1/5/02
9:07:38 PM

Science's Top Ten Scientific Advance Of 2001:

Nanoscale Computing Circuits Named Top Scientific Advance Of 2001

Molecular-scale circuits that link together tiny transistors, wires, and switches to carry out basic computing operations were named this year's top scientific achievement by the journal Science and its publisher, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

The nanocircuits, named the Breakthrough of the Year by Science's editors, leads their list of the top ten scientific developments in 2001. The top ten, chosen for their profound implications for society and the advancement of science, appear in the journal's 21 December issue.

This year's leap forward for molecular computing may pave the way to a future filled with tiny but extremely fast and powerful machines that can translate conversations on the fly or delve deep into your body to diagnose an illness. If these circuits can be combined into even more complex architecture, this would "undoubtedly provide computing power to launch scientific breakthroughs for decades to come," say the Science editors.

The idea of using molecules and small chemical groups as the building blocks of a new generation of computers has been around for years. The quest has become more urgent over the last decade, however, as traditional silicon circuitry continues to shrink towards a point where it can no longer function. Researchers hope to skirt this problem by using molecules and small chemical groups to create billions of devices that could fit easily in the space of a current chip.

After expanding their repertoire of molecular-scale devices in 2000, several research teams took the next critical step and wired the devices together to form working circuits. Several papers published in Science this year detail the progress from communicating nanowires (26 January 2001) to nanotube and nanowire-based logic circuits (9 November 2001) to computational circuits using single-molecule transistors (8 November 2001, Science Express).

Molecular computers with the speed, reliability, and low cost of silicon computers are still years away, but this year's Breakthrough has researchers charged up about the future.

Science also salutes nine other scientific achievements of 2001. Except for the first runner up, the others are in no particular order.

RNA Revolution: RNA revealed itself to be remarkably versatile in 2001, breaking out of its traditional role of genetic messenger and performing a number of unexpected tasks. Small snippets of RNA have already been shown to silence genes in plants, and this year researchers discovered that this "RNA interference" can happen in mice and humans as well. Cell biologists also uncovered key details of how messenger RNA--the biochemical link between DNA's information and protein formation--is spliced together. As part of this process, other small RNAs team up with proteins to form a slicing "editor" of forming mRNA, and researchers were surprised to learn that it's the RNAs that do the cutting, suggesting that RNA can act as an enzyme as well. The molecule's expanding repertoire has rekindled interest in an "RNA world," where RNA appeared before DNA in the earliest life forms.

Solar Mystery Solved: Scientific detectives cracked one of their toughest cases this year, solving the problem of the missing solar neutrinos. Neutrinos are particles with virtually no mass, and "electron" neutrinos are a byproduct of the nuclear furnace that drives the sun. In the late 1960s, researchers calculated the number of electron neutrinos that should be streaming away from the sun--but the actual number of detected neutrinos came up short. This year, researchers at the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory in Canada confirmed a hunch that earlier experiments had hinted at: the neutrinos weren't disappearing, but going incognito. Their experiments established that solar neutrinos convert to two other neutrino flavors (muon and tau) after leaving the sun, thereby escaping detection.

Genomes Galore: An amazing race ended early this year with the simultaneous publication of two draft sequences of the entire human genome, years earlier than anyone had expected at the outset of the sequencing effort. In a surprising twist, the human gene count was low--only 35,000 genes, much less than that of "simple" creatures like the lowly worm C. elegans (although the estimate is being revised upward). Humans were only part of the genome gold rush of 2001: over 60 organisms now boast a sequenced genome, including several disease-causing microbes. Full genomes for research-important animals such as the rat, mouse, zebrafish, and a malaria mosquito are in the works.

Sizzling Superconductors: In 2001, superconductors were hot--well, hotter than expected, at least. The promise of resistance-free electricity transmission suggested by superconductor technology competes with the cold reality that materials become superconducting at far below room temperature. This year, two new superconductors pushed the temperature limits higher. Japanese scientists discovered that magnesium diboride, a simple lab compound, becomes a superconductor at 39 degrees Kelvin, beating the previous high temperature for a metallic compound by a factor of two. Carbon buckyballs expanded with organic molecules became superconductors at 117 degrees Kelvin, suggesting new possibilities for superconducting electronics.

Neuron Traffic Signals: Axons are the spindly arms of nerve cells that reach out to each other to form a neural communications network, and this year scientists gained insight into how axons know where to grow in the developing nervous system. This information could aid in the quest to repair damaged adult nerves. Research in the 1990s identified a number of beckoning and repelling molecular signals that guide wandering axons. In 2001, researchers learned more about how these signals interact and how axons integrate their often-conflicting messages. Other studies demonstrated how these signals are translated into action by the axon.

Cancer In The Crosshairs: 2001 marked the clinical appearance of a new breed of cancer-fighting drugs, specific "smart bombs" targeted to the precise biochemical defects that cause certain cancers. This year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the drug Gleevec, which inhibits a faulty enzyme associated with one type of leukemia. Enzymes that influence the growth of cancer cells are prominent targets in this new salvo against cancer, and dozens of clinical trials of other defect-correcting drugs are under way worldwide. Many common cancers such as breast, colon and lung cancer, however, involve several gene defects and may require multiple targeted drugs.

Cold Atoms Still Hot: The first Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC), a "superatom" of trapped and supercooled atoms in quantum lockstep, was published in a landmark Science article in 1995. Science authors Eric A. Cornell and Carl E. Wieman were awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work, sharing the prize with Wolfgang Ketterle of MIT. The buzz about BECs continued this year, with an eye towards a future of atom lasers and ultraprecise measurements. Two French research teams created helium BECs for the first time, and lithium and potassium condensates also debuted. Scientists made strides in manipulating this new state of matter as well, imploding an atomic supernova ("bose nova"), stirring up whirlpool-like structures in the condensates, and trapping BEC clusters to create the first "squeezed" state of atomic matter.

Climate Consensus: It's official: "most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations," declared the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) this year, pinning the blame on human, rather than natural, causes. New data and new computer modeling led to a better understanding of climate change that confirms the human impact on an unnaturally warm 20th century, although uncertainty remains about the planet's sensitivity to greenhouse gases. United States President George W. Bush, citing this uncertainty along with reservations about the high cost and unequal burden of implementing emission controls, pulled the U.S. out of the Kyoto Protocol, designed to reduce human-produced greenhouse gases worldwide.

Missing Sink Found: The United States is the world's top greenhouse gas producer, but it's also a "sink," mopping up lots of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The size of the U.S. carbon sink has been a matter of dispute, but this year two opposing groups of scientists revised their estimates to come to an agreement on the sink's extent. Atmospheric researchers shrunk their prediction of a giant sink with new analyses of data from a longer time period, while carbon counters on the land found new hiding places for carbon that upped their estimates of overall sink size. The result: a sink that absorbs around one-third of current U.S. emissions but may show signs of slowing within the next century.

Science After September 11: The international science and engineering community faces a "sobering new era" after the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, challenged by shrinking budgets, information-sharing and collaboration restrictions, and shifting research priorities. In a special section devoted to "The Year of Living Dangerously," Science examines the consequences of the attacks for scientists, particularly regarding bioweapons and sweeping new security for top labs and universities.

The flip side of Science's top ten is its Breakdowns of the Year--less-than-inspiring moments in science and science policy in 2001. Featured this year are budget problems surrounding the International Space Station and the "scientific vacuum" in the Bush Administration.

Best Bets for Hot News in 2002: As in previous years, Science has chosen six hot topics to watch in 2002. This year, their choices include: U.S. stem cell research in private industry and abroad, the field of proteomics, the maiden voyage of several new telescopes, multifactorial diseases, optical clocks and fundamental constants, and visualizing complex molecules and biological interactions. The editors also check in on the 2000 scorecard to see how well they did with last year's predictions.

As the world's leading peer-reviewed general science journal, Science is uniquely suited to compile the most authoritative list of the year's scientific accomplishments. The top ten list is the thirteenth since Science inaugurated the feature. Editor-In-Chief Donald Kennedy writes about the Breakthrough of the Year report in the 21 December issue's editorial, which is available upon request.

Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by American Association For The Advancement Of Science for journalists and other members of the public. If you wish to quote from any part of this story, please credit American Association For The Advancement Of Science as the original source. You may also wish to include the following link in any citation:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011225095034.htm

1/5/02
8:57:52 PM

FOOD ADDITIVE EXTENDS LIFE OF FRUIT FLIES BY 15 PERCENT AND IMPROVES THEIR ABILITY TO WITHSTAND STRESS

Ben-Gurion University researchers have achieved a significant increase in the life span of fruit flies by adding small quantities of an experimental material to the flies' diet. The substance, known as ATA, also enabled the insects to better withstand stresses produced by exposure to a low-oxygen atmosphere, high temperature or X-ray irradiation.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011224082208.htm

STANFORD RESEARCHERS DEVELOP SYSTEM FOR FIELD TESTING MECHANISMS OF EVOLUTION

Evolutionary biology has always faced a major hurdle - how to test a process that takes place over thousands, if not millions, of years. Researchers at Stanford University may have come up with a solution.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011221080921.htm

WORLD'S SMALLEST LASER CAUGHT IN ACT OF LASING BY UC BERKELEY CHEMISTS

Chemists at the University of California, Berkeley, have taken snapshots of the world's smallest laser in action. Peidong Yang, assistant professor of chemistry at UC Berkeley, reported in June the creation of an ultraviolet nanowire nanolaser shorter than the width of a human hair and one-hundredth the width.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011224081002.htm

SCIENCE'S TOP TEN: NANOSCALE COMPUTING CIRCUITS NAMED TOP SCIENTIFIC ADVANCE OF 2001

Molecular-scale circuits that link together tiny transistors, wires, and switches to carry out basic computing operations were named this year's top scientific achievement by the journal Science and its publisher, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011225095034.htm

FISH MAY SHOW HOW NATURE DIVERSIFIES

Although the threespine stickleback fish has been celebrated on the currency of the Netherlands and been a star of a pioneering 1928 French documentary film, the fish has found its most receptive audience with biologists, who have been studying it for more than 100 years. In what may be its most important role yet, the stickleback is being used as a model by researchers at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) at Stanford University to track the genetic changes that define a species, a puzzle that until now could not be tested experimentally in vertebrate animals.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011220081713.htm

ARCHAEOLOGISTS REWRITE TIMELINE OF BRONZE AND IRON AGES

Using information gleaned from the sun's solar cycles and tree rings, archaeologists are rewriting the timeline of the Bronze and Iron Ages. The research dates certain artifacts of the ancient eastern Mediterranean decades earlier than previously thought. And it places an early appearance of the alphabet outside Phoenicia at around 740 B.C.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011220081204.htm

"SCARED TO DEATH," MORE THAN JUST AN EXPRESSION

In the legendary Sherlock Holmes story "The Hound of the Baskervilles," by Arthur Conan Doyle, Sir Charles Baskerville dies from a heart attack brought on by extreme psychological stress. Findings from a new medical article by University of California, San Diego Sociologist David Phillips suggest that people can indeed be scared to death, both in fact as well as fiction.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011225094518.htm

IMPLANTABLE HEARING DEVICE CAN IMPROVE SOUND QUALITY

A new hearing device that is implanted in your middle ear may provide better sound quality than conventional hearing aids, according to the January issue of Mayo Clinic Health Letter.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011228081859.htm

NEW UCLA IMAGING STUDY FIRST TO SHOW PLACEBO ALTERS BRAIN FUNCTION IN INDIVIDUALS WITH MAJOR DEPRESSION

UCLA researchers are the first to report altered brain function in people who respond favorably to placebo treatment for major depression. In addition, the findings show these changes are different than those found in people who respond to antidepressant medication.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102074543.htm

URBAN AIR POLLUTION LINKED TO BIRTH DEFECTS FOR FIRST TIME; RESEARCH LINKS TWO POLLUTANTS TO INCREASED RISK OF HEART DEFECTS

Exposure to two common air pollutants may increase the chance that a pregnant woman will give birth to a child with certain heart defects, according to a UCLA study that provides the first compelling evidence that air pollution may play a role in causing some birth defects.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102075340.htm

MINI-LASERS AND SILICON ON SAPPHIRE TECHNOLOGY LEAD TO SPEEDIER AND COST-EFFECTIVE INTERCONNECTS BETWEEN COMPUTER CHIPS

Using light beams in place of metal wires, engineers at The Johns Hopkins University have devised a cost-effective method to speed up the way microchips "talk" to each other. The method, created by a team in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, takes advantage of unusual characteristics associated with silicon on sapphire technology, a new way to manufacture microchips.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102075205.htm

NEW LIGHT SHED ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE

Individuals who have been blind from birth use different parts of their brain when they read Braille than do those who lost their sight later in life -- a difference that sheds new light on the relationship between thought and language.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102080342.htm

FRUITS AND VEGGIES GAINING GROUND, BUT NOT FAST ENOUGH

The percentage of men who consumed fruits and vegetables at least five times a day increased from 16.5 percent in 1990 to 19.1 percent in 1996. The percentage of women eating enough fruits and vegetables increased from 21.3 percent in 1990 to 26.2 percent in 1996, according to the American Heart Associations 2002 Heart and Stroke Statistical Update, an annual publication released Dec. 31.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102075940.htm

AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATIONS TOP 10 RESEARCH ADVANCES FOR 2001 INCLUDE HEART DEVICES, CELL TRANSPLANTS AND DRUG-ELUTING STENTS

New treatments for heart failure implantable heart devices and cell-grown tissues are among the top 10 research advances in heart disease and stroke for 2001, says David Faxon, M.D., president of the American Heart Association.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102074842.htm

2001: A YEAR OF CHALLENGE AND ACCOMPLISHMENT FOR NASA

As NASA's space odyssey for 2001 comes to an end, the Agency faces a year of transition and new challenges as it prepares to continue its mission of discovery into the new millennium. In the last year, the International Space Station, the largest and most sophisticated spacecraft ever built, celebrated its first full year of human habitation. The successful arrival of NASA's Mars Odyssey at the red planet energized space scientists and, for the first time, NASA was able to create a complete biological record of Earth.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/12/011227075443.htm

THE CURSE OF THE CARP

Carp must be Australia's most hated fish. Introduced to the River Murray about 20 years ago, they have become such an environmental threat that they now bear the nickname of "river rabbits."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/01/020102080525.htm

1/5/02
8:45:56 PM

MOJOURNAL

http://www.motherjones.com/

* Undercutting Executions * - Web Exclusive: Opinion: Death penalty opponents are launching a new campaign to make it more difficult -- and more costly -- for prison officials to carry out lethal injection executions.

http://www.motherjones.com/web_exclusives/features/news/executions.html

* A Biodefense Boondoogle * - Magazine: As pharmaceutical companies line up for multimillion-dollar contracts to make bioterrorism vaccines, some question whether the industry is up to the job.

http://www.motherjones.com/magazine/JF02/biodefense.html

* Daily Briefing * - Web Exclusive: The hunt for bin Laden; the Moussaoui trial; don't name my baby Osama; the Mumia Abu-Jamal decision; farewell, Rudy; more ...

http://motherjones.com/web_exclusives/features/news/index.html

* Capitol Beat * - Web Exclusive: Campaign finance reform, the politics of war; Amtrak reform derailed; more ...

http://motherjones.com/web_exclusives/features/news/capitol_beat.html

* Discuss * - Victim of unilateralism?: Was President Bush's decision to abandon the ABM treaty based on his administration's support for a missile defense plan or its basic antipathy for multi-lateral agreements which can limit US policies?

http://motherjones.com/cgi-bin/WebX?50@@.ee9a13e

1/5/02
8:37:00 PM

Avoiding Wars Takes Courage And Responsibility

by Dr Jamal A. Shurdom, The Jordan Times

A GLANCE at the seriousness of the outcome of the first round of bloody "war against terrorism", compels us all, as responsible human beings, to do the impossible, before it is too late, for the sake of alleviating human suffering and to prevent the expansion of the war into other areas, notably Iraq. A paramount objective should be to save human lives and to avoid catastrophes. Humanely, no one can justify a war. Wars, under any circumstances and for whatever reasons, are unacceptable human behaviour. It is an uncivilised demeanour where the rule of the jungle applies: the strong savages the weak.

Humanity is facing the possibility of extinction because of the accumulation of ever more sophisticated, deadly weapons and technology. To end the "war-making" psychology certainly takes courage and responsibility. It takes new thinking and devoted peace-loving leaders who have to act before it is too late. Political leaders should understand the cost and the price of wars.

In logical terms, wars and violence should not and cannot serve to resolve political conflicts that might arise among governments and nations. The lives of peoples should matter more than those of self-centred political leaders, interested in elections, military industry contractors, political lobbyists, or the dominating superpowers' views of national security and interests.

Conflict of interest is a common phenomenon in human relations, but it should not make people pay the price and become the only victims of initiating wars. Peoples should urge their leaders to seriously start rethinking wars in terms of tools for political gains.

The young American soldiers, the people of the Middle East and any other people on this planet have the God given right to live and survive in a decent, peaceful environment. Peoples also have the right to fight terrorism, resist the policies of wars, and get rid of foreign occupation, control, exploitation and domination.

Leaders should realise that a new national and international consciousness is powerfully developing among the masses of the peoples of the world against the investors and the beneficiaries of bloody wars.

At this crucial moment of the post-Taleban era, serious and honest American-Iraqi, face-to-face negotiations could, if successful, save the region from indescribable catastrophe, notably saving the children and people of Iraq from starvation and death brought about by unjustified UN sanctions. Leaders should wholeheartedly attempt to ease tensions by mutual understanding and respect for the other's interests and security. Relations should be based on common interest and human principles of justice and fairness. Both the Iraqi and the American leaders, for the sake of saving human lives, should compromise in negotiating an acceptable political settlement based on mutual interest.

President George W. Bush should seriously rethink his decision, in dealing with Iraq. America shouldn't fight the wars of others. War against Iraq is not justified. Iraq has nothing to do with terrorism and never supported, financed or harboured a terrorist group. Iraq is not a fundamentalist or unreasonably fanatic state. Iraq is a secular state defending its views of sovereignty and independence. Fighting Iraq now is not fighting the Taleban or Osama Ben Laden, or even the Gulf War for the withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait. For the Iraqis, a war now would be a matter of life and death. It is a war of survival and existence. The price paid in the event of a war is too high.

Political leaders should responsibly understand that saving human lives is more important than saving political lives and faces. The conflict should not be personalised.

For the sake of the basic principles of human decency, dignity and civilisation, it is hoped that the American and Iraqi leaderships will endeavour to end the human sufferings of the children and people of Iraq and open a new chapter of American-Iraqi mutual understanding and peace.

The writer is an expert consultant in international affairs, national security, terrorism, American government and strategic studies. He is the chief editor of MECRA International Journal in Orlando, Florida, and adjunct professor of international affairs and politics.

Source: http://www.jordantimes.com/Tue/opinion/opinion3.htm

1/5/02
8:34:49 PM

Israeli soldiers beat Bethlehem housewife to death

IAP News 30 December 2001

Israeli occupation soldiers last night raided Palestinian homes in several areas surrounding the town of Bethlehem, killing a young housewife after beating here savagely on the head using the butts of their rifles.

Hospital sources said Nujud Muhammed Ghuneim, 27, died of a massive brain haemorrhage resulting from a severe beating that also caused her skull to rupture.

Palestinian sources in Bethlehem said several crack Israeli soldiers raided Ghuneim's home at the village of el-Khader south of Bethlehem, and as the young woman sought to prevent the soldiers from vandalizing her utensils and house appliances, the soldiers reportedly started beating her savagely on the head until she collapsed.

Her cousin Muhammed Ghuneim described the incident as "extremely ugly."

"This is a reflection of the brutal ugliness of the Zionist-Jewish mentality. Here, you had ten soldiers, and all of them ganged up on the young lady, hitting her on the head without mercy until she died. So, why doesn't the American media speak about Jewish terror?"

Muhammed said the occupation soldiers understand only the language of death and murder.

"Nujud didn't pose any threats to those crack soldiers. She is a lady, does any person in his right mind believe she posed any risk to their lives?"

"If so why did they kill her? Why?

http://ummahnews.com/viewarticle.php?sid=2373

1/5/02
8:31:52 PM

Criticism Of The United Nations

If indeed, as I believe, the foundation of the United Nations was rooted in some selfish elitist scheme to more easily control people rather than to act as some angelic international body of peace, then why would any modern day peace, love and freedom supporter believe the UN holds answers to solutions on the world's greatest problems? The ideal behind the UN is beautiful but the reality from the beginning was masked in deceit and outright stupidity. The presented notion was that all peace-loving countries would band together in a world where war would be avoided and harmony would reign through cooperation and fairness. There have been more wars and more bloodshed SINCE the advent of the UN than at any time before. Why?

The concept from the beginning was rooted in artificial soil. How can the UN be seen in anyone's eyes, at its inception, now, or any time in between, to be "representative" of "the people" when "the people" in most of the participating countries didn't or still don't even have a say in the representation of their own country to begin with!? The grand representative UN was brought forth and given emergence to begin with in an unbelievably obvious and clear UN-representative way. The UN from its start was a collective of countries run by kings, dictators, monopoly-clad political parties (which is what the U.S. has become, under the guise of a two-party system), and moneyed interests. It wasn't some grassroots bonanza. It wasn't some magical butterfly equipped with angelic wings. It was concocted by brutes and tyrants, the bulk of them right here in our own paradise of arrogant successors to golden hereditary thrones.

Is it any wonder that we now have a World Monetary Fund, a World Bank, a World Trade Organization, World Peacekeeping Forces, a World Court, and every other world thing, while the world keeps spiralling in a materialistic ball of ignorance and selfishness and fear and violence? This lovely world, based on the U.N. blueprint, is working just fine for those who created it for themselves, but it does not work for everyday people and it does not work, at its root level, with compassion and concern for love and freedom. That is why consolidation of power has perpetually increased everywhere one looks, especially so since hero Franklin Roosevelt met with good guys Churchill and Stalin and shoved the boondoggle down a duped world's throat. In medicine, in the media, in finance, everywhere, power has become centrally controlled while the people have been led to believe they are wise and free. Yikes!

Yes, the United States government is full of flaws, but the system is in place to correct the flaws because the citizens are ultimately given free will to fix things or help things rot. The United Nations system is flawed even in its foundation, and even in its motives, to those who can see through the veil and false declarations of love and peace from wealthy, powerful, conniving fear mongers who only want to always be in control over others. It was not the common people who met in backrooms and who continue to meet in backrooms, in secrecy, to draft the U.N. Charter or to continue to expand the stretch of the U.N.'s octopus tentacles while the people of the world suffocate and drown.

The creators of the UN and the perpetrators of continued UN expansion are the very same powers that continue to undermine love and the indomitable role of our open minds, hearts, souls and spirits in our individual and collective ascensions to a truly better and more beautiful world.

Ron McEntee

President/Publisher, Active Communications, Inc., Active Voice/The Weekly Farce, P.O. Box 394, Berea, OH 44017; InnerSkies@aol.com

1/5/02
8:29:37 PM

Scientific Proof of Global Consciousness May Be Emerging

September 11 Attacks Registered Strongly

By Bernadette Cahill

Science may be on the verge of proving what the spiritual community has claimed all along about prayer and meditation: that group consciousness exists and it can show up on a worldwide scale. The events in the US on September 11 provided the latest indications of this possibility, when devices around the world registered significant anomalies before, during and for some time after the attacks.

