Friday, January 25, 2013

Leo Tolstoy on Government and Gun Control

The title for this piece is misleading inasmuch as, In the following paragraphs, Tolstoy does not address the Second Amendment to the US Constitution or the right of citizens to bear arms. What he does assert most forcefully, however, is the tyrannical tendency of all governments. Accepting that contention, whether it is best to respond to tyranny with an assault rifle or, as Tolstoy came to believe, by turning the other cheek, is a matter that readers must decide for themselves.

By Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) By Ivan Kramskoy. Source.
 Project Gutenburg: The object of authority and the justification for its existence lie in the restraint of those who aim at attaining their personal interests to the detriment of the interests of society.

But however power has been gained, those who possess it are in no way different from other men, and therefore no more disposed than others to subordinate their own interests to those of the society. On the contrary, having the power to do so at their disposal, they are more disposed than others to subordinate the public interests to their own. Whatever means men have devised for preventing those in authority from over-riding public interests for their own benefit, or for intrusting power only to the most faultless people, they have not so far succeeded in either of those aims.

All the methods of appointing authorities that have been tried, divine right, and election, and heredity, and balloting, and assemblies and parliaments and senate—have all proved ineffectual. Everyone knows that not one of these methods attains the aim either of intrusting power only to the incorruptible, or of preventing power from being abused. Everyone knows on the contrary that men in authority—be they emperors, ministers, governors, or police officers—are always, simply from the possession of power, more liable to be demoralized, that is, to subordinate public interests to their personal aims than those who have not the power to do so. Indeed, it could not be otherwise.

The state conception of life could be justified only so long as all men voluntarily sacrificed their personal interests to the public welfare. But so soon as there were individuals who would not voluntarily sacrifice their own interests, and authority, that is, violence, was needed to restrain them, then the disintegrating principle of the coercion of one set of people by another set entered into the social conception of the organization based on it.

For the authority of one set of men over another to attain its object of restraining those who override public interests for their personal ends, power ought only to be put into the hands of the impeccable, as it is supposed to be among the Chinese, and as it was supposed to be in the Middle Ages, and is even now supposed to be by those who believe in the consecration by anointing. Only under those conditions could the social organization be justified.

But since this is not the case, and on the contrary men in power are always far from being saints, through the very fact of their possession of power, the social organization based on power has no justification.

Even if there was once a time when, owing to the low standard of morals, and the disposition of men to violence, the existence of an authority to restrain such violence was an advantage, because the violence of government was less than the violence of individuals, one cannot but see that this advantage could not be lasting. As the disposition of individuals to violence diminished, and as the habits of the people became more civilized, and as power grew more demoralized through lack of restraint, this advantage disappeared.

Thursday, January 24, 2013

One of the Many Reasons Barak Obama Doesn't Need to Carry a Gun

Cadillac One, The Presidential limousine



Weight: 6.35 tons.

Amour plated with steel, aluminum, titanium and ceramic.

Five-inch thick glass.

Hermetically sealed to secure it from chemical attack and provided with its own oxygen supply.

The armour plated doors are eight-inches thicks.

The underside is reinforced with a Kevlar mat to protect Caddy One from bomb attacks.

The fuel tank is leak proof and filled with special foam that prevents it from exploding, even in a direct hit.

There are holes in the front bumper that can emit tear gas and fire smoke grenades.

There is an infrared video system for the driver to drive through smoke and night vision cameras for driving in darkness without lights.
 
There is a firefighting system located in the trunk together with a supply of the president’s blood. An ambulance follows close behind.

Defense systems include a pump-action shotgun in a compartment beside the driver.

The tires are reinforced with Kevlar and can run when flat. If the tires are missing, the steel rims have been designed to allow the car to keep on driving at speed.

Powerful people are different from you and me. They have more security. 

Source

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Check the Date on this Social Security Death Index Entry for Adam Lanza, Alleged Sandy Hook School Shooter


The above image is from Before It's News: Sandy Hook Shooter, Adam Lanza, Died One Day Before School Massacre? via GeneologyBank. The story, by Sheppard Ambellas, was first published by theintelhub.com.

Is the above a genuine reproduction of the record of Adam Lanza's death? If so, it implies either that the US police/security services state is at the point of implosion, or that in place of charades to gul the masses the US will increasingly rely on a "shut up or we'll kill ya," form of tyranny.

Story via the MemoryHole Blog (see story comments).

For more about that black Honda see: CT Police Captain Mark Kordick to Radioman911

Monday, January 21, 2013

Aangirfan: Algeria attack — inside job?

Attack 'mastermind' Mokhtar Belmokhtar, who worked for the CIA in Afghanistan.

Was the January 2013 Algerian hostage crisis an 'inside job', designed to get more NATO troops into Africa, to control the mineral wealth?

1. Some of the so-called Al Qaeda terrorists 'were working for BP'.

(BP has very close connections to MI6)

2. Witnesses have described one terrorist as speaking with a 'perfect English accent'.

3. A report in Norway's Aftenposten said one of the attackers was tall and white with blue or green eyes.

Dailymail - Algeria-Al-Qaeda-terrorists-working-BP

4. Professor Jeremy Keenan of the School of Oriental And African Studies told The Huffington Post UK that Mokhtar Belmokhtar has very close links to the secret intelligence services.
 


See also: Blonde haired, blue-eyed American and Canadian 'terrorists' led international 'al Qaeda' brigade in siege on BP gas plant in Algeria

Sunday, January 20, 2013

Idle No More: Canada's Restless Natives

Idle No More protesters, Huron Church Road, Windsor, Ont.,
Wednesday, Jan. 16, 2013. Image source.
Canada's indigenous peoples who, exclusive of the Inuit, I will refer to for the sake of brevity as Indians, have had a brutal half millenium since the arrival of Canada's first settlers. They have been driven from many of their traditional places of residence; their forests have been logged; their open grasslands have been enclosed for agriculture; many of their fisheries have been massively over-exploited; their traditional hunting areas have been bisected by roads and railways, pipelines and power lines; their rivers have been dammed and both rivers and lakes have been made toxic with the wastes from a thousand mines; their children have been targeted for cultural assimilation by institutions that showed a reckless disregard for the health and psychological welfare of those placed in their charge; whole communities have been targeted for extermination with guns or smallpox.

