MAY LIGHT AND LOVE PREVAIL ON EARTH
April 17, 2008
The Moment of Truth Series #12: WE ARE GOING THE WRONG WAY!!!
Hello everysoul!
Please try, if you can, to wrap your mind around the following numbers and let their true significance sink into you. As you read this, think about the 100,000,000 human beings - our brothers and sisters - who are said to be too poor now to feed themselves with the sudden global food price hikes and who are dying of starvation at this very moment. Think also about our long-suffering Earth Mother whose global health is fast deteriorating because we have not set our priorities correctly and because of a lack of investment to shift our civilization onto a sustainable path. Don't forget also to think about the unimaginable sufferings the following misguided investments have caused to tens of millions of people and could still cause to billions more if no radical change of direction is not soon made...
"US spending for its military establishment during the current fiscal year, conservatively calculated, to at least $1.1 trillion. (...) On 7 November 2007, the US Treasury announced that the national debt had breached $9 trillion for the first time. (...) The debt accumulated by the federal government did not top $1 trillion until 1981. When George Bush became president in January 2001, it stood at approximately $5.7 trillion. Since then, it has increased by 45%. This huge debt can be largely explained by our defence expenditures. (...)
By 1990 the value of the weapons, equipment and factories devoted to the Department of Defense was 83% of the value of all plants and equipment in US manufacturing. From 1947 to 1990, the combined US military budgets amounted to $8.7 trillion. (...) Between the 1940s and 1996, the US spent at least $5.8 trillion on the development, testing and construction of nuclear bombs. (...) There is today no sane use for them, while the trillions spent on them could have been used to solve the problems of social security and health care, quality education and access to higher education for all, not to speak of the retention of highly-skilled jobs within the economy."
- Taken from The economic disaster that is military keynesianism: Why the US has really gone broke below
And this merely concerns the United States. Can you imagine how different things could be today if these incalculable resources and all the human ingenuity wasted to develop ever more powerful and lethal weapons of mass destruction and fatten the bloated wallets of a tiny, tiny coterie of megalomaniac monsters had been dedicated instead to enhance everyone's quality of life and make sure everyone is well fed, well educated, and leading a happy fulfilling life?
I guess it is fair to say we have been going the wrong way, and that it is high time we get the enlightened leadership we badly need to pick a new direction towards a brighter future ...
This is definitely a critical Moment of Truth for all of us...
Jean Hudon
Earth Rainbow Network Coordinator
http://www.earthrainbownetwork.com
P.S. Your feedback is as always welcomed and may be included in a coming compilation - unless you prefer it is not. Circulating this compilation (or any part of it) and personally inviting your correspondents to subscribe to this list would also help enlarge the circle of people who have access to this material. Please include the following note and the URL address for the archived copy below along with your forwards, so others may have the opportunity to explore the original copy, if they so choose.
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Note from Jean: In my last compilation I forgot to include a link to the letter from Dr. Carlo entitled "BioPro's Fabricated Science Fiction" recommended by Ken in relation to the cell phone information in item # 12. This link is now embedded in the title above if you wish to review this letter. Incidentally Ken sent me the following comment: " You are doing a service for not only an ignorant and unconscious humanity, but for ALL planetary life! People have NO IDEA what damage they are causing and, sad to say, I'm sure a LARGE number of your readership HAVE and USE CELL PHONES. So they are part and parcel to the problem ... and the problem is CRITICAL. What it will take to wake people up is a MASSIVE number of people getting seriously ill (quickly) with an even larger number getting brain tumors and passing from this plane. I'd LOVE to see the executives of the telecom companies and the colluding bureau-rats in government being hauled off to prison for life ... for murder, manslaughter and crimes against humanity."
... Harsh words to which I replied:
Hi Ken
The blind spot most everyone has in their mind - and I certainly don't exclude myself from that! - once they get hooked onto some consumer product is pointing to a critical failure and fundamental flaw in our individual and collective psyche that leads us directly into an ecosuicidal abyss right now. I'm amazed at the disconnect there is in our minds between information that is now widely available - especially if one is subscribed to this list and actually reads and ponders the meaning and consequences of the material networked - and our individual lust for the cheapest, latest convenience or gizmo that make us selfishly focus solely on our immediate need and forget the far-reaching consequences of our consumer choices. Our individual and global ecological footprint is stamping out Life on Earth at such an alarming rate that it calls for a radical re-evaluation of our seemingly "sacrosanct" and completely irresponsible stealing from all future generations of the very Life support system we and they all depend on.
To me only a spiritual revolution of the xth magnitude can divert humanity from our current path towards oblivion, for it is only once we realize and feel how intricately connected we are to all other life forms and to this very living planet that we will make the leap in understanding that a New Way of Being exists and is achievable through a mere shift in perception from selfcentredness to Oneness Awareness - which is exactly the core focus of the next Meditation Focus #185: Healing the Chasm of Separation... (coming your way next Saturday night)
No amount of rational arguing can impart deep within what 30 minutes of intense immersion into the infinite sentient perfection of the One Universal Heart beating in our soul can achieve...
Be there and be-live!
Jean
THE QUOTES
"Jean, It would be so nice if you would post a few photos of yourself for those of us who have never met you in person, but who would like to have a picture in our minds of the person who put all this very valuable information you are so kind and generous to share with us. We would also like a face to put with our thoughts of appreciation and prayers for your continued joyous and long life."
- Beverly (thelistener@bellsouth.net) -- Message found in the ERN guestbook. There is a Personal bio page with pictures that has been on the ERN website for over 10 years, but I guess few people manage to find it...
" I come from a future Earth. Our world has been totally purified and everything is in total harmonic balance. Lush green forests lie where once there were deserts. Rivers and streams glisten with clear, pure water teeming with life. The mighty oceans are not such a mystery to us as we can live in chambers below the surface of the water.We telepathically communicate with the intelligent life forms that live there. Many of our kind communicate with the whales and dolphins learning technologies of consciousness that can aid both our species. The planet Gaia is totally honoured and respected as a living, intelligent, co-creative entity. All of our kind have their own unique connection to the planet. We have a new level of connection. We no longer consider ourselves separate to her. We now realise we are an intricate part of her consciousness. Gaia's dream has been accessed by our kind and all are expressing their unique part of the dream. We live on a planet that is ecologically balanced and harmonious. The planet is heavenly with stable, pleasant weather patterns and gentle climates. This enables all life to blossom. Food is in abundance and all the needs of the whole are brought forth from Gaia."
- Lees Meer -- Taken from http://snoedel.punt.nl/?gr=674680 - To be included in its entirety, with several other very inspiring documents, in the next Meditation Focus #185: Healing the Chasm of Separation - which you don't want to miss next Sunday...
"A new era of human consciousness is dawning. Look around you, daybreak is everywhere…"
- Keith Rhinehart -- Taken from A smile from the universe
"We are the first generation making ethical decisions that will determine whether we will be the last generation."
- Jonathan Granoff -- Taken from Peace On Earth! Charter For A World Without Violence
"No state or individual can be secure in an insecure world. The values of nonviolence in intention, thought, and practice have grown from an option to a necessity. These values are expressed in their application between states, groups and individuals. We are convinced that adherence to the values of nonviolence will usher in a more peaceful, civilized world order in which more effective and fair governance, respectful of human dignity and the sanctity of life itself, may become a reality. Our cultures, our histories, and our individual lives are interconnected and our actions are interdependent. Especially today as never before, we believe, a truth lies before us: our destiny is a common destiny. That destiny will be defined by our intentions, decisions and actions today. We are further convinced that creating a culture of peace and nonviolence, while a difficult and long process, is both necessary and noble. Affirmation of the values contained in this Charter is a vital step to ensuring the survival and development of humanity and the achievement of a world without violence. (...) In implementing the principles of this Charter we call upon all to work together towards a just, killing-free world in which everyone has the right not to be killed and responsibility not to kill others."
- Taken from the CHARTER FOR A WORLD WITHOUT VIOLENCE
"No one is above the law! Yet, leaders have placed themselves exactly there: above the law. Perhaps this has always been the case; however, now I am aware of it along with millions of others around the globe. The lights have come on. Through the Internet, we have been given many glimpses behind the curtain and into the ivory towers where those who pull the strings in our world operate with impunity and with intentions that could only be considered evil (anti-life) by any thinking, sentient being. In light of these revelations, how can any loving heart justify neutrality? (...) We do not know how it will work out in the physical world; but I am convinced that until we do take that stand, little will change. In all of your spiritual practices, please choose justice and the changing of the guard. In so doing, we co-create the new heaven and the new earth long prophesied. The planet, Earth herself, travails until we do our part. Heaven asks, “Who are you: sovereign or slave?” Only those willing to serve the highest good of all are fit to be leaders. May God bless the entire world with people of vision and compassion rising to positions of leadership! May justice with mercy prevail… with no exceptions for anyone, no matter how wealthy or seemingly powerful!"
- Ron Van Dyke -- Taken from Justice, and the Changing of the Guard
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An Interview With God
With my newly acquired title as a journalist, I decided to strike a high note.
"Come in," God said to me, "so, you would like to interview Me?"
"If you have the time," I said.
He smiled and said: "My time is called eternity and is enough to do everything; what questions do you have in mind to ask me?"
"None that are new to you. What's the one thing that surprises you most about mankind?"
He answered: "That they get bored of being children, are in a rush to grow up, and then long to be children again.
"That they lose their health to make money and then lose their money to restore their health.
"That by thinking anxiously about the future, they forget the present, such that they live neither for the present nor the future.
"That they live as if they will never die, and they die as if they had never lived..."
His hands took mine and we were silent. After a long period, I said, "May I ask you another question?"
He replied with a smile.
"As a Father, what would you ask your children to do for the new year?"
"To learn that they cannot make anyone love them. What they can do is to let themselves be loved."
"To learn that it takes years to build trust, and a few seconds to destroy it.
"To learn that what is most valuable is not what they have in their lives, but who they have in their lives.
"To learn that it is not good to compare themselves to others. There will be others better or worse than they are.
"To learn that a rich person is not one who has the most, but is one who needs the least.
"To learn that they should control their attitudes, otherwise their attitudes will control them.
"To learn that it only takes a few seconds to open profound wounds in persons we love, and that it takes many years to heal them.
"To learn to forgive by practicing forgiveness.
"To learn that there are persons that love them dearly, but simply do not know how to show their feelings.
"To learn that money can buy everything but happiness.
"To learn that while at times they may be entitled to be upset, that does not give them the right to upset those around them.
"To learn that great dreams do not require great wings, but a landing gear to achieve.
"To learn that true friends are scarce, he/she who has found one has found a true treasure.
"To learn that it is not always enough that they be forgiven by others, but that they forgive themselves.
"To learn that they are masters of what they keep to themselves and slaves of what they say.
"To learn that they shall reap what they plant; if they plant gossip they will harvest intrigues, if they plant love they will harvest happiness.
"To learn that true happiness is not to achieve their goals but to learn to be satisfied with what they already achieved.
"To learn that happiness is a decision. They decide to be happy with what they are and have, or die from envy and jealousy of what they lack.
"To learn that two people can look at the same thing and see something totally different.
"To learn that those who are honest with themselves without considering the consequences go far in life.
"To learn that even though they may think they have nothing to give, when a friend cries with them, they find the strength to appease the pain.
"To learn that by trying to hold on to loved ones, they very quickly push them away; and by letting go of those they love, they will be side by side forever."