As yet, scientists are not exactly sure what their results mean, but they do admit that something significant has occurred, and it has done so in similar circumstances before. The 38 devices called "eggs" are located around the world. These eggs generate random data continuously and send it for archiving and analysis to a special central location at Princeton University. They are known as Random Number Generators (RNG). To use an analogy familiar to most people through trips to the doctor, the network is like an EEG for the planet. The RNGs are the brainchild of scientists at Princeton University, who have been operating since the late 1990s ongoing research called the Global Consciousness Project (GCP). "The underlying motivation for this work," reports the GCPÃ web site at

http://www.noosphere.princeton.edu/ ,

"is to discover whether there is evidence for an anomalous interaction driving the eggs to non-random behavior. In a metaphoric sense, we are looking for evidence of a developing global consciousness that might perceive and react to events with deep meaning.

On September 11, "The whole world reeled in disbelief and horror as the news of the terrorist attack and the unspeakable tragedy unfolded. The egg network registered an unmistakable and profound response. That morning, data that normally flows randomly suddenly began to register distinct concentrations in pattern, like a peak on a graph. Extreme deviations began "before the first World Trade Center tower was hit and continu(ed) for nearly three days, to the end of (September) 13th. The anomalous trend began at about 4 a.m. EST on September 11. Scientists at the GCP are unready to commit to what this means exactly. "We cannot explain the presence of stark patterns in data that should be random, they report, but they also state, "the results of our analyses are unequivocal. There is an important and uniquely powerful message here. When we ask why the disaster in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania should appear to be responsible for a strong signal in our world-wide network of instruments designed to generate random noise, there is no obvious answer. When we look carefully and discover that the eggs might reflect our shock and dismay even before our minds and hearts express it, we confront a still deeper mystery. We do not know if there is such a thing as a global consciousness, but if there is, it was moved by the events of September 11, 2001. We do not know how, but it appears that the coherence and intensity of our common reaction created a sustained pulse of order in the random flow of numbers from our instruments. These

patterns where there should be none look like reflections of our concentrated focus, as the riveting events drew us from our individual concerns and melded us into an extraordinary coherence. Maybe we became, briefly a global consciousness. The RNG have shown deviations from the norm on at least one major world event before, the death of Princess Diana. They also registered some deviations from random patterns during a global meditation organized by the Gaia Mind Project, designed for the five minutes between 17:30 and 17:35 Greenwich Mean Time on January 23, 1997 to coincide with an unusual astronomical conjunction. However, the RNGs registered no anomalies during the funeral of Mother Teresa, which came shortly after Princess Diana. The RNGs also registered no anomalies during an attempt to replicate the January 23, 1997 Global Meditation. It seems that the events that register significant deviations from random "share a common feature, namely, that they engage our attention and draw us in large numbers into a common focus. Professor Mike Perry, Ph.D, a mathematician and statistician in the Math Department of ASU works a lot with random numbers. He said that, while he doesn't know anything about the Global Consciousness Group, the fact it comes from Princeton gives it a "basis for legitimacy, and the results "are kind of interesting. "Some people might think this is just nonsense, he said "but I'm not skeptical of anything until it is proved or disproved. It's the first time I've seen anything like this. There are lots of different kinds of explanations for things, but the actual explanation of this is beyond the realm of mathematics and statistics. He suggested it might belong more to the realm of philosophers.

Could the effect that appeared on the RNGs during the attack be similar to the effect that occurs when people pray together? Fr. Rick Lawler, Parish Priest of St. Mary of the Hills Episcopal Church in Blowing Rock said, "I feel that when we are involved in prayer we are opening to the sacred, to what the Christian community calls God and to each other in ways that may have been closed off or frozen to each other. The more people who pray together, the greater the impact. "I can't say anything about the experiment or the numbers, but I would like to believe that (the effect of prayer) could be measured. If what's being measured does indeed prove the existence of group consciousness, such a result could be of major significance. If more generally known and accepted, groups worldwide could begin consciously and deliberately to choose to focus their thoughts, emotions and energies towards the achievement of a single intention worldwide. Henry Reed, Ph.D., Senior Fellow at the Edgar Cayce Institute for Intuitive Studies, who also teaches at Ancient Wisdom in Boone, said, "This study is adding to a growing body of evidence that a group of people, setting their intent and working in consciousness alone, can have an impact world wide.

HERE IS AN EXCERPT FROM: http://noosphere.princeton.edu/

The Global Consciousness Project

We do not feel that our minds are isolated within our bodies. In truth, we experience the world with beautiful immediacy, we know our loved ones from afar, and we leap in thought to the stars. Research on anomalies of consciousness shows that we may have direct communication links with each other, and that intentions can have effects in the world despite physical barriers and separations. Evidence compels us to accept correlations that we cannot yet explain. It appears that consciousness may sometimes produce something that resembles, at least metaphorically, a nonlocal field. The Global Consciousness Project (GCP) takes this possibility as a starting point for a speculation that such fields generated by individual consciousness would interact and combine, and ultimately have a global presence. Usually, because we are busy with individual lives, there is little to produce structure in the field, so it is random and not detectable. But occasionally there are global-scale events that bring great numbers of us to a common focus and an unusual coherence of thought and feeling. To study the effects of a possible global consciousness, we have created a world-spanning network of detectors sensitive to coherence and resonance in the mental domain. Continuous streams of data are sent over the internet to be archived and correlated with events that may evoke a world-wide consciousness. Examples that appear to have done so include both peaceful gatherings and disasters: a few minutes around midnight on any New Years Eve, the first hour of NATO bombing in Yugoslavia, the Papal visit to Israel, a variety of global meditations, several major earthquakes, and now September 11.

1/5/02
8:27:43 PM

Indian PM eases Kashmir tension

http://www.guardian.co.uk/kashmir/Story/0,2763,627190,00.html

Biography on the Bush family

http://www.kmf.org/williams/bushbook/

Great color pictures of George W. Bush, giving the Satanic hand sign - Plus interesting research and family background information.

http://hardtruth.topcities.com/george_w_bush.htm

BUSH'S ENRON TIES The Enron Corp. scandal involves millions of dollars in campaign contributions to Bush, U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm and other members of Congress.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12155

Executive Privilege Again

http://www.truthout.com/01.04F.Safire.EP.Again.htm

Afghan Refugees, Freezing, Hungry and Prey to Bandits

http://www.truthout.com/01.04G.Afghan.Starve.htm

ARGENTINA'S CRISIS, IMF'S FINGERPRINTS Argentina's economic meltdown might seem far away from American borders, but our greedy support of short-sighted IMF policies is largely to blame.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12152

GLOBAL CITIZEN: STEALING THE SUN According to a new study, humans gobble up 32 percent of the total solar energy captured by land plants. How much more can we steal without upsetting the Earth's ecology?

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12153

1/5/02
8:22:40 PM

ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE (ENS)

http://ens-news.com

AUSTRALIAN BUSHFIRES BLAZE OUT OF CONTROL

SYDNEY, Australia, January 4, 2002 (ENS) - Nearly 20,000 exhausted firefighters are struggling to contain at least 80 fires blazing across New South Wales today. No lives have been lost, but an estimated 170 homes have been burned.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-04-01.html

RENEWABLE FUELS COULD SAVE MONEY, ENVIRONMENT

WASHINGTON, DC, January 4, 2002 (ENS) - Energy legislation emphasizing renewable fuels could help boost the U.S. economy by $300 billion and create as many as 300,000 new jobs by 2016, an independent analysis suggests. The study, sponsored by the National Biodiesel Board, finds that increased use of American made fuels such as biodiesel and ethanol would generate an additional $71 billion over the next 15 years.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-04-06.html

SPAIN SAYS CLIMATE A PRIORITY OF ITS EUROPEAN PRESIDENCY

BRUSSELS, Belgium, January 4, 2002 (ENS) - Spain took over the rotating presidency of the European Union on New Year's day at the start of a six month period likely to see lots of activity on the environmental policy stage. Madrid's tenure will be marked by three themes: sustainable development, climate change, and international environmental agreements.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-04-02.html

COURT ORDERS BETTER PROTECTION FOR NEW ENGLAND GROUNDFISH

WASHINGTON, DC, January 4, 2002 (ENS) - The nation's fisheries managers have defied Congressional mandates to conserve New England groundfish, a federal judge has ruled. The district court ruling in a case brought by five environmental groups could lead to new restrictions on the fishery, aimed at preventing overfishing and reducing bycatch.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-04-07.html

ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: JANUARY 4, 2002

World Trade Center Cleanup Highlights National Meeting

Summer Flounder Catches to Increase

Incineration Alternative Headed for Field Tests

California River Habitats Win Environmental Grants

$2.8 Million Funds Renewable Energy Research

Channel Islands Eelgrass Bed Will Be Restored

Pennsylvania Gets 343 Acre Conservation Gift

Website Offers Hot Information About Wildfires

For full text and graphics visit:

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-04-09.html

1/5/02
8:20:27 PM

hey crazy wackos just wanted to say Hi!

Thanks.

1/5/02
8:18:23 PM

A Hawk In Flight

Against the backdrop of US efforts to resume peace talks, Sharon has been aggressing Palestinians on all fronts

by Khaled Amayreh from Jerusalem

Rather than hailing the virtual halt to the Palestinians' armed resistance, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon appears to have ordered his forces to keep up the assault on the beleaguered people.

A fresh round of bloodletting began on 30 December when Israeli occupation troops ambushed and killed six Palestinian civilians who the Israeli army alleged were "terrorists" on their way to attack Israeli troops.

An occupation army spokesman initially claimed that three of the victims were trying to infiltrate the settlement of Eli Seinai, built on confiscated Palestinian land belonging to the village of Beit Lahya.

A few hours later, the spokesman changed his story, saying that the young men were only heading toward the settlement when they were shot and killed.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) condemned the killing of the six Gazan civilians as "a vile atrocity" aimed at "provoking the Palestinians to retaliate against Israel."

The killing in Gaza took place as the Israeli occupation army continued nightly incursions and raids into PA-administered towns and villages, ostensibly for the purpose of arresting "wanted Palestinians."

This week, the Israeli army raided villages in Hebron, Tulkarm, Nablus, Ramallah and Gaza, where Israeli soldiers harassed, beat, and humiliated Palestinian families. Israeli soldiers reportedly tattooed numbers on the arms of Palestinian detainees, allegedly to identify them more easily.

Meanwhile, Sharon's actions suggested that he intends to be even more intransigent. This week he told his increasingly powerless foreign minister, Shimon Peres, that creating a viable Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip was no longer a goal of the state of Israel.

Sharon, according to Israeli state run radio, also told Peres that his discussions with Palestinian Legislative Council Speaker Ahmed Qurei should be restricted to security issues, emphasising that Peres was not authorised to initiate "political talks" with the Palestinian Authority.

Further confirming his refusal to send positive signals to the Palestinian leadership, Sharon even ordered Israeli President Moshe Katsav to refuse to accept a PA invitation to address the Palestinian Legislative Council in Ramallah.

The invitation was relayed to Katsav earlier this week by former Arab Knesset member Abdel-Wahab Darawshe who suggested that Katsav propose to Palestinian legislators a year-long cease-fire allowing the two sides to resume peace talks.

Sharon ordered Katsav to close the subject, saying a visit to Arafat in Ramallah would undermine Israel's position and effectively break the blockade that Israeli troops are imposing on the Palestinian president in Ramallah.

This week, Peres revealed, probably inadvertently, that Sharon and his ideological bedfellows had been considering as their main strategy the idea of "transfer" -- effectively the expulsion of millions of Palestinians from the entirety of mandatory Palestine.

Israeli state radio quoted Peres as saying, "I don't think that transfer is a viable option, and the more we talk about it, the more damage we suffer in the international arena."

Because Peres's comments did not respond to a question about transfer, the foreign minister's remarks give the impression that imply that he knew of high-level discussions on the matter.

The Jordanian government may well have received word of a trend to that effect when one of the country's officials warned last week that Jordan would close all border crossings from the West Bank to Jordan in the event that a large number of Palestinian refugees try to enter Jordan.

Source: http://www.ahram.org.eg/weekly/2002/567/re1.htm

1/5/02
8:11:02 PM

January 4th, 2002

In a way, the fact that the Feds won't share all they know about the hijackers, or about the target for the 4th plane, or about the actions that ended in that plane nose-diving into a field, or about the exact reasons for thinking Bin Laden is guilty, and then on top of all that, they won't share what they know about the Anthrax attack, leads me to believe that whoever did it either does indeed have very high connections in DC, or doesn't need them because DC is helping them without there having even been a plan -- it amounts to the same thing, namely, the perpetrators are not caught and DC is doing fine, thank you, no problem, let's just keep going and forget about that unfortunately little incident.

I read recently that there are believed to be only about 100 people who could possibly have a connection to the Anthrax attack, because so few have both access to that strain/grade, and the knowledge to utilize that access. So how come we round up 1000 people on suspicion after the hijackings, but these 100 people go free? Is it because 99 of them (or perhaps 98 or 97) are good Americans whereas all the 1000 are Arab-Americans or Arabs?

So many things don't add up, it's pathetic. What's the world coming to? When are the answers coming? I hope that 20th hijacker gets a televised trial like he's asking for. I learned an awful lot -- good and bad -- from watching the OJ trial (he was guilty as sin, by the way). Let's watch this guy, and John Walker, and whatever Taliban leaders they've got get tried in public so we can see the "evidence" that purportedly exists. (Noting that they've just arrested the Taliban ambassador we kept seeing during the early phases of the war. What you arrest an ambassador for, I don't know.)

Russell Hoffman, Carlsbad, CA

1/5/02
8:08:15 PM

t r u t h o u t

DASCHLE | Rising to Our New Challenges

http://www.truthout.com/01.05A.Daschle.Rise.htm

t r u t h o u t Special Report Part I | Congressional Aide Found Dead in Congressman's Office

http://www.truthout.com/01.05B.Klausutis.1.htm

CONYERS | Confronts Ashcroft Over Covert Detention of Michigan Pastor

http://www.truthout.com/01.05C.Conyers.Pastor.htm

GAO Tests Value of Drug Discount Cards Savings Less Than 10%, Study Shows

http://www.truthout.com/01.05D.GAO.Cards.htm

Bush, Unions Tangle Over Contractor Rules, Labor Issues

http://www.truthout.com/01.05E.Bush.Unions.htm

Enron Executives Face Subpoenas

http://www.truthout.com/01.05F.Enron.Subpoena.htm

1/5/02
8:06:22 PM

DAILY GRIST <http://www.gristmagazine.com>

SIGH-ONARA

Not two months after the conclusion of the climate change negotiations in Marrakech, Morocco, Japan is sending alarming signals that it will bow to industry pressure and break its pledge to adhere to the Kyoto Protocol and cut greenhouse gas emissions. An advisory council to the government is recommending that emissions cuts be voluntary for businesses and that the government not impose any guidelines on how to achieve the reductions. Critics say such a framework would make it very difficult for the country to meet its target of cutting emissions by 6 percent below 1990 levels. Japan has been in the climate change spotlight ever since the Bush administration pulled out of the Kyoto Protocol.

straight to the source: BBC News, Alex Kirby, 03 Jan 2002 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1740000/1740677.stm>

straight to the source: Yomiuri Shimbun, 31 Dec 2001 <http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/newse/20011231wo12.htm>

RUNNING A GROUNDFISH

The U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service is breaking the law by failing to sufficiently protect groundfish in New England, a federal judge ruled last Friday. U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler said she would issue an order with specific directions for how the agency should stop overfishing, because the NMFS can't be trusted to enforce the 1996 Sustainable Fisheries Act. The region's 1,400 cod and other groundfish trawlers will likely face much tougher limits on where nets can be cast and how many fish can be caught. Environmentalists praised the decision as precedent-setting, while fishers worried that they might be regulated out of business.

straight to the source: Portland Press Herald, John Richardson, 04 Jan 2002 <http://www.portland.com/news/state/020104fish.shtml>

VICTOR: VICTORIA

These days, press coverage of the Middle East is all bombs and burkhas, but Victoria Jamali is fighting a very different battle. The Iranian woman cofounded one of her country's most active nonprofits, the Women's Society Against Environmental Pollution. Now, along with colleagues at the University of Tehran, she is launching Iran's first environmental law program. U.S. environmentalists have called Jamali an Iranian John Muir. She is leading Iran's movement against severe water and air pollution (cities like Tehran must close their schools in the fall, when air pollution is most severe); against threats to the country's wildlife (such as the rare Persian cheetah); and against the general lack of environmental regulation in her society.

straight to the source: Eugene Weekly, Cheri Brooks, 03 Jan 2002 <http://www.eugeneweekly.com/coverstory.html>

1/5/02
8:01:55 PM

The Discreet Charm Of The Straight Spin

by Norman Solomon

If my memory is correct, it was a Jerry Lewis movie. More than 40 years later, I still remember the scenes of a grown man so gullible that he believed his television. What a laugh riot! The guy dashed out to shop every time a commercial told him exactly what to buy. Then he'd sit in front of the TV set, dyeing his hair and smoking cigars, awaiting further instructions.

It was quite funny -- to a 10-year-old, anyway. Even back then, it seemed incontrovertibly absurd to think that someone would be so credulous about televised messages.

Today, print journalists may roll their eyes at the mention of television. Those of us who write for newspapers are (ahem) rather more sophisticated and nuanced. But even someone who sticks to reading the news has probably gotten the authoritative word that Sept. 11 changed "everything."

And so, it was unremarkable when, on the last Sunday of 2001, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch flatly stated in an editorial: "The unspeakable, the unthinkable, the inconceivable horror of that day changed everything." Meanwhile, a couple of thousand miles away, Northern California's largest newspaper was even more over the top as the San Francisco Chronicle's front page proclaimed: "Attack on the U.S. changed everyone and everything everywhere."

When highly regarded news outlets are serving up wild hyperbole in the guise of sober analysis, you gotta figure that some screws in the nation's media machinery are seriously loose.

On the trail of jingo-narcissism, it's difficult to stay within shouting distance of television. In early fall, Pentagon reporters sought -- and got -- more frequent news conferences. "Let's hear it for the essential daily briefing, however hollow and empty it might be," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in the middle of October. "We'll do it."

Since then, Rumsfeld has regularly helped with the propaganda chores. Airing live on such cable networks as MSNBC, CNN and Fox, his performances have won profuse media accolades. A news report by CNN called him "a virtual rock star." A Wall Street Journal essay -- by TV critic Claudia Rosett, a member of the newspaper's editorial board -- described Rumsfeld as "a gent who in our country's hour of need has turned out to be one (of) the classiest acts on camera."

Published on the last day of the year, Rosett's article was a fitting climax to a media season of slathering over the well-heeled boots of the man in charge of the Pentagon. During recent weeks, she noted approvingly, "in print and on the air, we've been hearing about Don Rumsfeld, sex symbol, the new hunk of home-front airtime."

Deep into the mass-media groove, the Wall Street Journal piece declared: "The basic source of Mr. Rumsfeld's charm is that he talks straight. He doesn't expend his energy on spin..." Now there's an example of some prodigious spinning. Actually, Rumsfeld -- who excels at sticking to the lines of the day -- is a fine practitioner of spin in the minimalist style, with deception accomplished mostly by what's left unsaid.

For some, Rumsfeld's dissembling style is a source of continual delight. "These briefings, beamed out live, have become, to my mind, the best new show on television," Rosett wrote. "It's a rare one that doesn't contain, at some point, some variation on his wry trademark reply when asked to discuss matters he'd rather not go into: 'I could, but I won't.'"

One of the subjects that Rumsfeld would rather not go into is civilian deaths in Afghanistan.

Several weeks ago, University of New Hampshire professor Marc Herold released a report calculating that 3,767 Afghan civilians had been killed by the bombing between Oct. 7 and Dec. 10. The report was ignored by major U.S. media.

In Britain, the report received a bit more attention. "The price in blood that has already been paid for America's war against terror is only now starting to become clear," an editor at the London-based Guardian wrote on Dec. 20. Seumas Milne explained that Herold's research was "based on corroborated reports from aid agencies, the UN, eyewitnesses, TV stations, newspapers and news agencies around the world."

Milne added: "Of course, Herold's total is only an estimate. But what is impressive about his work is not only the meticulous cross-checking, but the conservative assumptions he applies to each reported incident. The figure does not include those who died later of bomb injuries; nor those killed in the past 10 days (Dec. 10-20); nor those who have died from cold and hunger because of the interruption of aid supplies or because they were forced to become refugees by the bombardment."

As wars go, we are supposed to understand, this has been a noble one. Great men like Donald Rumsfeld have told us so. However, from a more informed and less credulous vantage point, buying such claims might seem absurd. But not funny like a Jerry Lewis movie.

Norman Solomon's latest book is "The Habits of Highly Deceptive Media." His syndicated column focuses on media and politics.

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12161

1/5/02
7:56:51 PM

How One Person Can Change the World

by Geov Parrish

I've never actually met Ruel Bernard; our paths have probably crossed at one time or another, but by the time we knew who each other was, we lived a continent apart. One day, we'll meet. In the meantime, I'm glad I know him, and know of him. It's people (and stories) like Ruel that always give me hope for a new year.

Our paths crossed because in 1991, two friends and I launched my first adventure in publishing -- and, for that matter, my first adventure in writing and reporting. It was a tiny volunteer, non-profit newspaper called On Indian Land, and it focused on Native American traditional land struggles and politics. (I left about five years ago, but it only recently went on a perhaps-permanent hiatus after a wonderful ten-year run.)

OIL turned out to primarily be about the newspaper, but it was originally only one piece of a larger project, called Support for Native Sovereignty, that carried out public education and raised material aid and political support for impoverished traditional Native communities. Enter Ruel.

Ruel Bernard is a carpenter who has lived for many years in Albany, New York. His sometimes-activism was abruptly jump-started by a trip to Nicaragua in the mid-'80s, of the sort common among progressives still then hopeful that the Sandanista revolution could withstand relentless hostility from the U.S. government. It was Ruel's first time in the Third World, and what he saw was that for the time he spent and the money he made building third bathrooms and luxury kitchens in one or another American suburb, whole communities could be built, and lives immeasurably improved, in an alternate universe not very far away.

One thing led to another, and when Hurricano Hugo devastated Puerto Rico in 1989, a project called Building Community was born. The purpose of Building Community, as with the Central American solidarity brigades Ruel learned from, was to apply U.S. skills and resources to far poorer communities where they were desperately needed -- but to do so by working with communities and responding to their perceived needs, rather than imposing norteamericano ideas and solutions. Ruel turned to Puerto Rico in part because it was a piece of the Third World that belongs to the United States -- Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens, but often live in Latin American housing conditions. And after Hugo, many of them weren't living in any housing at all.

Sometimes, all it takes is a simple idea, and a good one, to change a lot of lives. Early on, Ruel hooked up with families from Villa sin Miedo ("City Without Fear"), the campesino community made famous by spectacular confrontations with the Puerto Rican government in the early '80s over a huge squat outside San Juan. (My friendship with Ruel was cemented when I found out about that connection, and he found out about the song I'd written about that squat.) Building Community, the organization, has been and continues to be focused on building community, the mission. Its collectivist ethic extends beyond building structures, but also skill trainings and self-help projects that give people with few resources more confidence in themselves and each other.

Over a decade later, Ruel's channel for his restless energy now has construction and medical brigades in Puerto Rico and Guatemala, and works with schools and the public in the mainland U.S. as well.

The reason for writing about Ruel and Building Communities here isn't so much as a testimonial or because it's a cool group -- though it is -- as to suggest what kinds of answers can be possible if any of us asks the right questions.

Those questions are both personal (What do we really want to do with our energy, our labor, our lives?) and societal (How can we best use our tremendous creativity, good will, and wealth? Why are the things some of us can take for granted seemingly so far beyond the reach of other, equally deserving peoples? And how can that be fixed?).

