Monthly Archives: March 2012

Government Efficiency in Transportation

From Oakland County Michigain:

Oakland County School Speed Limit Sign

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open quoteThe sign tells drivers that on school days, they need to slow down to 25 between 6:49-7:15, 7:52-8:22 and 8:37-9:07 during the mornings and 2:03-2:33, 3:04-3:34 and 3:59-4:29 during afternoons.

The three schools along that stretch of road are Lakeland High, White Lake Middle and Lakewood Elementary schools. . . .

Ed Harris, White Lake Police Chief, said a meeting is being called with the White Lake supervisor, Huron Valley School district and the Road Commission of Oakland County to discuss the sign. Harris said the township did not erect the sign.

“We are aware of it and trying to resolve it,” he said.

School zone speed limits are determined by the motor vehicle code, Harris said.

Harris said it is not a speed trap for his officers, noting that patrols near the school are “hit and miss.”close quote (Read more)

Supreme Court Likely to Endorse Obama’s War on Whistle-Blowers by Chris Hedges

Below are some excerpts from a great essay by Chris Hedges. The only thing I disagree with is his surprise that the state chooses to increase its authority.

I’m no longer surprised when government courts rule that the government is right, and we underlings are wrong. This is Hoppe’s argument for what he calls “a private law society” (what others call anarcho-captialism). A monopoly on justice will always rule in its own favor.

Historian and author Tom Woods makes a strong case for nullification being a better protector of the Constitution than the panel of providentially appointed judges.

The government also gets to unilaterally decide how much to charge you for this “service” and kidnaps you if you refuse to pay, labelling you a “tax evader.”

open quoteTotalitarian systems disempower an unsuspecting population by gradually making legal what was once illegal. They incrementally corrupt and distort law to exclusively serve the goals of the inner sanctums of power and strip protection from the citizen. Law soon becomes the primary tool to advance the crimes of the elite and punish those who tell the truth. The state saturates the airwaves with official propaganda to replace news. Fear, and finally terror, creates an intellectual and moral void. . . .

And a conviction of Bradley Manning, or any of the five others charged by the Obama administration under the Espionage Act of 1917 with passing on government secrets to the press, would effectively terminate public knowledge of the internal workings of the corporate state. What we live under cannot be called democracy. What we will live under if the Supreme Court upholds the use of the Espionage Act to punish those who expose war crimes and state lies will be a species of corporate fascism. And this closed society is, perhaps, only a few weeks or months away.

Few other Americans are as acutely aware of our descent into corporate totalitarianism as Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers in 1971 to The New York Times and is one of Manning’s most ardent and vocal defenders.

. . . .

The Supreme Court has yet to hear a case involving the Espionage Act. But one of these six cases will probably soon reach the court. If it, as expected, rules that the government is permitted to use the Espionage Act against whistle-blowers, the United States will have a de facto official secrets act. A ruling in favor of the government would instantly criminalize all disclosures of classified information to the public. It would shut down one of the most important functions of the press. And at that point any challenges to the official versions of events would dry up.

The Obama administration, to make matters worse, has mounted a war not only against those who leak information but those who publish it, including Assange. The Obama administration is attempting to force New York Times reporter James Risen to name the source, or sources, that told him about a failed effort by the Central Intelligence Agency to sabotage Iran’s nuclear program. Jeffrey Sterling, a former CIA officer, is charged under the Espionage Act for allegedly leaking information about the program to Risen. If Risen confirms in court that Sterling was his source, Sterling probably will be convicted. A Supreme Court ruling in favor of the Espionage Act would also remove the legal protection that traditionally allows journalists to refuse to reveal their sources.close quote (Read more)

How to live a moniless life? Scavenge, beg and steal from the people who still use money, apparently.

This well-meaning man, despite his degree in economic is wrong in a number of ways. Money is not evil. Only being FORCED to use a particular type of money is evil.