Unknown
CONTENTS
1. The Axis of Responsibility: Addressing the Critical Global Issues of the 21st Century
2. Bush Launches Economic 'Shock and Awe' on Iran
3. Seeds of Compassion
4. Propaganda, Deception, and the 'Riots' in Lhasa: Why the Chinese regime has incited violence in Tibet
5. The Persecution of Falun Gong and the Olympics
6. Falun Gong "Disappearing by the Thousands"
7. Coming Ecological Collapse: Failing Ecosystems the Mother of All Bubbles
8. Why costs are climbing
9. Warmer seas, over-fishing spell disaster for oceans: scientists
10. The economic disaster that is military keynesianism: Why the US has really gone broke
11. Cardiff Demonstration about the Military Academy proposed to St Athan
12. An Insider's Report on Barack Obama's Meeting with Cleveland Jewish Leaders
Special Focus on the exceptional investigative work of Australian journalist, author and film maker John Pilger
The following videos document in gruesome details the litany of ignominious crimes against humanity committed, abetted and financed by the successive governments of the United States of America - and also of the United Kingdom - doing the bidding of a secret cabal bent of imposing its bloody grip of terror upon this entire planet. But they also document how ordinary people fight back often with only their undaunted courage and belief in the possibility of a better, more just world, and in the end show us all that can be accomplished when we let our hearts guide us towards victory against the forces of evil on Earth.
Please visit John Pilger's website for more information: http://www.johnpilger.com
The following comes from http://www.sprword.com/johnpilger.html where you will find much more material
"The censorship is such on television in the U.S. that films like mine don't stand a chance."
"It is too easy for Western journalists to see humanity in terms of its usefulness to 'our' interests and to follow government agendas that ordain good and bad tyrants, worthy and unworthy victims and present 'our' policies as always benign when the opposite is usually true. It's the journalist's job, first of all, to look in the mirror of his own society."
- John Pilger
John Pilger - Freedom Next Time (43 min 43 sec - 16 Jun 2007) FITTING INTRODUCTION TO HIS VIEWS
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4258131083758254736
John Pilger speaks about global media consolidation, war by journalism, US military's quest for domination/hegemony in the post 9/11 era, false history in the guise of 'objective' journalism. What he says about Barack Obama (at 35 minutes into this video) and the Democrats in general is real eye-opening stuff!!!
The War On Democracy by John Pilger (1 h 33 mn) POWERFUL!
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3739500579629840148
Award-winning documentary maker John Pilger suggests that, far from bringing democracy to the world as it claims, the US is doing its best to stifle its progress. Talking exclusively to American government officials, including agents who reveal for the first time on film how the CIA ran its war in Latin America in the 80s, Pilger argues that true popular democracy is more likely to be found among the poorest in Latin America, whose movements are often ignored in the West. "President Bush has promised to rid the world of evil and to lead the great mission to build free societies on every continent. To understand such an epic lie is to understand history. Hidden history. Suppressed history. History that explains why we in the West know a lot about the crimes of others, but almost nothing about our own. The missing word is Empire. The existence of an American Empire is rarely acknowledged." Recommended by Elisabeth (tara.jane@phonecoop.coop) Ex-DEA Head Admits CIA Imported Cocaine - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JR8s-mIj9BM
The New Rulers of The World Produced by John Pilger (53 Minutes)
http://www.sprword.com/videos/newrulers/
"Never before has the gulf between rich and poor been so vast and inequality so widespread. The facts of globalization are revealing a small group of powerful individuals...Just two-hundred giant corporations dominate a quarter of the world's economic activity. General Motors is now bigger than Denmark. Ford is bigger than South Africa." In order to examine the true effects of globalization, Pilger turns the spotlight on Indonesia, a country described by the World Bank as a model pupil until its globalized economy collapsed in 1998. The film examines the use of sweatshop factories by famous brand names, and asks some penetrating questions. Who are the real beneficiaries of the globalized economy? Who really rules the world now? Is it governments or a handful of huge companies? The Ford Motor Company alone is bigger than the economy of South Africa. Enormously rich men, like Bill Gates, have a wealth greater than all of Africa. Pilger goes behind the hype of the new global economy and reveals that the divisions between the rich and poor have never been greater -- two thirds of the world's children live in poverty -- and the gulf is widening like never before. The film looks at the new rulers of the world -- the great multinationals and the governments and institutions that back them -- the IMF and the World Bank. Under IMF rules, millions of people throughout the world lose their jobs and livelihood. The reality behind much of modern shopping and the famous brands is a sweatshop economy, which is being duplicated in country after country. The film travels to Indonesia and Washington, asking challenging questions seldom raised in the mainstream media and exposing the scandal of globalization, including revealing interviews with top officials of the World Bank and the IMF. (Excerpt from http://www.sprword.com/johnpilger.html)
Breaking The Silence - Truth and Lies in the War On Terror Directed by John Pilger (51 min 50 sec)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4527835028345509000
"We were sold this war on the basis of Iraq possessing a massive arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, which was never found, and won't be found, because there was no massive arsenal of weapons. We were also promised a need for war on the basis of active cooperation between Iraq and Al-Qaeda and the fact that it was just a matter of time before some of these weapons from this massive arsenal were passed to this terrorist group... There was no hard intelligence to establish there was a link between Iraq and Al-Qaeda." -- John Pilger dissects the truth and lies in the 'war on terror'. Award-winning journalist John Pilger investigates the discrepancies between American and British claims for the 'war on terror' and the facts on the ground as he finds them in Afghanistan and Washington, DC. In 2001, as the bombs began to drop, George W. Bush promised Afghanistan "the generosity of America and its allies". Now, the familiar old warlords are regaining power, religious fundamentalism is renewing its grip and military skirmishes continue routinely. In "liberated" Afghanistan, America has its military base and pipeline access, while the people have the warlords who are, says one woman, "in many ways worse than the Taliban". In Washington, Pilger conducts a series of remarkable interviews with William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, and leading Administration officials such as Douglas Feith, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, and John Bolton, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security. These people, and the other architects of the Project for the New American Century, were dismissed as 'the crazies' by the first Bush Administration in the early 90s when they first presented their ideas for pre-emptive strikes and world domination. Pilger also interviews presidential candidate General Wesley Clark, and former intelligence officers, all the while raising searching questions about the real motives for the 'war on terror'. While President Bush refers to the US attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq as two 'great victories', Pilger asks the question - victories over whom, and for what purpose? Pilger describes Afghanistan as a country "more devastated than anything I have seen since Pol Pot's Cambodia". He finds that Al-Qaida has not been defeated and that the Taliban is re-emerging. And of the "victory" in Iraq, he asks: "Is this Bush's Vietnam?"
John Pilger - War By Other Means Directed by David Munro (52 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5399796928596929639
"Contrary to a myth long popular in the West, it's been the poor of the world that finance the rich - not the other way around - and this film sets out to explain why. It's also a film about war, a war you don't see on your television screens for it's seldom news. It's been describe as a silent war. Instead of soldiers dying, there are children dying... Instead of the bombing of bridges, there is the tearing down of forests and other natural resources; the bulldozing of farmland; and the running down of schools and hospitals. In many ways, it's like a colonial war. The difference is that these days, people and the resources are controlled not by viceroys and occupying armies, but by other more sophisticated means of which the principle is debt." John Pilger and David Munro examine the policy of First World banks agreeing loans with Third World countries, who are then unable to meet the cripling interest charges.
John_Pilger - Inside Burma - Land of Fear (52 mn)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=253734287578732261
"More than a million people have been forced from their homes and according to the United Nations, untold thousands have been massacred, tortured, and subjected to a modern form of slavery. Burma, says Amnesty International, is a prison behind bars." John Pilger and David Munro go undercover in one of the world's most isolated, and extraordinary countries, Burma, which Amnesty International calls 'a prison without bars'. They discover slave labour preparing for tourism and foreign investment.
Nicaragua: A Nation's Right To SurviveDirected by John Pilger (52 Minutes)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=zJWNof0e2TM
"Almost all the people in Nicaragua rose up against a tyrant called Somoza, whose family had been in power for more than 40 years, put there by the United States marines. That uprising costs 50,000 lives, almost as many as died for America in Vietnam, but out of a population of less than 3 million people." In 1979, the Sandinistas won a popular revolution in Nicaragua, putting an end to decades of the corrupt US-backed Somoza dictatorship. They based their reformist ideology on that of the English Co-operative Movement, but was to prove too 'radical' for the Reagan administration. In this film, Pilger describes the achievements of the Sandinistas and their "threat of a good example".
Year Zero - The Silent Death of Cambodia Directed by John Pilger (52 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9159164859238659487
John Pilger vividly reveals the brutality and murderous political ambitions of the Pol Pot / Khmer Rouge totalitarian regime which bought genocide and despair to the people of Cambodia while neighboring countries, including Australia, shamefully ignored the immense human suffering and unspeakable crimes that bloodied this once beautiful country. "President Nixon and Mr. Kissinger unleashed 100,000 tons of bombs, the equivalent of 5 Hiroshimas. The bombing was their personal decision; illegally and secretly, they bombed Cambodia, a neutral country, back to the Stone Age. And I mean Stone Age in its' literal sense." John Pilger vividly reveals the brutality and murderous political ambitions of the Pol Pot / Khmer Rouge totalitarian regime which bought genocide and despair to the people of Cambodia while neighboring countries, including Australia, shamefully ignored the immense human suffering and unspeakable crimes that bloodied this once beautiful country.
Palestine Is Still The Issue Directed by John Pilger (52 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1259454859593416473
"This is a huge bluff of the Israeli establishment, that every criticism of its' policy is anti-semitism," In 1977, the award-winning journalist and film-maker, John Pilger, made a documentary called Palestine Is Still The Issue (1977). He told how almost a million Palestinians had been forced off their land in 1948, and again in 1967. In this in-depth documentary, he has returned to the West Bank of the Jordan and Gaza, and to Israel, to ask why the Palestinians, whose right of return was affirmed by the United Nations more than half a century ago, are still caught in a terrible limbo -- refugees in their own land, controlled by Israel in the longest military occupation in modern times. "The fate and struggle of the Palestinians," says Pilger, "are not just critical to the overdue recognition of their basic human rights, but are also central to whether the region, and the wider world, are plunged into war. Israel is now one of the biggest military powers in the world. While nothing changes, the dangers become greater. This is a film about a nation of people, traumatized, humiliated and yet resilient. In trying to liberate less than a quarter of historic Palestine, they have had no army, no air force, and no powerful friends -- and have fought back with slingshots and now with the terrorism of the suicide bombers."
Paying the Price: Killing the Children of Iraq Directed by John Pilger (1 Hour and 15 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1867691819991815704
"For almost 10 years of extraordinary isolation imposed by the UN and enforced by America and Britain, have killed more people than the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan - including half a million young children."
After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, the United Nations (backed strongly by the US and UK) imposed harsh sanctions on Iraq that lasted for 10 years (1991-2001); the harsh restrictions on imports of everything, including access to key medicines, resulted in over a million deaths, more than half a million of which were women and children. That's more deaths than the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan and 9/11 combined. The purpose was regime change, but it never came. The overwhelming majority of those killed were the poor, elderly, women and children. Empirically, sanctions overwhelmingly punish the poor, the destitute. While the sanctions were in place, the richest people in control of the resources (Saddam Hussein et al.) still had everything they wanted: food, cars, mansions, access to the best medicines, etc. Award-winning journalist John Pilger has documented the reality of UN harsh sanctions in this hard-hitting film.