I have no idea how many people, how many families, how many children have had their lives immeasurably improved over the last decade because one guy in Albany decided to stop building third bathrooms. But somewhere, at the dawn of this new year, other people are making equally important and inspiring decisions. For all of the political grimness that crops up in this site, this country, this planet, there are still billions of people on it, and with each of us there is the seed of hope.

Most of us will never change the world. But we can change ourselves, and each of us can change some peoples' worlds -- for the better -- if only we pick the right questions, and have the courage to answer them.

Building Communities can be reached at 845 679.6100

Or via email at: MailTo:ruel43@aol.com.

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12158

1/5/02
7:43:01 PM

The FBI's Black Magic?

by David Corn

Knock, knock.

Who's there?

The FBI.

The FBI who?

The FBI who is working on a way to gain remote access to all you type on your computer so we won't have to say 'knock, knock' in the future.

In mid-December, the FBI made a startling announcement that received scant attention. A spokesman for the bureau acknowledged it was developing a controversial Internet spying software -- code-named Magic Lantern -- that supposedly can surreptitiously enter an individual's personal computer, record every keystroke and zap all this data back to the G-men and G-women. Presto, the data-snoops at the bureau would have the target's computer passwords, the texts and addresses of all the emails written by him or her (even those angry emails drafted but never sent), a record of all the Internet traveling he or she did, copies of snail-mail correspondence, the contents of any diary kept, to-do lists, on-line banking information, memos, you-name-it --anything typed into the computer, even if it were immediately deleted or trashed.

For weeks, rumors of this computer-search software had been buzzing throughout tech circles. In November, MSNBC first reported FBI was developing a computer "virus" that would install "keylogging software" on a suspect's machine. But the bureau would neither confirm nor deny. Several software companies were asked by reporters if they were cooperating with the FBI by rigging their anti-virus detection programs to ignore Magic Lantern. Some firms offered conflicting replies; eventually all said they were not in league with the government. Then finally a FBI official named Paul Bresson publicly confirmed Magic Lantern was no illusion. "It's a workbench project" that has not yet been used, he told Reuters. And that was all he would reveal.

Magic Lantern would not entail a dramatic technological advance. As zdnet.com notes, "several hacking tools, the two most popular being Back Orifice and SubSeven, allow full control over a remote PC infected by the program, including keystroke logging." Still, it is a momentous law enforcement advance.

The software was born out of FBI frustration. In recent years, the electronic eavesdroppers of the bureau have been bedeviled by widely-available encryption programs. If the FBI gets a warrant to intercept the Internet communications of a suspect, it is screwed if that data has been encrypted, for the bureau does not have the resources to crack this sort of code. It would be much easier to obtain the passwords used by a target and with those in hand de-encrypt the information. In at least one known case, the feds, using a search warrant, gained physical access to the computer of an alleged loan shark and gangster who had utilized encryption to scramble information on his hard drive. The bureau planted keystroke-detection technology on the computer, uncovered his password and collected evidence against him. (In court, the FBI adamantly refused to disclose the specifics of its keystroke-snatching technology.) Magic Lantern would replace the need for a black-bag job. Instead of agents breaking into a home or office to attach a keystroke logger, the software would creep in, perhaps via an email that seems to come from a friend, and silently penetrate the computer.

With Magic Lantern, the FBI would move beyond its controversial Carnivore system, which is installed at an Internet service provider, reviews the data stream and picks out email and web visits of specific account holders. Carnivore is like a policeman at a speed trap watching for suspected speeders. Magic Lantern is a cop who sneaks into the backseat of the car of a suspect and, unbeknown to the driver, rides along.

So there's a problem with this? Possibly. Magic Lantern could too easily lead to overly broad searches. Though its grail may be encryption passwords, agents will be able to snag anything typed on a keyboard. (The FBI in the days of old used to love to obtain the discarded typewriter ribbons of suspected criminals or commies. With the ribbons in hand, the bureau could read whatever had been written on the suspect's typewriter.) Viewers of The Sopranos might recall the episodes in which FBI agents wiretapped Tony's home. As is often the case, they were not allowed to record everything that went on in the house. The FBI team could only roll tape when it was clear T. was talking about illicit enterprises. That is because wiretaps are supposed to be narrowly aimed, not used like a Hoover (pun intended). Magic Lantern could end up being much too powerful a snoop.

"Because the tool involves covert installation of software on someone's PC with no physical intervention, it could conceivably allow law enforcement to circumvent wiretapping restrictions,"Alex Salkever writes on Business Week Online. David Sobel, general counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center complains, "We don't know what this is capable of." Will this software be open-source? asks Lee Tien, a senior attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. If it is not, the public will not have a clear picture of its capabilites. (Don't bet on the FBI opening such a potent weapon to scrutiny.) The public may not even know when Magic Lantern is up and running, assuming the bureau's high tech wizards succeed. Perhaps it already is. And here's a scary thought: what if Magic Lantern fell into the wrong hands? Or what if the FBI's development and use of a particular software helped or encouraged corporations, individuals, or other governments (say, Beijing) to produce and exploit similar software? Who knows who will be slipping in and out of your computer.

In the Ashcroft era, it is easy to lose sight of a fundamental principle: not every government invasion of privacy has to be accepted, even if the government claims each one is a necessary tool for fighting the "evil ones." But when a war is under way, civil liberties tend to be trumped by national security concerns, real or imagined. For those who fret about Magic Lantern, the trendline is not encouraging. The USA Patriot Act, quickly passed by Congress in October, included a provision that made it easier for the FBI to unleash Carnivore. The legislation allows agents to install it without petitioning a judge for a warrant, as long as they get an okay from a U.S. or state attorney general,

In a 1967 decision, the Supreme Court observed that "by its very nature eavesdropping involves an intrusion on privacy that is broad in scope" and that "few threats to liberty exist which are greater than those posed by the use of eavesdropping devices." Which means it is a government power to be used sparingly, as a last resort, and with extensive oversight. If Magic Lantern does become operational, tough regulations ought to be imposed. Judges should be tightfisted in signing warrants allowing the FBI to dispatch the software. If a warrant is signed, the snoopers should have to report to the judge often and provide full updates on how Magic Lantern is being used and what it is collecting. The target ought to be notified his or her computer has been penetrated shortly after the investigation ends.

But because government wiretapping is a subject shrouded in great secrecy, it is usually difficult for the public to tell whether or not the rules governing it are being followed assiduously. When Attorney General John Ashcroft appeared at a Dec. 6 hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Maria Cantwell, a Democrat from Washington state, raised the subject of Magic Lantern. She noted that under the USA Patriot Act it was indeed possible Magic Lantern-like software could be employed in too sweeping a manner. She asked if Ashcroft would agree to meet four times a year with legislators to discuss how the government was utilizing intercept technologies like Carnivore and Magic Lantern. Ashcroft offered a noncommittal reply: "I welcome the opportunity for the [Justice] Department to work with you toward these objectives." In other words, yeah, right.

Lee Tien has a good idea along these lines. He suggests there be "some kind of powerful independent counsel (like a police Internal Affairs department) that watches all this surveillance." Magic Lantern, he says, "goes far beyond tapping a line. Those of us who use computers have a lot of our lives on them. You use your computer to read, to think with. It's our virtual home, very much an extension of self." The government should invade this turf only in the most dire circumstances.

In that 1967 Supreme Court decision, the justices said it is conceivable a surveillance technology could be so risky, from a constitutional perspective, that the Fourth Amendment would prohibit the government from taking advantage of it. That's never happened, but Magic Lantern is a close candidate. This software would give the government the power to enter your most private space and record everything you write. With a war on -- so to speak -- Magic Lantern is not shining brightly on many radar screens. But it is a step toward Big Brotherhood that warrants reflection and debate before this software magic becomes mundane.

David Corn is the Washington editor of The Nation and a regular AlterNet contributor.

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12163

1/5/02
7:38:58 PM

2001: A Year of W.

by Barry Crimmins

Can it really be a year since we didn't elect George W. Bush president? Time sure flies when you're going straight to hell.

Let's take a look back at our first 12 months with the court-appointed chief executive.

December 2000

Happy holidays! The Republicans, hell-bent on returning ethics to Washington, formalized the theft of the election with an assist from the Supremacist Court, when George W. Bush was appointed president of the United States.

The turn of the millennium, which reached a de facto conclusion a year earlier when marketers commandeered the calendar, actually expired at midnight, December 31, 2000, outliving the credibility of America's electoral process by several days.

January 2001

The New Year arrived with the feel of one of those action movies where a comet's hurtling toward Earth and, short of a miracle, it's going to hit -- hard.

Neither Bruce Willis nor Robert Duvall showed. Bush was inaugurated. A dazed electorate had been body-politic slammed into a deep Florida sinkhole. As we scrambled to clear the cobwebs from our heads, an ominous groan grew to a large rumble emanating from a fleet of conveyances set to dump toxic waste, religious sewage, and corporate effluence upon us. Only those who could tread slime stood any chance of crawling back to dry land.

During the Inaugural weekend, the Republicans delivered on their promise to return dignity to the capital by tying longhorn steers in the foyers of grand hotels. Z-list celebrities, such as Dixie Carter and the Statler Brothers, were the only showbiz types to soil themselves by attending the festivities. Bush wept as he awaited his swearing in. Perhaps he was thinking of all the Texans who gave their lives in the death chamber so that he could be there.

Laura Bush announced that she would use her position as First Lady to promote abstinence. No one wondered why.

February

The F-month was marked by the continuation of ridiculous cabinet confirmation hearings begun in January. Even though W.(orst) was appointed president after losing the popular vote and stealing the Electoral College, the assemblage of corporate toadies, backroom fixers, and self-loathing zealots he nominated would make you think he arrived with a mandate.

What this guy lacked in brains he made up for in audacity. Who else would even consider Governor Christy Todd Whitman of New Jersey to head the Environmental Protection Agency? And who would foist upon us church-state integrationist John Ashcroft -- a man deemed by Missouri voters less fit for public office than a corpse -- as attorney general?

After becoming treasury secretary, former ALCOA chair Paul O'Neill told Britain's Financial Times that he thinks corporate taxes should be abolished, along with Medicare and Social Security. Fortunately, O'Neill hasn't yet found time to transfer the Social Security trust fund into Enron and Lucent stock certificates.

Bush better be reappointed in '04, or there won't be time for his cabinet to unpack all the baggage they brought with them.

The only nominee to go down was Linda Chavez, who withdrew her name from consideration for labor secretary when it got out that she had illegal aliens sleeping in the exact spot under the table where she paid them. Too bad: she would have worked cheap.

February's highlight came when the teaching of evolution was restored in Kansas. Kansans celebrated by walking upright, taking shelter from storms, and communicating through a series of simple grunts. If this keeps up, their congressional delegation is in big trouble.

March

In March, Bush announced that taxes on the rich would be replaced with an honor system under which the elite would be expected to increase their commitment to private, faith-based bribery and slush funds by some 50 percent.

The aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan was christened and immediately manned by scab air-traffic controllers. The vessel is actually larger than Grenada, the site of Reagan's greatest military victory.

A March earthquake heavily damaged Starbucks' Seattle headquarters. Within days, the coffee giant bounced back and replaced it with 60 new headquarters at various places around the city.

In financial news, the NASDAQ was traded for a 1988 Yugo, high mileage, needs bodywork and a new engine. Smith Barney ran a 75% off! everything must go! sale.

April

So far, on W.'s watch, the US

• Accidentally sank a Japanese fishing boat.

• Got into a military incident with the Chinese that any kid in a video arcade could have avoided with a few clicks of a joystick. (In fairness, the South China Sea was positively crawling with Japanese fishing vessels.)

• Strafed Europe with debris from military aircraft that must have been built by the same technicians who found a way to make plastic rust on US cars in the '70s.

• Failed to explain adequately the " Baptists under fire " incident in Peru, where a Baptist missionary's plane was shot down under the aegis of narcotics interdiction. Apparently the War on Drugs targeted-substance list had been expanded to include " opium of the masses. "

On April 13, I wrote: " If Bush's foreign policy gets any more antiquated, the Crusades will resume in July. " Okay, I was off by a few months. Oh, and on April 15, wealthy Americans paid taxes for the final time.

Although humanity is pretty durable, many began to believe it didn't have a British cow's chance at customs of surviving the court-appointed Bush administration.

Aaron Sorkin, creator of the Emmy Award--winning The West Wing, was arrested for possession of hallucinogenic mushrooms, which explains Sorkin's vision of a White House peppered with idealists fighting good battles.

May

In honor of May Day, American corporations laid off workers by the thousands just to make sure they would be ineligible to celebrate the international workers' holiday. Court-appointed president Bush finally named his choices for the federal bench in May. The long delay was due to the travel time required for the judges to reach Washington from their residences in the 17th century.

After appearing at the National Rifle Association convention and praising gun nuts as " America's unsung conservation heroes, " Interior Secretary Gail Norton earned a new title: Secretary of the Ulterior.

May's top story: like any good Vermonter, Senator Jim Jeffords demonstrated he knows when the sap runs and when to run from the sap. Jeffords left George W. Bush and the Republican Party, taking with him majority control of the Senate. As a result, Trent Lott and the rest of the GOP Senate leadership were given a chance to do some of that " downsizing " they like so much.

June

First the court-appointed Bush administration literally takes office, and then The Producers sweeps the Tonys. The year 2001 will always be remembered for joke revivals featuring fascists.

In June, I traveled to Albuquerque to speak at a drug-policy conference hosted by the stalwart anti-drug-war warriors of the Lindesmith Center. Federal drug prosecutors and DEA agents just happened to schedule their convention in the same town at the same time. The feds held no seminars on subtlety.

Speaking of substance-abuse arrests, Jenna Bush was busted in June for underage drinking. Considering who her father is, it's a miracle the poor kid isn't walking around with a morphine drip in her elbow.

July

Al Giordano, a former Phoenix staff writer who publishes the Web-based Narco News, and Mexican journalist Mario Menéndez faced a huge civil suit in New York City brought by Banamex (a Mexican bank, since purchased by Citigroup) and its chair, Roberto Hernández. Hernández was upset with Al and Mario for printing corroborated facts about his and his bank's involvement in the drug trade. The suit was intended to prevent Al from continuing to publish his independent, highly factual refutations of the big lie that is the drug war. At a July hearing in federal court, Giordano and Menéndez demonstrated that the case had no business in New York, especially since it had already been thrown out of Mexican courts for lacking merit. In December, New York State Supreme Court judge Paula Omansky threw the case out of court, informing the plaintiff that Giordano and Menéndez deserved the same First Amendment protection afforded journals that publish lies about the War on Drugs.

August

Unlike most Americans in their first year on a new job, W. took an extended paid vacation in August. It's a good thing he got rested up, rather than exhausting himself with concerns like airport safety and domestic security.

September 1--10

George W. Bush's vacation ended on Labor Day in Detroit. He'd been invited there to attend a picnic by Teamsters president James Hoffa Jr., a man whose integrity is less likely ever to be discovered than the whereabouts of his missing father.

John Joslin and Kevin Mackey, two rank-and-file members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, were disturbed by the invitation of such an obvious enemy of labor to labor's hometown on Labor Day. So, at the spot where the building-trades portion of Motown's massive Labor Day parade formed, Joslin and Mackey put up a stage and sound system. Then they put me on the stage. As each union marched in place waiting to round the corner of Michigan and Trumbull, I suggested to the workers just how insulting and cynical Bush's visit was. And then Joslin, Mackey, and a host of activists handed out signs that articulated the many ways Bush and his cronies harm working Americans and their families.

Bush's photo op was co-opted by thousands of real working Americans. Carrying signs and chanting insults, union members made it clear that Bush was no more welcome in Detroit on Labor Day than they would be at a clambake at Bush's country club. It was the last wonderful day we would have for a long time.

September 11 and 12

On September 11, the whole world changed -- except for large portions of Europe, Asia, and Africa, several island nations, and those parts of the world where terrorism, whether state-sponsored or rogue, was already part of everyday life. Okay, on September 11 life in the US began to resemble, just slightly, life elsewhere.

The court-appointed prez was addressing elementary-school children in Florida when the attacks occurred. (Somehow it's always Florida.) He quickly headed to Louisiana and then into a game room in Omaha.

I might have given Bush a pass on going Barney Fife that morning except for a few things. During a time when even Rudolph Giuliani rose above venal political considerations (albeit briefly), the Bush administration's apparent top priority was to propagate alibis about why the president headed for the Grain Belt while the Northeast Corridor burned. This included telling us about a call to the Secret Service stating that the president was in imminent danger. Problem is, no such call was received. Bush was supposed to be a hard-ass Texas Republican naturally inclined to fly to DC, climb to the roof of the White House, and wave pearl-handled revolvers, yelling, " Try me, motherfuckers! " Instead, the Incredible President Limpet headed for a bunker in the Central Time Zone.

On September 12, while people lay trapped and dying under piles of rubble, several administration officials spent the morning telling us about the mythical phone threat, along with other prevarications that must have taken much of September 11 to prepare.

They also said the assault on the Pentagon was sort of a coincidence because the terrorists were really aiming for the White House. They called the Pentagon a " secondary target. "

Even if the Pentagon had been a terrorist afterthought (and of course it wasn't), why bring it up while people were still dead and dying in its wreckage? Because the cheesy people who operate the marionette that occupies the Oval Office value political viability over human life, that's why. This episode is important to recall as we watch the Bush administration seize this crisis to further its entire agenda. SDI, oil drilling in Alaska's Arctic Wildlife Refuge, destroying the federal judiciary, and yet another tax break for the rich -- all have suddenly become essential weapons in the War on Terrorism. Yeah, and W. will be joining Mensa soon, too.

September 13--30

Within days, even skeptics were convinced that Osama bin Laden was behind the terrorist attacks. The US vowed to bring him to justice. All searches should include probes into the curdled milk of human kindness -- a sure sign he's nearby. If that doesn't work, go to Jerry Falwell and take a slight right. If you get to Ann Coulter, you've gone too far.

The nation and the mainstream media universally embraced Junior for rising to the occasion. Such a delusion arose from the fact that September 11 created exactly what everyone feared: a life-and-death struggle that forced us to look to this rather dim bulb to think on his feet.

To be fair, after his weak start, Bush did have a good night of being TelePrompTed before Congress on September 20. His address promoted his basic dinosaur-brained good-versus-evil rap in terms speechwriters sufficiently airbrushed to make him seem almost eloquent. But once Jimmy Breslin busted him for recycling his father's dead-cop-badge gambit, we quickly returned to the frosty truth that we had a president and Jingo was his name-o.

Bush spoke of " evildoers " and " crusades. " They have a jihad; he gave us a GOPhad. We needed a president, and the guy who does the voice-overs for Underdog showed up.

Americans cautiously returned to airports to face many inconveniences. The new rule of thumb for airline passengers is to allow yourself as much time as it would take to walk to your destination.

October

Around October 7, the US " officially " began military action in Afghanistan. These were tough days for hungry Afghans who couldn't differentiate between a yellow cluster bomb and a yellow food packet. Even if they found a food packet, there was a decent chance it had landed in the middle of a minefield. In the meantime, US military action brought legitimate humanitarian efforts in Afghanistan to a standstill.

Congress rewarded the airline industry for staffing its security checkpoints with minimum-wage employees who didn't realize that McDonald's offered better career options by coughing up a $15 billion bailout package. Damned welfare scofflaws!

In a classic example of becoming what you resist, the new Office of Homeland Security, headed by Pennsylvania's Tom Rigid, opened. Rigid's familiarity with Pennsylvania-Dutch/South African customs should be a real plus on the war's domestic front.

The country was by now awash in the kind of demonstrative patriotism that is best left to used-car dealerships. Flags were everywhere -- particularly in Third World sweatshops where they couldn't keep up with the demand for Old Glory. Flag price-gouging was reported across the country. Now ain't that America?

Throughout the delayed post-season, by the fourth inning of any baseball game the entire Irving Berlin songbook had been exhausted. At around the same time, someone decided that all motor vehicles should enter a General-Patton-staff-car look-alike contest. The fiercest competition was among sport-utility vehicles. Americans, involved in a war that's in no small part related to dependence on Middle Eastern oil, managed to make obscenely fuel-inefficient SUVs that much worse with the addition of red, white, and blue wind resistance.

I had no flag at all until a homeless vet sold me a small one, the kind that goes on Fourth of July cupcakes. Now I can proudly point to it majestically flapping atop the bird feeder. It's a nice reminder that when the veterans of this war come home, feeling destitute and forgotten, there will always be flags for them to sell.

Since September 11, the flag has become a perverse and undemocratic symbol of blind obedience to the edicts of the unelected son of a former chief of the CIA, an organization that helped school Osama bin Laden in terrorism.

Nazi Germany had a lot of flags and no Bill of Rights. That's exactly where we are headed if we roll over for the likes of Kaiser Ashcroft and his full frontal attack on our civil liberties.

Osama bin Laden assaulted our way of life, but John Ashcroft and George W. Bush are destroying it. January 20, 2001, may end up much more a Day of Infamy than September 11. This does not make me proud to be an American.

I am willing to live with the slightly heightened danger of terrorist attack rather than the guaranteed oppression of a police state. I am willing to risk my life to remain free. Are you?

On October 30, the FBI sounded a new terrorism alert just in time for Halloween -- or perhaps just in time to spook Americans into accepting the idea of carpet-bombing Afghanistan on October 31.

November--December

It wasn't hard watching the hateful Taliban fall from power. These crackpots executed " improperly attired " women. Under the Taliban, Afghanistan became a fashion-police state. But when they faced true adversity, the Taliband of Brothers were routed from Afghan cities in less than two months.

I really can't sort November from December, or December from October, for that matter, but while time got fuzzy over the past months, some things came into focus.

W.'s " With us or against us " cant doesn't cut it. Every one of our lives is at stake, so we all need to get literate about the world in which we live. Though we'll never cave in to the barbarous Al Qaeda network, we must stop making the world fertile ground for its violent lunacy.

We have to look at certain issues -- even if they are found on known terrorists' lists of grievances -- because we don't want there to be more terrorists. For instance, it's time to face what over a decade of sanctions and bombing has done to the poor people of Iraq. And we must let the people of Israel know that we cannot truck the direction their nation has taken under the vicious Ariel Sharon. Mahmoud Abu Hanoud, the Hamas leader whose November 23 assassination sparked the recent terrorist attacks on Israel, was freed from a Palestinian jail under cover of mayhem caused when Israeli troops bombed it in a May attempt to kill Hanoud.

We can't afford to celebrate driving a fifth-rate dictatorship from power in Afghanistan -- particularly when the vacuum it leaves will be filled by the Northern Alliance, a collection of drug- and weapons-dealing misogynists with nary a democratic inclination among them. So far, all that has happened is the US has driven a bunch of terrorists from the cities and into the weeds. Terrorists like weeds and can strike at will from them.

What will America do when that starts happening? Send in Ashcroft to organize a round-up of all the people who appear to be Middle Eastern in Afghanistan?

Further, we can't afford to ask with affected naïveté how anyone in the world could hate us enough to bomb us when we have bombed unoffending people more often than any other nation. There is a reason the US coined the term " collateral damage, " and now that we understand just how profane it is, we have to speak up against it -- here, there, and everywhere.

Another reason we are hated is that we always get so much more than our share of the worldwide pie. Only in America would anyone suggest running up credit-card debt as a way of helping the nation recover from tragedy.