Yet it could have been worse. Genocide is as old as man. Tribes and nations that failed to match the weapons and scale of organization of their imperialist neighbors, have always been in mortal peril. Yet Canada's settler state was constrained to grant Indians certain rights as enshrined in treaties signed by the Great White Queen, Victoria. Moreover, these rights are still acknowledged, even if their exact meanings remain in a seemingly endless dispute and their practical application is delayed for generations.

Cree child, Attawapiskat, James Bay, Ontario. Image
Beside treaties, Indians have two other things going for them. First, despite the tragic past, they are still here, comprising with the Méti and non-status Indians almost 5% of Canada's population and constituting Canada's fastest growing ethnic group. Second, developments in electronic communication provide Indians a means never before possessed to organize nationally and internationally, and to speak freely not only among themselves but with all of Canada and the wider world. The Idle No More movement is an expression of this new power, and makes a forceful demand of all Canadians for action that will give real effect to Indian treaty rights.

Protest, however, is insufficient to achieve action. Indians must present clear and workable proposals to achieve their objectives. The demand for Indian sovereignty is simplistic and unworkable. The Governments of Canada and the provinces will never negotiate the creation of 600 sovereign Indian states within the borders of Canada. And even if a deal were negotiable it would be a charade for sovereignty is meaningful only insofar as it is enforceable, and Indian nations with an average population of only two or three thousand would be hard put to gain the upper hand in a dispute with a middle-sized municipal government let alone a Province, the Federal Government of Canada, or a foreign state.

Thus the only possibility for Indian self-government is through the formation of an Indian federation that speaks with one voice, and which demands inclusion within the Canadian Confederation with powers comparable to, though not necessarily identical with, those of a provincial government. United under such a government, Indians would have the financial and other resources necessary to push forward with land claims negotiations, the completion of which would provide Indians with the expanded resources necessary as a basis both for economic development and for the protection of the Indian cultural heritage.

Canadians and Indians alike, should hope that Shawn Atleo, Leader of the Assembly of First Nations, and Stephen Harper are able to devise the governmental machinery that will provide Indians with prosperous self-governing future. The adoption of such a plan will be opposed by some within the Indian community, particularly some among the hereditary chiefs and elders who have enjoyed the greatest benefits under the existing system of Indian administration. But the more enlightened chiefs and elders will surely recognize that their future role in Indian society depends on adaptation. As the constitutional monarchy still serves a useful role in the government of Canada, Britain and many other nations, so the hereditary factor in Indian affairs can surely serve in a new way under a reformed representative form of Indian government.

See also

Nine questions about Idle No More

Countering Those Who Would Delegitimize the U.S. Government

CIA Document 1035-960: Foundation of a Weaponized Term

By James Tracy

The Memory Hole Blog, January 19, 2013: “Conspiracy theory” is a term that at once strikes fear and anxiety in the hearts of most every public figure, particularly journalists and academics. Since the 1960s the label has become a disciplinary device that has been overwhelmingly effective in defining certain events off limits to inquiry or debate. Especially in the United States raising legitimate questions about dubious official narratives destined to inform public opinion (and thereby public policy) is a major thought crime that must be cauterized from the public psyche at all costs.

Conspiracy theory’s acutely negative connotations may be traced to liberal historian Richard Hofstadter’s well-known fusillades against the “New Right.” Yet it was the Central Intelligence Agency that likely played the greatest role in effectively “weaponizing” the term. In the groundswell of public skepticism toward the Warren Commission’s findings on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the CIA sent a detailed directive to all of its bureaus. Titled “Countering Criticism of the Warren Commission Report,” the dispatch played a definitive role in making the “conspiracy theory” term a weapon to be wielded against almost any individual or group calling the government’s increasingly clandestine programs and activities into question.

This important memorandum and its broad implications for American politics and public discourse are detailed in a forthcoming book by Florida State University political scientist Lance de-Haven-Smith, Conspiracy Theory in America. Dr. de-Haven-Smith devised the state crimes against democracy concept to interpret and explain potential government complicity in events such as the Gulf of Tonkin incident, the major political assassinations of the 1960s, and 9/11.

CIA Document 1035-960 was released in response to a 1976 FOIA request by the New York Times. The directive is especially significant because it outlines the CIA’s concern regarding “the whole reputation of the American government” vis-à-vis the Warren Commission Report. The agency was especially interested in maintaining its own image and role as it “contributed information to the [Warren] investigation.”

The memorandum lays out a detailed series of actions and techniques for “countering and discrediting the claims of the conspiracy theorists, so as to inhibit the circulation of such claims in other countries.” For example, approaching “friendly elite contacts (especially politicians and editors)” to remind them of the Warren Commission’s integrity and soundness should be prioritized. “[T]he charges of the critics are without serious foundation,” the document reads, and “further speculative discussion only plays in to the hands of the [Communist] opposition.”

The agency also directed its members “[t]o employ propaganda assets to [negate] and refute the attacks of the critics. Book reviews and feature articles are particularly appropriate for this purpose.”

1035-960 further delineates specific techniques for countering “conspiratorial” arguments centering on the Warren Commission’s findings. Such responses and their coupling with the pejorative label have been routinely wheeled out in various guises by corporate media outlets, commentators and political leaders to this day against those demanding truth and accountability about momentous public events.

  • No significant new evidence has emerged which the [Warren] Commission did not consider.
  • Critics usually overvalue particular items and ignore others.
  • Conspiracy on the large scale often suggested would be impossible to conceal in the United States.
  • Critics have often been enticed by a form of intellectual pride: they light on some theory and fall in love with it.
  • Oswald would not have been any sensible person’s choice for a co-conspirator.
  • Such vague accusations as that “more than ten people have died mysteriously” [during the Warren Commission’s inquiry] can always be explained in some natural way e.g.: the individuals concerned have for the most part died of natural causes.

