he is said to dwell in the castle of Kronborg, his beard grown down to the floor, and to sleep there until some date when Denmark is in mortal danger, at which time he will rise up and deliver the nation
Okay folks...get ready to redo your monthly budget ...again. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has decided to move forward with its regulations of serious emitters of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by using the authority that they say the Clean Air Act gives them. So, those of you that get your electricity from a power plants that burns clean coal can get ready to start writing monthly electric bills up to $100 more than last year. What? That doesn't make you happy? Oh c'mon! We will probably feel the Earth cool down in just a matter of months once this policing and fining begins!
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Environmental Protection Agency took steps Wednesday to control the emissions blamed for global warming from power plants, factories and refineries for the first time. The EPA proposal would require polluters to reduce six greenhouse gases by installing the best available technology and improving energy efficiency whenever a facility is significantly changed or built. The rule applies to any industrial plant that emits at least 25,000 tons of greenhouse gases a year.
These large sources are responsible for 70 percent of the greenhouse gas emissions—mainly carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels—that are released in the U.S., the EPA said. "By using the power and authority of the Clean Air Act, we can begin reducing emissions from the nation's largest greenhouse gas emitting facilities without placing an undue burden on the businesses that make up the vast majority of our economy," EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said. "We know the corner coffee shop is not the meaningful place to look for carbon reductions." Earlier this year, the Obama administration announced that it would start developing the first-ever greenhouse gas emissions standards for cars and trucks. Those regulations, which would take effect in 2010, compel the EPA to control greenhouse gases from large smokestacks as well, the agency said. Industry groups immediately questioned the agency's argument. They charged that the EPA was skirting the law, since the Clean Air Act typically covers any facility releasing more than 250 tons a year of a recognized pollutant. That threshold would require more facilities to fall under the new regulations. "This proposal incorrectly assumes that one industry's greenhouse gas emissions are worse than another's," said Charles T. Drevna, president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association. Jeff Holmstead, a former top EPA air pollution official who is now a lobbyist for the energy industry, said the agency was trying to "fit a square peg into a round hole." "Normally, it takes an act of Congress to change the words of a statute enacted by Congress, and many of us are very curious to see EPA's legal justification for today's proposal," Holmstead said. Jackson, speaking at a news conference at a climate change summit being hosted by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, said the rule was legally defensible. "EPA would not propose a rule that did not make legal sense," she said. The EPA's announcement came hours after Senate Democrats unveiled legislation that would set limits on the amount of greenhouse gases from large industrial sources. The Senate bill, unlike the House-passed version, preserves the EPA's authority to regulate under the Clean Air Act. Environmentalists said Wednesday the two efforts go hand-in-hand. "You can't have one without the other if we're going to be successful in moving America to clean energy," said Emily Figdor, director of the global warming program at Environment America, an advocacy group. The move will likely increase pressure on Congress to pass a bill to avoid less-flexible, and what Republicans said would be more costly, regulations. Supporters of the legislation have already used pending EPA rules as leverage to get Congress to act. Senate Republicans have already attempted to block the EPA from issuing regulations to buy more time for Congress to work on a bill. At least one Republican leader, Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, said Wednesday that Congress would try to stop the EPA again.
Some black Mercedes SUV's showed up in Hardin, Montana where a new, never-used detention facility is sitting empty. The SUV's had a strange decal on them. See that photo below. That's the background.
In the video below, Al Peterson, spokesman for the Two Rivers Detention in Hardin, Montana is quoted saying: "we are excited to have a military presence in a town without a police force." What does that mean? Who is American Police Force? Why would a Two Rivers spokesman refer to them as "military?" Who will be prisoners in the Two Rivers Detention facility? What do residents of Hardin, Montana think about American Police force? See video below.
Hardin, Montana - American Police Force Mercedes Vehicle Logo
Barbara Sowell at FaultlineUSA started the search for information about the situation in Hardin, Montana and posted her findings here at Maggie's Notebook. Dean Bremkamp blogging at Do the Right Thing first brought this to our attention. This post will build on their information and will be updated as new information is available and sources are found.
There are three pertinent questions for starters:
1) Is a corporation, American Police Force locating its operation in Hardin, Montana - planning to operate a training center?
2) Is a corporation contracting with the city to use or purchase the city's jail facilities to house prisoners, and if so, who will the prisoners be?
3) Will American Police Force actually be the police force in Hardin, Montana.
To begin, Kevin Flaherty, blogging in New Zealand at Cryptongon.com blogs on private military contractors. He says he "routinely" follows stories about "mercenaries." Crypton.com's [Flaherty] research about APFC is quoted in the Billings Gazette (linked below). The following will give you some food for thought:
Separate research efforts by The Billings Gazette and others turned up connections and similarities between the APF Web site and sites for other little-known defense procurement companies.
All of the Web sites share similarities in design, and some include exactly the same phrases, a red flag to Kevin Flaherty, an American blogger living in New Zealand who writes about private military contractors.
Public records show that the APF Web site, Americanpolicegroup.com, was first registered on May 15, about two weeks after an effort by the Two Rivers Authority to pursue prisoners from Guantanamo Bay made national headlines.
A section of text on the APF site refers to the company’s “U.S. Training Center,” and matches word for word text from the Web site for Xe, formerly Blackwater. That company’s U.S. Training Center is touted as the largest facility of its kind.
APF representatives have said that their company is a subsidiary of an undisclosed parent corporation founded in 1984. Blackwater was started in 1997.
Public Internet records show that the APF Web site is one of six hosted on a single Web server, including a site for Defense Product Solutions.
Both share the same double-eagle logo, and the same company, Purepoint Design, developed both Web sites. No one answered a call to Purepoint’s office in Newport Beach, Calif.
A section of text on the Defense Product Solutions Web site matches word for word text found on Web sites for Allied Defense Systems and Defense Logistic Services, all promising a similarly exhaustive range of military products and services.
Public records for those companies and others with similar Web sites – including Defense Contracting and Consulting, and Worldwide Military Exchange – all show connections to Edward Angelino, a government contractor in Huntington Beach, Calif.
There is this from an original Cryptogon.com post from Flaherty on September 14th [snippets, not continguous]:
An attorney for American Police Force, Maziar Mafi, describes the Santa Ana, Calif., company as a fledgling spin-off of a major security firm founded in 1984. But Mafi declined to name the parent firm or provide details on how the company will finance its jail operations.
On its elaborate Web site and in interviews with company representatives, American Police Force claims to sell assault rifles and other weapons in Afghanistan on behalf of the U.S. military while providing security, investigative work and other services to clients “in all 50 states and most countries.”
However, an Associated Press search of two comprehensive federal government contractor databases turned up no record of American Police Force.
American Police Force also is promising to invest $30 million in new projects for the city, including a military and law enforcement training center with a 250-bed dormitory and an expansion of the jail to 2,000 beds. The company says it will build a homeless shelter, offer free health care for city residents and even deliver meals to the needy.