THE OTHER night, after watching a news anchor pull off the amazing feat of correctly pronouncing several difficult Afghan names while simultaneously fellating the entire US military-industrial complex, I flicked off the TV and reached for Mark Twain's Notebook. In it, Sam Clemens demonstrated once again that he was light-years ahead of his -- or, apparently, our -- era. Twain wrote:

There are two kinds of patriotism -- monarchical patriotism and republican patriotism. In the one case, the government and the king may rightfully furnish you their notions of patriotism: in the other, neither government nor the entire nation is privileged to dictate to any individual what the form of his patriotism shall be. The Gospel of Monarchical Patriotism is: " The King can do no wrong. " We have adopted it with all its servility, with an unimportant change in the wording: " Our country, right or wrong! "

We have thrown away the most valuable asset we have -- the individual right to oppose both flag and country when he (just he by himself) believes them to be in the wrong. We have thrown it all away: and with it, all that was really respectable about that grotesque and laughable word, Patriotism.

Were Twain alive today, he could expect a visit from the Office of Homeland Security.

To keep up with Barry Crimmins's thoughts as they occur -- and not just annually --

Check out his Web site at http://www.barrycrimmins.com

1/5/02
7:30:02 PM

So You're an Environmentalist;

Why Are You Still Eating Meat?

by Jim Motavalli

There has never been a better time for environmentalists to become vegetarians. Evidence of the environmental impacts of a meat-based diet is piling up at the same time its health effects are becoming better known. Meanwhile, full-scale industrialized factory farming -- which allows diseases to spread quickly as animals are raised in close confinement -- has given rise to recent, highly publicized epidemics of meat-borne illnesses. At press time, the first discovery of mad cow disease in a Tokyo suburb caused beef prices to plummet in Japan and many people to stop eating meat.

All this comes at a time when meat consumption is reaching an all-time high around the world, quadrupling in the last 50 years. There are 20 billion head of livestock taking up space on the Earth, more than triple the number of people. According to the Worldwatch Institute, global livestock population has increased 60 percent since 1961, and the number of fowl being raised for human dinner tables has nearly quadrupled in the same time period, from 4.2 billion to 15.7 billion. U.S. beef and pork consumption has tripled since 1970, during which time it has more than doubled in Asia.

Americans spend $110 billion a year on meat-intensive fast food, and its growing popularity around the world may be a factor in dramatic increases in global meat consumption. © Jason Kremkau

One reason for the increase in meat consumption is the rise of fast-food restaurants as an American dietary staple. As Eric Schlosser noted in his best-selling book Fast Food Nation, "Americans now spend more money on fast food -- $110 billion a year -- than they do on higher education. They spend more on fast food than on movies, books, magazines, newspapers, videos and recorded music -- combined."

Strong growth in meat production and consumption continues despite mounting evidence that meat-based diets are unhealthy, and that just about every aspect of meat production -- from grazing-related loss of cropland and open space, to the inefficiencies of feeding vast quantities of water and grain to cattle in a hungry world, to pollution from "factory farms" -- is an environmental disaster with wide and sometimes catastrophic consequences. Oregon State University agriculture professor Peter Cheeke calls factory farming "a frontal assault on the environment, with massive groundwater and air pollution problems."

World Hunger and Resources

The 4.8 pounds of grain fed to cattle to produce one pound of beef for human beings represents a colossal waste of resources in a world still teeming with people who suffer from profound hunger and malnutrition.

According to the British group Vegfam, a 10-acre farm can support 60 people growing soybeans, 24 people growing wheat, 10 people growing corn and only two producing cattle. Britain -- with 56 million people --could support a population of 250 million on an all-vegetable diet. Because 90 percent of U.S. and European meat eaters' grain consumption is indirect (first being fed to animals), westerners each consume 2,000 pounds of grain a year. Most grain in underdeveloped countries is consumed directly.

Somalian famine victims line up for food handouts. Producing a pound of beef requires 4.8 pounds of grain, and critics of our modern agricultural system say that the spread of meat-based diets aggravates world hunger. © David & Peter Turnley / Corbis

While it is true that many animals graze on land that would be unsuitable for cultivation, the demand for meat has taken millions of productive acres away from farm inventories. The cost of that is incalculable. As Diet For a Small Planet author Frances Moore Lappé writes, imagine sitting down to an eight-ounce steak. "Then imagine the room filled with 45 to 50 people with empty bowls in front of them. For the 'feed cost' of your steak, each of their bowls could be filled with a full cup of cooked cereal grains."

Harvard nutritionist Jean Mayer estimates that reducing meat production by just 10 percent in the U.S. would free enough grain to feed 60 million people. Authors Paul and Anne Ehrlich note that a pound of wheat can be grown with 60 pounds of water, whereas a pound of meat requires 2,500 to 6,000 pounds.

Environmental Costs

Energy-intensive U.S. factory farms generated 1.4 billion tons of animal waste in 1996, which, the Environmental Protection Agency reports, pollutes American waterways more than all other industrial sources combined. Meat production has also been linked to severe erosion of billions of acres of once-productive farmland and to the destruction of rainforests.

McDonald's took a group of British animal rights activists to court in the 1990s because they had linked the fast food giant to an unhealthy diet and rainforest destruction. The defendants, who fought the company to a standstill, made a convincing case. In court documents, the activists asserted, "From 1970 onwards, beef from cattle reared on ex-rainforest land was supplied to McDonald's." In a policy statement, McDonald's claims that it "does not purchase beef which threatens tropical rainforests anywhere in the world," but it does not deny past purchases.

Circle Four Farms, a Utah-based pork producer, hosts a three-million gallon waste lagoon. When lagoons like this spill into rivers and lakes as happened in North Carolina in 1995, the result can be environmentally catastrophic. © AP Photo / Douglas C. Pizac

According to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), livestock raised for food produce 130 times the excrement of the human population, some 87,000 pounds per second. The Union of Concerned Scientists points out that 20 tons of livestock manure is produced annually for every U.S. household. The much-publicized 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska dumped 12 million gallons of oil into Prince William Sound, but the relatively unknown 1995 New River hog waste spill in North Carolina poured 25 million gallons of excrement and urine into the water, killing an estimated 10 to 14 million fish and closing 364,000 acres of coastal shellfishing beds. Hog waste spills have caused the rapid spread of a virulent microbe called Pfiesteria piscicida, which has killed a billion fish in North Carolina alone.

More than a third of all raw materials and fossil fuels consumed in the U.S. are used in animal production. Beef production alone uses more water than is consumed in growing the nation's entire fruit and vegetable crop. Producing a single hamburger patty uses enough fuel to drive 20 miles and causes the loss of five times its weight in topsoil. In his book The Food Revolution, author John Robbins estimates that "you'd save more water by not eating a pound of California beef than you would by not showering for an entire year." Because of deforestation to create grazing land, each vegetarian saves an acre of trees per year.

"We definitely take up more environmental space when we eat meat," says Barbara Bramble of the National Wildlife Federation. "I think it's consistent with environmental values to eat lower on the food chain."

The Human Health Toll

There is some evidence to suggest that the human digestive system was not designed for meat consumption and processing (see sidebar), which could help explain why there is such high incidence of heart disease, hypertension, and colon and other cancers. Add to this the plethora of drugs and antibiotics applied as a salve to unnatural factory farming conditions and growing occurrences of meat-based diseases like E. coli and Salmonella, and there's a compelling health-based case for vegetarianism.

The factory-farmed chicken, cow or pig of today is among the most medicated creatures on Earth. "For sheer overprescription, no doctor can touch the American farmer," reported Newsweek. According to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report, the use of antimicrobial drugs for nontherapeutic purposes -- mainly to increase factory farm growth rates -- has risen 50 percent since 1985.

Ninety percent of commercially available eggs come from chickens raised on factory farms, and six billion "broiler" chickens emerge from the same conditions. Ninety percent of U.S.-raised pigs are closely confined at some point during their lives. According to the book Animal Factories by Jim Mason and Peter Singer, pork producers lose $187 million annually to chronic diseases such as dysentery, cholera, trichinosis and other ailments fostered by factory farming. Drugs are used to reduce stress levels in animals crowded together unnaturally, although 20 percent of the chickens die of stress or disease anyway.

One result of these conditions is a high rate of meat contamination. Up to 60 percent of chickens sold in supermarkets are infected with Salmonella entenidis, which can pass to humans if the meat is not heated to a high enough temperature. Another pathogen, Campylobacter, can also spread from chickens to human beings with deadly results.

In 1997, more than 25 million pounds of hamburger were found to be contaminated with E. coli 0157:H7, which is spread by fecal matter. The bacteria are a particular problem in hamburger, because the grinding process spreads it throughout the meat. E. coli, the leading cause of kidney failure in young children, was the culprit when three children died of food poisoning after eating at a Seattle Jack in the Box restaurant in 1993.

Business as usual at the animal farm: From left: chicken debeaking, cow confinement, poultry transport and hog crowding.

The British epidemic of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), or mad cow disease, which began in 1986 and has affected nearly 200,000 cattle, jumps to beef-eating humans in the form of the always-fatal Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD). The CDC reports that an average of 10 to 15 people have contracted CJD from meat in Britain each year since it was first detected in 1994. In 1998, the British Medical Association warned in a report to Members of Parliament, "The current state of food safety in Britain is such that all raw meat should be assumed to be contaminated with pathogenic organisms." In 1997, it added, Salmonella or E. coli infected a million people in Britain. BSE spreads through cattle that are fed contaminated central nervous-system tissue from other animals. "Its future magnitude and geographic distribution...cannot yet be predicted," the CDC reported. In the U.S., deer have been affected with chronic wasting disease, which has many similarities to British BSE, though a definitive link to humans has not been established.

In the book Eating With Conscience, Dr. Michael W. Fox reports that what is known as "animal tankage" -- the non-fat animal residue from slaughterhouses -- is used in a wide variety of products, from animal feed and fertilizer to pet food. Dr. Fox adds that hundreds of cats in Europe (and several zoo animals) that ate tankage-laced food have contracted forms of BSE. The Japanese outbreak is believed to have originated in BSE-contaminated feed imported from Europe.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), more than 10 million animals that were dying or diseased when slaughtered were "rendered" (processed into a protein-rich meal) in 1995 for addition to pig, poultry and pet food. Animals that collapse at the slaughterhouse door or during transportation are called "downers," and their corpses are routinely processed for human consumption. A 2001 Zogby America poll conducted for the group Farm Sanctuary found that 79 percent of Americans oppose this practice, which could be an entry point for BSE into the U.S. meat supply. Farm Sanctuary petitioned the USDA in 1998 to end processing of downer meat for human consumption, but its petition was denied.

Europe will spend billions of dollars bringing a virulent epidemic of yet another animal-borne disease -- foot-and-mouth -- under control. In the last two years, 60 countries have had outbreaks of foot-and-mouth, which kills animals but does not spread to people.

One of the major western exports is a taste for meat, though it brings with it increased risk of heart disease and cancer. Clearly, there is something seriously wrong with a diet and food production system resulting in such waste, endemic disease and human health threats.

Caring About Animals

The average meat eater is responsible for the deaths of some 2,400 animals during his or her lifetime. Animals raised for food endure great suffering in their housing, transport, feeding and slaughter, which is something not clearly evident in the neatly wrapped packages of meat offered for sale at grocery counters. Given the information, many Americans -- especially those with an environmental background -- recoil at knowing they participate in a meat production system so oppressive to the animals caught up in it.

The family farm of the nineteenth century, with its "free-range" animals running around the farmyard or grazing in a pasture, is largely a thing of the past. Brutality to animals has become routine in today's factory farm. A recent article in the pig industry journal National Hog Farmer recommends reducing the average space per animal from eight to six square feet, concluding "Crowding pigs pays." Morley Safer reported on the television program 60 Minutes that today's factory pig is no "Babe": "[They] see no sun in their limited lives, with no hay to lie on, no mud to roll in. The sows live in tiny cages, so narrow they cannot even turn around. They live over metal grates, and their waste is pushed through slats beneath them and flushed into huge pits."

Beef cattle are luckier than factory pigs in that they have an average of 14 square feet in the overcrowded feedlots where they live out their lives. Common procedures for beef calves include branding, castration and dehorning. Veal calves, taken away from their mothers shortly after birth, live their entire lives in near darkness, chained by their necks and unable to move in any direction. They commonly suffer from anemia, diarrhea, pneumonia and lameness.

Virtually all chickens today are factory raised, with as many as six egg-laying hens living in a wire-floored "battery" cage the size of an album cover. As many as 100,000 birds can live in each "henhouse." Conditions are so psychologically taxing on the birds that they must be debeaked to prevent pecking injuries. Male chicks born on factory farms -- as many as 280 million per year -- are simply thrown into garbage bags to die because they're of no economic value as meat or eggs.

Some 95 percent of factory-raised animals are moved by truck, where they are typically subjected to overcrowding, severe weather, hunger and thirst. Many animals die of heat exhaustion or freezing during transport.

Some of the worst abuse occurs at the end of the animals' lives, as documented by Gail Eisnitz' book Slaughterhouse, which includes interviews with slaughterhouse workers. "On the farm where I work," reports one employee, "they drag the live ones who can't stand up anymore out of the crate. They put a metal snare around her ear or foot and drag her the full length of the building. These animals are just screaming in pain." He adds, "The slaughtering part doesn't bother me. It's the way they're treated when they're alive." Dying animals unable to walk are tossed into the "downer pile," and many suffer agonies until, after one or two days, they are finally killed.

The threat to slaughterhouse workers' safety is largely underreported or ignored in the media. For example, Mother Jones magazine, in an otherwise admirable story on slaughterhouse workers, barely mentions the frequent injuries caused by pain-wracked animals lashing out inside the slaughterhouses. Despite the existence of the Humane Slaughter Act and regular USDA inspection, animals are often skinned alive or -- in a major threat to worker safety -- regain consciousness during slaughtering.

The Vegetarian Solution

Vegetarianism is not a new phenomenon. The ancient Greek philosopher Pythagoras was vegetarian, and until the mid-19th century, people who abstained from meat were known as "Pythagoreans." Famous followers of Pythagoras' diet included Leonardo da Vinci, Benjamin Franklin, George Bernard Shaw and Albert Einstein. The word "vegetarian" was coined in 1847 to give a name to what was then a tiny movement in England.

In the U.S., the 1971 publication of Diet For a Small Planet was a major catalyst for introducing people to a healthy vegetarian diet. Other stimuli included Peter Singer's 1975 book Animal Liberation, which gave vegetarianism a moral underpinning; Singer and Jim Mason's book Animal Factories, the first expose´ of confinement agriculture; and John Robbins' 1987 Diet for a New America. In the U.S., according to a 1998 Vegetarian Journal survey, 82 percent of vegetarians are motivated by health concerns, 75 percent by ethics, the environment and/or animal rights, 31 percent because of taste and 26 percent because of economics.

Is the vegetarian diet healthy? The common perception persists that removing meat from the menu is dangerous because of protein loss. Lappé says there is danger of protein deficiency if vegetarian diets are heavily dependent upon 1) fruit; 2) sweet potatoes or cassava (a staple root crop for more than 500 million people in the tropics); or 3) the particular western problem, junk food.

But Reed Mangels, nutrition advisor to the Vegetarian Resource Group (VRG), says vegetarians can meet their protein needs "easily" if they "eat a varied diet and consume enough calories to maintain their weight. It is not necessary to plan combinations of foods. A mixture of proteins throughout the day will provide enough 'essential amino acids.'"

Although meat is rich in protein, Vegetarian and Vegan FAQ reports that other good sources are potatoes, whole wheat bread, rice, broccoli, spinach, almonds, peas, chickpeas, peanut butter, tofu (soybean curd), soymilk, lentils and kale.

Supermarket shelves overflow with soy- or seitan-based meat substitutes. The soybean contains all eight essential amino acids and exceeds even meat in the amount of usable protein it can deliver to the human body. (It should be noted, however, that some people are allergic to soy, and the "hyper-processing" of some soy-based foods reduces the useful protein content.) Animal rights advocates also claim that, contrary to the urging of the meat and dairy industries, humans need to consume only two to 10 percent of their total calories as protein.

How many vegetarians are there in the U.S.? It depends on whom you ask. A PETA fact sheet asserts that 12 million Americans are vegetarians, and 19,000 make the switch every week. Pamela Rice, author of 101 Reasons Why I'm a Vegetarian, puts the number at 4.5 million, or 2.5 percent of the population, based on recent surveys. Older counts, from 1992, put the number of people who "consider themselves" to be vegetarians at seven percent of the U.S. population, or an impressive 18 million. A 1991 Gallup Poll indicated that 20 percent of the population look for vegetarian menu items when they eat out.

Actual vegetarian numbers may be lower. VRG got virtually the same results in two separate Roper Polls it sponsored in 1994 and 1997: One percent of the public, or between two and three million, is vegetarian (eats no meat or fish, but may eat dairy and/or eggs), with a third to half of them living on a vegan diet (eschewing all animal products). Roughly five percent in both studies "never eat red meat." A 2000 poll was slightly more optimistic, putting the number of vegetarians at 2.5 percent of the population. Women are more likely to be vegetarians than men; and -- surprisingly --Republicans are slightly more likely to abstain from meat than Democrats.

The American Dietetic Association says in a position statement, "Appropriately planned vegetarian diets are healthful, are nutritionally adequate and provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases." Vegetarians now have excellent opportunities to put together well-planned meals. The sale of organic products in natural food stores is the highest growth niche in the food industry, according to Nutrition Business Journal, and it grew 22 percent in 1999 to $4 billion. The natural food markets of today are not the tiny storefronts of yesteryear, but full-service supermarkets, with vigorous competition among giant national chains. Diverse veggie entrees are now available in most supermarkets and on a growing list of restaurant menus.

It's never been easier to become a vegetarian, and there have never been more compelling reasons for environmentalists to make that choice. It's not always easy to do -- most environmentalists still eat meat -- but the tide is beginning to turn.

For resources about vegetarianism, contact:

International Vegetarian Union http://www.ivu.org

North American Vegetarian Society http://www.navs-online.org

Vegetarian Resource Group http://wwwv.vrg.org

Source: http://www.eMagazine.com

1/5/02
7:19:22 PM

AlterNet Headlines

http://www.alternet.org

SO YOU'RE AN ENVIRONMENTALIST; WHY ARE YOU STILL EATING MEAT?

Jim Motavalli, E Magazine

Evidence shows a meat-based diet is bad for the environment, aggravates global hunger, brutalizes animals and compromises health. So why aren't more environmentalists vegetarians?

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12162

2001: A YEAR OF W

Barry Crimmins, Boston Phoenix

A diary of year one with our unelected president: George W.'s journey from court-appointed chief executive to conquerer of evildoers.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12159

THE FBI'S BLACK MAGIC?

David Corn, AlterNet

The FBI just announced that it is developing a controversial Internet spying software -- codenamed Magic Lantern -- that can enter a personal computer and record every keystroke.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12163

MTV WANTS YOU!

Carina Chocano, Salon

Hey, kids! Ever wonder what it would be like to join the Air Force? You can travel to exotic locations, ride a mechanical bull and jam with Kid Rock in your dorm room!

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12160

HOW ONE PERSON CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

Geov Parrish, WorkingForChange.com

This inspiring story about a group called Building Communities shows the kind of solutions that emerge when average, concerned citizens have the will to change society.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12158

CAN UNIONS SEIZE THE POST-9-11 MOMENT?

Tom Robbins, Village Voice

The thousands of union hard hats digging through Ground Zero rubble proved the heroism of American workers. But can ailing unions capitalize on the worker-as-hero momentum?

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12157

MAD DOG: A EURO FOR YOUR THOUGHTS

Mad Dog, AlterNet

The idea of the euro is to unite the countries economically and create some truly boring paper money adorned with generic, unidentifiable bridges and doorways.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12164

SOLOMON: THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE STRAIGHT SPIN

Norman Solomon, AlterNet

When highly regarded news outlets are serving up wild hyperbole in the guise of sober analysis, you gotta figure that some screws in the nation's media machinery are seriously loose.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12161

1/5/02
7:07:56 PM

THINGS WE DON'T UNDERSTAND

Is there something to astrology after all? In June 2000, Lynne Palmer, a 69 year-old Las Vegas practitioner of the ancient art, published her Astrological Almanac for 2001. On page 95 was the notation, "avoid terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001."

1/5/02
5:00:45 PM

UTNE WEB WATCH

The Best of the Alternative Web

TAKING NO PRISONERS

by Ray Hartman, Riverfront Times

-- A Missouri prison maintains its spotless record by remaining empty while incurring millions of dollars in lease payments.

THE PAUPER: FINANCIAL PLANNING FOR ARTISTS

Web site review by Sara Buckwitz

-- Because artists should never have to die penniless, four artists got together to create The Pauper Web site -- a place "dedicated to helping the artist and entertainment community get a better handle on their money and finances."

THE GREENPEACE TRUE FOOD GUIDE

Web Site Review by Kate Garsombke

-- Greenpeace takes aim at genetically modified foods with a listing of brands that use GMO products and engineered foods currently in field tests.

Links to the above articles: http://www.utne.com/webwatch

1/5/02
4:56:03 PM

Biodiversity May Need Millions Of Years To Recover

by Cat Lazaroff

BERKELEY, California, January 3, 2002 (ENS) - The worldwide decimation of wildlife by humans could be "permanent on multi-million year timescales," warns James Kirchner of the University of California at Berkeley. Kirchner's analysis of long term trends in the fossil record suggests that natural speed limits constrain how quickly biodiversity can rebound after waves of extinction.

UC Berkeley geologist James Kirchner says current reductions in the planet's biodiversity could last for millions of years. Over the last 500 million years, life on Earth has experienced a series of booms and busts. The busts, or mass extinctions, can be gradual, occurring over thousands or millions of years, or they can happen suddenly in response to a natural catastrophe.

But the booms of diversification, in which hundreds or thousands of new organisms appear, rarely happen quickly, writes Kirchner in this week's issue of the journal "Nature."

His statistical analysis of the rates of extinction and diversification in the fossil record shows that life seldom rebounds rapidly after an extinction.

The results imply that the diversification of life obeys so called speed limits set by evolutionary processes, said Kirchner, a professor of earth and planetary science at UC Berkeley.

Some of the most biologically diverse areas on earth are also home to the hungriest humans. "There seem to be biological mechanisms that limit diversification of new organisms and control which ones become successful enough to persist," he said. "Biodiversity is slow to recover after an extinction."

This apparent speed limit on the rate at which surviving organisms evolve and diversify has major implications for present day extinctions - caused not by natural catastrophes but by human sources such as pollution, alteration of natural habitats, and unsustainable hunting and fishing.

"If we substantially diminish biodiversity on Earth, we can't expect the biosphere to just bounce back. It doesn't do that. The process of diversification is too slow," Kirchner said. "The planet would be biologically depleted for millions of years, with consequences extending not only beyond the lives of our children's children, but beyond the likely lifespan of the entire human species."

Kirchner has been mining a fossil database created by the late University of Chicago paleontologist Jack Sepkoski, who catalogued the genera and families of fossil marine animals over the past 530 million years, from the Cambrian to the present. Using a technique called spectral analysis, Kirchner looked for patterns in the rates at which new organisms appear or disappear.

Last year, Kirchner and colleague Anne Weil reported that the Earth needs, on average, about 10 million years to recover from global extinctions, whether they involve the loss of most life on Earth or wipe out far fewer species. This was much longer than most scientists had believed.

The new results come from asking a related question: How do rates of extinction and diversification vary, and how are they related? This is important because, if rapid diversification is possible, biodiversity might be able to rebound quickly from a global extinction.

Biologists are still discovering new species, like the tiny Jaragua lizard from Beata Island, off the coast of the Dominican Republic. Far more species are being lost to extinction every day, biologists warn.

Kirchner's analysis found that extinction rates and diversification rates are about equally variable over long spans of geological time. Over shorter periods, however, diversification rates vary much less than extinction rates do.

That means that evolution does not accelerate quickly in response to rapid bursts of extinction.