Today more so than ever news media personalities and commentators occupy powerful positions for initiating propaganda activities closely resembling those set out in 1035-960 against anyone who might question state-sanctioned narratives of controversial and poorly understood occurrences. Indeed, as the motives and methods encompassed in the document have become fully internalized by intellectual workers and operationalized through such media, the almost uniform public acceptance of official accounts concerning unresolved events such as the Oklahoma City Murrah Federal Building bombing, 9/11, and most recently the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, is largely guaranteed.

The effect on academic and journalistic inquiry into ambiguous and unexplained events that may in turn mobilize public inquiry, debate and action has been dramatic and far-reaching. One need only look to the rising police state and evisceration of civil liberties and constitutional protections as evidence of how this set of subtle and deceptive intimidation tactics has profoundly encumbered the potential for future independent self-determination and civic empowerment.

See also:

Fox Prestitutes Smear Professor Who Questions MSM Narrative on Sandy Hook

Prof James Tracy interview on Sandy Hook, January 18, 2013.

Why Is Canada Providing Logistical Air Support to French Fighters in Mali?

The answer is complicated. Extremely complicated. For an idea of just how extremely complicated, here's Pepe Escobar account of the current turmoil:
 
Niger River, Mali. Image source.
Burn, burn - Africa's Afghanistan

By Pepe Escobar

Asia Times, January 19, 2013: LONDON - One's got to love the sound of a Frenchman's Mirage 2000 fighter jet in the morning. Smells like... a delicious neo-colonial breakfast in Hollandaise sauce. Make it quagmire sauce.

Apparently, it's a no-brainer. Mali holds 15.8 million people - with a per capita gross domestic product of only around US$1,000 a year and average life expectancy of only 51 years - in a territory twice the size of France (per capital GDP $35,000 and upwards). Now almost two-thirds of this territory is occupied by heavily weaponized Islamist outfits. What next? Bomb, baby, bomb.

Girls: Inner Niger Delta. Image source.
So welcome to the latest African war; Chad-based French Mirages and Gazelle helicopters, plus a smatter of France-based
 
Rafales bombing evil Islamist jihadis in northern Mali. Business is good; French president Francois Hollande spent this past Tuesday in Abu Dhabi clinching the sale of up to 60 Rafales to that Gulf paragon of democracy, the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Girl: Bamako, Mali. Image source
The formerly wimpy Hollande - now enjoying his "resolute", "determined", tough guy image reconversion - has cleverly sold all this as incinerating Islamists in the savannah before they take a one-way Bamako-Paris flight to bomb the Eiffel Tower.

French Special Forces have been on the ground in Mali since early 2012.

The Tuareg-led NMLA (National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad), via one of its leaders, now says it's "ready to help" the former colonial power, billing itself as more knowledgeable about the culture and the terrain than future intervening forces from the CEDEAO (the acronym in French for the Economic Community of Western African States).

Read more

See also:


Thursday, January 17, 2013

Gun Control


Thousands rally in state capitals from New England to Texas against stricter gun control laws


Eliminate President's armed guard: White House Petition gets more than 25,000 signatures

FBI: Hammers, Clubs Kill More People Than Rifles, Shotguns


Independent Journal: NBC Admitted: No ‘Assault Rifle’ Used in Newtown Shooting

Blacks and Hispanics in New York City account for 51% of the population but 98% of all shootings. Whites, who account for 45% of the population, account for only 1.5% of all shootings.

Since those who commit gun crime are criminals, and since criminals will get guns whether legally or otherwise, gun control means denying law-abiding white and Black and Hispanic Americans the right to defend themselves against armed and dangerous -- mainly black and hispanic -- criminals, seemingly a recipe for a massacre of (mainly) whites. Its this Obama's objective?

Source of data — City Journal, Distorting the Truth About Crime and Race

Tony Catalucci: 3D Printed Guns Render Gun Control Moot

Carroll Quigley on On Guns and Freedom
". . . [T]he nature, organization and control of weapons is the most significant of the numerous factors that determines what happens in political life." [p. 1,200]

". . . We have democracy because around 1880 the distribution of weapons in this society was such that no minority could make a majority obey. If you have a society in which weapons are cheap, so that almost anyone can obtain them, and are easy to use — what I call amateur weapons — then you have democracy. But if the opposite is true, weapons extremely expensive and very difficult to use — the medieval knight, for example, with his castle, the supreme weapons of the year 1100 — in such a system, with expensive and difficult-to-use weapons, you could not possibly have majority rule. But in 1880 for $100 you could get the two best weapons in the world, a Winchester rifle and a Colt revolver; so almost anyone could buy them. With weapons like these in the hands of ordinary people, no minority could make the majority obey a despotic government.

Mohandas Gandhi Versus Barak Obama On the Right to Bear Arms

How Obama’s Gun ‘Order’ will Backfire
After the 1987 Florida right-to-carry legislation, homicide, firearm homicide and handgun homicide rates all decreased. Eight of Florida’s 10 largest cities experienced drastic decreases in homicide rates from 1987 through 1995: Jacksonville, down 46 percent; Miami, down 13 percent; Tampa Bay, down 24 percent; Orlando, down 41 percent; Fort Lauderdale, down 53 percent; Hollywood, down 30 percent; Clearwater, down 21 percent; and Miami Beach down an incredible 93 percent.

Opponents of Florida’s right-to-carry legislation claimed their state would become known as the “Gunshine State.” But the last quarter century’s actual experience (as of mid-2011, Florida has issued a total of 2,031,106 concealed-carry permits under the 1987 law) proves Florida’s trailblazing program to fight crime has been a tremendous success. As U.S. Sen. Orin Hatch, R- Utah, put it: “The effect of that legislation on state crime rates has been astonishing. The predictions of the gun-control advocates were wrong, flat wrong.”

But no matter. Politicians and others intent on restricting or eliminating firearms ownership ignore mountains of evidence, virtually all of which points to the same conclusion – that guns in the hands of responsible, law-abiding citizens always, in all places and times, result in a safer, more secure and more civilized society.

Thomas L. Knapp: “Gun Control for the Children?” Sorry, No Sale

Jeffrey Scott Shapiro: A Gun Ban That Misfired


Image source: Freedom Bunker.