The same report adds this intriguing detail. An AP reporter visited the offices of APF in Santa Ana, CA, and found "Captain Michael behind a desk there:
The man said his boss is a retired U.S. Army colonel named Richard Culver who is currently overseas. Culver’s role with the company could not be immediately verified.
The company claim of a headquarters address is just up the street from the White House.
The K Street building houses “virtual offices,” where clients pay to use the prestigious Pennsylvania Avenue address and gain access to onsite conference rooms but have no permanent presence. [APFC has an application pending]
Follow the developing story at Cryptongon.com. We all need to get into Flaherty's reporting on this.
*****
Research about The American Police Force (APF):
*) This is their website. The url reads www.americanpolicegroup.com. They do not refer to themselves as a corporation, but an "organization." Apparently, the website, since this hit the news, is not always available. AFC says this:
As part of our mission, APF plays a critical role in helping the U.S. government meet vital homeland security and national defense needs. Within the last 5 years the United States has been far and away our #1 client.
*) The American Police Force was incorporated in California in March 2009 Says they specialize in "training military and security forces oversees. Michael Hilton seems to be the spokesman for the company.
*) APF has black SUV's with a never-used Hardin logo which says "City of Hardin Police Force."
APF's Michael Hilton says they are looking for ground for "a planned tactical military training ground." They need 5000-10,000 acres.
*) Some APF representatives are staying at a bed-and-breakfast in Hardin.
*) APF plans to hire 200 locally. They have hired the company's first local employee:
On Friday, American Police Force announced its first local hire: a reporter for the Billings Gazette, Becky Shay, who has covered events surrounding the jail since its construction. She will be the company's spokeswoman for $60,000 a year.
Shay said she intended to bring new transparency to the process, but declined to directly answer the first question posed to her: Where is American Police Force getting the money to operate the jail and build the training center?
“I know enough about where the money is coming from to be confident signing on with them,” she said.
*) CBS Crimesider reports "significant obstacles" for APFC, including no signed contracts to bring in prisoners from outside Montana.
*) Hilton is reported to say that the company will begin payments to Hardin on February 1, 2010, and said their agreement with the city is worth at least $2.6 million annually.
*****
Information about Hardin, Montana and the city's interaction with APFC:
**) Hardin, Montana has a never used "detention" facility known as Two Rivers. Two Rivers Detention Center cost $27 million and the bonds have been in default since May 2008. It has never been used - no prisoners ever. Two Rivers can accommodate 464 prisoners.
**) Hardin has not had a police force in the last 30 years. The Sheriff of Big Horn Countyserves the town.
**) The city of Hardin offered the facility to house prisoners from Guantanamo Bay. Montana Governor, Brian Schweitzer, has opposed bringing in prisoners from outside the state. In 2007, the Montana Attorney General said it was illegal to bring in prisoners from outside Montana. Hardin sued the State and won.
**) The city announced an agreement with APF two weeks ago, but there appears to be no signed agreement.
*****
Information on the "logo" or decal depicted above: It appears the decals have now been removed from the Mercedes SUV's. Here are some thoughts from PrisonPlanet. Follow PrisonPlanet here:
An image on KULR’s Web site shows the insignia on the APF vehicles, which has caused some concern on the Internet as being of conspiratorial origin.
APF’s coat of arms, a clearer version of which appeared on the group’s Web site (which had been taken down at time of this writing but is viewable here), shows a double-headed eagle with a red shield and white cross borne on its breast.
The coat appears very similar to the insignia attributed to one Prince Aleksandar Karageorgevich, based on RAW STORY’s analysis of images hosted by Burke’s Peerage & Gentry International Register of Arms. The site notes the coat as hailing from the Royal crown of Serbia.
However, the significance or implied nationality of the insignia’s crown could not immediately be identified.
I have made no bones about it...that after both of the Israeli IDF soldiers were killed by Hezbollah, that Israel should do anything to get Gilad Shalit back alive from Hamas. I think it is important to Israel to see this young man returned home - alive and well. What I've also said is that once Shalit is safe and sound in Israel, that the Israelis should make Hamas pay for this capture....dearly. So, I think this latest news is encouraging in that the Israelis have made a deal with Hamas - Hamas will provide a videotape proving Shalit is still alive and in exchange, the Israelis will release 20 Palestinian women from prison.
From the article at Breitbart(and don't ask me why this report spells it "Schalit"):
Israel and Hamas militants announced a deal Wednesday that will see Israel release 20 Palestinian women from prison this week in exchange for a videotape proving that a captive Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip is still alive. The decision was the first tangible sign of movement in more than three years of talks over the release of the soldier, Sgt. Gilad Schalit, who has not been seen since he was captured by Hamas-linked militants in a cross-border raid in June, 2006.
To me, this deal signals that once the Israelis are convinced that Shalit is okay, they will make the distasteful deal that will have to be made to get Shalit back. And I know that deal will disgust me but again, there is time for retribution AFTER this young man is back in his parents' arms.
Israel moves closer to freeing captive soldier
JERUSALEM (AP) - Israel and Hamas militants announced a deal Wednesday that will see Israel release 20 Palestinian women from prison this week in exchange for a videotape proving that a captive Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip is still alive. The decision was the first tangible sign of movement in more than three years of talks over the release of the soldier, Sgt. Gilad Schalit, who has not been seen since he was captured by Hamas-linked militants in a cross-border raid in June, 2006.
Schalit's release, which does not appear imminent, would defuse a central point of contention and could help ease a crippling Israeli blockade on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. In a statement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said Wednesday that it expects Schalit's Hamas captors to release a recent videotape of the soldier. The deal is to be carried out on Friday. The statement said Israel's Security Cabinet accepted the deal, put forward by Egyptian and German mediators, as a "confidence-building measure." It quoted a senior official in Netanyahu's office as saying the negotiations are still "expected to be long and difficult." The deal was carried out, the statement said, "ahead of the critical stages in the negotiations for the release of Gilad Schalit and based on Israel's commitment to work with determination to bring him home quickly." Hamas is demanding that Israel release hundreds of prisoners, many of whom are serving lengthy sentences for violent attacks on Israelis, in exchange for the soldier. Israel has balked at many of Hamas' demands. In Gaza, a Hamas spokesman using the pseudonym Abu Obeida confirmed that 20 female prisoners were expected to be released in the coming days. He made no mention of a videotape of Schalit, saying only that Hamas would respond by "clarifying" the soldier's condition. "This simple deal is a precursor, God willing, to a comprehensive deal," he said. He said the prisoners would come from various Palestinian factions, including Hamas, the rival Fatah movement and Islamic Jihad, and that one was from Gaza while the rest were from the Fatah-controlled West Bank. Israel says that while the women were jailed for security-related offenses they were not directly involved in killing Israelis and are all within two years of the end of their prison sentences. Their names were to be published Wednesday, allowing a legally mandated 48-hour period for court appeals against their release before the deal is carried out. A senior Egyptian official involved in the mediation said the move was designed to create "an atmosphere of trust." "There is no doubt that this step will support the efforts of all sides to solve the problem," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity under security guidelines. Egypt has been trying to mediate a prisoner swap since Hamas-linked militants tunneled into Israel in June 2006 and attacked an Israeli tank, killing two crewmen and capturing Schalit. The Israeli soldier has not been seen since his capture and the Red Cross has not been allowed to visit him. But several letters and an audio recording have been released by his captors. Netanyahu believes it is important that the world know Schalit is alive and well and that his safety is Hamas' responsibility, according to the statement from his office. Both Hamas and Israel appear eager to wrap up a deal. For Israel, the return of Schalit would end a painful chapter. In a country where military service is mandatory, Israelis have rallied behind the soldier and his family, holding protests calling for his release and decorating their cars with bumper stickers bearing his name. One news anchor even ends his broadcast each night by mentioning how long Schalit has been in captivity. Hamas, meanwhile, wants to end a painful Israeli-led economic blockade of Gaza that has caused widespread shortages of many basic items. These shortages have prevented Hamas from repairing the massive damage caused in Gaza by an Israeli military offensive last winter. Israel imposed the blockade after Hamas, a violent group backed by Iran and Syria, seized power in Gaza two years ago. Officials have said the embargo will not be lifted until Schalit comes home. The closure has led to a bustling smuggling business along Gaza's border with Egypt. On Wednesday, two smugglers were killed and four were injured when a tunnel under the border collapsed. A paramedic said the men were working in a tunnel in an area struck by the Israeli military the night before. The Israeli army confirmed it targeted three tunnels in response to rocket and mortar fire from Gaza in the previous two days. Israel says the tunnels are used to smuggle weapons into Gaza. More than 120 people have died in tunnel collapses since 2007.