One possible explanation for why diversification takes so long to speed up after an extinction is that extinction eliminates not merely species or groups of species, but removes ecological niches: the roles which organisms play within ecosystems.

Recovery becomes more complicated because specialized roles, such as parasites that live on just one species, or animals that consume just one kind of food, do not evolve until their hosts are already well established.

"This shows that extinction is not like knocking chess pieces off a chessboard, with the empty squares ready for you to plunk down new pieces," Kirchner said. "Extinction is more like knocking down a house of cards. You only have places to put new cards as you rebuild the structure of the house."

96 percent of Madagascar's forests have been destroyed, leaving little habitat for species like this lemur, which live nowhere else on Earth.

"For a new kind of organism to evolve and survive long enough for us to notice it - for it to become common enough to leave a fossil record - requires that it have an evolutionary niche," he explained. "The organism has to have some role in order to succeed in its ecosystem. As a result, the ecosystem must first increase in complexity so there are niches for new organisms to fill, which is probably a very complicated process.

"At a fundamental biological level it takes time to build niches, evolve new organisms and filter out unsuccessful ones, although it's not yet clear what all the limiting factors are."

Kirchner's work was supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and the University of California.

Source: http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-03-07.html

1/5/02
4:46:15 PM

ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE (ENS)

http://ens-news.com

BIODIVERSITY MAY NEED MILLIONS OF YEARS TO RECOVER

BERKELEY, California, January 3, 2002 (ENS) - The worldwide decimation of wildlife by humans could be "permanent on multi-million year timescales," warns James Kirchner of the University of California at Berkeley. Kirchner's analysis of long term trends in the fossil record suggests that natural speed limits constrain how quickly biodiversity can rebound after waves of extinction.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-03-07.html

ROCKED BY AN EARTHQUAKE, AFGHANISTAN ESCAPES STARVATION

WASHINGTON, DC, January 3, 2002 (ENS) - Thanks to a tremendous effort by international donors, non-governmental organizations and Afghan volunteers, Afghanistan has "averted widespread famine," said Andrew Natsios, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Natsios and Alan Kreczko, acting assistant secretary of state, Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, spoke today at a special press briefing at the State Department.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-03-02.html

YELLOWSTONE RANGER VINDICATED UNDER WHISTLEBLOWER LAWS

WASHINGTON, DC, January 3, 2002 (ENS) - A seasonal park ranger whose crusade to protect the grizzly bears of Yellowstone led park officials to order his silence will be reinstated next season and allowed to speak with reporters. Bob Jackson was censured in August by the National Park Service for publicizing the effects that elk baiting in nearby Bridger Teton National Forest has on the behavior of Yellowstone's grizzlies.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-03-06.html

OIL TANKER GROUNDED IN PLYMOUTH SOUND CONSERVATION AREA

PLYMOUTH, England, January 3, 2002 (ENS) - An empty oil tanker has run aground on the rocky shore of an internationally protected natural area near Plymouth, and experts are working to vent petrol fumes that they fear may explode. About 100 people have been evacuated from the nearest town, the small seaside settlement of Cawsand.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-03-01.html

ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: JANUARY 3, 2002

Lawsuit Challenges Alternative Vehicles Compliance

Smuggled Turtles Sent to Florida to Recover

775 Acres Protected on Michigan's Black River

Tumbling Creek Cavesnail Receives Emergency Protection

Surveillance Cameras Monitor Pennsylvania Forests

New Technology Helps Clean Up Hazardous Waste

Public Grazing on Big Sur Coast Appealed

Conservation Easement Protects Maryland's Gunston Pointe

For full text and graphics visit:

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-03-09.html

1/5/02
4:41:52 PM

t r u t h o u t

LIEBERMAN | Statement, Collapse of Enron

http://www.truthout.com/01.04A.Lieberman.Enron.htm

LEVIN | Enron "Massive Shell Game"

http://www.truthout.com/01.04B.Levin.Enron.htm

Another Letter to Daschle Puts Senate on Alert

http://www.truthout.com/01.04C.Daschle.Letter.II.htm

Taliban Surrender Talks Hit 'Crucial' Stage

http://www.truthout.com/01.04D.Taliban.Talks.htm

69 Members of Congress Confront Chao Over Closure of Women's Offices

http://www.truthout.com/01.04E.69.Chao.htm

WILLIAM SAFIRE | Executive Privilege Again

http://www.truthout.com/01.04F.Safire.EP.Again.htm

Afghan Refugees, Freezing, Hungry and Prey to Bandits

http://www.truthout.com/01.04G.Afghan.Starve.htm

BBC | Israel stages West Bank pull-out

http://www.truthout.com/01.04H.Israel.Out.htm

1/5/02
4:37:42 PM

DAILY GRIST <http://www.gristmagazine.com>

COAL IN HIS STALKING

More bad news from the Bush administration: The U.S. EPA is planning to relax Clinton-era interpretations of the Clean Air Act by allowing owners of aging coal-fired power plants to upgrade their facilities without installing pollution controls. The policy change is bound to be unpopular with environmentalists, as well as with many Northeast states, which cannot meet federal clean-air standards because of pollution drifting toward them from coal-burning power plants in the Midwest and the South. The EPA proposals do not require congressional approval and cannot be blocked without the passage of new legislation -- an unlikely scenario, given the Republican-controlled House and President Bush's veto power.

straight to the source: Akron Beacon Journal, Bloomberg News, Alex Canizares, 03 Jan 2002 <http://www.ohio.com/home/docs_news/022052.htm>

PHYSICS LAB TESTS TENSILE STRENGTH OF SENATOR

And from the other side of the aisle ... U.S. Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), normally thought of as environmentally friendly, is championing legislation to protect a mining company from any liability for environmental damage done in its 125 years of operating in the senator's home state. The company, Homestake Mining, plans to close its gold mine in South Dakota's Black Hills this month; the mine will then be converted to an underground physics laboratory. Under the Daschle bill, which has already been approved by Congress and will likely be signed by President Bush in the next few days, the government will spend between $500 million and $1 billion to build and equip the lab and to indemnify the mining company. Daschle and other supporters say the lab will boost the local economy. But critics, including Rep. Sherry Boehlert (R-N.Y.), describe the bill as a sweetheart deal for the mining company and worry that it will set a dangerous precedent by placing limitations on liability and saddling taxpayers with the cost of cleaning up private-sector projects.

straight to the source: New York Times, Robert Pear, 03 Jan 2002 <http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/03/politics/03MINE.html>

COUGHING IN A WINTER WONDERLAND

Be glad you're not on the planning committee for the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. First there was terrorism to worry about; now there's the weather. Salt Lake's squeaky-clean image could suffer a blow if the world gets a glimpse of the woeful air pollution that plagues the city in the winter. Snow in Salt Lake City usually means a temperature inversion, which creates one of the ugliest smog blankets in the country. The U.S. EPA ranks Salt Lake among the 10 worst cities in the nation based on carbon monoxide counts. About 1,100 Utah residents per year die from respiratory diseases, which are often caused or exacerbated by poor air quality.

straight to the source: Denver Post, Allison Sherry, 02 Jan 2002 <http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1002,118%7E309016,00.html>

FUELS DON'T RUSH IN

Environmental groups sued the U.S. government yesterday for violating a 1992 law requiring federal agencies to buy vehicles powered by alternative fuels. The suit, filed by the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, and the Bluewater Network, charges 18 agencies for failing -- in some cases miserably -- to meet the terms of the Energy Policy Act, a Gulf War-era law designed to reduce U.S. dependence on oil. The law requires 75 percent of all agency-owned vehicles to use alternative fuels; alleged violators include the U.S. EPA, the Department of Energy (which is supposed to enforce the law), and the departments of Justice, Commerce, Transportation, Defense, Agriculture, and Interior.

straight to the source: Contra Costa Times, Associated Press, 03 Jan 2002 <http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/stories_news/energy_20020103.htm>

ANNISTON GET YOUR GUN

For almost four decades, the Monsanto Company discharged toxic waste, including millions of pounds of PCBs, into creeks and landfills in Anniston, Ala. For most of that time, the company knew PCBs were highly toxic: Monsanto consultants placed fish in the contaminated creeks and watched them die within 10 seconds, and confidential internal reports acknowledged the evident dangers. But the company didn't share that information with Anniston residents, who grew up playing in contaminated dirt and fishing and swimming in toxic lakes and streams. The effects on residents remain unknown, and Monsanto opposes comprehensive health studies. Now it's up to the courts to decide if Monsanto is liable for environmental and health damage in the area -- next week, 3,600 plaintiffs, one of every nine Anniston residents, plan to file suit against the company.

straight to the source: Washington Post, Michael Grunwald, 01 Jan 2002 <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A46648-2001Dec31.html>

1/5/02
4:27:58 PM

What Was Israel's Role In 911?

Fox News Revelations Point To An Ominous Conclusion

by Justin Raimondo

When is American foreign policy going to start putting America first? The US had nothing to gain, and everything to lose, by vetoing a UN resolution condemning violence on all sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The resolution condemned terrorism, no matter what the source, called for the creation of a "monitoring mechanism" to prevent violence, denounced executions without trial, and said the destruction of property must cease. You gotta problem with that?

NEGROPONTE'S VETO

This administration does: John Negroponte, American ambassador to the UN, justified the US veto by averring that the resolution aimed to "isolate politically one of the parties to the conflict through an attempt to throw the weight of the Council behind the other party.'' The resolution, said Negroponte, was unsatisfactory because it didn't specifically mention "recent acts of terrorism'' against Israelis. Naturally, this scuttled the whole thing, as it was intended to do.

THE VICTIMOLOGICAL OLYMPICS

For this argument, if carried on long enough, would lead to an infinite regression of victimological examples: the pro-Arab bloc would insist on specifically mentioning the supposedly accidental killing of five Palestinian children by an Israeli booby-trap bomb planted near a school. This would be the cue for the Israeli side to come up with a Hamas-Hizbollah atrocity that merits inclusion and, before you know it, we're all the way back to 1948 with the pro-Arabists demanding the inclusion of the massacre at Deir Yassein, and, naturally, the Zionist bloc doing them one better by moving for some mention of the Roman conquest and persecution of the Jews.

THE WAR AGAINST THE WORLD

The US veto undermines the war effort, and makes the Americans seem as if they are waging a war not only on Islam, but against the entire world on behalf of Israel. After decades of trying to prove its bona fides as an honest broker of peace in the region, it is the US that is effectively isolated. The resolution was co-sponsored (or amended) by France and the Security Council vote was 12-1, with Britain and Norway abstaining. Whatever credibility the US had in the Arab world very little, I'm afraid was lost with that one arrogant gesture. So much for the grand "coalition" that Colin Powell has been building: the Israeli lobby in the US has demolished it with a single blow.

THE LAST LAUGH

Is that the demonic laughter of the Mad Sheik I hear, chortling in his cave at this act of American self-sabotage? It may be Osama bin Laden is not long for this world. Yet he will die happy in the knowledge that the US is sowing the seeds of his future warrior army, who will spring like Muslim Myrmidons out of Palestine's blood-soaked earth.

BATTLEGROUND AMERICA

Speaking of sabotage, the story of the gigantic Israeli spy operation in the US and its mysterious activities in the weeks prior to 9/11 continues to amaze and shock even me. When I wrote, <http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j112801.htmla few weeks ago, that the detention of some 60 Israelis in connection with 9/11 was "ominous" little did I realize just how much of an understatement that would turn out to be. It is often said that, post-9/11, the US is going through what the Israelis have had to endure for decades. The series of Fox News special reports on Israeli penetration of US intelligence assets puts this insight in an entirely new light. For it appears, from what we are learning, that the struggle between two desert tribes in a far away land has truly been brought home to the US: America, we are discovering to our horror, has become a battleground for both sides in that ancient conflict.

ENDS & MEANS

As I related last week, the first part of this astonishing four-part series by Fox News reporter Carl Cameron presents credible evidence suggesting Israeli intelligence had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks. The second and third parts show they had the means to acquire this knowledge. According to Cameron,

"Fox News has learned that some American terrorist investigators fear certain suspects in the Sept. 11 attacks may have managed to stay ahead of them, by knowing who and when investigators are calling on the telephone."

ALL ROADS LEAD TO AMDOCS

Cameron takes us through an explanation of how and why virtually all telephone calls in the US are billed by a single company, Amdocs Ltd., which just happens to be headquartered in Israel. Chances are that when you make a call, the record of the call and the billing is done through Amdocs. With a virtual monopoly in the US, and tentacles worldwide, Cameron reports that "it is virtually impossible to make a call on normal phones without generating an Amdocs record of it." Amdocs denies any wrongdoing, but sources tell Fox News that, in 1999,

"The super secret national security agency, headquartered in northern Maryland, issued what's called a Top Secret sensitive compartmentalized information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United States were getting into foreign hands in Israel, in particular."

SPIES IN THE WOODWORK

It's not that anyone is listening in on all these calls, but that these methods are a way to know who is calling whom, when, and for how long vital information in and of itself. Cameron assures us that the White House and the Pentagon are immune from such surveillance, but an article in Insight, the magazine put out by the Washington Times, showed how Israeli intelligence had thoroughly penetrated the communications system at the Clinton White House. According to co-authors J. Michael Waller and Paul M. Rodriguez, writing in May of last year, the FBI was

"Probing an explosive foreign-espionage operation that could dwarf the other spy scandals plaguing the U.S. government. Insight has learned that FBI counterintelligence is tracking a daring operation to spy on high-level US officials by hacking into supposedly secure telephone networks. The espionage was facilitated, federal officials say, by lax telephone-security procedures at the White House, State Department and other high-level government offices and by a Justice Department unwillingness to seek an indictment against a suspect."

"The espionage operation may have serious ramifications," wrote Waller and Rodriguez, "because the FBI has identified Israel as the culprit."

MONICA TELLS ALL

Dozens of officials confirmed the story, telling the authors of this fascinating piece how the Israelis had managed to penetrate not only State Department telephone lines, but also those in the White House, the Defense Department, and the Justice Department. That the President knew this at the time is beyond doubt; it came out, you'll remember, during l'affaire Lewinsky, when Monica testified that, on March 29, 1997, she and Clinton were desecrating the Oval Office and she specifically remembered it because, as the Starr Report put it:

"He suspected that a foreign embassy was tapping his telephones, and he proposed cover stories. If ever questioned, she should say that the two of them were just friends. If anyone ever asked about their phone sex, she should say that they knew their calls were being monitored all along, and the phone sex was just a put on."

LITTLE DID THEY KNOW

That "foreign embassy" was the Israelis'. It is spooky, in retrospect, to read the comments of the American intelligence and law enforcement officials who sourced this pioneering Insight piece (which, for some reason, is no longer available on their website but is still available, thanks to the miracle of Google). "It's a huge security nightmare," said one senior US official. "The implications are severe," another unnamed official chimed in. "We're not even sure we know the extent of it," said a third high-ranking intelligence official. "All I can tell you is that we think we know how it was done. That alone is serious enough, but it's the unknown that has such deep consequences."

OUT OF THE MURK

Ah, but the deepness of these consequences is just beginning to be known. As the Fox News revelations make all too clear, they are a lot deeper than anyone, including Waller and Rodriguez, could possibly have imagined last year. The picture that is beginning to emerge out of the murk is this: the Israelis were watching the hijackers and/or their associates, and they very possibly had access to a complete set of the conspirators' phone records, if not direct access to the content of their conversations. In the months prior to the attacks, the Israelis did indeed issue a warning of "massive" terrorist attacks, but, in an effort to protect both their sources and methods, their warning gave no details and was therefore practically useless.

THE COMVERSE CONNECTION

The third part of the Fox series shows how the Israelis had access, not only to phone records, but also to the wiretaps being conducted by US law enforcement agencies. This access could have easily been provided, Cameron points out, by yet another hi-tech Israeli communications company, Comverse, which operates as practically a branch of the Israeli government, and enjoys near monopolistic status here in the US.

When you place a call, it goes through a complicated network of routers and switchers. The way wiretapping works is that customized computers are linked to that network via specialized software, and the system intercepts, records, and stores wiretapped calls. But this system has a "back door" that could have easily been opened by Israeli intelligence. Comverse maintains a link to the wiretapping computers, on the grounds that it is necessary for system "maintenance." Over the opposition of some patriotic law enforcement officers, this process was authorized by the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). But that wasn't the end of it. According to Fox News,

"Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller were both warned Oct. 18 in a hand-delivered letter from 15 local, state and federal law enforcement officials, who complained that 'law enforcement's current electronic surveillance capabilities are less effective today than they were at the time CALEA was enacted.'"

ASHCROFT'S COMPLICITY

But Ashcroft is too busy rounding up Arabs and closing down their organizations to worry about the wholesale penetration of our communications system including "secure" networks at the White House, the Defense Department, and elsewhere by our wonderful allies, the Israelis. Cameron cites several unnamed law enforcement agents concerned about the ominous implications of the Israeli penetration in light of 9/11 who say that even raising the issue is "career suicide."

I HOPE YOU'RE SITTING DOWN

Okay, so the Israelis have the phone lines over at the White House, the Defense Department, the Justice Department, and, for all we know, your local dogcatcher's office bugged to the max. So they have the capability to know where and when practically every phone call in the US, and large sections of the rest of the world, is made, and to whom. As fantastic as it sounds, given the advance of technology and the reputation of the Mossad, I'm willing to believe it. What's really alarming, however, is that, as Cameron reports:

"On a number of cases, suspects that they had sought to wiretap and survey immediately changed their telecommunications processes. They started acting much differently as soon as those supposedly secret wiretaps went into place."

BEYOND THE BEGUINE

The implications of this stunning news go far beyond my original contention: that the Israelis had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks and simply failed to let us know the details. For it all depends on the intended target of the wiretaps: was it the Israelis, or Bin Laden's agents? If the former were acting differently after wiretaps were put in place, it means only that the Israelis were using their sources and methods to protect their own: if the latter, it means the Israelis were using their sources and methods to protect the Bin Ladenites. That is a possibility no one including me wants to contemplate, and, in all truthfulness, I must confess I cannot believe it. I am forced to concede, however, that, given what we now know, it is possible. Until and unless the government comes clean, we won't know for sure.

INVESTIGATE THE ISRAELI CONNECTION

At the end of his second report, Carl Cameron remarked to Brit Hume that the question of the Israeli connection to 9/11 "came up in the select intelligence committee on Capitol Hill today," and "they intend to look into what we reported last night." Naturally, all this is occurring in secret, with the likelihood of a cover-up all but certain. What is needed is a public investigation, and full disclosure of the Israeli role, if any, in 9/11.

WHERE IS THE MEDIA?

That, of course, is the role of the media and, in this regard, it is interesting to note that Cameron's explosive investigation has not been picked up by a single news outlet, as far as I know (although I would be happy to be proved wrong) or discussed by a single "mainstream" columnist. Yet Fox News is hardly a marginal new source. In a business where scandal and especially spy stories are hot, you would think that a story like this, with its tie-in to 9/11, would have the other networks and the major media falling all over themselves to get a piece of the action. But not this time, at least so far.

FAN MAIL FROM SOME CRANKY FLOUNDER

It's funny, but when I wrote my first column on this subject, I got a whole bunch of nutball letters from anti-Semitic cranks who told me that "the Jews" would never let me get away with it, and that I am now a "marked man." This story, wrote one correspondent, "will go nowhere," because "the Jews" control the media, blah blah blah. I laughed, reading these perfervid notes, most of them WRITTEN IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS, wondering at the infinite capacity of people to fit reality into ideological categories rather than the other way 'round. After all, the mere fact that the story was broadcast on Fox News, a major media organization, appears to contradict the self-evidently absurd thesis that the "Elders of Zion," sitting in a control room somewhere, determine what news we're allowed to read.

THE ANTI-SEMITIC FALLACY

I can only hope, for Mr. Cameron's sake, that what amounts to "career suicide" in law enforcement doesn't hold true at Fox News. Israel certainly has many vocal and very active supporters, who are quick to make their opinions known. But it is false to posit a "Jewish-controlled" media, no matter what the ethnicity or political persuasion of editors, owners, or whatever: these media companies are beholden to their shareholders, and to the market. Reporting the news is an intensely competitive business: there is no way to enforce an embargo on certain information, not in this day and age. There is no "Jewish conspiracy" only the machinations of a particular foreign government and its uncritical supporters in this country, who span the ethnic and religious as well as the political spectrum.

THE TRUTH, AT LAST

It is too soon to say whether or not this story has "legs," as they say, and is going anywhere soon. But one thing's for sure: Fox News has blown the mystery of 9/11 wide open. This isn't going to just go away. On September 11, the American people looked on in disbelief at the sight of not only the World Trade Center going down but the Pentagon the Pentagon, fer chrissake! under attack and apparently defenseless. My first thought, at any rate, was: How could this happen? With these latest surprising developments pointing to an ambiguous Israeli role, at best, in all this I fear we are just beginning to discover the answer to that question.

Source: http://www.AntiWar.com

1/5/02
4:20:00 PM

Were The 911 Hijackers Really Arabs? Maybe Not

by Michael Collins Piper

Were those hijackers really Arabs? Would Israeli agents carry out a suicide mission that could cost American Jewish lives?

Consider these little-known facts . . .

In 1986, the New York-based leader of the terrorist Jewish Defense League, Victor Vancier, gave a prophetic hint of what may have been finally played out on Sept. 11, 2001:

"If you think the Shias in Lebanon are capable of fantastic acts of suicidal terrorism, the Jewish underground will strike targets that will make Americans gasp: 'How could Jews do such things?'"

According to Vancier, quoted by Robert I. Friedman in The Village Voice on May 6, 1986, his allies were "desperate people" who "don't care if they live or die."

Considering this warning it is entirely conceivable the "Middle Eastern" men described by passengers on the airliners were not Arabs at all.

Evidence to be explored suggests that instead, these hijackers could well have been Israeli-sponsored fundamentalist Jewish fanatics (posing as "bin Laden Arabs") hoping to instigate an all-out U.S. war against the Arab world.

"Jewish suicide bombers? Impossible!" cry critics. However, the fact is that there is a "suicide tradition" that is a much-revered part of Jewish history--going back to the famous mass suicide at Masada by Jewish zealots.

But in modern times, Israeli suicide missions have been undertaken. In The Other Side of Deception, former [Israeli] Mossad officer Victor Ostrovsky described one 1989 venture: the participants were "all volunteers" advised that there was effectively "no possibility of rescue should they be caught."

And what about the Arabic language heard on one airplane's black box?

Consider a formerly secret CIA assessment, Israel: Foreign Intelligence and Security Services, dated March 1979, which reported that it is a long-standing policy for Israeli intelligence to disguise Jews as Arabs:

One of the established goals of the intelligence and security services is that each officer be fluent in Arabic. A nine-month, intensive Arabic-language course is given annually ... to students ...

As further training, these Mossad officers work in the [Israeli-controlled Arab lands] for two years to sharpen their language skills....

Many Israelis have come from Arab countries where they were born and educated and appear more Arab than Israeli ...

By forging passports and identity documents of Arab and Western countries and providing sound background legends and cover, Mossad has successfully sent into Egypt and other Arab countries Israelis disguised and documented as Arabs or citizens of European countries.... These persons are also useful for their ability to pass completely for a citizen of the nation in question. The Israeli talent for counterfeiting or forging foreign passports and documents ably supports the agent's authenticity.

Pulitzer Prize-winner Jack Anderson, a supporter of Israel, wrote on Sept. 17, 1972 that:

"Israeli agents--immigrants whose families had lived in Arab lands for generations--have a perfect knowledge of Arab dialects and customs. They have been able to infiltrate Arab governments with ease."