... and the unrelenting torture and killing of Iraqi people and wholesale destruction of their country continue to this day!
Stealing a Nation Produced by John Pilger (56 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3667764379758632511
STEALING A NATION (John Pilger, 2004) is an extraordinary film about the plight of people of the Chagos Islands in the Indian Ocean - secretly and brutally expelled from their homeland by British governments in the late 1960s and early 1970s, to make way for an American military base. The base, on the main island of Diego Garcia, was a launch pad for the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. "Hidden from Parliament and the U.S. Congress, the deal was this: the Americans wanted the island, in their words, "swept and sanitized." A brochure of the film is available at http://www.bullfrogfilms.com/guides/stealguide.pdf. On April 8, 2008, the Chagos Islanders have launched a national Campaign for Resettlement of their islands - go to http://www.letthemreturn.com. Please visit the UK Chagos Support Blog at http://chagosuk.blogspot.com.
The Truth Game Directed by John Pilger (1 hr 19 min)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8188389096643641702
"The destruction of Nagasaki was officially described as having achieved "good results". These announcements and especially the words used: experiment, success, good results, to describe the unique and horrific carnage of nuclear war, were the first public examples of a new kind of propaganda. By using reassuring, even soothing language - language which allowed both the politicians and us to distance ourselves from the horror of nuclear war." John Pilger looks at world-wide propaganda surrounding the nuclear arms race. John Pilger's penetrating documentary which looks at world-wide propaganda surrounding the nuclear arms race. When the two American atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, they were code-named 'Fat Man' and 'Little Boy', and President Truman announced after the event: "The experiment has been an overwhelming success." "These", says Pilger, "were words used to describe the awful and horrific carnage of nuclear war. By using reassuring, even soothing language, this new kind of propaganda created acceptable images of war and the illusion that we could live securely with nuclear weapons". Official 'truths' are examined in connection with the bombing of Hiroshima, the build up of arms by Russia and America, the siting of nuclear bases by the US in Britain and Europe, Ministry of Defence statements about the Cruise missile base at Greenham Common, and other US bases, the amount of government money spent on weapons, 'Civil defence' arrangements and a NATO 'limited' nuclear and chemical war exercise in West Germany, which Pilger describes as 'a dry run for the unthinkable'. Many experts give their views, including Paul Warnke who thinks arms reduction is feasible -- 'All we need is the political will to go ahead with it'.
Apartheid Did Not Die Directed by John Pilger (51 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6343784518626528037
"Apartheid based on race is outlawed now, but the system always went far deeper than that. The cruelty and injustice were underwritten by an economic apartheid, which regarded people as no more than cheap expendable labor. It was backed by great business corporations in South Africa, Britain, the rest of Europe, and the United States. And it was this apartheid based on money and profit to allow a small minority to control most of the land, most of the industrial wealth, and most of the economic power. Today, the same system is called - without a trace of irony - the free market." John Pilger was banned from South Africa for his reporting during the apartheid era. On his return thirty years later with Alan Lowery, he describes the extraordinary generosity of a liberated people, but asks who are the true beneficiaries of a democracy - the black majority or the white minority?
Flying the Flag - Arming the World Directed by John Pilger (51 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7896356728565502659
"Britain is still a world leader. Indeed it has twenty percent of a world market, second only to the United States. And this industry is considered so important by the government that it consumes almost half of all research and development funds. Strangely it produces not consumer goods that people want, but machines that hardly any of us use or want to use. Moreover, for all its' preeminence, its' future is uncertain and depends to a large degree on secret deals with some of the most corrupt and brutal regimes on Earth. One of the biggest manufacturing industries in Britain at the close of the century is ARMS." John Pilger and David Munro look behind the political rhetoric and discover the world of international arms dealing.
Breaking The Mirror: The Murdoch Effect Directed by John Pilger (52 Minutes)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5005752483917353600
"The Daily Mirror was the best of them. It was a tabloid when tabloids still meant a peoples' paper that respected its' readers and earned their trust and affection...This film is a personal tribute, but it's also the story of what happened to the once popular Mirror. How the reporting of the blood, sweat, and tears of ordinary people has changed out of all recognition. Above all, it's the story of a rise of a new kind of tabloid and a new kind of media power now set to dominate much of the world." The British public were told that the new information technology, heralded by The Sun's move to Wapping, would bring a greater variety of newspapers and a more diverse media. But it produced a contracted press controlled by ever fewer proprietors. John Pilger describes the downfall of his old paper and the all-pervasive influence of Rupert Murdoch.
Ouch! The Daily Show's Eviscerating "Documentary" About Fox News (April 11, 2008) MUST WATCH!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/11/smackdown-the-emdaily-sho_n_96185.html
The Daily Show's John Oliver put together a stunning smackdown of Fox News on last night's show, punctuated by some damning clips showing egregious comments from some anchors (John Gibson, natch) and some — gasp! — flip-flopping on certain positions (like, say, executive privilege). Watch as Oliver tries to sneak into Fox HQ dressed as the Statue of Liberty, hosts a pundit shoutfest, and waves many flags. (Look for the April 10 show to view this)
WORTHY OF YOUR ATTENTION
The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil
http://www.powerofcommunity.org/cm/index.php and http://globalpublicmedia.com/articles/657
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, Cuba's economy went into a tailspin. With imports of oil cut by more than half – and food by 80 percent – people were desperate. This film tells of the hardships and struggles as well as the community and creativity of the Cuban people during this difficult time. Cubans share how they transitioned from a highly mechanized, industrial agricultural system to one using organic methods of farming and local, urban gardens. It is an unusual look into the Cuban culture during this economic crisis, which they call "The Special Period." The film opens with a short history of Peak Oil, a term for the time in our history when world oil production will reach its all-time peak and begin to decline forever. Cuba, the only country that has faced such a crisis – the massive reduction of fossil fuels – is an example of options and hope. Recommended by Serge St-Amand (myownvirtual@ownplace.com) who also recommended the Relocalization Network website http://www.relocalize.net/ (which supports and connects groups as they work toward building strong communities) as examples of positive ways to face the Peak Oil global crisis and challenge which can be turned out into a wonderful opportunity to set our civilization onto a sustainable path for the highest good of all future generations.
The End of the World as You Know It
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/041508D.shtml
Michael T. Klare writing for TomDispatch.com observes: "Oil at $110 a barrel. Gasoline at $3.35 (or more) per gallon. Diesel fuel at $4 per gallon. Independent truckers forced off the road. Home heating oil rising to unconscionable price levels. Jet fuel so expensive that three low-cost airlines stopped flying in the past few weeks. This is just a taste of the latest energy news, signaling a profound change in how all of us, in this country and around the world, are going to live..." (...) According to the DoE, renewable fuels, including wind, solar and hydropower (along with "traditional" fuels like firewood and dung), supplied but 7.4% of global energy in 2004; biofuels added another 0.3%. Meanwhile, fossil fuels - oil, coal and natural gas - supplied 86% of world energy, nuclear power another 6%. Based on current rates of development and investment, the DoE offers the following dismal projection: In 2030, fossil fuels will still account for exactly the same share of world energy as in 2004. The expected increase in renewables and biofuels is so slight - a mere 8.1% - as to be virtually meaningless. In global warming terms, the implications are nothing short of catastrophic: Rising reliance on coal (especially in China, India and the United States) means that global emissions of carbon dioxide are projected to rise by 59% over the next quarter-century, from 26.9 billion metric tons to 42.9 billion tons. The meaning of this is simple. If these figures hold, there is no hope of averting the worst effects of climate change. When it comes to global energy supplies, the implications are nearly as dire. To meet soaring energy demand, we would need a massive influx of alternative fuels, which would mean equally massive investment - in the trillions of dollars - to ensure that the newest possibilities move rapidly from laboratory to full-scale commercial production; but that, sad to say, is not in the cards. Instead, the major energy firms (backed by lavish US government subsidies and tax breaks) are putting their mega-windfall profits from rising energy prices into vastly expensive (and environmentally questionable) schemes to extract oil and gas from Alaska and the Arctic, or to drill in the deep and difficult waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean. The result? A few more barrels of oil or cubic feet of natural gas at exorbitant prices (with accompanying ecological damage), while non-petroleum alternatives limp along pitifully. (...) What this adds up to is simple and sobering: the end of the world as you've known it. In the new, energy-centric world we have all now entered, the price of oil will dominate our lives and power will reside in the hands of those who control its global distribution. In this new world order, energy will govern our lives in new ways and on a daily basis. It will determine when, and for what purposes, we use our cars; how high (or low) we turn our thermostats; when, where, or even if, we travel; increasingly, what foods we eat (given that the price of producing and distributing many meats and vegetables is profoundly affected by the cost of oil or the allure of growing corn for ethanol); for some of us, where to live; for others, what businesses we engage in; for all of us, when and under what circumstances we go to war or avoid foreign entanglements that could end in war. This leads to a final observation: the most pressing decision facing the next president and Congress may be how best to accelerate the transition from a fossil-fuel-based energy system to a system based on climate-friendly energy alternatives.
Oil nears $115 a barrel
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/415118
Gasoline and oil futures prices rocketed to new records Wednesday, propelled by concerns about how much gas will be available during the peak summer months. Crude futures approached US$115 for the first time.
Bill C-517: Mandatory labelling of GE food: Your turn to speak out! IMPORTANT ACTION FOR ALL CANADIANS!
http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/en/recent/c-517-mandatory-ge-labelling
By the luck of the Parliamentary draw, a private member’s bill supporting mandatory labelling of GE food in Canada was randomly selected for debate in the House of Commons in April. ill C-517, presented by a Bloc Québécois MP, was debated during a second resading on April 3, 2008. A second hour of parliamentary debate may take place in as early as two weeks, according to the House of Commons calendar. Following this second debate, the House will be called on to vote on Bill C-517 on mandatory GE labelling in Canada. We have a reasonable chance of winning this vote, but we must get the word out now. Not only will mandatory labelling of GE foods provide you with the information you have a right to, it will also pave the way for a gradual withdrawal of GE foods from the food chain. This will also reduce the dissemination of GE seeds in the environment. If it is adopted in its second reading, Bill C-517 will be studied by a parliamentary committee and then returned for a third reading in the House of Commons followed by a final vote by Canada's 301 MPs.
What YOU can do! It is important that federal MPs vote in favour of Bill C-517 on the second reading. The stakes are high but this time, the bill has a very good chance of becoming law. You have the power to persuade our federal MPs to support this bill and to choose us instead of Monsanto! 5 Easy Steps • 1 Message • 7 Minutes - Take Action Now! CLIP La version française de cette information est disponible au http://www.greenpeace.org/canada/fr/actualites/c517-a-vous-dagir -- À vous d'agir!