Gary North: Drudge Links Obama and Hitler on Gun Control. Left Cries, 'Foul!'

ClarionLedger: Mississippi will block Obama's federal gun actions

Judge Napolitano: "Either We Have a 2nd Amendment or We Don't"

NRA President: "Elite Schools In Washington Protected By Armed Security"


No Guns, No Violence:
 

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Sam Johnson: Both a Great and a Good Man

By Theodore Dalrymple


Samuel Johnson (1709–84): Death mask. Source: the visual impairment
and inscrutable disease of Samuel Johnson.

His character illuminates every word he wrote

City Journal, Autumn 2006: A friend of mine, Russian by birth but English by adoption, who speaks English more elegantly and eloquently than most native speakers, once asked me of what, precisely, the greatness of Doctor Johnson consisted. He was asking only for information, in a spirit of inquiry; but the question took me aback, because the greatness of Doctor Johnson was something that I took for granted. If my friend had asked me to name a man whose greatness was his most salient characteristic, I think I would have named Doctor Johnson without a second thought.

“But,” my friend continued, “Doctor Johnson was a writer, and the greatness of writers is in their writing. Who reads him now, or feels the need to do so?” He added that he had never read him but still considered himself well-read in English literature.

Johnson’s quality of unreadness is not new and is equaled only by that of Walter Scott, whose once-famous historical romances are now read, I suspect, only rarely, and with a sinking heart and a sense of duty—even though Ivanhoe is allegedly Prime Minister Blair’s favorite reading. Carlyle, in his essay on Boswell’s Life of Johnson, says that the Life far exceeds in value anything Johnson wrote: “[A]lready, indeed,” says Carlyle, “[Johnson’s works] are becoming obsolete in this generation; and for some future generations may be valuable chiefly as Prolegomena and expository Scholia to this Johnsoniad of Boswell.” This was written in 1832, less than half a century after Johnson’s death, and as literary prophecy was not far from the mark. Boswell has many more readers than Johnson, and probably has had ever since Carlyle passed judgment.

Can a man be really great whose greatest claim to fame is to have been the subject of a great biography, perhaps the greatest ever written? Of the biographer himself, Macaulay wrote (one year before Carlyle): “Homer is not more decidedly the first of heroic poets, Shakespeare is not more decidedly the first of dramatists, Demosthenes is not more decidedly the first of orators, than Boswell is the first of biographers. He has no second. He has distanced all his competitors so decidedly that it is not worth while to place them.” This despite the fact that the biography opens with the words, “To write the life of him who excelled all mankind in writing the lives of others . . . is an arduous, and may be reckoned in me a presumptuous task.”

A great biography could be written, at least in theory, about a man who was not of the first importance. Johnson himself wrote a small biographical masterpiece about the reprobate poet Richard Savage, who would by now have been entirely forgotten had Johnson not done so. But great as Boswell’s book is, it could not have been written about any man taken at random: Johnson found his Boswell, as the saying goes, but it would be truer to say that Boswell found his Johnson. By the end of the Life, most of us are convinced that the final encomium of the writer to his subject was fully justified: “Such was SAMUEL JOHNSON, a man whose talents, acquirements, and virtues were so extraordinary, that the more his character is considered, the more he will be regarded by the present age, and by posterity, with admiration and reverence.”

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Fox Prestitutes Smear Professor Who Questions MSM Narrative on Sandy Hook

Lovely, blonde, Fox News presstitute, Megyn Kelly, the Fox-proclaimed Judge of Kelly's Court, does a great job on Florida Atlantic University professor, James Tracey, who has had the temerity to suggest that the Sandy Hook Massacre may not have occurred exactly as the mainstream news media have led the public to believe.

I think what this remarkable hatchet job — or should one say hackette job — shows is just how awful the world will be if it ever comes to be ruled solely by women: notice how, as the video begins, both women, Megyn Kelly and Fox's legal analyst, Lise Wheel, have their teeth bared. But I digress.

The charge, as announced by Judge/Prosecutor, Megyn is that professor Tracy has:
suggested on his blog that:

"there may very well be elements of that event [Sandy Hook Massacre] that are synthetic to some degree, that are somewhat contrived. I think overall that the media really did drop the ball. I don't think that they got to the bottom of some of the things that have taken place there."
Judge Megyn continues the indictment with her own interpretation of the professor's beliefs:
He believes the media dropped the ball by not pushing into why we didn't hear from more parents, and the fact that we did not hear from more distraught parents, and the fact that they were assigned police officers to guard them in their moment of turmoil means it was all a big cover up.
These claims are not supported by direct verifiable quotes, and so appear to be libelous, although unless the professor has a billion dollars behind him he would be ill advised to try taking Fox News's and Megyn Kelly to court.

The fact is, though, that the professor is surely smart enough to refrain from what is being alleged: namely, to baldly state that, "it [the news coverage] was all a big cover up."

Turning, now, to Fox's legal analyst, Lise Wheel, Kelly asks:
And the question is, Lise, is whether the people who are demanding this guy be axed from Florida Atlantic University have a case to be made.
Wheel immediately spins into a full frontal assault on the professor's, character, competence and career:
What he did was put his thoughts out there as fact and they could be seen as incompetent, gross incompetence. This is not the first time this professor has gone into this. He did the same with 9/11, same with the horrific attack on the movie theatre at Aurora, Colorado. So he has done this. This is his kind of MO, then to walk back and say this is my First Amendment right. Yes, maybe your first amendment right, but academic freedom, no. Academic freedom does not shield you from gross incompetence in the classroom in which you write.
Lets look at this bit by bit:

"Put his thoughts out there as fact." Evidence, none offered.

"They could be seen as incompetence, gross incompetence." They, presumably, being his thoughts put out as facts, of which no example is provided. Actually, the professor seems consistently careful to phrase his questions about Sandy Hook in hypothetical terms. He is, in other words, raising questions that any victim of a terrorist outrage or a citizen of a democratic republic should surely be prepared to see answered.