Money allows fr the division of labor. Without the division of labor, we are destitute, and must endure poverty as this man does. It is only mitigated by the huge amount of wealth around him which he benefits from in a variety of ways.

Israeli Court Invalidates a Military Exemption

open quotehe Israeli Supreme Court has invalidated a law that exempted from military service ultra-Orthodox Jews engaged in religious studies, adding a new urgency to the government’s negotiations with religious parties over a more equitable distribution of the burdens of citizenship.

The 6-to-3 decision, handed down late Tuesday, declared the so-called Tal Law unconstitutional at a time of growing tension in Israel over the place of the ultra-Orthodox. The law, in effect since 2002, granted exemptions to tens of thousands of religious academy students. It was widely viewed as a failure, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had already said it would not be renewed when it expired this summer.

Still, the ruling will now force the government’s hand to come up with a new way forward, one that will be strongly resisted by religious party coalition members. . . .

Using data presented by the army, the decision noted that last year fewer than 1,300 ultra-Orthodox youths enlisted out of a pool of 8,500, a rate of 15 percent. Among the rest of the Jewish population, the enlistment rate is 75 percent. . . .

The place of the ultra-Orthodox, also known as the Haredim — those who tremble before God — has long been controversial in Israel, but the issue has heated up in recent months. As a group, the Haredim do not accept the legitimacy of a Jewish state before the arrival of the Messiah and believe that the primary task of men should be studying Torah. close quote (Read more)

Soldiers don fake belly, breasts to better understand pregnant troops’ exercise concerns

Historically, belief in an empire’s military supremacy outlasts the reality. Soldiers donning “empathy bellies” is a strong sign that the decline of American empire will be accompanied by humiliating military defeats.

open quotehe Army is ordering its hardened combat veterans to wear fake breasts and empathy bellies so they can better understand how pregnant soldiers feel during physical training.

This week, 14 noncommissioned officers at Camp Zama took turns wearing the “pregnancy simulators” as they stretched, twisted and exercised during a three-day class that teaches them to serve as fitness instructors for pregnant soldiers and new mothers.

Army enlisted leaders all over the world are being ordered to take the Pregnancy Postpartum Physical Training Exercise Leaders Course, or PPPT, according to U.S. Army Medical Activity Japan health promotion educator Jana York.

Developed by the Army in 2008, the course includes aerobics classes, pool sessions and classroom studies on the physiology of pregnant women.close quote (Read more)

Anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan won’t pay back taxes

open quoteAnti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, who is being sued in California by the federal government, said she has a duty to not pay taxes because her son died in what she called an “immoral” war.

An Internal Revenue Service officer, in a federal filing Tuesday in Sacramento, said Sheehan has refused to provide financial information for the 2005 and 2006 tax years. The filing asks the court to order Sheehan to comply.

Sheehan, of Vacaville, told CNN affiliate KXTV she has not paid federal incomes taxes since 2004 — and has not disguised the fact.

“I feel like I gave my son to this country in an illegal and immoral war. I’ll never get him back,” Sheehan said. “And, so, if they can give me my son back, then I’ll pay my taxes. And that’s not going to happen.”close quote (Read more)

Media smears suggest Swedish complicity in a Washington-driven push to punish WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange

open quoteWar by media, says current military doctrine, is as important as the battlefield. This is because the real enemy is the public at home, whose manipulation and deception is essential for starting an unpopular colonial war. Like the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, attacks on Iran and Syria require a steady drip-effect on readers’ and viewers’ consciousness. This is the essence of a propaganda that rarely speaks its name.

To the chagrin of many in authority and the media, WikiLeaks has torn down the facade behind which rapacious western power and journalism collude. This was an enduring taboo; the BBC could claim impartiality and expect people to believe it. Today, war by media is increasingly understood by the public, as is the trial by media of WikiLeaks’ founder and editor Julian Assange.

. . . .

