins, many would have no choice but to seek out the company's own patented high-profit MC-1 version of the vitamin, and that wold generate a windfall of profits.
Making money in the pharmaceutical industry, you see, is not
about helping people in any real way; it's about limiting their
options, controlling the marketplace, and forcing people to buy
products from you at monopoly prices.
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The recent 20-year-old phenomenon of "off-shoring" the manufacture of pharmaceuticals (and other products) to foreign nations, specifically China, and including "health" products as varied as cough syrup and blood thinners, had led again to disaster for American and foreign consumers. Even tainted toys from China have sickened our children with few guarantees anything is being done to correct the problem.
The most recent scandal involves the manufacture of the popular blood thinner heparin, made in several locations in China. At least 62 people have died and as many as 800 people have been sickened from the use of Chinese-manufactured heparin, Which is made by communist slave laborers from processed pig guts. Heparin is derived from mucous wrung and washed from pig intestines and other animal organs. It has been used for decades to prevent blood clotting.
The two major outbreaks of illnesses from Chinese heparin have occurred in the United States and Germany, two nations that ought to know by now that outsourcing products iroducts ingested by consumers is a bad ideal. Just a year ago, for instance, 93 consumers in Central America were killed by tainted cough syrup made in China.
China, in a half-hearted show of concern, has ordered tighter controls on heparin production. That followed a U.S. Food and Drug Administration order requiring all heparin imports to be tested. According to MSNBC, the FDA also announced plans to station eight regulators in China and hire a handful of Chinese nationals to work with them to identify the source of the problem and isolate the exact plants where the tainted heparin was produced. This appears to have been next to impossible.
According to Dr. Bryan Liang, an adviser to the Partnership for Safe Medicines, a U.S. group working to promote drug safety, "This is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of problems with sensitive drugs.... The problem is only going to get worse as more materials come from suspect sources."
According to U.S. government statistics, about 40 percent of pharmaceuticals and80 percent of the active chemical ingredients in drugs are imported. Not surprisingly, the lion's share comes from developing countries such as China, India and Mexico - nations were drug safety watchdog groups are scarce and governmental concern for foreign consumers is in many instances nonexistent.
Chondroitin sulfate, one of the major active ingredients in heparin, is usually made of animal or shark cartilage. This popular supplement is also used by many people to alleviate joint pain. It is many times cheaper than heparin, which would obviously tempt suppliers in the production chain to save money - and increase profits - by using it.
And its chemical similarity to heparin makes it difficult to pinpoint, the FDA has said.
Heparin was first manufactured in North America and Europe, but its production has shifted to lower-cost developing countries over the past 20 years. This has coincided with the growing trend known as "globalization," by which mega-companies boost profits (and lower safety) by "offshoring" production to cheap labor sources in other nations. American workers have, of course, suffered greatly from such practices.
"We have an increasingly globalized supply chain," said James Shen, the publisher of Pharma China. "The Chinese are now major suppliers of bulk pharmaceuticals and also supply intermediate chemicals for drugs. It is likely we will continue to see the same problems with other drugs," he added.
According to statistics, the FDA inspects only about 7 percent of foreign drug makers each year. Unregulated slaughterhouses and sausage-casing factories in china provide the raw materials for heparin.
Is it even possible to police china - a nation about the size
of the lower 48 states and long known for keeping details of its
internal workings secret - when it comes to manufacturing pharmaceuticals?
Is it any wonder that China, famous for cutting corners when it
comes to manufacturing goods for outsiders and possessing a potential
slave labor force of 1.4 billion, has become one of Big Pharma's
largest producers of health products many Americans ingest on
a daily basis?
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During the summer of 1991, the United States military had collected artillery, tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles, conventional and unconventional munitions, trucks, etc at Camp Doha in Kuwait.
As result of carelessness, this weapons depot caught fire with consequent catastrophic explosions resulting in death, injury, illness and extensive environmental contamination from depleted uranium and conventional explosives.
Recently the emirate of Kuwait required the U.S. Department of Defense to remove the contamination. Consequently, over 6,700 tons of contaminated soil, sand and other residue was collected and shipped back to the United States for burial by American Ecology at Boise, Idaho.
When Bob Nichols, an investigative journalist, and I contacted American Ecology we found out that they had absolutely no knowledge of U.S. Army regulations and all of the medical orders dealing with depleted uranium contamination, environmental remediation procedures, safety and medical care.
They had never heard of Environmental Protection Agency guidelines for dealing with hazardous waste such as radioactive materials and conventional explosives byproducts.