FOOD RIOTS Begin Worldwide (April 13, 2008)
http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=tAtyjrehu94
LOTS more on this crisis below in item #8 below Why costs are climbing
UN Body Urges Agriculture Reforms to Stave Off Food Crisis (April 15 2008)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/apr/15/food.unitednations1
"A UN body today called on world leaders to urgently reform farming rules to boost the state of global agriculture and prevent a food crisis that could threaten international security and the fight against poverty. The International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) said in a report that failing to take action would put future generations in jeopardy."Calls for immediate action have gathered momentum after riots in Haiti, Pakistan, Egypt and the Philippines as families struggle to feed themselves. Food prices have rocketed in recent months as climate change, China's increasing consumption and the growth in biofuels intensify demand for limited supplies. CLIP
The Library - LOTS of spiritual articles!
http://www.eboards4all.com/360514/index.html
UFO Spotted Over Alice, TX
http://www.kiiitv.com/news/local/17402674.html
ORBS and CIRCLES
http://www.greatmystery.org/nl/orbs-circles.html
(...) One evening soon after we moved in we were sitting on the porch overlooking the crack and to our astonishment we saw colored balls or orbs about the size of grapefruits moving up and down the crack. We thought that this was something like ball lightening, but later, when talking to an old Hawaiian cowboy in Grandma’s Coffee Shop in Keokea a few miles down the mountain, we were told it was the spirit of the mountain showing off for us. The glowing balls were regular visitors during our time on the mountain.They weren’t the only visitors. Often we would see mysterious lights moving around the volcano which would appear to hover and then rapidly shoot off into the sky. (...) As we drew near the shimmering, to our amazement we saw that the tall grass was pressed down into a perfect circle about 20 feet in diameter with the pressed down ring being around a yard wide, nothing fancy, just a perfect circle. There wasn’t any trace in the surrounding grass of any entry by person or animal. We stepped into the grass in the circle center and felt an inexplicable energy surrounding us, as if transporting us into something unknown, a place of power that we couldn’t explain away. We sat and meditated in the circle for what we thought was an hour and then headed up the field in an ecstatic state to the grandmother tree and then headed back across the mountain to our nearby home. It was early morning when we began our hike which only covered a mile or so from our house, but as we entered our porch we could see the sun nearing the ocean horizon. We looked at the kitchen clock and to our surprise we had been gone for almost seven hours. We both thought that we had been gone for no more than two or possibly three hours. We had simply lost track of time. CLIP Many more related articles through http://www.greatmystery.org/events/glastonbury08.html
SAVE THE GORILLAS PETITION
http://gopetition.com/petitions/save-the-gorillas-stop-mining-coltan/sign.html
The forests are being destroyed and gorillas are being killed and snared for 'bushmeat' to feed thousands of loggers and of miners, and to sell to upscale European markets. Reports indicate that up to 90% of eastern lowland gorillas may have been killed in the last three years, and are headed for extinction. SIGN THIS Petition: We, the undersigned, believe that the situation affecting gorillas is very bad. They are being killed at an alarming rate. We know that your respective companies use coltan for your products. We also know that gorillas also need this mineral in their habitat. So we petition that you should make gorilla friendly products. It would save a species and more people (environmentalists) would buy and support your products. More on the issue of coltan through Blood Phones
PETITION: Protect your health from Electromagnetic Radiation
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/bioinitiativeemrpi/index.html
Protect Yourself from Electromagnetic Radiation (EMR) hazards by supporting the BioInitiative Report recommendations on EMR exposure limits. The EMR Policy Institute is putting forward this petition to endorse the recommendations of The BioInitiative Working Group Report. We are seeking support from other organizations whose missions call for responsible public health policy for children, for workers and for the general public both where they work and where they reside. We are also seeking the endorsement of individuals to call for tougher EMR safety policy globally as spelled out in the report: BioInitiative Report: A Rationale for a Biologically-based Public Exposure Standard for Electromagnetic Fields (ELF and RF). Following the Petition language is the statement of support for The BioInitiative Report that was issued on September 17, 2007, by the European Environmental Agency (EEA). It summarizes the importance of the BioInitiative Report and the EMR safety actions it recommends. Petition: We, the undersigned, find that current government limits do not protect the public from adverse health effects from electromagnetic radiation (EMR) emanating from devices such as power lines, cell phones and wireless internet devices and their associated antenna sites, TV and FM broadcast towers and radar. Most of the existing limits on this form of radiation are 1 to 4 thousand times too lenient to prudently protect humans from adverse health effects ranging from Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases, reproduction problems, sleep reduction, learning, memory, slowed ability of the body to repair damage, interference with immune function, cancer and electrohypersensitivity. Based upon the scientific evidence set forth in The BioInitiative Report: A Rationale for a Biologically-based Public Exposure Standard for Electromagnetic Fields (ELF and RF) and a large body of additional research, we recommend that the following limits of electromagnetic radiation be set to not exceed: CLIP
Worldwide Energy Shortages
http://www.energyshortage.org/
Al Gore's New Slide Show is Even More Awesome (9 April 2008) http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1532/73/
Earth Day 2008
http://www.positivenews.org.uk/artman/publish/article_1611.shtml
In 2007 the Earth Day Network (EDN) organised 10,000 Earth Day events worldwide as well as many more in the US. The aim was to disseminate information on a wide variety of environmental challenges, and demonstrating the power of Earth Day to rally millions of people behind our environmental welfare. Of those 10,000, EDN directly collaborated on events in Togo, Russia, Ghana, Somalia, and China.This year on April 22nd people from all over the world will be getting involved in events that raise awareness of the need to protect our planet. Events will range from education packs for young people that teach them how to make their schools greener to providing clean, safe water to remote regions in Africa. Along with these projects, people will be getting together to make their voices heard about the need for senior politicians and governing bodies in their countries to lead by example and legislate to protect the environment. There will be campaigns across the US to get their leaders to take pro-active action on key environment issues as well as pledges to reduce waste or cut back on flights and fuel use.To find out more about getting involved visit the website: http://ww2.earthday.net
Money As Debt (47 mn 7 s - 12 févr. 2007) http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9050474362583451279
Paul Grignon's 47-minute animated presentation of "Money as Debt" tells in very simple and effective graphic terms what money is and how it is being created. It is an entertaining way to get the message out. The Cowichan Citizens Coalition and its "Duncan Initiative" received high praise from those who previewed it. I recommend it as a painless but hard-hitting educational tool and encourage the widest distribution and use by all groups concerned with the present unsustainable monetary system in Canada and the United States. Recommended by Ricardo (ricardos@auroville.org.in)
Call for unification of all Sovereign Indigenous Nations of Turtle Island (Mother Earth) http://www.longestwalk.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=313&Itemid=123
As of the date of this Press Release, more than 100 Indigenous Sovereign Nations who live and prosper in the traditional ways within the current borders of Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and the Caribbean have agreed to gather together on April 20, 2008, to sign a Declaration of Sovereignty, by which these Indigenous Sovereign Nations will join together to re-assert their inherent sovereignty as ONE, inviting all Indigenous Sovereign Nations from all around the world to join. This movement, foreseen in the Prophesies thousands of years ago, is named “The Sovereignty Project.” (...) The creation of the New Confederacy will “immediately” free the Indigenous Sovereign Nations to re-assert their sovereignty, an inherent sovereignty granted by the Creator to each human at birth, which was never surrendered and never could have been surrendered. It has taken the Indigenous Sovereign Nations over 200 years to regroup and arrive at this crucial point in history to re-commence performing their sacred duties to care for Mother Earth, all Her creatures, great and small (and, hence, all humans too). CLIP recommended by Zackoree (zackoree@hills.net)
Behind the Veil: A Look at the Phenomenon of Channeling
Interview with Lyssa Royal: November 1998
http://www.lyssaroyal.com/channel.htm
Channeling is the process of receiving information or inspiration from realms beyond our physical reality. There are many forms of channeling such as vocal trance channeling and divination (using tools such as tarot or runes). Even the simplest form of creativity can be considered channeling such as music composition, dance and movement, and artistic endeavors. The specific source of channeled inspiration is not nearly as significant as the essence of the gift brought through to this reality.From where does channeling come? Most people have heard of the process of channeling spirit guides, angels, extraterrestrials and ascended masters. But perhaps the most important aspect of channeling is each person's ability to connect with his or her own unique spiritual energy -- that of the Higher Self. Without that ability, the process of connecting with spirit guides may seem two-dimensional or shallow. As we develop our relationship with our own Higher Selves (thus committing to the process of our personal growth) the universe comes alive with consciousness that helps us learn about the wonders of God's universe. This article is taken from an interview with Lyssa Royal on the subject of channeling and its connection with the Higher Self. Many subjects are discussed but an overall theme is explored -- that the channeling process can only be as clear as the channel. To achieve clarity a channel must commit herself to a journey of intense personal growth and discovery. (...) When you focus on your personal growth and clear your blockages the natural result is to make a connection with the Higher Self. Once you make that connection with the Higher Self many doors will open. The door to your creativity opens along with the door to many hidden talents that you might not know you had. One of these talents might be the talent to channel spirit guides. If you choose to learn to channel spirit guides and focus only on that and do not focus on your personal growth, it will be a difficult road. If you choose the path of your Higher Self, then the door to the universe opens widely before you.The Higher Self is, simply, the part of us that we all have that connects with God. It is our own individual Christ/Buddha consciousness that we possess within us. It also represents the pinnacle of human potential. That Higher Self exists for all of us and is the higher point of view of life on Earth. From the point of view of the Higher Self, our confusing world makes sense. When you make your own intimate connection with the Higher Self, your life begins to make sense. (...) In our distant past, channeling in its many forms was a natural part of life practiced not only by shamans and spiritual teachers but by anyone with a sincere desire to connect with the greater part of themselves. Today's western world has rigid and dogmatic scientific perspectives that leaves many people feeling the void of spirituality within them. People in increasing numbers are turning to their inner selves for guidance. This quest will serve to strengthen the individual as a spiritual being and, when practiced with humility and an open heart, will always lead the seeker back Home.
NNS - Neighborhood Nuclear Superiority - Tactical nuclear weapons for your home and garden!
http://tinyurl.com/3ytfvw
Community Radio Activists Murdered in Oaxaca (4/09/2008)
http://corrugatedfilms.blogspot.com/2008/04/community-radio-activists-murdered-in.html
(...) The Center for Community Support Working Together (CACTUS as the spanish acronym) released a communique denouncing the murders and demanding that the state authorities investigate and punish those responsible for the crime. The state attorney general said that 20 bullet shells, caliber 7.62, were found at the site of the murders, along with other arms including an AK-47. People are encouraged to contact their local embassies and consulates (or to organize demonstrations at their local embassies and consulates) to express their condemnation of this paramilitary repression of indigenous women and community media projects. Recommended by an anonymous reader who wrote: "I'm requesting prayers from your readers for the souls of these brave freedom-fighters and their families. We are losing TOO MANY OF OUR PEOPLE at a time when we need to be massive in numbers to counter the opposition."