For this, as the American historian William Blum points out, “dozens of members of the American media and public officials have called for [his] execution or assassination”. If he is passed from Sweden to the US, an orange jumpsuit, shackles and a fabricated indictment await him. And there go all who dare challenge rogue America.

In Britain, Assange’s trial by media has been a campaign of character assassination, often cowardly and inhuman, reeking of jealousy of the courageous outsider, while books of perfidious hearsay have been published, movie deals struck and media careers launched or resuscitated on the assumption that he is too poor to sue. In Sweden this trial by media has become, according to one observer there, “a full-on mobbing campaign with the victim denied a voice”. For more than 18 months, the salacious Expressen, Sweden’s equivalent of the Sun, has been fed the ingredients of a smear by Stockholm police.close quote (Read more)

Iran’s banks to be blocked from global banking system

The economic war is now in full swing. I fear the kinetic war will begin soon.

open quoteSwift, the body that handles global banking transactions, says it will cut Iran’s banks out of the system on Saturday to enforce sanctions.

The move will isolate Iran financially by making it almost impossible for money to flow in and out of the country via official banking channels.

It will hit its oil industry, but may also have a heavy impact on Iranians who live abroad and send money home.

The move follows EU sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme.close quote (Read more)

Statement from SWIFT: open quoteFollowing an EU Council decision, SWIFT is today announcing it has been instructed to discontinue its communications services to Iranian financial institutions that are subject to European sanctions.

The new European Council decision, as confirmed by the Belgian Treasury, prohibits companies such as SWIFT to continue to provide specialised financial messaging services to EU-sanctioned Iranian banks. SWIFT is incorporated under Belgian law and has to comply with this decision as confirmed by its home country government. close quote

WikiLeaks Emails: Judge Imprisoned because of Ruling Against Halliburton

open quoteA March 2009 email from a top director at Stratfor (released as part of WikiLeaks’ Global Intelligence Files) shows that former US District Court judge Sam Kent, who has been in prison from May 2009 through November 2011 on an obstruction of justice charge, believed the charges against him were a result of him ruling against Halliburton.

The Kent case saw him accused of “aggravated sexual abuse” and he was later sentenced for lying during the investigation. According to the email, Kent was having lunch of Stratfor director Lauren Goodrich, and said that the Bush Administration’s Justice Department had begun “sniffing around for dirt to throw at me just weeks after I ruled a heavy case against Halliburton.”

The Stratfor analyst “told him he was nuts to rule anything against Halliburton.”close quote (Read more)

‘2012 is not 1944’: Netanyahu invokes Auschwitz in warning to Obama over Iran

open quoteBenjamin Netanyahu has invoked the US refusal to bomb Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp, in 1944 as he issued a warning to Barack Obama that Israel cannot “afford to wait much longer” before striking against Iran’s nuclear facilities.

. . . .

“We’ve waited for diplomacy to work. We’ve waited for sanctions to work. None of us can afford to wait much longer. As Prime Minister of Israel, I will never let my people live under the shadow of annihilation,” he said in a speech given just hours after meeting Mr Obama for critical talks in the White House. close quote (Read more)

Russia must stay “combat ready” says Orthodox Church

open quoteSpeaking on matters beyond the realm of the spiritual, a top Orthodox Church cleric said Russia must play a greater role in responding to ongoing global events that could deteriorate into a world war.

“There are many processes occurring in the world in which Russia should play a much more active role,” Vsevolod Chaplin, a high-placed cleric in the Russian Orthodox Church, said in an interview with the Svobodnaya Pressa (‘Free Press’) publishing house. “The economic and social contradictions that have cropped up in the world are so powerful that they are sure to blow up into serious military operations.”

Chaplin said Russia’s military must remain “combat-ready” to prevent the outbreak of military incidents on or around its territory.

“In order to ensure that these military operations not unfold on our territory or in the vicinity of our borders, we need to keep our armed forces combat ready,” Chaplin said.close quote (Read more)