Well, Gore Vidal has plenty of slams for the President that he helped get into office but he also has a major slam for the American people. From the article at TimesOnline, look at what good old Gore said about us, Americans:
America has no intellectual class and is rotting away at a funereal pace, he believes. “We’ll have a military dictatorship soon, on the basis nobody else can hold everything together. Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people. His problem is being overeducated. He doesn’t realise how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is.”
Full story here:
US under Obama could slide into military dictatorship, says Gore Vidal
Barack Obama is failing as President and the US is in danger of sliding into a military dictatorship, says Gore Vidal, the American essayist and intellectual. In an exclusive interview with The Times, Vidal, 83, reveals that he regrets switching his allegiance from Hillary Clinton to Mr Obama during last year’s campaign to secure the Democratic presidential nomination. “I was hopeful,” he said of Mr Obama. “He was the most intelligent person we’ve had in that position for a long time. But he’s inexperienced. He has a total inability to understand military matters. He’s acting as if Afghanistan is the magic talisman: solve that and you solve terrorism.” America should leave Afghanistan, Vidal said. “We’ve failed in every other aspect of our effort of conquering the Middle East or whatever you want to call it.” Vidal, a friend of President John F. Kennedy, became an Obama backer because he “grew up in a black city” (Washington) and was impressed by Obama’s intelligence.
On Mr Obama’s plan to reform healthcare, he said: “He f***** it up. I don’t know how, because the country wanted it. We’ll never see it happen.” Vidal added: "He loves quoting Lincoln and there’s a great Lincoln quote from a letter he wrote to one of his generals in the South after the Civil War. ’I am President of the United States. I have full overall power and never forget it, because I will exercise it’. That’s what Obama needs - a bit of Lincoln’s chill.” He also predicted Obama may be assassinated: “Just one lone gunman lurking in the shadows of the capital.” America has no intellectual class and is rotting away at a funereal pace, he believes. “We’ll have a military dictatorship soon, on the basis nobody else can hold everything together. Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people. His problem is being overeducated. He doesn’t realise how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is.”
PAGING! PAGING! "Will 360 virgins please report to the lobby of Hell"
Yes, this morning we have the report that a predator drone attack in South Waziristan at a Taliban commander's home has left three Pakistani Taliban dead along with two of their imported pals from Uzbekistan. There isn't word yet if the owner of the home, Taliban commander Irfan Mehsud was killed or not. Also, there were six Taliban wounded in the attack so hopefully, they are busy wandering the hillsides telling all their Taliban buddies that one minute they were yucking it up, the next their flesh was on fire.
This strike also points out something else. If you live in South or North Waziristan, and your last name is "Mehsud"....you may want to just get your ass out of the area.
Suspected U.S. drone attack kills five in Pakistan
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - A suspected U.S. drone aircraft fired two missiles Tuesday at a Taliban commander's house in Pakistan's South Waziristan region, killing five militants, intelligence officials said. The strike took place about 60 km (40 miles) northeast of Wana, the main town in South Waziristan, the Pakistani officials said. South Waziristan is on the Afghan border and a sanctuary for al Qaeda and Taliban militants. "The house of the commander has been completely destroyed and five dead bodies, three Pakistanis and two Uzbeks, have been recovered," one of the intelligence officials, who declined to be identified, told Reuters. He identified the commander as Irfan Mehsud. Residents said six militants were wounded and that Pakistani Taliban fighters had cordoned off the area and were not letting people approach. The United States stepped up its attacks by pilotless drones on militants in northwestern Pakistani border sanctuaries last year as the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan intensified. There have been nearly 60 such strikes since the beginning of 2008, including one in early August that killed Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud. About 500 people, most of them militants, have been killed in the strikes since early last year, according to a tally of reports from Pakistani security officials and residents. Pakistan officially objects to the drone strikes, saying they violate its sovereignty and the civilian casualties they sometimes inflict inflame public anger. U.S. officials say the strikes are carried out under an agreement with Islamabad that allows Pakistani leaders to decry the attacks in public. Late Monday, a drone fired a missile at the house of a Taliban supporter in the North Waziristan region, which is also on the Afghan border, but it missed and caused no casualties, Pakistani security agents in the region said.
I received an alert from a Holger Awakens reader about a scheduled appearance by home grown American communist terrorists, Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn in Wisconsin. More specifically, this pair of jihadis will be speaking on October 10, 2009 in Madison, Wisconsin.
CALL TO ACTION:
Everyone please assist in stopping this pair of misfits and murderers from speaking at this event by contacting the host of the event and sharing your outrage that they would disgrace Wisconsin and U.S. soil by providing a forum for the hate spewed by these two. Here's the contact information for the host of this event:
Feel free to also send any emails or phone calls to State and Local Government officials in Wisconsin.
In the event that the Wisconsin Humanities Council decides to allow these two subversives to speak, perhaps a welcoming committee of concerned Americans might make this a more memorable event for the Ayers' - a few signs, a few poster boards, a few unnerving questions might just remind Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dorhn that they truly are not welcome anywhere in this country outside of their Chicago apartment.
Okay, ever since Barack Hussein Obama took office, we have seen a startling surge forward towards implementation of the Marxist ideals he holds so dear. In case some of you haven't been paying attention, let me point out a couple of pillars of Communism put forth by Karl Marx and his pal Frederich Engels in "The Communist Manifesto":
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.
Now, I think all of us agree that what is in store for all of us, based upon the current deficits facing America, that this pillar is just around the corner (hell, we're already there in many cases) - but we have seen new proposals today that Americans be hit with a VAT - it's progressive, for sure.
5. Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.
Umm....has anyone noticed the control that the Federal government has now over the financial institutions of America? Can you say, "stress test" ?
Anyway, just the other day Barack Hussein Obama decided to float the idea that American children should stay in school year round because our children are falling behind others in the world. Obama is saying that America's children aren't putting enough time in at school and since this announcement, many on the Right have come forward to question the control that Obama is trying to wield. Many have tried to analyze what Obama's real motives are here. Well, I decided to join in.
First, look at this quote from the article on Obama's new school year plan from Yahoo News:
"Our school calendar is based upon the agrarian economy and not too many of our kids are working the fields today," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a recent interview with The Associated Press.
Okay, so Obama's Education Secretary is pointing out that in today's society, we just don't have kids needed on the family farm during the late spring, summer and early fall months. Oh really, Mr. Duncan? Hmmm....perhaps Mr. Duncan hasn't spent too much time in the states of Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, North Dakota, etc. I would propose that a good number of students in rural schools in those states and others ARE needed on family farms...but wait....hold on just a second here. What if Obama's plan wasn't even about our kids getting smarter? What if Obama's plan was more sinister?
Let's do a quick review: Obama has seen to it that the Federal government is heavily involved now in the financial/banking markets, the Federal government has ownership in the top manufacturing sectors of America and as for the communications in this Land, I believe we can certainly cede television as nearly state run and the President recently sought power to shut the internet down for governmental purposes if need be. So let's see...what doesn't the government have control of? Hmmm.....hey! Could it be food?
Quick, let's go back and check out what Obama's buddy Karl Marx had to say with another pillar of Communism:
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.
Interesting, wouldn't you say? Let me lay this out, plain and simple. America's family farmers are already an endangered species but they still account for a good deal of the food produced in America. If the family farms were to hit yet another huge bump in the road, say...perhaps the children that work on those family farms are forced to stay in school year round and that labor pool is thus taken from those farms, well, it could very well be the straw that broke the camel's back.
With family farms thus falling by the wayside, those farms would be gobbled up by the huge corporate farming operations of America and what we would end up with is a small contingent of corporations controlling upwards of 90% of the food produced in America. So, it would be kind of like three automobile manufacturers producing America's cars and trucks. As shown above, the Federal government used it's leverage and control and power to infiltrate the nation's auto makers and if there are these few agricultural corporations, the same could be easily done in that arena.
My message is simple - Barack Hussein Obama cannot afford the time it would take to wrestle control away from the family farms of America...but he'd be a lot closer to that goal if those family farms went belly up and by forcing kids into school 12 months a year, he will have taken away the labor needed to sustain those farms.
Something to ponder, eh comrades?
More school: Obama would curtail summer vacation
WASHINGTON – Students beware: The summer vacation you just enjoyed could be sharply curtailed if President Barack Obama gets his way. Obama says American kids spend too little time in school, putting them at a disadvantage with other students around the globe. "Now, I know longer school days and school years are not wildly popular ideas," the president said earlier this year. "Not with Malia and Sasha, not in my family, and probably not in yours. But the challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom." The president, who has a sixth-grader and a third-grader, wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go. "Our school calendar is based upon the agrarian economy and not too many of our kids are working the fields today," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a recent interview with The Associated Press. Fifth-grader Nakany Camara is of two minds. She likes the four-week summer program at her school, Brookhaven Elementary School in Rockville, Md. Nakany enjoys seeing her friends there and thinks summer school helped boost her grades from two Cs to the honor roll. But she doesn't want a longer school day. "I would walk straight out the door," she said. Domonique Toombs felt the same way when she learned she would stay for an extra three hours each day in sixth grade at Boston's Clarence R. Edwards Middle School. "I was like, `Wow, are you serious?'" she said. "That's three more hours I won't be able to chill with my friends after school." Her school is part of a 3-year-old state initiative to add 300 hours of school time in nearly two dozen schools. Early results are positive. Even reluctant Domonique, who just started ninth grade, feels differently now. "I've learned a lot," she said. Does Obama want every kid to do these things? School until dinnertime? Summer school? And what about the idea that kids today are overscheduled and need more time to play? ___ Obama and Duncan say kids in the United States need more school because kids in other nations have more school. "Young people in other countries are going to school 25, 30 percent longer than our students here," Duncan told the AP. "I want to just level the playing field." While it is true that kids in many other countries have more school days, it's not true they all spend more time in school. Kids in the U.S. spend more hours in school (1,146 instructional hours per year) than do kids in the Asian countries that persistently outscore the U.S. on math and science tests — Singapore (903), Taiwan (1,050), Japan (1,005) and Hong Kong (1,013). That is despite the fact that Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong have longer school years (190 to 201 days) than does the U.S. (180 days). ___ Regardless, there is a strong case for adding time to the school day. Researcher Tom Loveless of the Brookings Institution looked at math scores in countries that added math instruction time. Scores rose significantly, especially in countries that added minutes to the day, rather than days to the year. "Ten minutes sounds trivial to a school day, but don't forget, these math periods in the U.S. average 45 minutes," Loveless said. "Percentage-wise, that's a pretty healthy increase." In the U.S., there are many examples of gains when time is added to the school day. Charter schools are known for having longer school days or weeks or years. For example, kids in the KIPP network of 82 charter schools across the country go to school from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., more than three hours longer than the typical day. They go to school every other Saturday and for three weeks in the summer. KIPP eighth-grade classes exceed their school district averages on state tests. In Massachusetts' expanded learning time initiative, early results indicate that kids in some schools do better on state tests than do kids at regular public schools. The extra time, which schools can add as hours or days, is for three things: core academics — kids struggling in English, for example, get an extra English class; more time for teachers; and enrichment time for kids. Regular public schools are adding time, too, though it is optional and not usually part of the regular school day. Their calendar is pretty much set in stone. Most states set the minimum number of school days at 180 days, though a few require 175 to 179 days. Several schools are going year-round by shortening summer vacation and lengthening other breaks. Many schools are going beyond the traditional summer school model, in which schools give remedial help to kids who flunked or fell behind. Summer is a crucial time for kids, especially poorer kids, because poverty is linked to problems that interfere with learning, such as hunger and less involvement by their parents. That makes poor children almost totally dependent on their learning experience at school, said Karl Alexander, a sociology professor at Baltimore's Johns Hopkins University, home of the National Center for Summer Learning. Disadvantaged kids, on the whole, make no progress in the summer, Alexander said. Some studies suggest they actually fall back. Wealthier kids have parents who read to them, have strong language skills and go to great lengths to give them learning opportunities such as computers, summer camp, vacations, music lessons, or playing on sports teams. "If your parents are high school dropouts with low literacy levels and reading for pleasure is not hard-wired, it's hard to be a good role model for your children, even if you really want to be," Alexander said. Extra time is not cheap. The Massachusetts program costs an extra $1,300 per student, or 12 percent to 15 percent more than regular per-student spending, said Jennifer Davis, a founder of the program. It received more than $17.5 million from the state Legislature last year. The Montgomery County, Md., summer program, which includes Brookhaven, received $1.6 million in federal stimulus dollars to operate this year and next, but it runs for only 20 days. Aside from improving academic performance, Education Secretary Duncan has a vision of schools as the heart of the community. Duncan, who was Chicago's schools chief, grew up studying alongside poor kids on the city's South Side as part of the tutoring program his mother still runs. "Those hours from 3 o'clock to 7 o'clock are times of high anxiety for parents," Duncan said. "They want their children safe. Families are working one and two and three jobs now to make ends meet and to keep food on the table."