Use secure email providers - Useful advice from the RiseUp Net people...
http://help.riseup.net/security/measures/#use_secure_email_providers
There are many governments and corporations who "sniff" general traffic on the internet. Even if you use a secure connection to check and send your email, the communication between mail servers is almost always insecure and out in the open.Fortunately, there is a solution! StartTLS is a fancy name for a very important idea: StartTLS allows mail servers to talk to each other in a secure way. CLIP
ALSO RECOMMENDED
Global hunger, corporate greed: When will enough be enough? (04/15/2008) http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/04/15/global-hunger-corporate-greed-when-will-enough-be-enough.html
Media around the world are currently feeding off the increasing price of food everywhere. The World Bank chief has joined in with the prediction that starvation is a distinct possibility for many of the weaker nations, leading to political turmoil. The Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) chief says only 14 percent of available water is used in Asia, 2 percent in Africa, with the rest flowing into the oceans each year. If this is the sorry state of affairs, what do our political leaders and their henchmen do at the office every day?The instinctive urge to shoot the messenger is of course misdirected energy. But when you put the disparate pieces of our puzzling world on the table, the emerging picture is embarrassing indeed. A kilogram of rice costs more than US$1 and a barrel of oil costs over $100. One influences the other. The subprime loan crisis will cost more than $1 trillion and the Iraq war will cost the United States alone as much as $3 trillion. Different problem, same instinct. Many pundits will argue none of this has any connection to global hunger, as if these colossal costs aren't real and do not affect the common man. It is all too easy to throw stones at our politicians and bureaucrats. But those of us in business would do well to spend a minute pondering the glass houses we go to work in. The altar of the shareholder has become the convenient excuse for inexcusable conduct. The voracious appetite for dividends and stock prices has allowed CEOs to hold boards and investors alike to ransom. Systemic deception has become acceptable culture in too many boardrooms, with nothing more than a wink and a nod required down the chain of command. CLIP -- PONDER THIS: Trillions go to Wall Street Fat Cats while pennies are spent of feeding the poorest billions of us...
Top 5 Hedge Fund Managers Made Over $1 Billion Each In Last Year (April 16, 2008)
http://tinyurl.com/4qbp3r
George Soros, chairman of Soros Fund Management, was ranked second in a survey of hedge-fund managers' earnings. Soros and the other top-five managers made more than $1 billion in the last year.
A man-made famine (April 15, 2008)
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/raj_patel/2008/04/a_manmade_famine.html
For anyone who understands the current food crisis, it is hard to listen to the head of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, without gagging. Earlier this week, Zoellick waxed apocalyptic about the consequences of the global surge in prices, arguing that free trade had become a humanitarian necessity, to ensure that poor people had enough to eat. The current wave of food riots has already claimed the prime minister of Haiti, and there have been protests around the world, from Mexico, to Egypt, to India.The reason for the price rise is perfect storm of high oil prices, an increasing demand for meat in developing countries, poor harvests, population growth, financial speculation and biofuels. But prices have fluctuated before. The reason we're seeing such misery as a result of this particular spike has everything to do with Zoellick and his friends. Before he replaced Paul Wolfowitz at the World Bank, Zoellick was the US trade representative, their man at the World Trade Organisation. While there, he won a reputation as a tough and guileful negotiator, savvy with details and pushy with the neoconservative economic agenda: a technocrat with a knuckleduster. His mission was to accelerate two decades of trade liberalisation in key strategic commodities for the United States, among them agriculture. Practically, this meant the removal of developing countries' ability to stockpile grain (food mountains interfere with the market), to create tariff barriers (ditto), and to support farmers (they ought to be able to compete on their own). This Zoellick did often, and enthusiastically. Without agricultural support policies, though, there's no buffer between the price shocks and the bellies of the poorest people on earth. No option to support sustainable smaller-scale farmers, because they've been driven off their land by cheap EU and US imports. No option to dip into grain reserves because they've been sold off to service debt. No way of increasing the income of the poorest, because social programmes have been cut to the bone. The reason that today's price increases hurt the poor so much is that all protection from price shocks has been flayed away, by organisations such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organisation and the World Bank. CLIP
42% of Your (US) Taxes Spent on Military, Death
http://www.cnbc.com/id/24033281?photo=2
Make sure to read Why the US has really gone broke Item #10 below...
Credit crunch? The real crisis is global hunger. And if you care, eat less meat (April 15 2008)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/apr/15/food.biofuels
A food recession is under way. Biofuels are a crime against humanity, but - take it from a flesh eater - flesh eating is worse. -- ever mind the economic crisis. Focus for a moment on a more urgent threat: the great food recession that is sweeping the world faster than the credit crunch. You have probably seen the figures by now: the price of rice has risen by three-quarters over the past year, that of wheat by 130%. There are food crises in 37 countries. One hundred million people, according to the World Bank, could be pushed into deeper poverty by the high prices.But I bet that you have missed the most telling statistic. At 2.1bn tonnes, the global grain harvest broke all records last year - it beat the previous year's by almost 5%. The crisis, in other words, has begun before world food supplies are hit by climate change. If hunger can strike now, what will happen if harvests decline?There is plenty of food. It is just not reaching human stomachs. Of the 2.13bn tonnes likely to be consumed this year, only 1.01bn, according to the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organisation, will feed people.I am sorely tempted to write another column about biofuels. From this morning all sellers of transport fuel in the United Kingdom will be obliged to mix it with ethanol or biodiesel made from crops. The World Bank points out that "the grain required to fill the tank of a sports utility vehicle with ethanol ... could feed one person for a year". This year global stockpiles of cereals will decline by around 53m tonnes; this gives you a rough idea of the size of the hunger gap. The production of biofuels will consume almost 100m tonnes, which suggests that they are directly responsible for the current crisis. CLIP
Military Releases High Casualty Figures
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/041408S.shtml
According to CBS News's Pia Malbran, "The Department of Defense has released its latest American military casualty numbers for those who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the figures reveal non-fatal casualties that go well beyond the more than 4,000 US troops who have died so far."
Unofficial US-Iran Group Holding "Secret" Nuclear Program Talks
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/041408R.shtml
Anne Penketh, The Independent UK, reports: "Iran and the United States have been engaged in secret 'back channel' discussions for the past five years on Iran's nuclear program and the broader relationship between the two sworn enemies."
Source: U.S. Strike on Iran Nearing (April 14, 2008)
http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/iran_nuclear_strike/2008/04/14/87887.html?s=al&promo_code=4940-1
Contrary to some claims that the Bush administration will allow diplomacy to handle Iran’s nuclear weapons program, a leading member of America’s Jewish community tells Newsmax that a military strike is not only on the table – but likely.“Israel is preparing for heavy casualties,” the source said, suggesting that although Israel will not take part in the strike, it is expecting to be the target of Iranian retribution.“Look at Dick Cheney’s recent trip through the Middle East as preparation for the U.S. attack,” the source said. Cheney’s hastily arranged 9-day visit to the region, which began on March 16, included stops in Israel, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman, Turkey, and the Palestinian territories.Tensions in the region have been rising.While Israel was conducting the largest homefront military exercises in its history last week, Israel’s National Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer warned Tehran about expected attacks on the Jewish state.“An Iranian attack will prompt a severe reaction from Israel, which will destroy the Iranian nation,” he said.He predicted that in a future war, “hundreds of missiles will rain on Israel,” but added that Iran “is definitely aware of our strength.”In addition to long-range missiles Iran has been developing to strike Israel, Israel’s military strategists see the Iranians using terror groups they back like Hamas operating from Palestine and Hezbollah from Lebanon to launch attacks.Iran has supplied Hezbollah with an arsenal that now contains “tens of thousands of missiles,” according to the Washington Post.IIsrael’s recent war exercises, including preparations for chemical and biological weapons attacks, drew a sharp response from Syria which held its own military drills. The Syrian government accused Israel of preparing for a war which Damascus predicted would be begin anytime between May 1 and the end of June.Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu recently told foreign journalists that Israel needs to confront the threat posed by Iran. Privately he has been telling associates his number one priority is have the Israeli military strike Iran if the U.S. is unwilling. CLIP
Manifest Destiny and Israel - By Uri Avnery (15/04/08) http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19747.htm
NEXT MONTH, Israel will celebrate its 60th anniversary. The government is working feverishly to make this day into an occasion of joy and jubilation. While serious problems are crying out for funds, some 40 million dollars have been allocated to this aim. But the nation is in no mood for celebrations. It is gloomy. From all directions the government is blamed for this gloom. (...) There is no escape from the inevitable conclusion: the government is not working for peace. It does not want peace. And, also, that there is no effective parliamentary opposition pressing for peace, nor any pressure from the media. CLIP
Israel test-fires 'Iran' missile
http://tinyurl.com/63yhod
Israel has conducted a test of a ballistic missile aimed at simulating an Iranian attack on Israel.
Iran would 'eliminate Israel' if attacked (LOTS OF SABER RATTLING!)
http://tinyurl.com/4dfn45
"We are not worried by Israeli manoeuvres, but if Israel takes such action against the Islamic Republic of Iran, we will eliminate it from the global arena," Mohammad Reza Ashtiani was quoted as saying by the Mehr news agency.
Iran raises nuclear stakes before big powers meet
http://tinyurl.com/3lgdpz
Iran says it plans proposals to help end a row over its nuclear ambitions but at the same time it is raising the stakes before world powers meet by expanding work the West fears could produce bombs.
Administration Set to Use New Spy Program in U.S. (April 12, 2008) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/11/AR2008041103655.html
Congressional Critics Want More Assurances of Legality -- The Bush administration said yesterday that it plans to start using the nation's most advanced spy technology for domestic purposes soon, rebuffing challenges by House Democrats over the idea's legal authority. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said his department will activate his department's new domestic satellite surveillance office in stages, starting as soon as possible with traditional scientific and homeland security activities -- such as tracking hurricane damage, monitoring climate change and creating terrain maps.Sophisticated overhead sensor data will be used for law enforcement once privacy and civil rights concerns are resolved, he said. The department has previously said the program will not intercept communications. CLIP
British documentary alleges pope linked to "child abuse cover-up"
http://tinyurl.com/6kclbq
A British documentary claimed that Pope Benedict XVI was implicated in the systematic cover-up of child sex abuse allegations against Catholic priests. Before becoming head of the church, the then cardinal Joseph Ratzinger enforced church doctrinal orthodoxy, including a "secret Vatican decree which seemed to shelter the perpetrators and silence the victims of abuse", the Panorama programme said.This was the 1962 document Crimen Sollicitationis, which told top churchmen how to deal with priests who "solicit or provoke the penitent toward impure and obscene matters", according to a translation from Latin on the BBC website. It imposed an oath of secrecy on victims, witnesses and those probing abuse claims and said that anyone breaking this would be excommunicated, the BBC said.Father Tom Doyle, a canon solicitor reportedly sacked by the Vatican after criticising its handling of child abuse claims, told the BBC that Crimen was "an explicit written policy to cover up cases of child sexual abuse by the clergy, to punish those who would call attention to these crimes by the churchmen." But the programme's claims have provoked a furious response from the Catholic Church in Britain. CLIP Didn't you cringe when you heard Herr George Bush say to pedophile priests (4392 in the US ONLY!) protector Pope Benedict XVI that "every single human life is sacred"?...
Bill Maher: "Catholic Church is the BearStearns of Organized Pedophilia"
http://tinyurl.com/4h435v
Whenever a cult leader sets himself up as God’s infallible wingman, here on Earth, lock away the kids. Which is why I’d like to tip off law enforcement to an even larger child-abusing religious cult. Its leader also has a compound, and this guy not only operates outside the bounds of the law, but he used to be a Nazi and he wears funny hats. That’s right, the Pope is coming to America this week and ladies, he’s single!Now I know what you’re thinking: “Bill, you shouldn’t be saying that the Catholic Church is no better than this creepy Texas cult.” For one, altar boys can’t even get pregnant. But really, what tripped up the little cult on the prairie was that they only abused hundreds of kids, not thousands, all over the world. Cults get raided, religions get parades. How does the Catholic Church get away with all of their buggery? Volume, volume, volume! If you have a few hundred followers, and you let some of them molest children, they call you a cult leader. If have a billion, they call you “Pope.” It’s like, if you can’t pay your mortgage, you’re a deadbeat. But if you can’t pay a million mortgages, you’re BearStearn and we bail you out. And that is who the Catholic Church is: the BearStearns of organized pedophilia. Too big, too fat. When the current pope was in his previous Vatican job as John Paul’s Dick Cheney, he wrote a letter instructing every Catholic bishop to keep the sex abuse of minors secret until the Statute of Limitations ran out. And that’s the Church’s attitude: “We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it…”
Strike Over Vote Falters in Zimbabwe
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/041508I.shtml
Angus Shaw of The Associated Press writes: "A nationwide strike called by Zimbabwe's opposition to protest the withholding of election results appeared to falter Tuesday as police and soldiers fanned out across the country. Many in the capital said they were not aware of the protest. Zimbabwe is still waiting for the presidential results 17 days after a vote that longtime ruler Robert Mugabe apparently lost."