"He did the same with 9/11 ... the horrific attack on the movie theatre at Aurora." What exactly "the same" refers to is not entirely clear. But the inference is clear enough, it was grossly incompetent.

"This is his kind of MO, then walk back and say this is my first amendment right." No evidence of this MO is offered. When did professor Tracy refer to his First Amendment right in connection with Sandy Hook, 9/11 or anything else? Maybe he did, but it's no concern of Kelly's Court, apparently, to establish the fact, let alone the evidence of an MO.

"Yes, maybe, it's your First Amendment right, but academic freedom no." Again, a straw man argument: no evidence is provided that Professor Tracy seeks to conflate his First Amendment right with his rights under his contract of employment with FAU.

"Academic freedom does not shield you from gross incompetence in the classroom in which you write." Here loose Wheel Lise abandons any pretense of journalistic integrity by mendaciously asserting that what professor Tracy has written on his blog is what he teaches in class. But since she offers no evidence of this claim, it seems reasonable to assume that she has resorted to the lie direct.

At this point, Megyn Kelly brings Mark, the prosecuting attorney into the discussion:
If he has tenure, Mark, is he unfireable?
Mark, who seems not to be entirely clued in to the concept of a kangaroo court, with apologies to kangeroos, gets off in the wrong direction.
I believe he cannot be fired at all ...
But veers back on course, continuing:
for these, what I think are offensive and insensitive statements. Lise makes a compelling argument ...
Well that's good. Tag the professor as making "offensive and insensitive" statements, except that these supposed statements, in fact, consist in hypotheses or suggestions that would seem most highly offensive and insensitive to those with a criminal conspiracy to hide.

Then he veers again:
... but she's ignoring the law.
Oh screw the law, this is Fox News, not the Supreme Court. But then young Mark (remind me not to have this guy on again) gets back on message:
Let's start off with, is this type of speech, assuming it is offensive and insensitive as many people would agree, is that protected by the Constitution, and it is. Look no further than Skokie vs. Illinois, which allowed skinheads to walk down Skokie, Illinois and announce that the Hurricane, I mean the Holocaust never happened.
Oh that's good. Lining up Professor Tracy with the Holocaust deniers. I love it. That's really good.

And naturally Mark did not mention that the skinheads marching down the main street of Skokie, Illinois, a town with perhaps the largest concentration of Holocaust survivors in America, were members of the National Socialist Party of America led by Frank Collin, a multiple sex offender born, Francis Joseph Cohen. But then, the mainstream media had no interest in the possibility that the Skokie march may have served an agenda quite different from that avowed by the march's crypto-Jewish leader.

But back to Lise Wheel:
Can a tenured professor be fired for something like this. I would say yes, all the university has to show is that they're being fired for cause, that they did something that was beyond the course for reasonable employment. ... [when] you're positing as a fact ...
"Positing as a fact:" hey that's brilliant. It's a complete logical self-contradiction that sounds learned and legalistic: "to posit," means to put forward as a basis for argument, i.e., as a hypothesis. But no, in Kelly's Court, to posit is to put out as a fact. And the professor clearly posited, so therefore, he stated as a fact.

But back to Judge Kelly:
He's talking about, "regardless of where one stands on the First Amendment, it is not unreasonable to suggest the Obama administration [had] complicity or direct oversight of an incident that has in very short order sparked a national debate on the very topic—and not coincidentally remains a key piece of Obama’s political platform."
Well, now we know she can read. That's exactly what the professor wrote. And with his rather clunky construction "it is not unreasonable to suggest," he was clearly making a suggestion not a statement of fact. So what Judge Kelly is doing is conflating an opinion with an assertion of fact and then convicting the professor for a statement of fact that he did not make.

Then, Mark the prosecutor, who again seems to forget where the argument is supposed to be going, breaks in with:
He put this out on his private blog. He cannot be punished for that.
Wow, now the Judge is really inflamed:
Suppose he goes on his private blog and advocates violence against children, could he be fired for that?
Oh, good, Megyn, apply the paedophile/sadistic pervert smear. But Mark puts his foot in it, again.
Yes, that's unlawful.
Well that's all we'll hear from him. Kelly's off on a closing rant.

What's funny is watching Mark the Prosecutor. It seems he wants to urge some semblance of respect for legal decency. But all that comes of whatever suppressed impulse he experiences is a twitching of his lips as Judge Kelly runs out the clock with a rapid-fire crescendo of verbiage.

The Rise of American Tyranny


Source: StormCloudsGathering.com


Source: Resisting the New World Order

Monday, January 14, 2013

In UK It's Now OK to Say Woof to a Police Dog

Daily Telegraph, January 14, 2013: Home secretary Theresa May said the Government will accept a House of Lords amendment to remove the word 'insulting’ from Section 5 of the Public Order Act.

The amendment had been promoted in the House of Lords by Lord Dear, a former HM Inspector of Constabulary.

Six years ago police tried to prosecute Oxford student Sam Brown after he said to a mounted officer: “Excuse me, do you realise your horse is gay?"

Mr Brown, who made the comment during a night out with friends in Oxford after his final exams, was arrested under section 5 of the Public Order Act for making homophobic remarks.

However, after he refused to pay a [sic] £80 fine, the Crown Prosecution Service declined to pursue the case.

The following year Kyle Little, a 16-year-old from Newcastle, was fined £50 with £150 costs for saying “woof” to a Labrador dog in front of police officers.

Eventually the magistrates’ decision was overturned by a crown court. He had been arrested and charged under the Public Order legislation.

No Conspiracy Theories Here, Thank You

By Tragedy Restore

Puffs of Logic and other Mind-Altering Substances, December 30, 2012: I would like to preface this post by saying that in no way, shape, or form do I consider myself to be a 'conspiracy theorist'. Everybody knows that human beings never ever ever behave conspiratorially in any way, and that any collusion between men of means in no way represents an exercise of power or influence.

So, let's start looking into this latest mass shooting with a closed mind, eager to cling to the certain truth that our news is unbiased information that is in no way comparable to the black propaganda used to manipulate public opinion in most countries throughout the whole of recorded history.