Support for Gen. McChrystal's now revealed plan for a "troop surge" in Afghanistan is starting to flow in from overseas as Britain's commanding general in Afghanistan, General Dutton, has agreed that the influx of more troops is necessary for victory and stability. It seems that just about everyone with a military mind has come behind this proposed new approach to the War in Afghanistan...except for Barack Hussein Obama and Joe "I'dCarveUpIraqInto3Countries" Biden.
From the article at TimesOnline, look at this quote from British General Dutton:
General Dutton told The Times that victory was a matter of “straightforward force ratios”. “If you want to achieve long-term stability, and therefore a lack of terrorism potential in an area, you need to be doing more than simply patrolling the skies,” he said.
See that? That is a direct slam at Vice President Biden and his ludicrous idea that America and NATO can simply keep troops at current levels or reduce them and just "surgically" attack the Taliban with air strikes and UAV predator drones.
You know, it's high time that someone just comes out and dispels this notion that Joe Biden knows his ass from a hole in the ground. The Left in America has been effective in portraying Joe Biden as an "expert" in the theaters of the Iraq War and the War in Afghanistan and the truth is, he's a doofus. Biden proved it with his ridiculous plan for Iraq and now he's dispelling any doubt with his "plan" for Afghanistan.
And while I'm at it, let's talk about our Commander-in-chief. Barack Hussein Obama (mmm, mmm, mmm) has been derelict in his duties in his main role as President of the United States. This is a man who has two major wars going on that involve a large number of American troops and he's completely out to lunch on both. This is a man, Barack Hussein Obama, who is so enthralled with maintaining his narcissistically inflated image of himself in America and the world that he has placed the War in Afghanistan so far down on his priority list, our fighting men and women have suffered on the battlefield. We are talking about a President of the United States that has enabled the Iranians with as much time as they have needed to complete their nuclear weapons programs and at the same time, has enabled the Taliban in Afghanistan all of the time they have needed to not only regroup but to add to their forces.
This man is no Commander-in-chief....this is a man who has never made a vital decision in his life other than to run away from the pressures and responsibility of living in mainstream America to the welcome laziness of a community organizer. This is a man who now, when confronted with the most crucial decision of his Presidency, has decided he needs "about a month to make a decision."
British general supports request for 40,000 new troops in Afghanistan
Britain’s top general in Afghanistan backed calls for more troops, insisting it would be impossible to deny al-Qaeda their terrorist safe havens by “simply patrolling from the skies”. In an exclusive interview with The Times, Lieutenant-General Jim Dutton, said yesterday that he supported a formal request made by his boss, General Stanley McChrystal, the US commander, for up to 40,000 new troops. On Friday General McChrystal submitted a formal request to Nato and the Pentagon for a surge in troop numbers to help to tame a growing insurgency. General Dutton, the deputy commander of Nato’s International Security Assistance Force, insisted that “long-term stability” in Afghanistan was the only way to stop international terrorists using the country as a launch pad for attacks in Europe and the US. His comments came as continuing violence across the country yesterday claimed the lives of six Nato troops, including a British casualty. The soldier, from the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Welsh Regiment, was hit by a roadside bomb in northern Helmand.
The growing toll exacted by the campaign has undermined public support, prompting some US officials to suggest scaling back the foreign presence and relying instead on unmanned drones to bomb terrorist training centres as and when they appear. A leaked report by General McChrystal warned that without more troops the mission risks failure. General Dutton told The Times that victory was a matter of “straightforward force ratios”. “If you want to achieve long-term stability, and therefore a lack of terrorism potential in an area, you need to be doing more than simply patrolling the skies,” he said. “The ultimate answer to this problem is a stable democratic state of Afghanistan in which their own forces are capable of maintaining the rule of law and security.” Earlier this year President Obama ordered 21,000 extra troops to Afghanistan this year, bringing the total foreign presence to more than 100,000 for the first time since the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. General Dutton said the ideal ratio of civilians to security forces, according to the most up-to-date counterinsurgency doctrine, was 50:1. In Afghanistan that would mean 560,000 Afghan and international soldiers for an estimated population of 28 million. There are now 100,000 foreign troops and 174,000 Afghan security forces. “It’s not 20 troops per thousand people throughout the country, but for a period of time [in certain parts of the country] it might need even more than that,” General Dutton said. He insisted that Britain and Nato were prepared to send more soldiers. “There’s no sense here that we are going to fail because the analysis has been rejected,” he said. “Far from it. Nato’s Secretary-General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, has fully supported it. Several countries have supported it. I know my own has.” He said that General McChrystal came away from briefing Nato’s defence chiefs last week “hugely enthused” by their support. Nonetheless, critics of the campaign have demanded a timeline for withdrawal. Robert Gates, the US Defence Secretary, warned yesterday that this would be disastrous. “The reality is, failure in Afghanistan would be a huge setback for the United States,” he said. “[The] Taleban and al-Qaeda, as far as they’re concerned, defeated one superpower. For them to be seen to defeat a second, I think, would have catastrophic consequences in terms of energizing the extremist movement.” Many governments are reluctant to send more troops while Afghanistan’s presidential election results last month remain disputed. General Dutton said that he was confident Afghan authorities would resolve the uncertainty, but he warned that if they fail, it will undermine Nato’s mandate. European observers said that as many as 1.5 million votes, including more than a million in support of President Karzai, may have been fraudulent. A recount of some is due to start this week as the Electoral Complaints Commission wades through more than 2,700 allegations of fraud, ballot box stuffing and police intimidation. “The basis of our mandate is to support the legally elected government,” General Dutton said. “If you haven’t got one, you either have to change the mandate, or you rethink the whole endeavour.” He was confident, however, that the British public would stomach more casualties as long has he could answer yes to two key questions: “Are we right?” and “Can we win?”. “We can only be right if we are supporting a legally elected government,” he said. “Can we win? Yes. General McChrystal has a plan that will succeed. This project is absolutely doable.”
According the article here at DEBKA, the Pentagon here in the U.S. has rushed to speed up production of more of the GBU-57A/B bunker buster bomb in readiness for any call to action - the production has been moved up to be completed by December 2009.
Of course, I've got a couple of questions - first, did the Pentagon and administration actually DOUBT that the Iranians would have second underground facility? I thought we have known about this for two years? The second question is... why wouldn't we have inventory of this in the first place? Funding? We didn't have any trouble spending hundreds of billions of dollars on projects like funding a racist organization like ACORN yet we didn't have the time or the dollars to protect the American people?