On Sept. 29, 1998, Yossi Melman, writing in Israel's Ha'aretz, revealed that:

"Shin Bet agents, who worked undercover in the Israeli-Arab sector in the 1950s, went as far as to marry Muslim women and have children with them, in an attempt to continue their mission without raising suspicion."

In fact, serious questions have been raised about the identities of the Sept. 11 "Arab hijackers."

While the [pro-Israel] media reported the ringleader's passport conveniently landed atop rubble eight blocks from "Ground Zero," The Orlando Sentinel also reported that at least four men identified as hijackers are not dead and had nothing to do with the attacks.

In The New Yorker on Oct. 8, Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh pointed out:

"Many of the investigators believe that some of the initial clues about the terroristsí identities and preparations, such as flight manuals, were meant to be found. A former high-level intelligence official told me, 'Whatever trail was left was left deliberately--for the FBI to chase.'"

Why Arabs would plant evidence implicating their own is a point mainstream [pro-Israel] media chooses not to address.

Nor has the [pro-Israel] media ever ballyhooed the "hero" who tipped off the FBI where the hijackers' car (conveniently filled with "evidence") was parked.

And for those who would doubt that Israel would endanger American-Jews via terrorism, consider this: hard-line Israelis are willing to kill Jews if it means assuring Israel's survival.

The late Rabbi Meir Kahane--founder of the Jewish Defense League and one spiritual mentor of fundamentalists who support Ariel Sharon--exemplifies those willing to sacrifice other Jews to guarantee Israel's future.

Kahane called for killing "Hellenist [i.e. Western-oriented] spiritually sick [Jews] who threaten the existence of Judaism." That would include those working in slick offices in the World Trade Center, living on Long Island, rather than kibbutzing in Israel.

Israeli journalist Yair Kotler reports in Heil Kahane that Kahane wrote: "the adoption of foreign, gentilized [i.e. non-Jewish] concepts by a Jewish state... opens the door to a national tragedy."

In his book, Time to Go Home, Kahane called for all Jews to "go home" to Israel--the only safe place for Jews. Those who refused to "go home" were expendable. The CIA's 1979 report on Israeli intelligence says this widely-held view mirrors "the aggressively ideological nature of Zionism."

In fact, this Jewish attitude toward the West (exactly what the media says is the Islamic attitude) has support at the Mossad's top levels.

Robert Friedman revealed that "high-ranking members of Mossad" were directing Kahane and that the "central player" was former Mossad operations chief (and later Prime Minister) Yitzhak Shamir, an outspoken critic of America.

When Kahane said America would become "the major enemy of Israel," due to "economic disintegration, which no administration can stem," he enunciated a popular Israeli view.

In his Kahane biography, The False Prophet, Robert I. Friedman noted that Kahane's beliefs "have taken root and have become 'respectable'" and that Ariel Sharon is one of the "most potent supporters" of such extremism.

In the Oct. 15 issue of The New Republic, Israeli writer Yossi Klein Halevi echoed this view:

"The destruction of the World Trade Center has partially rehabilitated, if only by default, the Zionist promise of safe refuge for the Jewish people.

"In the last year, it had become a much-noted irony that Israel was the country where a Jew was most likely to be killed for being a Jew. For many, the United States had beckoned as the real Jewish refuge; in a poll taken just before the bin Laden attacks, 37 percent of Israelis said their friends or relatives were discussing emigration. That probably changed on Sept. 11.

"I was among the thousands of Israelis who crowded Kennedy Airport on the weekend after the attack, desperate to find a flight to Tel Aviv. 'At least weíre going back where it's safe,' people joked.

"Everyone seemed to have a story about an Israeli living in New York who just barely escaped the devastation. If this could happen in Manhattan, the reasoning went, you might as well take your chances at home."

What Halevi describes reflects the widespread ideology known as "catastrophic Zionism" which rejects America, saying Israel is the only safe Jewish refuge.

In The Ascendance of Israel's Radical Right, Israeli scholar Ehud Sprinzak found that these views are "a major school" of modern Israeli thought.

Sprinzak described the Israeli movement, Sikarikin, which honors ancient Jews who "conducted a systematic terror campaign against Jewish moderates who were ready to come to terms with the Romans on questions of religious purity." Israelis consider these terrorists "the symbolic defenders of religious and nationalist purity."

Another popular rabbi, Israel Ariel, will risk massive loss of Jewish lives to achieve the "elimination" of the Arab countries to guarantee Israel's survival. The hawkish rabbi proclaims:

"There is a ruling that a war is permitted as long as no more than one-sixth of the nation be killed. And this was stated in relation to an ordinary war, a fight between neighbors.

"A war for Eretz Israel does not depend on the number of casualties. The command is 'Ase!' ('Do it!'), and you may be sure that the number of casualties will thus be minimal."

As far as non-Jews, Sprinzak cites Rabbi David Bar-Haim who declares the concept Jews and non-Jews are equals "stands in total contrast to the Torah of Moses, and is derived from a total ignorance and an assimilation of alien Western values."

Ben-Haim cites 10 religious authorities who "repeatedly proposed that Gentiles are more beast than human," whereas, "only two authorities recognize non-Jews as full human beings created in the image of God."

Bear in mind: these comments from supposed "allies" represent widespread opinion in Israel's military and intelligence services.

Did Ariel Sharon help orchestrate the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to instigate all-out U.S. war against Israel's enemies? Don't discount it.

Source: http://www.apfn.org

1/5/02
3:54:15 PM

Fox News Pulls Its Four-Part Israeli US Phone Spying Series

by Michael Rivero

Fox News just yanked the four part story about the phone spying scandal.

This has become absurd.

Here the FBI has just uncovered the largest spy ring ever discovered in our country, and the government that owns and operates that spy network is able to tell Fox News NOT to report the story?

Will someone explain to me what is going on when the nation that owns the largest spy ring ever discovered inside the United States is, even AFTER that spy ring is discovered and arrested, able to tell Fox News what stories they can and cannot run?

We need to get this to as many people as possible. Clearly, the Mossad has a huge network of people able to call and complain to Fox News to remove the story. We must muster an even greater number of people to call Fox News and DEMAND the full and complete story be put back on the web site and on the air.

Please email everyone on your activist list and post the news about this most egregious censorship, about Fox caving in on this story, to every public forum you can.

Have everyone on your activist list call Fox News to demand the return of the story, then phone ten of their activist friends and have THEM phone Fox News.

Source: http://www.WhatReallyHappened.com

1/5/02
3:48:54 PM

Wiretaps Through Israeli Company Subject To Leaks - Part 3

by Carl Cameron

BRIT HUME, HOST: Last time we reported on an Israeli-based company called Amdocs Ltd. that generates the computerized records and billing data for nearly every phone call made in America. As Carl Cameron reported, U.S. investigators digging into the 9/11 terrorist attacks fear that suspects may have been tipped off to what they were doing by information leaking out of Amdocs.

In tonight's report, we learn that the concern about phone security extends to another company, founded in Israel, that provides the technology that the U.S. government uses for electronic eavesdropping. Here is Carl Cameron's third report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The company is Comverse Infosys, a subsidiary of an Israeli-run private telecommunications firm, with offices throughout the U.S. It provides wiretapping equipment for law enforcement. Here's how wiretapping works in the U.S.

Every time you make a call, it passes through the nation's elaborate network of switchers and routers run by the phone companies. Custom computers and software, made by companies like Comverse, are tied into that network to intercept, record and store the wiretapped calls, and at the same time transmit them to investigators.

The manufacturers have continuing access to the computers so they can service them and keep them free of glitches. This process was authorized by the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA. Senior government officials have now told Fox News that while CALEA made wiretapping easier, it has led to a system that is seriously vulnerable to compromise, and may have undermined the whole wiretapping system.

Indeed, Fox News has learned that Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller were both warned Oct. 18 in a hand-delivered letter from 15 local, state and federal law enforcement officials, who complained that "law enforcement's current electronic surveillance capabilities are less effective today than they were at the time CALEA was enacted."

Congress insists the equipment it installs is secure. But the complaint about this system is that the wiretap computer programs made by Comverse have, in effect, a back door through which wiretaps themselves can be intercepted by unauthorized parties.

Adding to the suspicions is the fact that in Israel, Comverse works closely with the Israeli government, and under special programs, gets reimbursed for up to 50 percent of its research and development costs by the Israeli Ministry of Industry and Trade. But investigators within the DEA, INS and FBI have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying through Comverse is considered career suicide.

And sources say that while various F.B.I. inquiries into Comverse have been conducted over the years, they've been halted before the actual equipment has ever been thoroughly tested for leaks. A 1999 F.C.C. document indicates several government agencies expressed deep concerns that too many unauthorized non-law enforcement personnel can access the wiretap system. And the FBI's own nondescript office in Chantilly, Virginia that actually oversees the CALEA wiretapping program, is among the most agitated about the threat.

But there is a bitter turf war internally at F.B.I. It is the FBI's office in Quantico, Virginia, that has jurisdiction over awarding contracts and buying intercept equipment. And for years, they've thrown much of the business to Comverse. A handful of former U.S. law enforcement officials involved in awarding Comverse government contracts over the years now work for the company.

Numerous sources say some of those individuals were asked to leave government service under what knowledgeable sources call "troublesome circumstances" that remain under administrative review within the Justice Department.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

And what troubles investigators most, particularly in New York, in the counter terrorism investigation of the World Trade Center attack, is that on a number of cases, suspects that they had sought to wiretap and survey immediately changed their telecommunications processes. They started acting much differently as soon as those supposedly secret wiretaps went into place – Brit.

HUME: Carl, is there any reason to suspect in this instance that the Israeli government is involved?

CAMERON: No, there's not. But there are growing instincts in an awful lot of law enforcement officials in a variety of agencies who suspect that it had begun compiling evidence, and a highly classified investigation into that possibility – Brit.

HUME: All right, Carl. Thanks very much.

Source: http://www.FoxNews.com

1/5/02
3:43:15 PM

All US Phone Call Records And Billing Done In Israel - Part 2

by Carl Cameron

BRIT HUME, HOST: Last time we reported on the approximately 60 Israelis who had been detained in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorism investigation. Carl Cameron reported that U.S. investigators suspect that some of these Israelis were spying on Arabs in this country, and may have turned up information on the planned terrorist attacks back in September that was not passed on.

Tonight, in the second of four reports on spying by Israelis in the U.S., we learn about an Israeli-based private communications company, for whom a half-dozen of those 60 detained suspects worked. American investigators fear information generated by this firm may have fallen into the wrong hands and had the effect of impeded the Sept. 11 terror inquiry. Here's Carl Cameron's second report.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Fox News has learned that some American terrorist investigators fear certain suspects in the Sept. 11 attacks may have managed to stay ahead of them, by knowing who and when investigators are calling on the telephone. How?

By obtaining and analyzing data that's generated every time someone in the U.S. makes a call.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What city and state, please?

CAMERON: Here's how the system works. Most directory assistance calls, and virtually all call records and billing in the U.S. are done for the phone companies by Amdocs Ltd., an Israeli-based private elecommunications company.

Amdocs has contracts with the 25 biggest phone companies in America, and more worldwide. The White House and other secure government phone lines are protected, but it is virtually impossible to make a call on normal phones without generating an Amdocs record of it.

In recent years, the FBI and other government agencies have investigated Amdocs more than once. The firm has repeatedly and adamantly denied any security breaches or wrongdoing. But sources tell Fox News that in 1999, the super secret national security agency, headquartered in northern Maryland, issued what's called a Top Secret sensitive compartmentalized information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United States were getting into foreign hands - in Israel, in particular.

Investigators don't believe calls are being listened to, but the data about who is calling whom and when is plenty valuable in itself. An internal Amdocs memo to senior company executives suggests just how Amdocs generated call records could be used. "Widespread data mining techniques and algorithms.... combining both the properties of the customer (e.g., credit rating) and properties of the specific 'behavior.'" Specific behavior, such as who the customers are calling.

The Amdocs memo says the system should be used to prevent phone fraud. But U.S. counterintelligence analysts say it could also be used to spy through the phone system. Fox News has learned that the N.S.A has held numerous classified conferences to warn the F.B.I. and C.I.A. how Amdocs records could be used. At one NSA briefing, a diagram by the Argon national lab was used to show that if the phone records are not secure, major security breaches are possible.

Another briefing document said, "It has become increasingly apparent that systems and networks are vulnerable.Such crimes always involve unauthorized persons, or persons who exceed their authorization...citing on exploitable vulnerabilities."

Those vulnerabilities are growing, because according to another briefing, the U.S. relies too much on foreign companies like Amdocs for high-tech equipment and software. "Many factors have led to increased dependence on code developed overseas.... We buy rather than train or develop solutions."

U.S. intelligence does not believe the Israeli government is involved in a misuse of information, and Amdocs insists that its data is secure. What U.S. government officials are worried about, however, is the possibility that Amdocs data could get into the wrong hands, particularly organized crime. And that would not be the first thing that such a thing has happened. Fox News has documents of a 1997 drug trafficking case in Los Angeles, in which telephone information, the type that Amdocs collects, was used to "completely compromise the communications of the FBI, the Secret Service, the DEO and the LAPD."

We'll have that and a lot more in the days ahead - Brit.

HUME: Carl, I want to take you back to your report last night on those 60 Israelis who were detained in the anti-terror investigation, and the suspicion that some investigators have that they may have picked up information on the 9/11 attacks ahead of time and not passed it on.

There was a report, you'll recall, that the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, did indeed send representatives to the U.S. to warn, just before 9/11, that a major terrorist attack was imminent. How does that leave room for the lack of a warning?

CAMERON: I remember the report, Brit. We did it first internationally right here on your show on the 14th. What investigators are saying is that that warning from the Mossad was nonspecific and general, and they believe that it may have had something to do with the desire to protect what are called sources and methods in the intelligence community. The suspicion being, perhaps those sources and methods were taking place right here in the United States.

The question came up in select intelligence committee on Capitol Hill today. They intend to look into what we reported last night, and specifically that possibility - Brit.

HUME: So in other words, the problem wasn't lack of a warning, the problem was lack of useful details?

CAMERON: Quantity of information.

HUME: All right, Carl, thank you very much.

Source: http://www.FoxNews.com

1/5/02
3:37:12 PM

Massive Isreali Spy Operaton Discovered In US - Part 1

by Carl Cameron

BRIT HUME, HOST: It has been more than 16 years since a civilian working for the Navy was charged with passing secrets to Israel. Jonathan Pollard pled guilty to conspiracy to commit espionage and is serving a life sentence. At first, Israeli leaders claimed Pollard was part of a rogue operation, but later took responsibility for his work.

Now Fox News has learned some U.S. investigators believe that there are Israelis again very much engaged in spying in and on the U.S., who may have known things they didn't tell us before Sept. 11. Fox News correspondent Carl Cameron has details in the first of a four-part series.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Since Sept. 11, more than 60 Israelis have been arrested or detained, either under the new patriot anti-terrorism law, or for immigration violations. A handful of active Israeli military were among those detained, according to investigators, who say some of the detainees also failed polygraph questions when asked about alleged surveillance activities against and in the United States.

There is no indication that the Israelis were involved in the 9/11 attacks, but investigators suspect that they Israelis may have gathered intelligence about the attacks in advance, and not shared it. A highly placed investigator said there are "tie-ins." But when asked for details, he flatly refused to describe them, saying, "evidence linking these Israelis to 9/11 is classified. I cannot tell you about evidence that has been gathered. It's classified information."

Fox News has learned that one group of Israelis, spotted in North Carolina recently, is suspected of keeping an apartment in California to spy on a group of Arabs who the United States is also investigating for links to terrorism. Numerous classified documents obtained by Fox News indicate that even prior to Sept. 11, as many as 140 other Israelis had been detained or arrested in a secretive and sprawling investigation into suspected espionage by Israelis in the United States.

Investigators from numerous government agencies are part of a working group that's been compiling evidence since the mid '90s. These documents detail hundreds of incidents in cities and towns across the country that investigators say, "may well be an organized intelligence gathering activity."

The first part of the investigation focuses on Israelis who say they are art students from the University of Jerusalem and Bazala Academy. They repeatedly made contact with U.S. government personnel, the report says, by saying they wanted to sell cheap art or handiwork.

Documents say they, "targeted and penetrated military bases." The DEA, FBI and dozens of government facilities, and even secret offices and unlisted private homes of law enforcement and intelligence personnel. The majority of those questioned, "stated they served in military intelligence, electronic surveillance intercept and or explosive ordinance units."

Another part of the investigation has resulted in the detention and arrests of dozens of Israelis at American mall kiosks, where they've been selling toys called Puzzle Car and Zoom Copter. Investigators suspect a front.

Shortly after The New York Times and Washington Post reported the Israeli detentions last months, the carts began vanishing. Zoom Copter's Web page says, "We are aware of the situation caused by thousands of mall carts being closed at the last minute. This in no way reflects the quality of the toy or its salability. The problem lies in the operators' business policies."

Why would Israelis spy in and on the U.S.? A general accounting office investigation referred to Israel as country A and said, "According to a U.S. intelligence agency, the government of country A conducts the most aggressive espionage operations against the U.S. of any U.S. ally."

A defense intelligence report said Israel has a voracious appetite for information and said, "the Israelis are motivated by strong survival instincts which dictate every possible facet of their political and economical policies. It aggressively collects military and industrial technology and the U.S. is a high priority target."

The document concludes: "Israel possesses the resources and technical capability to achieve its collection objectives."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

A spokesman for the Israeli embassy here in Washington issued a denial saying that any suggestion that Israelis are spying in or on the U.S. is "simply not true." There are other things to consider. And in the days ahead, we'll take a look at the U.S. phone system and law enforcement's methods for wiretaps. And an investigation that both have been compromised by our friends overseas.

HUME: Carl, what about this question of advanced knowledge of what was going to happen on 9/11? How clear are investigators that some Israeli agents may have known something?

CAMERON: It's very explosive information, obviously, and there's a great deal of evidence that they say they have collected ó none of it necessarily conclusive. It's more when they put it all together. A bigger question, they say, is how could they not have know? Almost a direct quote.

HUME: Going into the fact that they were spying on some Arabs, right?

CAMERON: Correct.

HUME: All right, Carl, thanks very much.

Source: http://www.FoxNews.com

1/3/02
10:12:36 PM

Electricity From Earth's Core

by Erik Baard

A radical new method of producing electricity from the Earth's inner heat has been devised by a power plant designer from Texas.

Doyle Brewington of ESOR Consulting Engineers in Houston has designed a long, self-contained turbine shaft called a Power Tube that could tap subterranean heat without relying on geysers and steam vents.

"I spent 25 years building power plants and I saw the damage they were causing," Brewington said. "The noxious gas being emitted by a lot of these steam turbines were causing a lot of acid rain around the world."

Brewington's Power Tube is a sealed tube, four-foot wide and 185-feet long, containing a vapor-driven generator. The idea is to bury the Power Tube deep enough to touch hot rock.

The tip of the Power Tube contains a pair of hydrocarbons, isopentane and isobutene, that turn to vapor when in contact with rock that's at least 220 degrees Fahrenheit (104 C). The vapor rises to drive a generator above. The vapor is then cooled back into a liquid by helium that is compressed and expanded using sound waves. The liquefied hydrocarbons are then pumped back to the tip to restart the cycle in an unbroken loop. Magnetic suspension, rather than lubrication, eliminates friction in the turbine.

Brewington has designed a half-size prototype that is just over two-feet in diameter and 85 feet long. It is expected to produce a megawatt of electricity, enough to power 750 homes. The first Power Tubes to go into operation will be in Hawaii and Costa Rica, Brewington said. He is still talking to authorities, and didn't say when it would go into the ground.

Brewington said full-size Power Tubes will produce 10 MW, enough to light up a small residential town. Unlike old-fashioned geothermal sites, which consume up to 10 acres of land, Power Tubes will have only a small maintenance shed on top. And because Power Tubes run silently, homes and offices could be built over them.

Working Power Tubes will be easy to assemble on site: Long ones will be transported in sections, Brewington said. And on-site maintenance of a Power Tube would be swifter than that for traditional power plants because the entire shaft can be removed and replaced in hours. The defective tube could then be retrofitted back at the plant.

If Brewington is correct, much of the energy needed for expanding industrialization could be provided without releasing greenhouse gases associated with burning fossil fuel or the risks associated with nuclear energy.

Many of the fastest growing economies sit on the Earth's "Ring of Fire," a circuit of volcanoes, earthquakes, and other manifestations of tectonic tension. Brewington claims that 48 countries in the Ring of Fire alone could be powered entirely by Power Tubes, a great stride over other geothermal systems.

"Anything that's got magma underneath it is great," he said.

But leading researchers are watching with a wary eye, and some have expressed strong reservations about Brewington's plans. They don't see how he's going to pull off his power plans without water.

In geothermal plants, water plays the vital role of a heat conductor. Designs for extracting electricity from hot, dry rocks have hit a very basic and frustrating wall -- the rocks cool down too fast, noted John Lund, director of the Geo-Heat Center at the Oregon Institute of Technology.

"The process is feasible in the short term. There's no question about that," said Lund. But "rock is very poor at transferring heat. You're pulling heat out to turn the turbine, so the surrounding rock cools down and new heat is very, very slow to replenish.

"If not (in) a month, maybe after a year, and he'll be out of heat. I don't think the process he has in mind is going to work very well."

Lund said there are already geothermal power plants using a process called binary cycles that use hydrocarbon vapors in much the same way as Brewington's Power Tubes. The critical difference is that when these plants are situated in a dry area, they pump water down at high pressure to exploit fissures in the rock so that water can then conduct heat from a wider area.

A plant built for sustained operations needs to draw upon a heat well hundreds, if not thousands, of feet deep, Lund said. Considering the geology of the United States, Lund said nothing east of the Mississippi could meet a Power Tube's needs at the shallow depths proposed by Brewington. "So the economics defeats him and the heat transfer of rock defeats him," Lund concluded.

Ted Clutter, executive director of the Geothermal Resources Council, an industry advocacy group, would only say that Power Tubes are "not something we're interested in."

A Department of Energy spokesman said the agency's experts weren't familiar enough with Brewington's plans to offer an evaluation.

Source: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,48947,00.html

1/3/02
4:13:49 PM

The Ex-Presidents' Club

by Oliver Burkeman and Julian Borger

It is hard to imagine an address closer to the heart of American power. The offices of the Carlyle Group are on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC, midway between the White House and the Capitol building, and within a stone's throw of the headquarters of the FBI and numerous government departments. The address reflects Carlyle's position at the very centre of the Washington establishment, but amid the frenetic politicking that has occupied the higher reaches of that world in recent weeks, few have paid it much attention. Elsewhere, few have even heard of it.

This is exactly the way Carlyle likes it. For 14 years now, with almost no publicity, the company has been signing up an impressive list of former politicians - including the first President Bush and his secretary of state, James Baker; John Major; one-time World Bank treasurer Afsaneh Masheyekhi and several south-east Asian powerbrokers - and using their contacts and influence to promote the group. Among the companies Carlyle owns are those which make equipment, vehicles and munitions for the US military, and its celebrity employees have long served an ingenious dual purpose, helping encourage investments from the very wealthy while also smoothing the path for Carlyle's defence firms.

But since the start of the "war on terrorism", the firm - unofficially valued at $3.5bn - has taken on an added significance. Carlyle has become the thread which indirectly links American military policy in Afghanistan to the personal financial fortunes of its celebrity employees, not least the current president's father. And, until earlier this month, Carlyle provided another curious link to the Afghan crisis: among the firm's multi-million-dollar investors were members of the family of Osama bin Laden.