The trans-shipment across the ocean, unloading at Longview, Washington State port, transport by rail, and burial in Idaho not only endanger the residents of these areas, but pose a significant agricultural threat through introduction of pests, microbes etc. foreign to our nation.
Sadly, the known adverse health and environmental hazards from uranium weapons contamination are in our own backyard. The EPA has listed the former Nuclear Metals-Starmet uranium weapons manufacturing site in Concord, Mass. on the EPA's Superfund National Priority List because it poses a significant risk to public health and the environment.
Consequently, the community in which our nation was born on April 18, 1775, is now the location of America's own closed dirty bomb factory that will endanger the health and safety of the descendants of the Minutemen.
The previous delivery of at least 100 GBU 28 bunker buster bombs containing depleted uranium warheads by the United States and their use by Israel against Lebanese targets has resulted in additional radioactive and chemical toxic contamination with consequent adverse health and environmental effects throughout the Middle East. Israeli tank gunners are also using depleted uranium tank rounds, as photographs verify.
Today, U.S., British, and now Israeli military personnel are using illegal uranium munitions — America's and England's own "dirty bombs." The U.S. Army, Department of Energy, Department of Defense and British Ministry of Defense officials deny that there are any adverse health and environmental effects as a consequence of the manufacture, testing and/or use of uranium munitions. They do so to avoid liability for the willful and illegal dispersal of a radioactive toxic material — depleted uranium.
The use of uranium weapons is a crime against humanity. All governments must force cessation of uranium weapons use. Israel should provide medical care to all DU casualties in Lebanon and clean up all DU contamination.
U.S. and British officials have arrogantly refused to comply with their own regulations, orders and directives that require U.S. Department of Defense officials to provide prompt and effective medical care to all exposed individuals. They also refuse to clean up dispersed radioactive contamination as required by Army regulations.
Dr. Doug Rokke is the former director of the Army's Depleted Uranium Project. It was his task to clean up the radioactive battlefields of the Gulf War.
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Ron Paul supporters rallied in Washington July 12 as thousands from around the country showed that the Campaign for Liberty is a real movement that will carry on Paul's message beyond the 2008 election.
"Some people thought the enthusiasm was going to die down after the primaries, and I think I am on the record as saying it's only the beginning, folks!" Paul said.
The crowd was littered with Ron Paul signs, some homemade, some printed, one on a huge helium balloon. Huge banners with Paul's signature "REVOLUTION" logo were held by faithful supporters.
"I thought it was a nice crowd . . . it was empowering being around people that were of the same mindset," AFP worker Steve Lombardo said. "I came away more dedicated to fighting tyranny and world government."
The 17 speakers, including Paul, ripped into big government, the war and the loss of civil liberties. Speakers like Constitution Party presidential nominee and pastor Chuck Baldwin pushed for Americans to get back to constitutional laws and realities in the U.S.
"It's not a matter of conservatives or liberals; those classifications mean nothing today; what we are dealing with is you are either an American or a globalist, and I am an American," Baldwin said. "Congressman Ron Paul has been at the forefront of this battle for all of these years; now the rest of us are joining him in this fight for freedom and constitutional government."
Paul's speech was delayed for several minutes as the crowd chanted, "Ron Paul!" and "Freedom!" Paul's speech returned often to the foibles of the Federal Reserve.
"The government hasn't even admitted there is a recession yet. All they have to do is get out of this town and find out how American people are forced to live in this country, and they'll realize that we are not on the right track; and we know where the right track is, and that is to follow the Constitution," Paul said.
Later in the speech, Paul mentioned "the Fed" and the crowd started chanting, "End the Fed!"
Then Paul reminisced about a previous rally when he spoke about the Fed and students began burning Federal Reserve notes (dollars).
"Probably the ashes are going to be worth more than the paper at the rate we are going," Paul said.
He talked about the cost of the war in Iraq, a war he said we never should have gotten into. He said that "the facts are out there" and that is why the younger generation is waking up to the message that Paul has been carrying forward for years.
"We as a nation have obligated ourselves to approximately a trillion dollars a year to manage our empire, and it's money we don't have, it's money we tax the people till we can't tax anymore, we borrow until we can't borrow anymore. Then, of course, you know their answer. They go to the Fed and print more money, then they wonder why we have problems."
Paul said that focusing on drilling for more oil is a "distraction" from the real issue that is causing increases in the cost of most commodities and oil: the devaluation of the dollar.