About a week ago, we hear so called "experts" on national security in America saying that we should deny air space to the Israelis for any possible mission to take out Iranian nuke facilities and then a week later, we see calls to rush the delivery of these high power bombs. So I ask..who is running this shop of Keystone Kops?
US giant bunker-buster bomb project rushed since Iran's Qom site discovered
The Pentagon has brought forward to December 2009 the target-date for producing the first 15-ton super bunker-buster bomb (GBU-57A/B) Massive Ordinance Penetrator, which can reach a depth of 60.09 meters underground before exploding. DEBKAfile's military sources report that top defense agencies and air force units were also working against the clock to adapt the bay of a B2a Stealth bomber for carrying and delivering the bomb. The Pentagon has ordered the number of bombs rolling off the production line increased from four to ten - a rush job triggered in May by the discovery that Iran was hiding a second uranium enrichment plant under a mountain near Qom - a discovery which prompted this week's international outcry. Congress has since quietly inserted the necessary funding in the 2009 budget. All this urgency indicates that the Obama administration has been preparing military muscle to back up the international condemnation of Iran's concealed nuclear bomb program, its sanctions threat and his willingness to join the negotiations with Iran opening on Oct. 1 in Geneva. Tehran may have to take into account a possible one-time surgical strike against its underground enrichment facility as a warning shot should its defiance continue. In particular, the world powers this week demanded that Iran open up all its nuclear facilities and programs to full and immediate international inspection. Failure to do so could bring forth further US military action. According to our military sources, the earliest date for the accelerated Pentagon program to produce a super bunker buster bomb mounted on a stealth bomber is December 2009 or January 2010. This too is three years ahead of its original schedule. Pressed into service are two US Air Force research centers for work on adapting the radar-evading stealth bomber to the giant bomb: the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright Patterson Air Force Base and the Munitions Directorate and Air Armament Center, both headquartered at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida. Last month, DEBKAfile quoted Air Force Lt. Gen. Mark Shackelford as disclosing that the Pentagon had decided to accelerate the production of 10-12 giant bunker buster bombs in response to intelligence received of Iranian and North Korean underground nuclear plants.
This really is an excellent article by Walid Phares over at Counterterrorism Blog. He is very specific in his warning, that terrorist cells, like the ones discovered inside of America the past couple of weeks, will continue to grow and become more and more large and dangerous and that their actual operations will become more frequent and threatening.
We have the warning. Will the administration act or not?
Spread of Jihadi "operations" inside America: a quantitative warning
It is unprecedented in American counter terrorism annals: in one day the nation was dealing with three separate Jihadist plots to blow up civilian and other targets inside the Homeland. Although the cases were addressed at different time periods by the FBI and other agencies, nevertheless, the thickening web of Terror attempts breached the crossing line of US national security. This week, authorities revealed three conspiracies by American Jihadists: Michael C. Finton, (other name: Talib Islam) a 29-year-old man who wished to follow the steps of American-born Taliban John Walker Lindh, was arrested after trying to detonate what he thought was a bomb inside a van outside a federal courthouse in Springfield, Ill. Hosam Maher Husein Smadi, a 19-year old Jordanian national was arrested after placing what he believed was a bomb at a downtown Dallas skyscraper. But perhaps the most troubling case is of Afghan-born Najibullah Zazi who set up shop in suburban Denver, scouting the Web and visiting beauty supply stores in a hunt for chemicals needed to build bombs for Al Qaeda. Sources called the alleged plot one of the most significant terror threats to the U.S. since 9-11. Add to the list the North Carolina Jihad cell, led by Saifullah Boyd, which was planning on attacking civilian and military targets across the country. The immediate question raised by an increasingly worried public is about the connection between all these terror cases: are they all connected? While law enforcement and certainly judicial authorities proceed in a bottom up reasoning, that is to build the case for a global connection between all what is happening with the help of legal evidence, analysts in the field of counter terrorism and conflict are already realizing the meaning of what is happening inside America.
In my book Future Jihad: Terrorist Strategies against America (2005-2006) I clearly projected that Jihadists, individuals and cells will be mushrooming and expanding inside the United States within few years from then and that they will precisely do what they are trying to do now. I have also projected how large they will become, with time. It was a simple deduction: if the Government doesn’t counter this ideological growth, Jihadists will keep coming. And in fact they kept coming, spreading crossing the barriers of ethnicities, races, nationalities and geographical frontiers. The Jihadists committed to harm the US, and based inside our borders, are now by the hundreds. When I suggested this fact on CNN in 2006, and reiterated it on Oprah’s show so that the public realizes what is to come, I raised a few eyes brows. Now unfortunately, we are meeting the cells of Jihadism in our cities and little towns, and sadly the expectation is that we will see more, and we may unfortunately not be able to stop them all from reaching their goals. The North Carolina cell, the New York subway plot, the Dallas attempt, the Illinois case, added to the previous cases of the shooting of a soldier in Arkansas, the precedent New York cells, Georgia’s young Jihadists, all the way back to the infamous Virginia paintball network, if anything gives us the genome of what is morphing inside the country -- a vast body of dispersed cells with at least one binding force -- the Jihadi ideology. The question thus is to find out who is propagating the doctrines of Jihadism: who is funding it; who is protecting the indoctrination operation which leads naturally to the rise of homegrown or foreign linked, lone wolves or packs of Jihadists, Terrorists. That is the real question: where is the factory? What should the US Government do? Well, it must first of all come to the front of the threat and lead the nation against it. This is not a matter of only local police or law enforcement efforts. President Obama and Congressional leaders from both parties must give this spreading plague a top priority: for if one of these groups is successful, our national economy will crumble again, or at least will be wounded even more severely, let alone the human consequences of terror. Americans are watching with great concerns, these terror plots being revealed. They expect their elected officials to address these fears before the worse happens.
He looks mild-mannered, not a man who would stand up to bullies and force them to back down. But Professor Indrek Wichman of Michagan State University, has become a Hero.
Now what would force this Professor of Mechanical Engineering to stand up for the First Amendment? Nothing less than a planned protest by the MSU chapter of the Muslim Students Union (MSU)
Members of the Muslim Student Association (MSA) at Michigan State University (MSU) didn’t know what they were getting into when they tried to suppress the free speech rights of Professor Indrek Wichman. On February 28, 2006 he read in the MSU student newspaper a call to protest the publication of the Muhammad cartoons. The article struck a raw nerve. He responded with the following:
Dear Moslem Association:
As a professor of Mechanical Engineering here at MSU I intend to protest your protest. I am offended not by cartoons, but by more mundane things like beheadings of civilians, cowardly attacks on public buildings, suicide murders, murders of Catholic priests (the latest in Turkey!), burnings of Christian churches, the continued persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt, the imposition of Sharia law on non-Muslims, the rapes of Scandinavian girls and women (called "whores" in your culture), the murder of film directors in Holland, and the rioting and looting in Paris France.