The closest the Carlyle Group has previously come to public attention was last May, when a Seoul-based employee called Peter Chung was forced to resign from his £100,000-a-year job after sending an email to friends - subsequently forwarded to thousands of others - boasting of his plans to "fuck every hot chick in Korea over the next two years". The more business-oriented activities of Carlyle's staff have been conducted much more quietly: since it was founded in 1987 by David Rubenstein, a policy assistant in Jimmy Carter's administration, and two lawyer friends, the firm has been dispatching an array of former world leaders on a series of strategic networking trips.

Last year, George Bush Sr and John Major travelled to Riyadh to talk with senior Saudi businessmen. In September 2000, Carlyle hired speakers including Colin Powell and AOL Time Warner chair Steve Case to address an extravagant party at Washington's Monarch Hotel. Months later, Major joined James Baker for a function at the Lanesborough Hotel in London, to explain the Florida election controversy to the wealthy attendees.

We can assume that Carlyle pays well. Neither Major's office nor Carlyle will confirm the details of his salary as European chairman - an appointment announced shortly before he left the House of Commons after the election - but we know, for the purposes of comparison, that he is paid £105,000 for 28 days' work a year for an unrelated non-executive directorship. Bush gives speeches for the company and is paid with stakes in the firm's investments, believed to be worth at least $80,000 per appearance. The benefits have attracted political stars from around the world: former Philippines president Fidel Ramos is an adviser, as is former Thai premier Anand Panyarachun - as well as former Bundesbank president Karl Otto Pohl, and Arthur Levitt, former chairman of the SEC, the US stock market regulator.

Carlyle partners, who include Baker and the firm's chairman, Frank Carlucci - Ronald Reagan's defence secretary and a former deputy director of the CIA - own stakes that would be worth $180m each if each partner owned an equal slice. As in many areas of its work, though, Carlyle is not obliged to reveal the details, and chooses not to.

Among the defence firms which benefit from Carlyle's success is United Defense, a Virginia-based contractor which makes vertical missile launch systems currently on board US Navy ships in the Arabian sea, as well as a range of other weapons delivery systems and combat vehicles. Carlyle's other holdings span an improbable range, taking in the French newspaper Le Figaro and the company which bottles Dr Pepper.

"They are big, and they are quiet," says David Mulholland, business editor of Jane's Defence Weekly. "But they're not easy to get information out of, [but] United Defense are going to do well [in the current conflict]." United also owns Bofors, a Swedish munitions manufacturer.

Carlyle has said that it does not lobby the federal government, thus avoiding a conflict of interest when, for example, Carlucci met Rumsfeld in February when several important defence contracts were under consideration. But critics see that as a matter of definition.

"It should be a deep cause for concern that a closely held company like Carlyle can simultaneously have directors and advisers that are doing business and making money and also advising the president of the United States," says Peter Eisner, managing director of the Center for Public Integrity, a non-profit-making Washington think-tank. "The problem comes when private business and public policy blend together. What hat is former president Bush wearing when he tells Crown Prince Abdullah not to worry about US policy in the Middle East? What hat does he use when he deals with South Korea, and causes policy changes there? Or when James Baker helps argue the presidential election in the younger Bush's favour? It's a kitchen-cabinet situation, and the informality involved is precisely a mark of Carlyle's success."

The world of private equity is an inherently secretive one. Firms such as Carlyle make most of their money buying firms which are not publicly traded, overhauling them and selling them at a profit, so the process by which likely targets are evaluated is much more confidential than on the open market. "These firms certainly don't go out of their way to get into the headlines," says Steven Bell, chief economist at Deutsche Asset Management. "They'd rather make a splash in Institutional Pensions Week. The aim is to realise very high returns for your investors while exerting a high degree of control over the company. You don't want to get into the headlines when you force the management to fire a director."

The process has worked wonders at United, and this month the firm announced plans to go public, giving Carlyle the chance to cash in its investment.

But what sets Carlyle apart is the way it has exploited its political contacts. When Carlucci arrived there in 1989, he brought with him a phalanx of former subordinates from the CIA and the Pentagon, and an awareness of the scale of business a company like Carlyle could do in the corridors and steak-houses of Washington. In a decade and a half, the firm has been able to realise a 34% rate of return on its investments, and now claims to be the largest private equity firm in the world. Success brought more investors, including the international financier George Soros and, in 1995, the wealthy Saudi Binladin family, who insist they long ago severed all links with their notorious relative. The first president Bush is understood to have visited the Binladins in Saudi Arabia twice on the firm's behalf.

The Carlyle Group does not employ anyone at its Washington headquarters to deal with the press. Inquiries about the links with the Binladins (as most of the family choose to spell their name) are instead referred to someone outside the company, on condition he is referred to only as "a source familiar with the relationship". This source says: "I can confirm the fact that any Binladin Group investment in Carlyle has been terminated or is being terminated. It amounted to a $2m investment in the Carlyle II Fund, which was anyway a very small portion of a $1.3bn fund. In the scheme of the investments and in the scheme of the business of either party it was very small. We have to get this into perspective. But I think there was a sense that there were questions being raised and some controversy, and for such a small amount of money it was something that we wanted to put behind us. It was just a business decision."

But if the Binladins' connection to the Carlyle Group lasted no more than six years, the current President Bush's own links to the firm go far deeper. In 1990, he was appointed to the board of one of Carlyle's first purchases, an airline food business called Caterair, which they eventually sold at a loss. He left the board in 1992, later to become Governor of Texas. Shortly thereafter, he was responsible for appointing several members of the board which controlled the investment of Texas teachers' pension funds. A few years later, the board decided to invest $100m of public money in the Carlyle Group. The firm's magic touch was already bringing results. Today, it is proving as fruitful as ever.

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4288516,00.htm

1/3/02
2:58:48 PM

"Flyer that should be dropped over the United States"

This brief commentary comes courtesy of Bill Blum, author of Killing Hope and Rogue State.

United States military flyer dropped over Afghanistan:

"Do you enjoy being ruled by the Taliban? Are you proud to live a life of fear? Are you happy to see the place your family has owned for generations a terrorist training site? Do you want a regime that is turning Afghanistan into the Stone Age and giving Islam a bad name? Are you proud to live under a government that harbors terrorists? Are you proud to live in a nation ruled by extreme fundamentalists? The Taliban have robbed your country of your culture and heritage. They have destroyed your national monuments, and cultural artifacts. They rule by force, violence, and fear based on the advice of foreigners. They insist that their form of Islam is the one and only form, the true form, the divine form. They see themselves as religious experts, even though they are ignorant. They kill, commit injustice, keep you in poverty and claim it is in the name of God."

Flyer that should be dropped over the United States:

"Do you enjoy being ruled by the Republican-Democratic Party? Are you proud to live a life of fear, insecurity and panic? Are you happy to see the place your family has owned for generations taken away by a bank? Do you want a regime that is turning the United States into a police state and giving Christianity a bad name? Are you proud to live under a government that harbors hundreds of terrorists in Miami? Are you proud to live in a nation ruled by extreme capitalists and religious conservatives? The capitalists have robbed your country of your equality and justice. They have destroyed your national parks and rivers and corrupted your media, your elections and your personal relations. They rule by threat of unemployment, hunger, and homelessness based on the advice of a god called the market. They insist that their form of organizing a society and remaking the world is the one and only form, the true form, the divine form. They see themselves as morality experts, even though they are ignorant. They bomb, invade, assassinate, torture, overthrow, commit injustice, keep you and the world in poverty and claim it is in the name of God."

Bill Blum

Author: Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower

http://members.aol.com/superogue/homepage.htm

The above US military flyer and other flyers dropped by the US can be read at:

http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/10/18/ret.flyers/

1/3/02
2:53:03 PM

Foreign Policy Quiz

This test consists of one (1) multiple-choice question

(so you better get it right!)

Here's a list of the countries that the U.S. has bombed since the end of World War II, compiled by historian William Blum:

China 1945-46

Korea 1950-53

China 1950-53

Guatemala 1954

Indonesia 1958

Cuba 1959-60

Guatemala 1960

Congo 1964

Peru 1965

Laos 1964-73

Vietnam 1961-73

Cambodia 1969-70

Guatemala 1967-69

Grenada 1983

Libya 1986

El Salvador 1980s

Nicaragua 1980s

Panama 1989

Iraq 1991-99

Sudan 1998

Afghanistan 1998

Yugoslavia 1999

In how many of these instances did a democratic government respectful of human rights, occur as a direct result? Choose one of the following:

(a) 0

(b) zero

(c) none

(d) not a one

(e) a whole number between -1 and +1

(The list doesn't include Iran and Chile, both of which the US didn't bomb but backed thuggish coups.)

But, hey, glad we're going to end our streak of mistakes by backing a government in Afghanistan that respects women and human rights, because as our track record clearly shows, we're quite concerned about that, far more than we are about relatively unimportant things like oil or natural resources.

1/3/02
2:47:25 PM

FBI Continues To Cover Up Pilot Communications Related To September 11

by Joel Skousen, World Affairs Brief http://www.joelskousen.com

In all major conspiratorial events, evidence related to the event continues to surface over time, and if the government is involved, it demonstrates its collusion by the degree to which it attempts to suppress and cover up the emerging evidence. As in the JFK assassination and the downing of TWA 800 by a missile, we are beginning to see the same pattern of obfuscation, denial, and cover-up by federal agencies in the September 11th tragedy--especially by the FBI, the military, and the FAA.

Some of the biggest questions about the events of 9/11 center around the hijacking of the various airliners: how the pilots reacted, and what actions the government took via the military to impede the results. Pilots have instant access to Air Traffic Control (ATC) with a push of a button on the control yoke. In contrast, it takes time for a hijacker to take over the cabin and then deal with the pilots who are in a separate compartment behind a locked aluminum sliding door. We know, by FAA admission, that in each and every case the pilots had time to communicate their emergency to ATC. In at least two cases the pilots were able to change the transponder code to 7700 for "emergency in progress" before the hijackers took control and switched off the transponder. The FAA and US military have standing orders and written procedures on how to intercept and deal with aircraft hijackings.

The FAA has said that it alerted military authorities in Colorado at the first signs of a hijacking. Yet we know that a few aircraft were scrambled and that all others were grounded and prohibited from reacting according to standing procedures. One of my subscribers is friends with an air traffic controller at McGuire AFB in New Jersey. His friend confided to him that "he was on duty at the time of the crashes into the towers. They got a phone call in between the first and second 'hit'. His superior told him that 'NO take-off's were permitted ... NONE at all.'" This was too early to be a direct result of shutting down all flights nationwide--which only affected private and commercial flights--not military. Here we have evidence of the US military acting in direct opposition to national defense--acting on orders from above. These orders couldn't have come from Bush, who was engaged at an elementary school, so higher military officials were either taking orders from someone else at the White House or acting on predetermined orders.

I find it also very strange that flight data and voice recorders from all the 9/11 crashes except Flight 93 (which crashed or was shot down over Pennsylvania) have been declared not found, destroyed, or unreadable. These declarations are without precedent in aviation accident history, and especially preposterous when we consider that the FBI claims to have found letters, passports and other fragile documents belonging to the supposed Arab hijackers amidst the tons of rubble of the WTC--and yet they couldn't find crash hardened data recorders. The data and voice recorders are designed to survive both the crash and resulting fire and almost always do. Why not this time?

Now the FBI tells us they will not be releasing the lone cockpit voice recorder that survived Flight 93 because "it would be too traumatic for the surviving families." What could be more traumatic that what they already know? This is just another blatant excuse to withhold even more information about the tragedies. There has to be a good reason why the FBI refuses to release this voice recorder, and I think it has to do with the fact that it may not have been a hijacking at all that took down this aircraft.

It is becoming evident that Flight 93 was shot down by an unmarked white jet that was seen intercepting Flight 93 and following it down as it crashed. The jet was witnessed in detail by several people on the ground. One military witness claims he heard a missile being fired. In addition, the main body of the engine of Flight 93 was found miles from the main wreckage site, with damage comparable to that which a heat seeking missile would do to an airliner. There were also personal papers, and articles of clothing from the plane found miles from the crash. The government is now saying these were carried up into the air by the crash fireball--but no such occurrence has happened in other crashes. The existing body of evidence is found at on a website at http://www.flight93crash.com.

The author of the website doesn't draw any conclusions except that Flight 93 didn't go down as the public has been told and that the government knows why and isn't telling.

Source: http://www.rense.com/general18/sep.htm

1/3/02
2:45:42 PM

Dear Peaceloving Friends of the World,

As we leave the mourning and sorrow of the terrible act of September 11, 2001, the destruction of Taaliban & Afghanistan behind, it is time to re-evaluate terrorism and how foreign policy blunders can contribute to more to it, instead of making this world better and safer for all.

The First question must be asked why people are angry and why educated people with friends and family volunteers for suicide missions around the world, SPECIALLY America???

It is time that G8 nations, specially US, doesn't take sides to add fuel to the fiery world disputes, most of which can be resolved with honest generous diplomacy quickly and decisively. US needs to re-evaluate its assassination policy of world leaders.

Most people in the world - Christians, Hindu, Muslims, Jews, Buddhist and others, are very peaceful, honest, loving and friendly, and generally doesn't or cannot protest against Super Power terrorism using stealths and missiles.

Killing Osama Bil Naden will create more people like him who will work secretly and silently - sometime staying around us as friends, neighbors and colleagues.

So, it is time to end all middle east conflicts letting oil to be sold at free market price. It is time to end the OIL politics of supporting the Uncontrolled Industrialized economy.

It is time to convert our enemies to friends - from Afghanistan to Peru and Basnia to Palestine. People of most countries which are labeled as terrorists have been starving for Western love and cooperation AND NOT bombs, missiles and merciless destructions.

Hope good sense prevails to all heads of states throughout the world.

God bless this beautiful world and all its wonderful people.

Deepak Sarkar 50-1699 Trans Canada Highway, Victoria, BC V9B5T9, Canada

1/3/02
2:37:00 PM

The high-tech hunt for terrorist lairs

By Robert Windrem, NBC NEWS INVESTIGATIVE PRODUCER

Nov. 27 - The United States is using its growing expertise in virtual spelunking to search Afghanistan's maze of caves for Osama bin Laden. Satellite imagery and an experimental underground mapping program hidden away in rural Alaska are just some of the tools at Washington's disposal.

JEFF RICHELSON, an intelligence historian who works with the National Security Archive, says the United States has long been interested in looking underground and has put several systems to use over the years: Spy satellites and spy planes that look for construction equipment and slight variations in ground temperatures, which can indicate the presence of structural elements like shafts, entrances and even communication links. Seismic stations that listen for explosions associated with construction. Ground sensors planted covertly by special operations forces and spies near suspected sites to monitor heat and sound from underground. There have been a number of successes - for example, massive Soviet underground hideouts were discovered in 1971 by enhancing spy satellite pictures. But locating an underground structure and imaging it are two different things. Richelson, author of "The Wizards of Langley," a new book on spy technology, believes that two experimental spy satellites launched several years ago - code-named Cobra Brass and Misty - were used to further enhance U.S. detection capabilities. Moreover, newer versions of the CIA's workhorse KH-11 spy satellites may have upgraded capabilities. Richelson said the advanced KH-11 is almost certainly involved in the effort to locate caves used by bin Laden and the Taliban. Richelson noted that two key multispectral technologies would be particularly useful for tracking caves: infrared and thermal imaging. "Infrared looks for reflected heat. Thermal looks for heat generated by the object," he said. "The advanced KH-11 has had some capabilities in these areas since 1992. Whether that capability has been significantly upgraded is classified." Another tool the United States could find helpful in pinpointing caves is the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle, which has already been used to track Taliban and al-Qaida movements. The Predator, say imaging experts, is ideal for tracking heat sources because it has both infrared and thermal imaging capabilities, plus the ability to hover for hours above a suspect site.

A senior U.S. official would neither confirm nor deny the aerial vehicle's usefulness, saying only that the Predator "has a variety of imaging capabilities."

HAARP IN THE HUNT

Meanwhile, the United States has been spending millions of dollars on two above-ground stations that use experimental technology to find underground complexes. The stations are both in Alaska - one near Gokana, 180 miles east-northeast of Anchorage, and the other west of Fairbanks. Over the past five years, the government has spent $70 million on the technology.

HAARP, is the most advanced. Run by the Office of Naval Research and the Air Force's Phillips Laboratory with help from the University of Alaska, HAARP has been operating for seven years, first under secrecy then more recently in the open. And it has not been without controversy. Using 72 180-foot antennae set on a 33-acre gravel pad, HAARP heats - some would say it boils - the ionosphere to create a "mirror" so that Extremely Long Frequency/Very Long Frequency radio waves can bounce off and penetrate the Earth. By measuring anomalies in the return signal, the military has had some success in creating "images" of underground facilities, including human-made tunnels and natural cavities. Once identified, tunnel entrances can be more easily spotted by satellites or spy planes, communications from the complexes can be more easily intercepted by antennae in space or on the ground, and underground facilities can be more easily targeted. Such signals, according to the HAARP Web site, "can penetrate deeply beneath the surface and interact with the geological structure of the Earth. ... The research called for in this effort is to assess the viability of exploiting the concept of electromagnetic induction to detect and image subterranean features such as tunnels, bunkers and other potential military targets." Officials have said the detection of underground facilities was a byproduct of the main research mission of the project - "simulating the aurora borealis to determine how we can compensate for its effects on our satellites," as one official put it. HAARP has also become a favorite of conspiracy theorists who see it as a "death ray," a means of "mind control" on a massive scale and a phenomenon responsible for widespread buzzing sounds heard in Germany and during Turkish earthquakes.

MORE POWER

Just a week before the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the Office of Naval Research announced that it was negotiating with a Washington contractor, Advanced Power Technologies Inc., to enhance the system and bring it to full power. HAARP has been running at about one-quarter of its planned power.

It is not known if HAARP has been used in the hunt for bin Laden's caves, and attempts to reach Advanced Power Technologies were fruitless. However, its Web site describes HAARP's capabilities this way: "The (VLF/ELF) signals are useful for communications with land forces and submarines and, because they have great penetration range, for the investigation of subterranean formations or structures." Advanced Power Technologies also advertises that it has a full range of hyperspectral cameras and data-processing technology along with global ground tomography technology, which it describes as "characterization of underground structures."

That means the company could easily combine HAARP's ability to find underground structures with its own ability to find minute gradations in ground temperatures. Although U.S. officials declined to say whether HAARP or other similar technologies were being used, they noted that looking for bin Laden was an "all-source intelligence effort."

Robert Windrem is an investigative producer for NBC's "Nightly News."

1/3/02
2:36:21 PM

Happy New Year! Happy New Year! Happy New Year to all my friends! Happy New Year to everyone else - Around the world!

One more year passed by- With the flow of our time Adding memories, knowledge and love!

Many children born - Throughout the world Need peace and love to grow - To see a better tomorrow!

As we celebrate - With fireworks and champagne Lets not forget, its not for everyone!

So, let us take this vow - From this very day We will see New Years - Where everyone celebrates!

Author: Deepak K. Sarkar 844 Royal Oak Ave, Victoria, BC V8X 3T2, Canada. copyright 12/31/2000. Tel/Fax:250-389-1090.

1/3/02
2:32:24 PM

Why is Colonel Albert Carone interesting?

by Donald Stacey

What do you think of the WAR ON DRUGS that this country has been waging for decades? Each year, the government budgets a huge amount for the WAR. This year it is about $20 billion directly for the WAR and other moneys are spent in supporting activities as well. I first heard of the WAR ON DRUGS during the Nixon administration. Every year sinice then, it has been a highly visible, well-funded effort waged by our government.

And what have Americans experienced as a result of the WAR? Does anyone really believe that drug traffickinig in this country has diminished in any significant way? What we have been treated to is frequent photo opportunities where a stash of drugs, usually accompanied by guns that have been seized as well as cash, are shown with ample praise for those who ran down the low level traffickers and busted them. After all this effort over the years, have you any idea who the Drug Kingpin in our country is? Who runs the traffickers in the US?

Of course you don't know who it is. After decades and billions and billions, we have no idea who runs the drug trafficking in this country. This is true in spite of an army of DEA, FBI, local police, customs, etc personnel supposedly out looking for the traffickers. It is true despite technology that effectively monitors our every telephone conversation, our every email and our every fax. Yet year after year, only low level drug traffickers are busted.

Meanwhile, we have lost substantial freedom so that the WAR can be fought. It is now permissable to bust down your door without notice if a tip comes in that you are a drug dealer.This is called a "no knock" warrant and it has been used against innocent people, sometimes resulting in their deaths.

It is routine for assets of Americans to be seized by the government without any proof of criminal activity. Even where there is no evidence of crime, some innocent people have been unable to get their assets back. Seizures are a source of funding for several government operations.

Our police have been militarized. Many communities have SWAT teams now that are highly armed and trained military units. What does a community do when it has a SWAT team? It uses it. Again innocent people have been brutalized by such tactics.

All the new powers created for our government in the name of fighting TERRORISM are available for use by all law enforcement agencies in their normal efforts. Some of these have been used against Americans on suspicion of criminal activities where there is no suggestion of terrorism. And what is terrorism anyway? It is whatever the government thinks it is. It could be considered terrorism to insist on one's Constitutional rights. Or to be a very religious person. Precedent exists for both of these examples.

Meanwhile the evidence abounds of direct involvement of our government in drug trafficking. There are many who have direct information and experience who speak to the extensive trafficking of drugs in our country by our government. They maintain that the WAR ON DRUGS is really fought against Americans. It is used to increase the power of those who operate our government. Those who are busted are often traffickers who compete with the government. The invasion of Panama was likely because of a dispute over mutual drug trafficking matters.

Isn't it clear to all of us that the WAR ON DRUGS is a scam? Isn't it interesting that we spend billions and billions of taxpayer moneys to help our government traffick drugs?

And that brings me to the significance of Colonel Carone. The deposition of his daughter contains a great deal of information that we haven't known about. It contains substantial amounts of information that the media has not provided us. Of course there is a question of credibility. How do you know whether you should believe what Desiree Ferdinand testifies about in the deposition? And that is an issue that we face everyday. Who do we believe and who do we not? In this case, I assure you that there are many people in a position to know who have provided information that correlates with Ms. Ferdinand's statements. My reason in distributing the information about Colonel Carone is to give you a detailed exposure to a piece of the puzzle. There are many, many other pieces that are necessary before the picture of what we are experiencing today becomes a bit clearer, of course. But a key piece is governmental drug trafficking. I have sent you two messages that contain part of a deposition about Colonel Carone. The deposition speaks to his being a made member of the mafia, a bag man in the NYPD and a "paymaster" for the CIA while serving as a Colonel in the US Army. It names names. It points to the highest levels of our government. Many of you who receive this message will not want to believe that this could be so. Unfortunately, it is clear to many of us that it is.

The third installment of the Carone series follows in a separate message. Please let me know what your thoughts are. Is the WAR ON DRUGS a scam?

Donald Stacey

MailTo:dstacey@mediaone.net

1/3/02
2:32:18 PM

Why is Colonel Albert Carone interesting?

by Donald Stacey

What do you think of the WAR ON DRUGS that this country has been waging for decades? Each year, the government budgets a huge amount for the WAR. This year it is about $20 billion directly for the WAR and other moneys are spent in supporting activities as well. I first heard of the WAR ON DRUGS during the Nixon administration. Every year sinice then, it has been a highly visible, well-funded effort waged by our government.

And what have Americans experienced as a result of the WAR? Does anyone really believe that drug traffickinig in this country has diminished in any significant way? What we have been treated to is frequent photo opportunities where a stash of drugs, usually accompanied by guns that have been seized as well as cash, are shown with ample praise for those who ran down the low level traffickers and busted them. After all this effort over the years, have you any idea who the Drug Kingpin in our country is? Who runs the traffickers in the US?