Dozens arrested in Zimbabwe strike clamp down (April 17)
http://malaysia.news.yahoo.com/afp/20080416/tts-zimbabwe-vote-c1b2fc3.html
HARARE (AFP) - - President Robert Mugabe's security forces clamped down hard on unrest during a general strike in Zimbabwe, arresting dozens of opposition supporters before the stoppage fizzled out on Wednesday. (...) A torched mini-bus in the capital's Glen View suburb was one of the few visible signs of anything out of the ordinary as workers ignored the call to stay at home, either out of choice, fear or desperation to feed their families (...) After the double-blow of the soft SADC statement and the rejection of its legal bid, the opposition had hoped its strike call would re-energise efforts to put pressure on the veteran strongman.But with the unemployment rate over 80 percent, inflation well into six figures and even the most basic foodstuffs only available on the black market, few workers have heeded the call to stay at home. CLIP
Zimbabwe inflation hits record of nearly 165,000 percent (April 16, 2008)
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gHsXPstmKhRxsCxqkPms_co9pAVA
HARARE (AFP) - Zimbabwe's annual rate of inflation soared to an all-time high of almost 165,000 percent in February, according to the latest government statistics obtained Wednesday.In a report seen by AFP, the Central Statistical Office said year-on-year inflation for February stood at 164,900.3 percent -- an increase of 64,320.1 percentage points from the previous month. Official inflation rates have become increasingly difficult to access in recent months as Zimbabwe grapples with a world record hyperinflation. The CSO last released monthly inflation statistics to the media in September. The November figure was only released by the central bank in a statement. Zimbabwe is in the throes of an economic crisis characterised by runaway inflation, soaring poverty levels, an unemployment rate hovering at around 80 percent and chronic shortages of fuel and basic goods like cornmeal.While the products are readily available on a burgeoning black market, many Zimbabweans have resorted to buying their essentials from neighbouring countries like Botswana, South Africa and Zambia. At least 80 percent of the population is living below the poverty threshold, often skipping meals to stretch their income, which frequently fails to cover basic needs. The latest increase comes amid rising tensions as the country awaits results from presidential elections held nearly three weeks ago. Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai claims he beat 84-year-old President Robert Mugabe outright, and alleges that is why electoral authorities are sitting on the results. But the Mugabe's ZANU-PF ruling party says neither man won a clear victory and insists a run-off will be necessary.
Met Police officers to be 'microchipped' by top brass in Big Brother style tracking scheme (10th April 2008)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=558597&in_page_id=1770
Every single Metropolitan police officer will be 'microchipped' so top brass can monitor their movements on a Big Brother style tracking scheme, it can be revealed today.According to respected industry magazine Police Review, the plan - which affects all 31,000 serving officers in the Met, including Sir Ian Blair - is set to replace the unreliable Airwave radio system currently used to help monitor officer's movements.The new electronic tracking device - called the Automated Personal Location System (APLS) - means that officers will never be out of range of supervising officers.But many serving officers fear being turned into "Robocops" - controlled by bosses who have not been out on the beat in years. CLIP
The Science Of Sleep (March 16, 2008)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/14/60minutes/main3939721.shtml
(CBS) Human beings spend on average one third of their lives asleep. We know we need to sleep but most of us have never really given a whole lot of thought to why. Why do we spend seven or eight hours a night immobile and unconscious? What really happens inside our brains and bodies while we're sleeping? We've known the purpose of our other biological drives for hundreds of years: we eat to give our bodies energy, we drink to keep hydrated, we procreate to perpetuate the species - among other things. But what is the biological purpose of sleep? It turns out no one really knows for sure. As correspondent Lesley Stahl reports, why we sleep is one of the biggest unanswered questions in all of science, which is why researchers all over the country are doing studies and coming up with some new and intriguing discoveries. --- Here is a sampling of what she found after talking with sleep researchers from across the United States: You can die from sleep deprivation, just like you can die from being deprived of food. Sleep can actually enhance your memories. A single night of sleeping just four, five or even six hours can impact your ability to think clearly. Sleep deprivation can cause changes in your brain activity similar to those experienced by people with psychiatric disorders. Sleep deprivation puts your body into a pre-diabetic state, and makes you feel hungry, even if you’ve already eaten.
Some revealing news
http://www.WantToKnow.info/008/080410superfastinternetnavysonarwhaledeathsfourthamendment
Monsanto Partners With Bayer CropScience (04.08.08)
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2008/04/08/ap4868262.html
(...) The partnership is part of Monsanto's plan to offer strains of corn that have multiple engineered genes to make the crops resistant to pests and herbicides. Monsanto said Tuesday that some of those seeds will also be sold with the fungicide treatment the company is developing with Bayer.The fungicide-treated seeds will be available for sale by the year 2010, according to the companies. The new seed treatment will use an existing Bayer CropScience fungicide called Vortex. COMMENT forwarded by Nattanya (nattanya@telus.net) : "The same Monsanto who is in the process of patenting the pig and the same Bayer who knowingly shipped AIDS infected "Factor 8" intravenous medication overseas. Could there be a worse team of genocidal eugenicists controlling the food crops? They know that controlling the food means controlling the population and with food riots already happening there are rough times ahead you can be sure."
Monsanto's Harvest of Fear
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/05/monsanto200805
Monsanto already dominates America's food chain with its genetically modified seeds. Now it has targeted milk production. Just as frightening as the corporation's tactics-ruthless legal battles against small farmers-is its decades-long history of toxic contamination.
'Now we have the technology that can make a cloned child'
http://tinyurl.com/5z9yuy
A new form of cloning has been developed that is easier to carry out than the technique used to create Dolly the sheep, raising fears that it may one day be used on human embryos to produce "designer" babies.
Robert Kennedy on the Vaccine Autism Mercury Coverup (video) MUST WATCH!! 1 US kid in 166 now gets ill!
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=32019883
Deadly Immunity (June 20, 2005)
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/7395411/deadly_immunity/
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. investigates the government cover-up of a mercury/autism scandal - (...) In fact, the government has proved to be far more adept at handling the damage than at protecting children's health. The CDC paid the Institute of Medicine to conduct a new study to whitewash the risks of thimerosal, ordering researchers to "rule out" the chemical's link to autism. (...) "Thimerosal used as a preservative in vaccines is directly related to the autism epidemic," his House Government Reform Committee concluded in its final report. "This epidemic in all probability may have been prevented or curtailed had the FDA not been asleep at the switch regarding a lack of safety data regarding injected thimerosal, a known neurotoxin." The FDA and other public-health agencies failed to act, the committee added, out of "institutional malfeasance for self protection" and "misplaced protectionism of the pharmaceutical industry."The story of how government health agencies colluded with Big Pharma to hide the risks of thimerosal from the public is a chilling case study of institutional arrogance, power and greed. CLIP
Canadian Bill C-51 Threatens To Usher CODEX Into Canada & the US: WHAT TO DO TO STOP IT!!!
http://tekgnosis.typepad.com/tekgnosis/2008/04/canadian-bill-c.html
(...) The Act gives overly broad discretionary powers to Health Canada inspectors to force compliance on alleged "safety" grounds. Currently, 60% of all licensing applications for Natural Health Products are being rejected by Health Canada. The majority of these are for single ingredient formulations. Buckley estimates that as multi-ingredient product formulations are considered, fully 70% of license applications will be rejected. If this bill passes into law, it will accelerate the speed with which Health Canada is able to destroy the dietary supplement industry because it will enable inspectors to do far more to tie companies up in totally unnecessary red tape. The bill gives Health Canada far more resources to process license applications, which means products will be banned, sooner rather than later. C-51 gives inspectors broad new powers to force products off the market. CLIP
Bangladesh faces climate change refugee nightmare (April 13, 2008)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080414/india_nm/india330220
DHAKA (Reuters) - Abdul Majid has been forced to move 22 times in as many years, a victim of the annual floods that ravage Bangladesh. There are millions like Majid, 65, in Bangladesh and in the future there could be many millions more if scientists' predictions of rising seas and more intense droughts and storms come true. "Bangladesh is already facing consequences of a sea level rise, including salinity and unusual height of tidal water," said Mizanur Rahman, a research fellow with the London-based International Institute for Environmental Development. "In the future, millions of people will lose their land and houses. Their survival will be threatened," Rahman told Reuters. Experts say a third of Bangladesh's coastline could be flooded if the sea rises one metre in the next 50 years, creating an additional 20 million Bangladeshis displaced from their homes and farms. This is about the same as Australia's population. Saline water will creep deeper inland, fouling water supplies and crops and livestock will also suffer, experts say.Government officials and NGOs estimate about 10 million people are already threatened by annual floods and storms damaging riverine and coastal islands. It is unclear how the government could feed, house or find enough clean water for vast numbers of climate refugees in a country of 140 million people crammed into an area of 142,080 sq km. (...) In a taste of what the future might look like, Bangladesh suffered two massive floods and a cyclone last year that together killed about 4,500 people, made at least two million homeless and destroyed 1.8 million tonnes of rice, the country's main staple. Even without the additional threat of global warming, the country's future is under pressure from a rising population and shrinking farmland. The country lost a third of its agricultural land to accommodate more people as the population rose from 75 million in 1971. Bangladesh has been able to increase food grain production to nearly 30 million tonnes from less than half that in the early 1980s because of better farming practices and high-yielding varieties of rice. But many believe Bangladesh has reached saturation point in producing grains, while the population is still growing at nearly 2 percent annually. CLIP
Soot Plays Big Role in Global Warming (April 7, 2008)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20080407/sc_livescience/sootplaysbigroleinglobalwarming
Black carbon, the stuff that gives soot its dirty color, could be the second most important contributor to climate change after carbon dioxide and a key to preventing warming, at least in the short-run, a new study suggests. Black carbon is a type of aerosol - a small particle suspended in the atmosphere - that is produced in diesel exhaust and when wood, coal or other types of solid fuel are burned. Like other aerosols, soot particles absorb and scatter the sun's radiation; black carbon is the absorbing component of soot. (...) Black carbon can mix with other aerosols to form what are called atmospheric brown clouds, which have been observed in regional hotspots over China, India, Southeast Asia, Africa and parts of Central and South America. These brown clouds absorb incoming solar radiation and prevent it from reaching the surface, warming the atmosphere in the process. CLIP
'Unexpected growth' in CO2 found (23 October 2007)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7058074.stm
Carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the atmosphere have risen 35% faster than expected since 2000, says a study. International scientists found that inefficiency in the use of fossil fuels increased levels of CO2 by 17%. The other 18% came from a decline in the natural ability of land and oceans to soak up CO2 from the atmosphere. About half of emissions from human activity are absorbed by natural "sinks" but the efficiency of these sinks has fallen, the study suggests. CLIP
Big Oil to Big Wind: Texas Veteran Sets Up $10 Billion Clean Energy Project
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/041408G.shtml
Ed Pilkington writes for The Guardian UK: "This month [T Boone Pickens] will make the first down payment on 500 wind turbines at a cost of $2m each. The order is the first material step towards his goal of building the world's largest wind farm. Over the next four years he intends to erect 2,700 turbines across 200,000 acres of the Texan panhandle. The scheme is five times bigger than the world's current record-holding wind farm and when finished will supply 4,000 megawatts of electricity - enough to power about one million homes."