This is what offends me, a soft-spoken person and academic, and many, many, many of my colleagues. I counsel you dissatisfied, aggressive, brutal, and uncivilized slave-trading Moslems to be very aware of this as you proceed with your infantile "protests."
If you do not like the values of the West--see the 1st Amendment--you are free to leave. I hope for God's sake that most of you choose that option. Please return to your ancestral homelands and build them up yourselves instead of troubling Americans.
Cordially,
I. S. Wichman, Professor of Mechanical Engineering.
Some may say this reaction was a tad over-heated. But in a university environment, the more important question is: Were the statements accurate? It’s tough to argue with the validity of Professor Wichman’s factual assertions. And even tougher to demand that Wichman remain morally neutral regarding the examples of Muslim misconduct he cites.
For over three weeks Professor Wichman heard nothing about his email. But behind the scenes, the MSA had called in CAIR and had three separate meetings with the MSU provost. The MSA and CAIR both demanded that Wichman be censured, disciplined, enrolled in diversity and sensitivity training, and even “re-educated” on Islam.
To his credit, the MSU Provost did not cave in to the CAIR/MSA demands. On March 20, 2006 he wrote Wichman a letter saying that he strongly disagreed with the “intemperate tone” of his email. But he added that Wichman still had rights to free speech. From there, things got worse.
The MSU Provost told Wichman that if he continued to “harass” and “intimidate” the MSU MSA - while creating a “hostile intellectual climate” - then formal charges consistent with MSU anti-discrimination policy (ADP) would be filed by MSU against him. (emphasis mine)
On April 24, 2006 Wichman realized that the issue had not quietly gone away. He began receiving telephone calls and emails from local newspapers, AP, Reuters and other national and international outlets. CAIR and MSA, frustrated by the MSU Provost, had gone over his head and published a response, organized a press conference, and made a national/international press release.
CAIR and MSA’s public call upon MSU to take “disciplinary action" against Wichman’s “Islamophobic” email was a classic example of Muslim cowardice. Michigan’s CAIR Executive Director Mr. Dawud Walid said it was “unconscionable for a professor to use his university e-mail account to foster a hostile learning environment for Muslim students.” He added, “The University needs to take appropriate disciplinary action in this case to demonstrate through its actions that anti-Muslim bigotry will not be tolerated on campus.”
It should be noted that Mr. Walid has gone to court to argue for applying Sharia law in mid-Michigan. That serves to undercut significantly his stature as an opponent of bigotry towards minorities.
I sat down for a beer - I believe it was a Danish beer – with Indrek Wichman in April. When he said he meant to “protest the protest” of the MSA he really meant it. He helped form a conservative faculty group at MSU. The group serves to protest speech codes, invite conservative speakers to campus, and represent students and faculty whose rights are trampled by the MSU administration.
Indrek Wichman is not your typical college professor. He is a true First Amendment hero.
Meanwhile, Dawud Walid is still fighting to repeal the First Amendment and keep Muslims from being offended. He wants to replace it with Sharia law so Muslims can freely beat their wives and publicly execute homosexuals.
How is it that Muslims can say the most hurtful, racially insensitive, anti-Semitic rhetoric on US campuses without the administrations of those schools saying a word no, yet one lone professor on a campus writes an e-mail in protest of the barbaric practices of Islam, he is vilified and crucified? The behavior of the MSU in regards to Free Speech and other rights is well documented on the net. One just has to read Fousesquawk by blogger Gary Fouse to see what is happening at UC Irvine.
And it is happening at every college and university in the US.
What the MSU & CAIR are trying to do is first to stiffle free speech, then to impose Shar'ia Law on the US. Their counterparts have been very successful in doing this in Europe and Great Britain. But unlike those lost lands, the US has the Free exercise of Speech firmly written into the US Constitution. And there are plenty of court cases backing the right of Free Speech.
Slowly, on campuses, faculity are speaking out against the MSU. They are challenging their claims, and forcing the 1st Amendment down their throats.
I'm stealing this from Gold-Plated Witch on Wheels. I encourage all to check out her blog, it's an excellent one.
Conservatives vs. Liberals
If a conservative doesn’t like guns, they don’t buy one. If a liberal doesn't like guns, then no one should have one.
If a conservative is a vegetarian, they don’t eat meat. If a liberal is, they want to ban all meat products for everyone.
If a conservative sees a foreign threat, he thinks about how to defeat his enemy. A liberal wonders how to surrender gracefully and still look good.
If a conservative is homosexual, they quietly enjoy their life. If a liberal is homosexual, they loudly demand legislated respect.
If a black man or Hispanic is conservative, they see themselves as independently successful. Their liberal counterparts see themselves as victims in need of government protection.
If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation. A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him.
If a conservative doesn’t like a talk show host, he switches channels. Liberals demand that those they don’t like be shut down.
If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn’t go to church. A liberal wants any mention of God or religion silenced.
If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. A liberal demands that his neighbors pay for his.
You know, I've documented a lot here at Holger where Somali citizens of America are leaving to go back to Somalia and fight on the side of terror with al Qaeda and there are dozens of other examples of jihadis who have left their homeland to further their allegiance to jihad but today's article here from The Telegraphdocuments a village, yes...a whole village of Germans (and those are white Germans, not immigrant citizens of Germany) who have converted to islam and now live in this village in Pakistan, near the Afghan border.
Words escape me.
(Hat Tip goes out to " cb " )
Pakistan discovers 'village' of white German al-Qaeda insurgents
The village, in Taliban-controlled Waziristan, is run by the notorious al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which plots raids on Nato forces in Afghanistan. A recruitment video presents life in the village as a desirable lifestyle choice with schools, hospitals, pharmacies and day care centres, all at a safe distance from the front.
In the video, the presenter, "Abu Adam", the public face of the group in Germany, points his finger and asks: "Doesn't it appeal to you? We warmly invite you to join us!" According to German foreign ministry officials a growing number of German families, many of North African descent, have taken up the offer and travelled to Waziristan where supporters say converts make up some of the insurgents' most dedicated fighters. The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which has a foothold in several German cities, has capitalised on growing concern over the rising profile of German forces in Afghanistan. Their role has become increasingly controversial in Germany in recent weeks after dozens of civilians were killed in an air strike ordered by German officers. Last night a foreign ministry spokesman told The Daily Telegraph they were now negotiating with Pakistani authorities for the release of six Germans, including "Adrian M", a white Muslim convert, his Eritrean wife and their four year old daughter, who were arrested as they were making their way to the "German village". They are particularly concerned about the welfare of the child. They are being held in custody in Peshawar after their arrest in May shortly when they crossed the border from Iran. They are understood to have left Germany in March this year. The spokesman said negotiations were "under way" with Pakistani authorities "concerning a group of German citizens" and that it had been aware that the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan had been recruiting in Germany "since the beginning of the year". Their recruitment drive has been led by "Abu Adam", a 24-year-old German believed to be of Turkish or North African descent who was raised with his, and fellow Jihadi, Abu Ibrahim, in the smart Bonn suburb of Kessenich. Adam, whose real name is Mounir Chouka, received weapons training from the German army as part of his national service, and later spent three years training at the Federal Office of Statistics where colleagues described him as a "nice boy". He left in 2007, telling colleagues he was joining a trading firm in Saudi Arabia, but is believed to have joined a terrorist training camp in Yemen. In another recruitment video released earlier this year he urged supporters to: "Die the death of honour." Khalid Khawaja, a former Pakistan intelligence officer, who describes himself as a friend of Osama bin Laden, said he was aware of a German contingent and that there were a number of Swedish converts too who had arrived in Pakistan "for Jihad". "The Europeans are there [in Waziristan]. The most dedicated people there are from Europe. They will do anything for Islam. They are not there because their father's are Muslim, but by choice," he said.