In fact, here's a former head of the CIA going before a house committee to state on record that his agency has been quite active in manipulating American media instruments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5ED63A_hcd0

Here's a story from 2002 about how The Pentagon plans to release fake media stories to help promote their agenda! http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2002/feb/19/marketingandpr.september112001

Man, it's a good thing that never actually happened! Imagine how confused we'd all be!

Here's a link to the Wikipedia entry on Operation Mockingbird: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird

"Operation Mockingbird was a secret Central Intelligence Agency campaign to influence media beginning in the 1950s"

Shee, it's a good thing that all such activity clearly stopped, that the CIA had an attack of conscience and pulled back from such questionable activities!

So, let's hope we've established with certainty that funny business can never ever actually happen in the really real world of which we are all certainly a real part.

It should make it easier to stomach the following information!

Read more

Those Pesky Heteronyms. A Modest Proposal

Do you ever write their when you mean they're, or there when you mean their?

If so, some people would call you an illiterate ignoramus. Join the club.

But why are we supposed to spell words with the same sound in different ways merely because their meanings differ?

The grammar freaks who devote themselves to pointing out other people's errors  (I don't call them Nazis, since that might imply that they should be hanged, and I don't go that far — quite) would never ask "What do you mean?" if you wrote Its snowing in Jerusalem today, because the context makes it obviously idiotic to take its to be the possessive case of it, rather than a contraction of it is.

And in fact, in speech, we never have difficulty recognizing the intended meaning of a homophone, which is the technical name for a word with only one sound but several meanings. So why not spell all words with the same sound the same way, which for those who like fancy technical terms, would make all homophones homographs — though they'd still be a homophones too!

And just so no one could be confused, why not, where possible, select new and unique spellings for our newly coined homophones/graphs. Thus, for their, they're and there, I propose we adopt the spelling thare, to rhyme with share, fair, heir, pear, where, and nom-de-guerre.
For example, thare are the nuns of Sandy Hook. Some people think that thare wearing Size 14, military issue, 511 Tactical Shoes in a non-suede finish. They departed the scene in thare purple van.
I think it works, and since it spares us illiterates the social stigma of illiterate ignoramushood, I'm (Ime?) for it.

But while we are in the mood for reform, what about those pesky heteronyms, words with the same spelling but different meanings when pronounced differently: for example lead, which may be pronounced with a long e, as in Shackleton will lead the expedition, or a short e, as in lead-pipe certainty.The solution, obviously, is to adopt the phonetic spellings: leed and led.

Arthur Bottomly, Swindler, Fraud and MP.  Image source
The absurdity of English spelling reaches its apogee in the spelling of proper names, as illustrated by an account of a visit paid by the English scoundrel and Member of Parliament, Horatio Bottomly, to the residence of Lord Cholmondley.

Addressing the Butler who answered the door, Bottomly said:
I have come to see Lord CHOL-MOND-LEY.
To which the butler responded:
Do you mean Lord CHUMLEY?
To which Bottomly replied:
Yes. Tell Lord CHUMLEY it's Mr. BUMLEY.
 For more  about heteronyms, see the Heteronym Home Page.

Saturday, January 12, 2013

The Sandy Hook Nuns had a purple getaway van

( Don Emmert, Getty Images / December 14, 2012 )
Two unidentified nuns leave the scene of the aftermath at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. At least 27 people, including 18 children, were killed. Source: The Chicago Tribune.

Military issue?
The photo and photo caption above appeared in the Chicago Tribune on the day of the Sandy Hook shootings. Shepard Ambellas, writing on January 9th for the Intelhub comments that:
the nuns look very official. In fact they ... even have identification badges. The nuns also appear to be wearing police or military issue 511 Tactical Shoes in a non-suede finish. We have also had a local reader ... saying that no nuns [in the Sandy Hook area] wear this type [of] garb, ... these nuns are not indigenous to the area.
And according to this police/fire department radio log, there were reports of suspects of whom "One may be wearing a nun outfit, headed toward Danbury and Stoney Hill, purple van" (just after 1:35).

Maybe this is all fake. "The camera," so the late, great journalist Malcolm Muggeridge maintained, "always lies" and the bit about the suspect "in a nun outfit" could easily have been dubbed into the police audiotape. But then, why? To give a bum steer to those trying to find out what actually happened? That would certainly be a good way to discredit those unsatisfied with the CNN version of events.

Referring to the photo above, Harold Calahan, over at James Tracy's blog comments:
 I knew our Nuns were pretty scary but ...
Three separate pictures have the tall nun with her right hand apparently holding down something, So it looks like a 6 ft 2 inch 70 year old pregnant Nun is holding her stomach – with her size 14 shoes on ...
Note: In my view there is no reason to assume that the nuns pictured above are other than ordinary, if non-indigenous, non-pregnant nuns, of ordinary height, going about the ordinary business of nuns, whatever that may be, and wearing sensible shoes that look to me very much like the ordinary shoes worn now-a-days by nearly everyone, notwithstanding that they may also resemble "military issue" 511 Tactical Shoes.

If, as the Newtown Police are said to have reported," there were multiple suspects in "possible nun outfits ... fleeing the scene in a purple van wearing ski masks," so be it. They must have been a different bunch of nuns to those shown above who are clearly without masks.

But how do we know that the nuns shown above were even at Sandy Hook on the day of the Shooting? We know the police reported someone in a nun outfit taking off in a purple van. So perhaps the photograph of these very ordinary looking  nuns was introduced into the narrative to suggest that any nuns witnessed at the scene of the shooting were, in fact, just ordinary nuns. The idea is outlined in greater detail and in relation to the discarded black clothing seen at the school, in the following video (beginning at 2:30).


Oops! Ssorry about that, but the vid. has been flushed down the U-Tube Memory Hole. It was quite brillian how George Orwell anticipated U-Tube in his novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four.

But hey look:

Blow up the image and, what's that bulge?