Slowing deforestation may be worth $billions - study (Apr 7, 2008)
http://uk.reuters.com/article/homepageCrisis/idUKL06460279._CH_.242020080407
OSLO, April 7 (Reuters) - A slowdown of deforestation from the Amazon to the Congo basin could generate billions of dollars every year for developing nations as part of a U.N. scheme to fight climate change, a study showed on Monday. Burning of forests by farmers clearing land accounts for 20 percent of world greenhouse gas emissions. A 190-nation U.N. climate conference agreed in Bali, Indonesia, in December to work on ways to reward countries for slowing deforestation."Even with quite conservative assumptions, you can generate substantial amounts of money and emissions reductions," said Johannes Ebeling of EcoSecurities in Oxford, England, of a study with Mai Yasue at the University of British Columbia in Canada. They said a 10 percent decline in the rate of tropical forest loss could generate annual carbon finance for developing nations of between 1.5 billion and 9.1 billion euros ($2.4 to $14.30 billion) assuming carbon prices of 5 to 30 euros a tonne.Such curbs would represent about 300 million tonnes of avoided carbon dioxide emissions a year -- about the amount of heat-trapping gases, mainly from burning fossil fuels, emitted by Turkey, or half the total of France. The United Nations wants reduced emissions from deforestation to be part of a new long-term climate treaty beyond 2012 to help avert more droughts, heatwaves, outbreaks of disease and rising seas. Ebeling told Reuters that any credits for avoided deforestation would have to be matched by tough restrictions elsewhere, for instance forcing coal-fired power plants or cement factories to pay for right to emit carbon dioxide. CLIP
Logging Boreal Forest Could Detonate Massive ‘Carbon Bomb,’ Says Report (April 10, 2008)
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/04/10/8206/
OTTAWA - Canada’s boreal forest is a ticking “carbon bomb” and its continued logging could trigger a massive release of greenhouse gases, says a new report. A Greenpeace study released Thursday says cutting down trees in the boreal forest is exacerbating climate change by releasing stores of greenhouse gases trapped in soil and vegetation. It also found that logging makes the forest more susceptible to insect outbreaks and wildfires which, if widespread, could cause a spike in greenhouse-gas emissions - the so-called “carbon bomb.” And the report says a warmer climate melts permafrost, releasing methane, a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide. “The idea is that if the current trends continue … what could happen is a sudden and massive release of greenhouse gases from the forest caused by a rapid outbreak of forest or peat fires,” said Greenpeace’s Christy Gerguson. Canada’s boreal forest stores 186 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, the report says - about 27 times the world’s yearly fossil-fuel emissions. About 80 per cent of the carbon is stored in the soil as dead organic matter. The rest is stored in the forest’s evergreen trees, moss and peat. Older, untouched parts of the forest tend to store about three times more carbon than younger trees planted to replace logged ones, Gerguson said. The boreal forest cuts a swath from Canada’s Far North down to British Columbia and all the way across to the east coast. Most of the untouched parts of the boreal forest are located in the northern parts of Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec. The federal government’s national forestry database shows about 900,000 hectares boreal forest are logged each year. CLIP
Jim Hansen, the Big Ice Melt and the Mainstream Media (9 April 2008)
http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/040908EA.shtml
Imagine you have a choice between two scenarios on the future impact of climate change: Scenario A: Climate change is real and human-caused, a gradual increase in global temperature that we have a long time to do something about (2050 targets) before drought, sea level rise, etc. get too severe; climate change can be effectively mitigated within continuing political and economic business as usual with carbon taxes and more efficient green technology. Scenario B: Climate change is an emergency where we must make Draconian cuts to our use of fossil fuels immediately and globally in order to reduce greenhouse gases in the atmosphere this decade so that we don't continue over a tipping point where both polar ice caps melt completely, sea level rises by 75 meters, and conditions become fiercely inhospitable to humanity and most of the species with which we share this small blue planet. Political and economic business as usual is far too slow and path dependent for mitigation of this scale, so we must innovate a World War II-style government mobilization so that a systemic reconfiguration of the global economy is possible. Thousands of mainstream media articles and commentaries on TV, in newspapers and magazines, inform about climate change Scenario A, but there has been minimal, almost nonexistent mainstream coverage of Scenario B even though its main proponents - James Hansen and his NASA climate science team - have released several papers explaining this nonlinear vision of climate change focusing upon the unpredicted rapid melting of the polar ice caps. Very few people outside of climate scientists and climate activists even know about Hansen's polar ice melt hypothesis and what it means to each of our distant and more immediate futures. There is probably a scientific debate raging in labs and symposia about this new and compelling vision of climate change, but since publics globally remain, surrealistically, almost completely uninformed, how would we know? CLIP
Melting Mountains Called a Water "Time Bomb"
http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/041608EA.shtml
Reuters reports that: "Glaciers and mountain snow are melting earlier in the year than usual, meaning the water has already gone when millions of people need it during the summer when rainfall is lower, scientists warned on Monday."
Home Sweet Non-Toxic Home: Going Beyond 'Green' (April 09, 2008)
http://www.naturalnews.com/022976.html
(...) What most people don't realize, unless they get sick themselves and feel the effects firsthand, is that the typical American home is built with materials laden with toxic chemicals. The most common are formaldehyde (found in plywood, particle board, and other pressed wood products that are used to make furniture, cabinets, shelves, and counter tops) and solvents (used in oil-based paints, stains, wood preservatives, carpet glue, and other adhesives that release dangerous fumes containing volatile organic compounds). Many homes are full of electrical pollution caused by problems with wiring, large appliances, cordless phones, and the now-ubiquitous WiFi and other computer and cable TV transmission systems. Homes that are designed to be hermetically sealed trap indoor pollutants and create an environment ripe for mold growth.Even if a person with chemical sensitivities were to have sufficient resources - the finances, knowledge, energy, time, and wherewithal - to build a "safe" house for him- or her-self, there is the persistent problem of neighbors. Wafts of their fabric softeners, air-polluting particulates in smoke from fireplaces and wood stoves, ambient pesticide drifts, gas-powered exhaust-spewing lawn appliances, and those Sunday barbecues all threaten the safety and health of those with allergies and other environmental sensitivities. (...) If individuals are not willing to curb their use of toxic chemicals and EMF-emitting devices, the growing ranks of the chemically and electrically sensitive will be forced out of the workplace and onto disability benefits, where they will burden the community as a whole. If individuals are not willing to curb their use of toxic chemicals and EMF-emitting devices, animals and plant life will continue to bear the toxic brunt, resulting in more species' mutations and extinctions, imbalances of our precious biodiversity, and pollution of our food sources. If individuals are not willing to curb their use of toxic chemicals and EMF-emitting devices, their children will continue to suffer from early exposure to estrogen-mimicking chemicals implicated in a host of childhood illnesses and low-level radiation, which has been thought to be linked to childhood leukemia and other diseases. If we choose not to take the needs of everyone in our communities into consideration (human and nonhuman, adult and child, rich and poor, powerful and vulnerable, alike), it will come back to us eventually. The truth is that industry's use of chemicals is on the rise, as is our own use of chemicals in home and personal care products, triggering a rise in environmental illnesses. The issue of a safe home will continue to be a problem - and might even become your problem. We are in need of a complete overhaul of the architecture and design industries, including how these subjects are taught in our schools. Even the "green" bandwagon many have jumped on does not completely address the issue of toxicity when it comes to building materials. Ask any person with environmental sensitivities who has tried to build green. CLIP
Plastic bottle chemical may be harmful: agency (April 15, 2008)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080415/sc_nm/plastic_bottles_dc;_ylt=AnohE_GhbINuf11Ueh9Tv4is0NUE
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A chemical in some plastic food and drink packaging including baby bottles may be tied to early puberty and prostate and breast cancer, the U.S. government said on Tuesday. Based on draft findings by the National Toxicology Program, part of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, senior congressional Democrats asked the Food and Drug Administration to reconsider its view that the chemical bisphenol A is safe in products for use by infants and children.The chemical, also called BPA, is used in many baby bottles and the plastic lining of cans of infant formula. (...) Bisphenol A is used in the production of polycarbonate plastics and epoxy resins and can be found in food and drink packaging as well as compact discs and some medical devices. Some dental sealants or composites contain it as well. (...) In Canada, the Globe and Mail newspaper said the Canadian health ministry was ready to declare BPA a dangerous substance, making it the first regulatory body in the world to reach such a determination. The newspaper said the ministry could announce the decision as soon as Wednesday.Environmental activists long have warned about health concerns regarding the chemical. They praised the draft findings of the National Toxicology Program, which cited more potential worries about the chemical than did a panel of experts that advised the program last year. CLIP
High mobile use puts us at risk of brain tumours (April 13, 2008)
http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1159577
NEW DELHI: India could see several cases of brain tumour over the next two-to-three years due to constant use of mobile phones say neurologists, as they debate a recent Australian study that says a correlation does exist between the two.Australian neurosurgeon Dr Vini Khurana's study predicts that the fallout of heavy mobile phone use would be visible soon as the nation's love affair with mobile phone climbs to dizzying heights.In his research, Khurana says heavy usage of cell phones for a period of 10 years or more doubles the chances of brain tumour. It also, he adds, has larger public health ramification than asbestos and smoking. CLIP
MIT Plasmatron - Principles of the Pantone GEET Device - A 2003 REPORT ON A GIZMO THAT COULD CLEAR THE SMOG IN CITIES AND GREATLY IMPROVE GAS MILEAGE -- IF ONLY IT WAS WIDELY KNOWN AND USED!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3kueRyzvlY&feature=related
MIT(Institute of technology of Massachusett) has just launched a prototype of bus whose engine functions with a plasmatron. This new apparatus uses plasma as reformer to produce hydrogen, in order to improve combustion and thus the output of the engine. The particles highly energy of plasma can break the carbon chains of the fuels to form hydrogen. Moreover, associated a catalyst, it would reduce the nitrogen oxide emissions (Nox) of 90%. Far from neglecting work of the scientists of MIT at the origin of Plasmatron (anteriority of the patent of MIT - 1995), it is interesting to note that such reformeurs are realizable, which officializes the principles with work in a PMC Pantone (of which the patent is posterior - 1998). But everyone cannot buy Plasmatron or manufacture it. What is formidable with the PMC Pantone (and which we owe in Pantone which placed at the disposal of all, in the public domain, thanks to Internet), the procedure to do oneself its basic engine), it is that it could be reproduced hundreds of times, and that even at the experimental stage, with now 5 years of retreat, it shows that it is perfectly operational and has undeniable measurable results. First advantage of the PMC Pantone: its reproducibility. The second advantage and not least: not only the results obtained are comparable with those of Plasmatron, but the PMC (Processing Multi-Carbons) Pantone is more economic than him since a good part of the reaction is due to the heat of exhaust fumes, i.e. with calories which otherwise would have been wasted. -- Much more on the Pantone reactor through this LINK
Ultrashort pulse propagation at the photonic band edge: Large tunable group delay with minimal distortion and loss
http://www.uah.edu/LSEG/past3.htm
A study commissioned by the U.S. Army Missile Command, Weapons Sciences Directorate (...) We use results of our simulations to gain insight into the physical origin of this unusual excited state. CLIP Note from Jean: Highly complex scientific jargon describing the discovery of a property of crystals that may - or may not - have already led to the design of the same type of crystal-based weapons responsible for the physical and very catastrophic dislocation of Atlantis... I'm currently translating the part in Suzy's second book where the initial destruction of the continents of Atlantis and Lemuria is attributed to "the harnessing of the power of crystals for destructive purposes". So I was curious to find out if this could happen again today and googled the Web with "theoretical use of crystals as weapons" which led me to this material above which was referenced in this webpage http://www.uah.edu/LSEG/pastres.htm related to a seemingly benign quest: "High Energy Lasers May Put Power in Space -- Summary: It may someday be feasible to build an optically based power infrastructure in space that uses high-energy lasers to convert sunlight to optical power. -- ABSTRACT: More than a billion gigawatts of sunlight pass through the area extending from Earth out to geostationary orbit. A small fraction of this clean renewable power appears more than adequate to satisfy the projected needs of Earth, and of human exploration and development of space far into the future. Recent studies suggest safe and efficient access to this power can be achieved within 10 to 40 years. Light, enhanced in spatial and temporal coherence, as compared to natural sunlight, offers a means, and probably the only practical means, of usefully transmitting this power to Earth. We describe safety standards for satellite constellations and Earth based sites designed, respectively, to transmit, and receive this power. The spectral properties, number of satellites, and angle subtended at Earth that are required for safe delivery are identified and discussed.