At some point in time, the American people are simply going to have to form a human ring around the White House and demand of this rookie, socialist President that he keep his oath to protect the American people. We have sat idly by while this fool that "leads" our country has allowed tyrannical leaders to not only move towards acquiring the means to endanger America but he has encouraged them.
The latest nutjob world leader to explore nuclear capabilities is the madman from Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. No one in their right mind would even trust Hugo Chavez in a room of 20 people while he has access to a steak knife...imagine this loon with nuclear weapons.
PORLAMAR, Venezuela – Iran is helping to detect uranium deposits in Venezuela and initial evaluations suggest reserves are significant, President Hugo Chavez's government said Friday. Mining Minister Rodolfo Sanz said Iran has been assisting Venezuela with geophysical survey flights and geochemical analysis of the deposits, and that evaluations "indicate the existence of uranium in western parts of the country and in Santa Elena de Uairen," in southeastern Bolivar state. "We could have important reserves of uranium," Sanz told reporters upon arrival on Venezuela's Margarita Island for a weekend Africa-South America summit. He added that efforts to certify the reserves could begin within the next three years. The announcement came as revelations that Iran has secretly been building a uranium-enrichment plant provoke concerns among countries including the U.S., Russia, France, Britain, Germany and China. On Friday, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev urged Iran in a statement to prove it is not seeking to develop atomic weapons, saying the undeclared construction of an enrichment facility flies in the face of U.N. Security Council demands for Iran to stop uranium enrichment at its only declared facility. Iran is under three sets of Security Council sanctions for refusing to freeze enrichment at what had been its single publicly known enrichment plant, which is being monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. U.S. State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said recently that U.S. officials also have "concerns" about a possible transfer of nuclear materials between Iran and Venezuela. But analysts say Iran, which has significant uranium deposits, currently has no need to import uranium, although those deposits may not be enough to sustain its future enrichment goals. Sanz dismissed suggestions that Venezuela could aid Iran with its nuclear program, saying Venezuela is only aiming to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. Chavez has repeatedly said that all countries should end their nuclear-weapons programs, while insisting that Iran and Venezuela have a "sovereign right" to pursue peaceful nuclear ambitions. Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington said that regardless of whether the uranium exploration efforts lead to nuclear cooperation, they are going to cause "a serious problem in the relationship" between Caracas and Washington. Chavez's government has "clearly announced they're sort of beginning down this road," Shifter said. "It's going to be very difficult for the U.S. to really pursue any cooperation with Caracas on other issues because this is going to top everything else." Chavez's project remains in its planning stages and still faces a host of practical hurdles, likely requiring billions of dollars, as well as technology and expertise that Venezuela lacks. Russia has offered to help bridge that gap, and Chavez has announced that the two countries have created an atomic energy commission. But Sergei Novikov, a spokesman for Russian state nuclear agency Rosatom, has said there are no concrete projects and that any joint work on mining deposits of uranium or the radioactive metal thorium would have to wait until Venezuela decides whether it wants Russian help exploring them and, if so, create a joint venture for the purpose. Both Chavez and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are well-known for their anti-U.S. rhetoric, and have forged ties in everything from finance to factories, provoking concerns in Washington. Iran now manufactures cars, tractors and bicycles in Venezuela. Earlier this month, Chavez sealed a deal to export 20,000 barrels of gasoline daily to Iran, giving Tehran a cushion if the West carries out threats of fuel sanctions over Iran's nuclear program.
It's way past time that the Ministry of Propaganda for the Left (which some of you might call the main stream media or MSM) got its just dues for their role in aiding and abetting the Socialistic and totalitarian takeover of America. We have seen, since the early campaign for the 2008 elections, how the always Left-leaning MSM transforme it self from a spinner of the news to aid the Left's agenda to AN ACTIVE PARTICIPANT in the Left's overall plans.
So now, the Katie Courics of the world....the CNN's....the folks at MSNBC ...all will get a taste of some good old fashioned American justice and attention. Since the MSM decided to lie about the 912 Rally in Washington, D.C. , the movement of tea partiers and other conservative groups in this country have decided to stick their signs and microphones into the faces of the Communist sympathizers like Chris Matthews and Brian Williams and Keith Olbermann and simply ask these minions of Obama some questions. Like, "Why did you lie about the 912 Rally?" ....or perhaps this one...."How come you got scooped on ACORN?" ....oh, and one of my favorites...."Don't you owe the American public an apology for withholding the truth that Barack Hussein Obama was a Marxist before the election?"
The Right is coming for you Rachel Maddeu. It will be fun to see these Leftist propaganda tools scurrying from their office buildings to their parked cars with hundreds and thousands of America citizens hot on their heels looking for the answers and ready to expose these propagandists for what their are.
MSM....you started a war on America with your lies and your complicity in the coverups...and now, we're bringing the war to your doorstep, to your face, to your daily life. Welcome to the nightmare, bitches.
Exclusive: After Targeting Greedy Government, Citizens Target its Aiders and Abettors – the Mainstream Media
After having done their best to ignore Tea Parties across the nation and, when they couldn’t ignore the biggest one of all in Washington D.C. this month, vastly underreporting the numbers of American citizens who showed up to exercise their First Amendment rights, the media find themselves directly in the crosshairs of an exasperated American public.
A recent poll by Sacred Heart University indicates that nearly 90 percent of Americans think the media actively worked to get Obama elected, 70 percent think the press is promoting his presidency, and 56 percent say the media are pushing ObamaCare “without objective criticism.”
The mainstream media or, as some are calling it, the minion media have had a particular bias for decades. Only with the relatively recent advent of the new media – talk radio, cable news and the Internet – have many Americans awakened to the reality of what drives the media. Is it a search for the truth? Sadly, it’s more often a push for a particular ideology. To be honest, most people would be more accepting of this if the media would simply state its bias – on either side of the aisle – up front. Then we’d be able to read or watch the news with the proverbial grain of salt and read between the lines. But we’ve just about reached the limits of our patience with phony claims of neutrality.
So, America, brace yourselves for a new round of tea parties – gatherings that the media will have difficulty ignoring because they are the target.
Protests are planned for October 17th that will take place on the front steps of 30 press offices around the nation, including the CNN studios in Atlanta, a yet-to-be-announced location in New York City and the Plain Dealer in Cleveland.