A nun with a gun? Image source



















See Also:

State crimes against democracy, By Prof Lance de Haven-Smith

When did the US Republic End?

re·pub·lic  

/riˈpəblik/
Noun
A state in which supreme power is held by the people and their elected representatives, and which has an elected or nominated president...
By Luke Hiken

Image source.
ProgressiveAvenues.org, January 11, 2013: When did the coup happen here, and how did we miss it? I always imagined military coups to occur when jack-booted generals marched into the town square in front of columns of heavily armed soldiers. Pinochet, Mussolini, Franco come to mind – we’ve all seen the pictures. But here in the United States, nobody even has a clue as to when the Pentagon, and its secret policing, “anti-terrorist” organizations took control of the U.S. government and its people.

Recently, the newspapers indicated that the U.S./NATO was sending scud missiles to Turkey and U.S. soldiers would be stationed there to fire them at Syria. No declaration of war, no ok from Congress, not a word from the President. If the Pentagon wants to go to war against Syria, it simply does so. We are already fighting other wars throughout the Middle East – not just in Afghanistan and Iraq, Libya, Bahrain and (add the Muslim nation of your choice), but in dozens of other countries, as well.

Last week, we sent groups of “anti-terrorist” mercenaries to 35 countries in Africa. Most Americans can’t even name 25 countries on that continent, but the Pentagon is making sure that every African nation is on board for at least one U.S. base. That way, we can justify invading any country we want in case something happens to one of our “heroes” protecting Africa.

The U.S. government has secret prisons for “renditions” (torture is what the rest of the world calls it); secret assassination squads (“Seals” in the euphemistic jargon for such mercenaries); CIA “destabilization” officers throughout the world: the list of assassins go on an on. This “secret” world of U.S. terror exists side-by-side with the 1000 identified U.S. military bases throughout the globe.

The ascendancy of an all-powerful, unrestrained military system, unaccountable to the Congress, the courts, or the public, was one of the subtlest coups anywhere in the history of the world. Certainly, the presidencies of Dwight D. Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan consolidated the authority that the Pentagon held over the American people, but nobody ever recognized that during those regimes there was a formal abdication of power to the military-corporate state by the civilian government.

After World War II, with the development of the nuclear weapons industry, there was a recognition that the complexity of modern warfare was beyond the knowledge and capacity of the American people to control. Reinforced by the Pentagon’s propaganda efforts during the Cold War, and the establishment of a secret Central Intelligence Agency (under the auspices of numerous named and unnamed front groups), the Congress and executive governments gradually gave more and more power to these agencies. With the advent of “terrorists” as the new shibboleth, and “Homeland Security” as the front group, the Pentagon and its secret police are so protected that it is a crime to even talk publicly about what these monsters are doing to those we characterize as “terrorists” throughout the world. Whistleblowers are at risk of being tortured and assassinated as quickly and deftly as are our “enemies.”

And now there is not even a pretext at controlling this run-away military/industrial complex. Even if President Obama, or his predecessors, had the courage or integrity to try to control the Pentagon and its cohorts, they could not do so. Instead, we witness one clown after another, sitting in the White House, rubber-stamping outrageously expensive military budgets, and endorsing one unpopular war after another, with no oversight by any civilian authority. The creation of one unnecessary program after another is the standard for Pentagon spending. That Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and General Adolph Betray-us would be “in bed” with each other, is not a caricature of their relationship, but rather, constitutes the normal state of affairs. Hillary will undoubtedly be the next President of the United States, since she represents everything that the Pentagon wants in a leader: total dishonesty, coupled with unrestrained violence against those who would oppose U.S. world domination.

The shibboleth of “terrorism” is merely the Pentagon’s latest excuse for permanent war, and endless drone attacks, not only on foreign populations, but also for the domestic police surveillance state, at home. The silent military coup that has taken place in this country is beyond the reach of our elected officials. Whatever hope we ever had for regaining control over the Pentagon was lost with the Citizens United decision issued by the puppets on the U.S. Supreme Court, and we, like the rest of the world, are left with no government independent enough to fight back. History demonstrates that military empires burn themselves out eventually, but in the meantime, we are facing a long, difficult period of oppression and violence.

___________________________________

Luke Hiken is an attorney who has engaged in the practice of criminal, military, immigration, and appellate law.

Does Anderson Cooper Want Professor James Tracy and/or His Family Members Harmed?

We create your reality, not some goddam professor.


It would seem so from the broadcast journalist’s January 11 performance on his CNN program. Once corporate news media have told us what “reality” is, no further questioning is allowed, especially from credentialed individuals such as “tenured professors.” One has to ask, “Is this journalism? Or the frustrated defense of a news presenter and an increasingly uncertain storyline?”


ANDERSON COOPER 360 DEGREES

Newtown Conspiracy Theory; Gun Control Debate
Aired January 11, 2013 – 20:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good evening, everyone.

We begin tonight “Keeping Them Honest” with the story that is frankly hard to believe. You are going to want to sit down for this one.

Nearly one month to the day of the horrific shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, in which 26 people were killed including 20 children, tonight we expose a number of people who are claiming that the Sandy Hook shootings were staged.

Now, there are always conspiracy theorists lurking on line who comes up with some horrifically outrageous claims. And normally, we would not dig any phi these claims with air time. These claims are obviously sickening to many in Newtown who spent the past four weeks crying and console bearing friends and family members trying to figure out how to restart their lives.

As I said, normally, we wouldn’t mention these conspiracy theories. But it turns out one of the people who’s peddling one version of this conspiracy theory is actually a tenured associate professor at Florida Atlantic University, a state university that get taxpayers’ money.

His name is James Tracy. This is a picture of him. This is what he looks like. James Tracy is his name. Now, he claims the shooting did not happen as reported and may not have happened at all. Here’s what he wrote on his personal blog and I quote, “one is left to inquire whether the Sandy Hook shooting ever took place, at least in the way law enforcement authorities and the nation’s news media have described.”

Read more at CNN.com – Transcripts

For some excellent and some bizarre comments, see James Tracy's blog  from which the above is copied.

Note: the figure caption is mine, not James Tracy's.

Friday, January 11, 2013

James Corbett with Prof. James F. Tracy: "Truth in the Academy"

The first thing one has to do to address the War on Terror is to address 9/11.
Prof. James F. Tracy
James Corbett of the Corbett Report discusses academia and the role of academia as a "tool of social critique" with Professor James F. Tracey of Florida Atlantic University:



Prof. Tracy is currently reviewing media coverage of the Sandy Hook School massacre in a series of posts at his MemoryHole blog.