There are a GREAT number of possible and fascinating technological applications of crystals. Here is another example...
NY team confirms UCLA tabletop fusion (Feb 13, 2006)
http://www.scienceblog.com/cms/ny_team_confirms_ucla_tabletop_fusion_10017.html
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed a tabletop accelerator that produces nuclear fusion at room temperature, providing confirmation of an earlier experiment conducted at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), while offering substantial improvements over the original design. The device, which uses two opposing crystals to generate a powerful electric field, could potentially lead to a portable, battery-operated neutron generator for a variety of applications, from non-destructive testing to detecting explosives and scanning luggage at airports. The new results are described in the Feb. 10 issue of Physical Review Letters. "Our study shows that 'crystal fusion' is a mature technology with considerable commercial potential," says Yaron Danon, associate professor of mechanical, aerospace, and nuclear engineering at Rensselaer. "This new device is simpler and less expensive than the previous version, and it has the potential to produce even more neutrons." The device is essentially a tabletop particle accelerator. At its heart are two opposing "pyroelectric" crystals that create a strong electric field when heated or cooled. The device is filled with deuterium gas -- a more massive cousin of hydrogen with an extra neutron in its nucleus. The electric field rips electrons from the gas, creating deuterium ions and accelerating them into a deuterium target on one of the crystals. When the particles smash into the target, neutrons are emitted, which is the telltale sign that nuclear fusion has occurred, according to Danon. A research team led by Seth Putterman, professor of physics at UCLA, reported on a similar apparatus in 2005, but two important features distinguish the new device: "Our device uses two crystals instead of one, which doubles the acceleration potential," says Jeffrey Geuther, a graduate student in nuclear engineering at Rensselaer and lead author of the paper. "And our setup does not require cooling the crystals to cryogenic temperatures -- an important step that reduces both the complexity and the cost of the equipment." The new study also verified the fundamental physics behind the original experiment. This suggests that pyroelectric crystals are in fact a viable means of producing nuclear fusion, and that commercial applications may be closer than originally thought, according to Danon. CLIP
A COUPLE COMMENTS FROM THIS SCIENTIFIC BLOG ABOVE:
The Fusion of common Hydrogen is now a scientific fact, see the experiments at http://www.fusionpeery.com/
(Norris Ray Peery who just released - March 15, 2008 - on the Web the results of his experiment has a wide-ranging number of interests as shown through http://www.fusionpeery.com/photo3_1.html - and is offering to sell the rights on his discovery for a whopping 50 billion US dollars!!...)
CLIP
This and the heating and cooling of crystals, both of which give off strong proton emissions for just battery power, will gladly be developed as a weapon.
EMF-Omega-News 12. April 2008
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/4857569/
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A BRIGHT, SHINING ILLUSTRATION OF WHAT WOULD BE GOING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION...
From: http://www.gsinstitute.org/gsi/pubs/12_2007_Axis.pdf
The Axis of Responsibility: Addressing the Critical Global Issues of the 21st Century
An address by Jonathan Granoff
President, The Global Security Institute
as Representative of The International Peace Bureau
Let us challenge those who aspire to political office:
1) What are your plans to address crushing poverty and ensure sustainable livelihoods and productive, just employment?
2) What are your plans to protect the global commons such as the oceans, the climate, and the rainforests—the living systems upon which all civilization depends?
3) What are your plans to eliminate nuclear weapons?
Axis of Responsibility: Ensuring Our Common Future
Many native peoples wisely made policies holding before themselves a question: How will decisions today affect the next seven generations?
Today, the world is interconnected as never before. It is not only connected presently but decisions made today will have permanent consequences long into the future. If our decisions today are flawed, we cannot say how long the future will last. This is unique in human history. We are the first generation which must ensure consciously and intentionally that we are not the last.
Our most critical challenges require new levels of holistic creative thinking and governance that can integrate local concerns with global responsibility. The dangers that used to threaten just a few now threaten the existence of all. Wisdom to understand the interconnectedness of these dangers is now also required. No longer can we afford to think locally and act globally. Humanity’s global footprint must be met with appropriate thinking and policies.
There is an Axis of Responsibility. Three issues require global cooperation, the rule of law, and universal norms. Whether we effectively address crushing poverty, adequately organize ourselves to protect the global commons such as the oceans, the climate, and the rainforest— living systems upon which civilization depends—and eliminate nuclear weapons before they eliminate us, defines whether we pass on a sustainable future.
Successfully addressing the Axis of Responsibility requires new levels of international cooperation. No state, nor even a powerful group of states, can succeed alone. Universal coordinated approaches using our highest values and the arts of law and diplomacy are needed.
Globalization reminds us that we are in fact one human family. The living ecosystem of the planet is our shared home. We would never permit conduct that dishonors our personal homes. Healthy people know that nurturing a family is a crucible of training wherein learning to care for others determines success more effectively that dominating others.
The lesson of the last century is that we cannot find security by attempting to dominate each other, nor by trying to dominate nature. In fact, learning to live in harmony with each other and nature is not an ideal; it is both a moral and practical imperative.
Publics will not empower leaders with the political room required to create necessary changes unless they are made aware. All too often, the media fails to inform the public on important issues. Yet this must not prevent us from engendering the political passion and will to act now. Responsible hope requires clarity of vision and analysis. We must make these global concerns part of domestic and local agendas. By asking the correct questions we can help reframe the public debate.
At the outset, let me thus place before your minds several questions to hold before setting forth the nodes of the Axis of Responsibility:
Will we achieve the necessary cooperation in a world with nuclear weapons in the hands of a few?
Will we achieve a global security framework with this nuclear apartheid system?
Is our planet secure when the problem for some is what to do with the garbage, and survival for all too many others requires picking through garbage for food?
Can civilization be sustained through a global economic order which does not adequately honor the balance and limits of the natural world?
Protecting Global Commons
No nation can be secure when the living systems upon which everyone depends are at risk. Global warming will lead to radical changes in food production and increase the likelihood of disease pandemics. Climate change will cause population displacements leading to instability and conflict. Rainforest destruction—whether in Brazil, Canada, or anywhere—destroys the lungs of the planet and thus the air we all need to breathe. If one country can dump in the oceans, all can dump toxic chemicals and life destroying waste through that country’s flag. We must protect the oceans’ biodiversity and fishing stocks. This issue is gaining public traction but cannot be addressed in isolation. Is there anyone so naive as to think that global warming will exempt any country from its destructive forces?
In this regard, here are some recommendations:
1. Create an International Environmental Protection Agency
2. Create an International Sustainable Energy Agency to advance non-fossil fuel, safe, clean, renewable energy resources
3. Support the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Plant for the Planet: Billion Tree Campaign
4. Complete negotiations for strengthened legal instruments to protect the climate
Poverty and Sustainable Development
Can we survive a world where vast millions lack a simple glass of clean water? A world where half of the population lives on less than $2.00 per day cannot be sustained. It is both immoral and impractical to ignore such suffering when we know there are solutions achievable at low cost. The Marshall Plan worked well, helping to build a post-WWII security system with trading partners. The same principles can now be applied between the developed and developing communities. The Millennium Development Goals and the plans developed at the World Summit on Social Development set forth excellent maps. Crushing poverty is an injustice that breeds instabilities and suffering wherein hopelessness turns to terrorism. Immigration becomes a problem because people cannot sustain their families by staying home. The world is now our collective home. We have to make every room in the home hospitable. And again there is traction and public awareness to pursue a sustainable development agenda.
In this regard, here are some recommendations:
1. Fulfill the Millennium Development Goals
2. Convene a Global Marshall Plan Summit
3. Review and reform agricultural subsidy policies of developed nations
4. Declare that there is a human right to water
5. Advance access to micro-credit
Nuclear Disarmament
Security in all its aspects must be redefined as integrated and based on cooperation, engagement, law, and shared interests. We cannot sustain a world where the security for some is valued more than for others. The greatest present disequilibrium in the quest for common security is the persistent existence of nuclear weapons apartheid. There are now over 25,000 nuclear weapons in the world in the hands of only a few countries. Five members of the nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty – US, Russia, UK, France, and China – have pledged to negotiate nuclear disarmament in exchange for all other parties to the treaty restraint from acquiring the weapons. Three states with weapons remain outside the treaty – India, Pakistan and Israel. It is unsustainable for eight nations to try to tell all others that nuclear weapons are legitimate for themselves but not acceptable for others. Nuclear weapons are unworthy of civilization and the only security against their spread and use is their universal, legally verifiable elimination. Every step towards the elimination of nuclear weapons must reduce threats, enhance security, and promote the rule of law. Nuclear weapons themselves are dangerous in anyone’s hands, and are themselves more dangerous than any problem they seek to solve. We cannot achieve a nuclear weapons free world overnight, but we can diminish risks and begin the journey today.
Also, the weaponization of space will undermine non-proliferation and disarmament efforts on earth. Cooperative security requires cooperation in ensuring the peaceful uses of outer space.
Without clear commitment to the vision of cooperation, law and disarmament, the inequities of the current order will generate greater instabilities and conflicts. Our choice is a sustainable non-proliferation regime with movement toward disarmament, or an irresponsible ignoring of the inequities thus ever more dangerous efforts to stem proliferation through force and even war. We cannot think the status quo will hold. We must either accept ever more violent counter proliferation efforts or get on with nuclear disarmament. There is insufficient public traction on this axis. We know that we cannot achieve a nuclear weapon-free world overnight, but we can diminish risks and must begin the journey today. The process of disarmament will liberate enormous amounts of resources that will benefit needed development.
In this regard, here are some recommendations:
1. Reaffirm the commitment to nuclear disarmament embodied in the nuclear Non- Prolife