"Obviously, our policy of going into the Middle East to protect ‘our oil' didn't work out so well," Paul said. "Our foreign policy has pushed the cost of energy up, and then, again, the value of the dollar has gone down."
Paul spoke out against HCR-362, that would "advocate a blockade of Iran." Paul has been speaking out against the resolution in Congress. "We don't have to endorse pre-emptive war." (For more on the resolution, see page 8.)
"The message of liberty and the Constitution brings us together, regardless of our beliefs," Paul said. "If we did the right things, if we restored freedom, restored sound money, went back to work, believe me it wouldn't take long. We would be back on our feet in no time."
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Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.) has warned millions of radio listeners that a strike against Iran seems inevitable. He called House Concurrent Resolution 362, strongly pushed by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a "virtual Iran war resolution."
Since its introduction by Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.) three weeks ago, the resolution has won 238 cosponsors. In the Senate, companion Resolution 580, introduced by Evan Bayh (D-Ind.), has gathered 35 cosponsors.
After making its case against Iran with 11 "whereas" items, House 362 requires a naval blockade to "Prohibit the export to Iran of all petroleum products, impose stringent inspection requirements on all persons, vehicles, ships, planes, trains and cargo entering or departing Iran." It also bans international travel of all Iranian officials not involved in negotiating the suspension of Iran's nuclear program.
If passed by both chambers, the United States would be at war with Iran - alone with no allies. The gasoline price would jump up to $8 or $10 per gallon. Both measures have been referred to each chamber's Foreign Affairs Committee.
The Times of London reported that President Bush has told the Israeli government that he may approve a military strike on Iran if negotiations on nuclear weapons with Tehran break down, citing a senior Pentagon official.
Despite the opposition of his own generals and skepticism that America is ready to risk its military, already spread thin, Bush has given an "amber light" to an Israeli plan to strike Iran, the official said. "Amber means get on with your preparations, stand by for immediate attack and tell us when you're ready," the official was quoted.
Iran's military leaders warned July 5 it wold shut down the Strait of Hormuz and use "blitzkrieg" tactics in the Gulf if the United States attacks. Iran has demonstrated the ability to shut down the Strait of Hormuz and block 25 percent of the world's daily ocean-borne oil traffic. Sinking or crippling a couple of oil tankers, thus blocking traffic, would be no challenge for Iran. Ship owners throughout the world would refuse to navigate around the stricken ships. Last January, three small, unarmed Iranian speedboats darted about U.S. Naval vessels. If they had been suicide missions, ships would have been hit, as the USS Cole was in 2000.
Iran's largest naval base at Bandar Abbas commands the northern
side of the strait. Three islands near the middle of the strait
are under Iranian control with naval gun emplacements and concealed
missiles. Iran has advanced torpedoes from Russia that can travel
over 200 mph and seek out targets.
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The 31st annual Cost of Government Day was July 16. The purpose is to highlight the enormity of the tax burden federal, state and local governments impose on taxpayers. The Center for Fiscal Accountability and Americans for Tax Reform announced their findings in Washington.
The Cost of Government Day is announced every year on the day that a taxpayer with an average income would have paid his or her share of the federal, state, and local tax burden. This year the tax burden would be paid off four days later than last year, and 17 more days than in 2000.
"Working people must toil on average 197 days out of the year just to meet all costs imposed by the government. In other words, the cost of government consumes 53.9 percent of national income," the Center for Fiscal Accountability (CFA) reported. "All components of the cost of government—federal spending, state and local spending, and regulation—are now increasing faster than national income."
The report says the average taxpayer works 84 days for federal spending, 50 days for state and local spending, 42 days for federal regulations, and 21 days for state and local regulations.
"Federal spending as a percentage of national income will increase again in 2008 and is up 11.4 percent since 2000," CFA said.
The group also focused attention on the federal budget deficit.
"The federal deficit is a completely uninteresting number which is the difference between two meaningful and important numbers—the total level of federal spending and the total level of federal taxes," CFA said. "The Congressional Budget office now projects the deficit for 2008 to balloon to $357 billion."
This year's high deficit was made much worse by the $200 billion economic stimulus package, which the CFA said will have no positive prolonged impact on the economy.
The CFA called for a combination of tax cuts coupled with spending restraint to deal with the federal deficit, and for comprehensive tax reform, possibly in the form of a flat tax (though other options were mentioned).
State and local spending jumped in 2007, and yet again in 2008 according to the report, with states like New Jersey and New York increasing the tax burden by 16 and 17 billion respectively. Only six states reined in spending in 2008: Arizona, Louisiana, Wyoming, Florida, Idaho and Hawaii. All other states increased the tax burden, most by hundreds of millions of dollars.