Thursday, January 10, 2013

Extreme Weather? Don't Worry. It's Normal

It was really, really wet in Britain last year, with 1244 mm of precipitation, more than four feet, compared with only 30 inches the year before.

Climate change is to blame, so the Guardian says:
A month's rain fell in a day last week in parts of Britain. There were 140 flood warnings in the north of England, rain forcing the evacuation of Croston and Darwen in Lancashire; elsewhere, it washed out the Isle of Wight festival. Indeed, rainfall over the last three months has broken new records – following two years in which less rain had fallen than at any time since the 1920s.

This is part of a wider pattern. It is not just that world temperatures are on average steadily rising, the weather everywhere is becoming more extreme.
But Met Office data suggest otherwise:


Image source.

What the record shows is that extreme variability in British weather, or at least in rainfall, is not actually extreme, but normal, with little if any long-term trend. Thus although 2012 was very wet, it was not as wet as 1872. Likewise, although 2011 was very dry, it was not as dry as 1788.

Big, extremely violent storms are also quite normal, although they don't happen all the time, obviously, or they would'nt be considered extreme. In 1287, an unusual combination of an extreme low pressure and a very high tide created a storm surge that killed thousands in England and on the other side of the North Sea. Overnight the storm fundamentally changed the geography of the English coast:
 The harbour at Hastings was destroyed, the old town of Winchelsea, which was already under attack from the sea, was abandoned, and the coastline realigned.

Perhaps the most remarkable feature of the damage was that the thriving port of New Romney was turned into a landlocked town. Massive quantities of shingle from Dungeness, along with mud and soil, inundated the town, completely filled the harbour, and left New Romney nearly a mile from the sea.

The river Rother, which ran through the town, was stopped up by the storm and found a new outlet to the sea at Rye, 15 miles away, a course that the river still takes. In New Romney (a Saxon name, so not very new) there is still visible evidence of this extreme event. It is a draw for archaeologists, because the silt and gravel covered and preserved the town.

Visitors to the parish church of St Nicholas, the only surviving building from the period, have to step down into the church. There are still stains on the pillars marking the level of the flood.
Image source
Then there was the grote Mandrenke of 1362:
The Grote Mandrenke (Low Saxon for “Great Drowning of Men”) was the name of a massive southwesterly Atlantic gale which swept across England, the Netherlands, Northern Germany, and Schleswig around January 16, 1362, causing at minimum 25,000 deaths. …An immense storm tide of the North Sea swept far inland from the Netherlands to Denmark, breaking up islands, making parts of the main land into islands, and wiping out entire towns and districts, such as Rungholt on the island of Strand in North Frisia. This storm tide, along with others of like size in the 13th century and 14th century, played a part in the formation of the Zuider Zee.
The chief difference between now and then is that we now know much more than our ancestors would have known about extreme weather events occurring far from home. Thus many people may be under the mistaken impression that extreme weather events are more common now than in the past. Unfortunately, the media rarely put this information in a context that permits rational evaluation of trends and risks.

Thanks to Tallbloke for the info on Medieval storms.

The Bing Cache of December 13, 2012, With the text of the Newtown Bee's before-it-happened story on the Sandy Hook Massacre


Logo of the Newtown Bee.
Note the date (third line below the asterisks) on which the cached page was crawled.  At the time of making this post, the cached page appeared to be unavailable from the bing.com server, suggesting that it had been deleted from the server sometime between January 9 and January 10, 2013. However, at the time of this update (January 11, 2013) I am again able to access the cached page.

Note also that the cached Newtown Bee story includes an interview with Dawn Hochsprung, Principal of Sandy Hook Elementary, in which she "told The Bee that a masked man entered the school with a rifle and started shooting multiple shows [sic] – more than she could count – that went 'on and on.'"

Dawn Hochsprung proved this account a lie, by heroically sacrificing her own life while accosting the shooter, who killed her before there was the slightest chance of her giving the Newtown Bee an interview about the massacre.

The following is from the Bing.com server at: http://cc.bingj.com/cache.aspx?d=27022733625131571&w=yZ8j1YFE_Mw as it appeared on January 9, 2013.

* * * * * * * * * * * *
Below is a snapshot of the Web page as it appeared on 2012-12-13 (the last time our crawler visited it). This is the version of the page that was used for ranking your search results. The page may have changed since we last cached it. To see what might have changed (without the highlights), go to the current page.
Bing is not responsible for the content of this page.

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Shooting Reported Sandy Hook Elementary School

12/14/2012

State police personnel led children from the school, following the shooting. -- Bee Photo, Shannon Hicks
State police personnel led children from the school, following the shooting. -- Bee Photo, Shannon Hicks
State and Newtown police, ambulance, and emergency response personnel responded to the Sandy Hook Elementary School shortly after 9:30 am, Friday, following reports of a shooting. One child was carried from the school by a police officer, apparently seriously wounded. Other injuries are reported, and emergency personnel have set up triage facilities. Three victims were transported to Danbury Hospital by ambulance. The other children in the school exited school under state police protection.
Police are in the process of setting up a staging area for parents coming to the scene that is away from the school, possibly at Fairfield Hills, to alleviate the traffic congestion in the immediate area.
A state police officers runs toward the school. -- Bee Photo, Shannon Hicks
A state police officers runs toward the school. -- Bee Photo, Shannon Hicks
Sandy Hook School Principal Dawn Hochsprung told The Bee that a masked man entered the school with a rifle and started shooting multiple shows – more than she could count – that went "on and on."All of Newtown's schools are in lockdown, and the private schools have in town have been notified of an alleged shooting being reported at Sandy Hook Elementary School.
Superintendent of Schools Janet Robinson said the schools were placed on lockdown the morning of Friday, December 14, "until we hear what is going on there."
Dr Robinson said it is best if parents do not try to call the district at this time, and the school district will release a message once further information is known.
The situation is evolving.
 
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