Regulations and regulatory agencies are growing as well, costing Americans billions of dollars. The EPA alone added $6.7 billion in expenses this year, dwarfing even the Department for Homeland Security's $1.4 billion increase.
The cost of regulation in America goes further than taxes though, reports the CFA. The economic cost of complying with regulations could be more than $1.5 trillion per year.
"These costs are threatening to explode due to costly and unnecessary global warming regulation," CFA said. "This would lay close to a trillion [more] dollars a year in unnecessary costs on the American economy, just to start. The price of gasoline would increase further, and the cost of electricity would begin to soar as well. The cost of food, and especially meat, would rise due to higher costs for fertilizer, farm fuel, truck hauling for produce, and other factors."
Mike Finch is a reporter/intern for American Free Press. He has a Master's degree in journalism and is working on his Ph.D. in communication.
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Although questions continue to be asked about the Federal Reserve's role in the recent JPMorgan Stearns merger, no one has yet observed that the merger could be a major achievement toward the international insiders' foal of dominating the world's economy.
Consider the Fed's motive. After all, the Fed is not a bona fide government agency. It merely exists in fact (de facto) and not in law (de jure). Much of its existence continues to be a mystery - especially concerning the money it generates. In fact, apart from its fractional reserve and bookkeeping entries, the Fed's money doesn't really exist. It's simply issued by decree. Being fiat money, it has no backing - not even seashells, buttons or beans.
Now consider the Fed-Morgan "partnership." Having assets of $1.6 trillion and millions of consumers in the U.S. and the rest of the world, why does Morgan even need the Fed? Maybe the Fed needs Morgan.
However, having indirectly acquired Morgan through the Bear takeover, the Federal Reserve (by definition) can no longer be our central bank, defacto. Because, like Morgan and Bear, it will be operating all over the world. Bear, for instance, has 14,000 employees worldwide.
It is predicted that the Fed will eventually be taking over more, if not all, of the investment banks. This would probably entail Treasury reforms. After that would come the commercial banks, or increased authority over them.
As a consequence, predictably, the Fed would merge with the world's other central banks, all of which are in private hands. Finally, acting in concert, they could control the world's economy.
But this is the Fed's purpose. That is, historically, it was created for this very reason - and guess who was behind it: J.P. Morgan, et. al.
In 1910, the Fed was planned by Morgan and Rockefeller agents on Jekyll Island, Ga., at Morgan's private hunting range. Most influential were Sen. Nelson Aldrich (Morgan) and Frank A. Vanderlip (Rockefeller). A. Piatt Andrew, assistant treasury secretary, was also there. However, out of fear of a Wall Street monopoly, the plan failed and had to be revised.
The "revision" was actually the same plan, revised to look different. Then, after much deception and political razzle-dazzle during the 1912 election, it received approval. Known as the Rederal reserve act, it was passed by a naïve Congress on Christmas Eve, 1913.
The most important of its 12 reserve districts is the one in New York. As to be expected, its first governor was the president of Morgan's Bankers Trust Co., Benjamin Strong. Under Strong, the Fed was closely associated with the Bank of England, though few knew.
None of this could have happened without the Fed's "unseen guardian angel," British-educated "colonel" Edward Mandell House. As the international bankers' front man, he and Paul Warburg worked closely together. Behind them, in the shadows, were Morgan and Rockefeller, et. al. They had all the string and knew how to pull them.
House, who was President Woodrow Wilson's personal advisor, manipulated him "like a puppet." Moreover, backed by such leading financiers as J.P. Morgan, John d. Rockefeller, and Paul Warburg, House (a financier's son) was largely responsible for the graduated income tax and Federal Reserve legislation being enacted, which fulfilled two of the 10 strategic objectives listed in the Communist Manifesto.
This tax and the Fed are indispensable to socialism with its
state ownership and leveling of wealth.
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America has adopted many of the strategic objectives of Karl
Marx's Communist Manifesto.
Here they are according to many sources.
1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents
of land to public purposes.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
3. Abolition of all right of inheritance.
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.
5. Centralization of credit in the hands of the state by means
of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.
6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport
in the hands of the state.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned
by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and
the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common
plan.
8. Equal liability of all to labor. Establishment of industrial
armies, especially for agriculture.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual
abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more
equitable distribution of the population over the country.
10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition
of children's factory labor in its present form. Combination of
education with industrial production.
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