Of course you don't know who it is. After decades and billions and billions, we have no idea who runs the drug trafficking in this country. This is true in spite of an army of DEA, FBI, local police, customs, etc personnel supposedly out looking for the traffickers. It is true despite technology that effectively monitors our every telephone conversation, our every email and our every fax. Yet year after year, only low level drug traffickers are busted.

Meanwhile, we have lost substantial freedom so that the WAR can be fought. It is now permissable to bust down your door without notice if a tip comes in that you are a drug dealer.This is called a "no knock" warrant and it has been used against innocent people, sometimes resulting in their deaths.

It is routine for assets of Americans to be seized by the government without any proof of criminal activity. Even where there is no evidence of crime, some innocent people have been unable to get their assets back. Seizures are a source of funding for several government operations.

Our police have been militarized. Many communities have SWAT teams now that are highly armed and trained military units. What does a community do when it has a SWAT team? It uses it. Again innocent people have been brutalized by such tactics.

All the new powers created for our government in the name of fighting TERRORISM are available for use by all law enforcement agencies in their normal efforts. Some of these have been used against Americans on suspicion of criminal activities where there is no suggestion of terrorism. And what is terrorism anyway? It is whatever the government thinks it is. It could be considered terrorism to insist on one's Constitutional rights. Or to be a very religious person. Precedent exists for both of these examples.

Meanwhile the evidence abounds of direct involvement of our government in drug trafficking. There are many who have direct information and experience who speak to the extensive trafficking of drugs in our country by our government. They maintain that the WAR ON DRUGS is really fought against Americans. It is used to increase the power of those who operate our government. Those who are busted are often traffickers who compete with the government. The invasion of Panama was likely because of a dispute over mutual drug trafficking matters.

Isn't it clear to all of us that the WAR ON DRUGS is a scam? Isn't it interesting that we spend billions and billions of taxpayer moneys to help our government traffick drugs?

And that brings me to the significance of Colonel Carone. The deposition of his daughter contains a great deal of information that we haven't known about. It contains substantial amounts of information that the media has not provided us. Of course there is a question of credibility. How do you know whether you should believe what Desiree Ferdinand testifies about in the deposition? And that is an issue that we face everyday. Who do we believe and who do we not? In this case, I assure you that there are many people in a position to know who have provided information that correlates with Ms. Ferdinand's statements. My reason in distributing the information about Colonel Carone is to give you a detailed exposure to a piece of the puzzle. There are many, many other pieces that are necessary before the picture of what we are experiencing today becomes a bit clearer, of course. But a key piece is governmental drug trafficking. I have sent you two messages that contain part of a deposition about Colonel Carone. The deposition speaks to his being a made member of the mafia, a bag man in the NYPD and a "paymaster" for the CIA while serving as a Colonel in the US Army. It names names. It points to the highest levels of our government. Many of you who receive this message will not want to believe that this could be so. Unfortunately, it is clear to many of us that it is.

The third installment of the Carone series follows in a separate message. Please let me know what your thoughts are. Is the WAR ON DRUGS a scam?

Donald Stacey

MailTo:dstacey@mediaone.net

1/3/02
2:23:51 PM

Forget The Constitution

by John Keller

Ron Paul is frequently, and correctly, praised as the lone constitutionalist in Congress. But he is truly the exception that proves the rule: our government is no longer bound by anything resembling the written limitations of the Constitution.

I used to share the minarchist view. A small, limited government seemed possible and pragmatic. Even that's changed since September 11th. Instead of rethinking the foreign policy that contributed to the attacks, the government piled on more of the same. Instead of firing the chiefs of the FAA, CIA, and FBI, those agencies get more funding. The attacks on September 11th have given the federal government an excuse to shear all but the ghostly forms of any remaining constitutionally guaranteed liberties from a sheep-like people. Torture, constant surveillance, seizure upon suspicion, suspension of habeas corpus, abolishment of Posse Comitatus, and warrant-less searches of your person and property are either in effect or under serious debate. Imagine, torture in the United States! The United States has become a police state, all with our precious, written Constitution still moldering under glass in Washington, D.C.

In the span of less than 100 years communism peaked and collapsed in the Soviet Union. Communism failed because it was based on severely flawed assumptions about people, and what motivates them. I think it's time to admit that the idea of a Constitutionally limited government has failed as well. It, too, is based on flawed assumptions about people. Perhaps not as spectacularly wrong as communism, but wrong, nonetheless. Since it has taken over 200 years to produce our American "Stalinism-lite", and it has not yet collapsed, perhaps we can say constitutionally limited republicanism is at least three times better than communism. Or, to paraphrase Churchill the worst government yet invented, but better than all the rest tried so far.

We can always feel better about our revolutionaries than the Russians do about the Bolsheviks; ours didn't purges millions after winning the war. Our patriots fought for individual, God given rights, instead of aetheistic utopian groups rights. Still, the men who founded our current Republic by writing and ratifying the Constitution understood the dangerous path they were taking. Students of antiquity, they tried to avoid following the Roman path of Kingdom, then Republic, then Empire, by writing everything down. It turns out in practice that the "social contract" cannot bind the politician or the entrenched bureaucrat, any more than the Soviet Union could make the New Soviet Man. In hindsight we can see that a piece of paper is no match for the linguistic gymnastics of our permanent caste of lawyer kings.

When things do change in this country, it will not be because the bureaucrats, professional liars, and assorted utopians come to work one day and say "Gee, we failed in our job. The private market would be so much better at this." It will be because the people have finally figured out that Ben Franklin was right all along, liberty can't be traded for security, and it looks like Rothbard, Spooner, and Patrick Henry were right about the Constitution.

It's time for we the people to let go of our sentimental attachment to the Constitution; our politicians broke their allegiance to it long ago. Like communism, it may sound like a good idea on paper, but it hasn't worked in practice. It just took longer to fail. I've made the journey from skeptical Republican to minarchist Libertarian to anarcho-capitalist in a few short years. Thankfully, I had the Internet to help me stand on the libertarian shoulders of free-market and freedom minder thinkers. Forget the Constitution. It didn't work. It's time to start thinking about a government-free future.

Source: http://www.lewrockwell.com/keller/keller19.html

1/3/02
2:17:31 PM

Hail George, Conqueror Of Evildoers!

by Michael Moore

Dear George W. Bush:

Hats off to you, sir, for a job well done! The Soviets tried for ten years to do what it took you only two months to accomplish in Afghanistan. How did you do that? It's funny how a couple months ago there were all these Taliban, and now -- there aren't any! You must be some kind of super magician -- almost as good at disappearing acts as ol' Osama (or, as they say on the Fox Nuisance Channel, "Usama" -- I like their spelling better, like "We put the 'USA' in USAma!"). He did exist, didn't he? I would hate to have gotten myself all worked up over the wrong evildoer! I loved that last tape of his, the home video of his sleepover with that sheik. What a party animal, that guy!

And how 'bout that Northern Alliance! Thanks to them, my weekly supply of heroin will finally be reinstated. Whoo-hoo -- and just in time for New Year's Rockin' Eve! Those Taliban simply did NOT have the best delivery system for the stuff, kinda like why you never see Beaman's gum anymore --poor distribution and shelf placement. According to the New York Times, the Northern Alliance has put all the poppy farmers back to work, and they are promising a "bumper crop" by spring.

But Mr. Bush, I am most impressed with how you have used those who died on September 11th to justify your lining the pockets of your rich friends and campaign contributors. Your "Economic Stimulus Bill" -- pure genius! You actually got the House of Representatives to pass a bill eliminating the law that said corporations have to pay at least a token minimum tax every year. See, most people forget that back in your daddy's day (when he was VP) thousands of companies were able to lawyer their way out of paying any taxes at all! Then a law was passed to stop that. Now you got the House to agree to give all these corporations back ALL the minimum taxes they have paid since 1986!! That's $140 billion of givebacks ($1.4 billion to IBM, a billion to Ford, $800 million to GM, etc.). And you got this passed, all under the guise of "September 11th!" How do you get away with this without the American public whoopin' your behind? Man, you are THE MAN!

Hey, and tell your top sheriff, Big John Ashcroft, that his refusal to let the FBI look at the files of gun background checks that the Justice Department keeps -- to see if any of the terrorists or suspected terrorists have purchased weapons in the past two years -- took some balls! Even though checking those files might turn up information that could protect us in possible future attacks, Ashcroft was more concerned with not upsetting the NRA than in helping his own FBI catch the bad guys. Now that's what I call getting your priorities straight. Big John may have lost his Senate seat last year to a dead guy, but he sure as heck ain't gonna lose me as a huge admirer!

Well, I better go before someone from the Office of Homeland Security mistakes me for someone who needs to be "interviewed!" Rest assured I'm doing my part for the country by shopping my sorry ass off in this week before Christmas. Buy! Buy! Buy! Tora! Tora! Tora! Bora! Whoo-hoo, Prince O' Peace!! Fight Team Fight! Go get 'em, George, Jr. -- we're counting on you to kill all evildoers!

Yours,

Michael Moore

Third in Line to the King of Afghanistan

http://www.michaelmoore.com

MailTo:mmflint@aol.com

1/3/02
1:50:54 PM

The Hundredth Monkey Revisited

Going back to the original sources puts a new light on this popular story

by Elaine Myers

Is there some magic key that provides a short cut to cultural transformation?

THE STORY OF "The Hundredth Monkey" has recently become popular in our culture as a strategy for social change. Lyall Watson first told it in Lifetide (pp147- 148), but its most widely known version is the opening to the book The Hundredth Monkey, by Ken Keyes. (See below.) The story is based on research with monkeys on a northern Japanese Island, and its central idea is that when enough individuals in a population adopt a new idea or behavior, there occurs an ideological breakthrough that allows this new awareness to be communicated directly from mind to mind without the connection of external experience and then all individuals in the population spontaneously adopt it. "It may be that when enough of us hold something to be true, it becomes true for everyone." (Watson, p148)

I found this to be a very appealing and believable idea. The concept of Jung's collective unconscious, and the biologists' morphogenetic fields (IN CONTEXT #6} offer parallel stories that help strengthen this strand of our imaginations. Archetypes, patterns, or fields that are themselves without mass or energy, could shape the individual manifestations of mass and energy. The more widespread these fields are, the greater their influence on the physical level of reality. We sometimes mention the Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon when we need supporting evidence of the possibility of an optimistic scenario for the future, especially a future based on peace instead of war. If enough of us will just think the right thoughts, then suddenly, almost magically, such ideas will become reality.

However, when I went back to the original research reports cited by Watson, I did not find the same story that he tells. Where he claims to have had to improvise details, the research reports are quite precise, and they do not support the "ideological breakthrough" phenomenon. At first I was disappointed; but as I delved deeper into the research I found a growing appreciation for the lessons the real story of these monkeys has for us. Based on what I have learned from the Japan Monkey Center reports in Primates, vol. 2, vol. 5 and vol. 6, here is how the real story seems to have gone.

Up until 1958, Keyes' description follows the research quite closely, although not all the young monkeys in the troop learned to wash the potatoes. By March, 1958, 15 of the 19 young monkeys (aged two to seven years} and 2 of the 11 adults were washing sweet potatoes. Up to this time, the propagation of the innovative behavior was on an individual basis, along family lines and playmate relationships. Most of the young monkeys began to wash the potatoes when they were one to two and a half years old. Males older than 4 years, who had little contact with the young monkeys, did not acquire the behavior.

By 1959, the sweet potato washing was no longer a new behavior to the group. Monkeys that had acquired the behavior as juveniles were growing up and having their own babies. This new generation of babies learned sweet potato washing behavior through the normal cultural pattern of the young imitating their mothers. By January, 1962, almost all the monkeys in the Koshima troop, excepting those adults born before 1950, were observed to be washing their sweet potatoes. If an individual monkey had not started to wash sweet potatoes by the time he was an adult, he was unlikely to learn it later, regardless of how widespread it became among the younger members of the troop.

In the original reports, there was no mention of the group passing a critical threshold that would impart the idea to the entire troop. The older monkeys remained steadfastly ignorant of the new behavior. Likewise, there was no mention of widespread sweet potato washing in other monkey troops. There was mention of occasional sweet potato washing by individual monkeys in other troops, but I think there are other simpler explanations for such occurrences. If there was an Imo in one troop, there could be other Imo-like monkeys in other troops.

Instead of an example of the spontaneous transmission of ideas, I think the story of the Japanese monkeys is a good example of the propagation of a paradigm shift, as in Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. The truly innovative points of view tend to come from those on the edge between youth and adulthood. The older generation continues to cling to the world view they grew up with. The new idea does not become universal until the older generation withdraws from power, and a younger generation matures within the new point of view.

It is also an example of the way that simple innovations can lead to extensive cultural change. By using the water in connection with their food, the Koshima monkeys began to exploit the sea as a resource in their environment. Sweet potato washing led to wheat washing, and then to bathing behavior and swimming, and the utilization of sea plants and animals for food. "Therefore, provisioned monkeys suffered changes in their attitude and value system and were given foundations on which pre-cultural phenomena developed." (M Kawai, Primates, Vol 6, #1, 1965).

What does this say about morphogenetic fields, and the collective unconscious? Not very much, but the "ideological breakthrough" idea is not what Sheldrake's theory of morphogenetic fields would predict anyway. That theory would recognize that the behavior of the older monkeys (not washing) also is a well-established pattern. There may well be a "critical mass" required to shift a new behavior from being a fragile personal idiosyncrasy to being a well-established alternative, but creating a new alternative does not automatically displace older alternatives. It just provides more choices. It is possible that the washing alternative established by the monkeys on Koshima Island did create a morphogenetic field that made it easier for monkeys on other islands to "discover" the same technique, but the actual research neither supports nor denies that idea. It remains for other cultural experiments and experiences to illuminate this question.

What the research does suggest, however, is that holding positive ideas (as important a step as this is) is not sufficient by itself to change the world. We still need direct communication between individuals, we need to translate our ideas into action, and we need to recognize the freedom of choice of those who choose alternatives different from our own.

The Hundredth Monkey

by Ken Keyes

The Japanese monkey, Macaca fuscata, has been observed in the wild for a period of over 30 years.

In 1952, on the island of Koshima, scientists were providing monkeys with sweet potatoes dropped in the sand. The monkeys liked the taste of the raw sweet potatoes, but they found the dirt unpleasant.

An 18-month-old female named Imo found she could solve the problem by washing the potatoes in a nearby stream. She taught this trick to her mother. Her playmates also learned this new way and they taught their mothers, too.

This cultural innovation was gradually picked up by various monkeys before the eyes of the scientists.

Between 1953 and 1958 all of the young monkeys learned to wash the sandy sweet potatoes to make them more palatable.

Only the adults who imitated their children learned this social improvement. Other adults kept eating the dirty sweet potatoes.

Then something startling took place. In the autumn of 1958, a certain number of Koshima monkeys were washing sweet potatoes - the exact number is not known.

Let us suppose that when the sun rose one morning there were 99 monkeys on Koshima Island who had learned to wash their sweet potatoes.

Let us further suppose that later that morning the hundred monkey learned to wash potatoes.

THEN IT HAPPENED!

By that evening almost everyone in the tribe was washing sweet potatoes before eating them.

The added energy of this hundredth monkey somehow created an ideological breakthrough!

But notice.

A most surprising thing observed by these scientists was that the habit of washing sweet potatoes then jumped over the sea -

Colonies of monkeys on other islands and the mainland troop of monkeys at Takasakiyama began washing their sweet potatoes!

1/3/02
1:38:25 PM

A Face in the Crowd

Is surveillance software turning police into Robocops?

by Julie Wakefield

Americans have long accepted the presence of hidden security cameras that monitor banks, airports, office lobbies, and convenience stores. But over the past year, law enforcement agencies have sparked new privacy concerns by quietly linking surveillance cameras to computers, using software to scan the faces of ordinary citizens and instantly identify those with a criminal record.

In January, federal agents at the presidential inauguration wore tiny cameras designed to compare the facial features of onlookers with computerized images of suspected terrorists. That same month, police in Tampa, Florida, tested "facial recognition technology" at the Super Bowl, scanning 75,000 fans and running the images through a database of digitized mug shots. (The system made 19 matches, but police did not stop any of the suspects to confirm their identities.) And in June, Tampa police installed software in 36 cameras in the Ybor City entertainment district to routinely monitor the faces of pedestrians for wanted criminals.

The technology used in Ybor City, called FaceIt, was designed by Visionics Corp. of New Jersey, a leading developer of face-recognition systems. The software breaks faces into 80 distinct "landmarks," which can then be compared to features in stored images almost instantaneously. Visionics has received $2 million from the Defense Department to adapt the idea for military uses, and the company says that a growing number of law enforcement agencies have expressed interest in the technology, especially in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks. West Virginia and Illinois already use versions of such software to confirm the identity of applicants for driver's licenses and social services. As the systems spread, police are digitizing more mug shots to create larger databases-and the FBI has begun digitizing 40 million criminal records at its National Crime Information Center.

Armed with cameras linked to every mug shot in the nation, law enforcement officers would be more like Robocops, capable of recognizing anyone in a police database. But the emerging technology has raised myriad privacy concerns. Civil rights advocates question whether people who have been arrested but not convicted will be included in the databases, and who will have access to stored surveillance images. What's more, government tests show that bad lighting or camera angles can produce false matches. "Police harassment of innocent people is a real possibility," says Eric Rubin, an organizer with the Tampa Bay Action Group, a coalition that has staged masked protests against the technology.

So far, police in Tampa have made no arrests based on the face-scanning software. But officials in the East London borough of Newham, where 250 cameras installed by Visionics have scanned pedestrians for the past three years, insist that law-abiding citizens have nothing to fear. The technology, says town official Bob Lack, is not Big Brother, but more like "a friendly uncle and aunt watching over you."

Source: http://motherjones.com/magazine/ND01/surveillance.html

1/3/02
1:32:20 PM

Police Repression and Prison Industrial Complex

http://globalresearch.ca/by-topic/police-repression/

The New Totalitarianism and the Unseen Terrorist Pattern: Why there is a War in Afghanistan?

http://globalresearch.ca/articles//MCM112A.html

The aspartame epidemic

http://www.disinfo.com/pages/article/id992/pg1/

A Face in the Crowd Is surveillance software turning police into Robocops?

http://motherjones.com/magazine/ND01/surveillance.html

Explore the list of articles posted at

http://www.dorothynetwork.org/main/

1/3/02
1:29:52 PM

"I have known war as few men now living know it. Its very destructiveness on both friend and foe has rendered it useless as a means of settling international disputes."

General Douglas MacArthur

1/3/02
1:13:46 PM

ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE (ENS)

http://ens-news.com

BUILDING CONSENSUS KEY TO GLOBAL PROTECTION IN 2002

NAIROBI, Kenya, January 2, 2002 (ENS) - The top United Nations environmental official is calling for a speedy ratification of the Kyoto climate protocol before September.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-02-01.html

DETROIT RIVER INTERNATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE CREATED

WASHINGTON, DC, January 2, 2002 (ENS) - Legislation creating the first international wildlife refuge that includes part of the United States has been signed into law by President George W. Bush. The President's signature officially establishes the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-02-02.html

PACTS SIGNED TO CONSERVE AMERICA'S LARGEST ESTUARY

ANNAPOLIS, Maryland, January 2, 2002 (ENS) - Three regional pacts that aim to improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries were signed late last month to encourage regional planning, storm water management and low impact development in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-02-04.html

TORRENTIAL RAINS CLAIM 66 LIVES IN BRAZIL

RIO DE JANIERO, Brazil, January 2, 2002 (ENS) - In the slums of Brazilian towns across the state of Rio de Janeiro, 66 people are dead and nearly two thousand have been driven from their homes by torrential rains, floods, and mudslides persisting over the past two weeks.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-02-03.html

AUSTRALIA MOVES AGAINST JAPANESE WHALERS

CANBERRA, Australia, January 2, 2002 (ENS) - Australia has attempted to expel whaling ships from Antarctic waters it claims as Australian, after its resupply ship found the bulk of the Japanese whaling fleet there.

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-02-05.html

ENVIRONMENT NEWS SERVICE AMERISCAN: JANUARY 2, 2002

$340 Million Pledged to Clean Up Landfill

Urban Air Pollution Linked to Birth Defects

New York Spending Millions On Clean Fueled Buses

Lioness Killed at Boston Zoo

Wisconsin Drops Mandatory Crop Buffers Proposal

Roadless Areas Host Fish, Old Growth Forests

Colorado, Coors Settle Beer Spill Case

For full text and graphics visit:

http://ens-news.com/ens/jan2002/2002L-01-02-09.html

1/3/02
1:09:12 PM

Truth Is Stranger Than Fact

Madam, I'm 2002 a Numerically Beautiful Year

by ALFRED S. POSAMENTIER

Now, in the year 2002, we are the last generation for more than the next thousand years to experience two palindromic years in a lifetime. Palindromes in mathematics are numbers that read the same in both directions, like 2002 and 1991. In the English language there are very well-known palindromic words, like "rotator" and "reviver," and there are also sentences that are palindromic, like "Madam, I'm Adam."

Palindromic numbers are not only pleasing in appearance, but also harbor some nice, curious qualities. For example, take any number, write it in reverse order and add the two numbers. The sum will likely be a palindromic number, and if not, then simply continuing this process by adding the sum to its reverse should eventually lead to a palindromic number. This surprising result is the kind of discovery that can pique interest in numbers even in students indifferent to math.

Teachers should be able to capitalize on the beauty in mathematics, and specifically the charm of some numbers to hook students on studying mathematics. But qualified math teachers who might actually inspire children are in short supply, and math teaching in today's schools is often dry and boring. The problem is not new. Math instruction at the elementary school level, when students form their first impressions about the nature of math and their own abilities with numbers, has historically been mediocre. Without a strong beginning, a student's chances for sustaining interest in this field are very small indeed. The problem is compounded by relatively weak teaching at the secondary level as well.

A number of quick-fix programs to increase the supply of secondary school math teachers have been put in place around the country through the process of alternative certification. Participants in one such program in New York City function reasonably well, but many also lack the ability to bring to their classes a depth of understanding of math that allows a teacher to do more than merely conform to the prescribed instructional plan. A marginally competent teacher may not necessarily be skilled enough to promote interest in or appreciation for math among students.

At a time when there is a national shortage of math teachers, made worse by a low supply of math-prepared students, we must look beyond the quick-fix solutions. We must develop better and more creative training programs for elementary math teachers. We need to give them more classroom time on this subject. And when students begin to pursue the study of math, we must make the teaching profession more attractive, financially as well as by giving teachers more control of how they teach.

The point is to make math intrinsically interesting to children. We should not have to sell mathematics by pointing to its usefulness in other subject areas, which, of course, is real. Love for math will not come about by trying to convince a child that it happens to be a handy tool for life; it grows when a good teacher can draw out a child's curiosity about how numbers and mathematical principles work. The very high percentage of adults who are unashamed to say that they are bad with math is a good indication of how maligned the subject is and how very little we were taught in school about the enchantment of numbers.

Alfred S. Posamentier is professor of mathematics education and dean of the School of Education at City College of the City University of New York.

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/02/opinion/02POSA.html?todaysheadlines

1/3/02
1:02:30 PM

The Greatest Betrayal

by Dr. William Pierce

Let's begin today by tying up a few loose ends from previous broadcasts. Last week, in commenting on the December 12 arrests of the head of the Jewish Defense League and his second-in command in Los Angeles as they prepared to bomb a mosque and the office of a California congressmen of Lebanese ancestry, I predicted that unless you kept a very close eye on the news you probably wouldn't hear a peep from the Jewish media bosses about these arrests, that the Jews would attempt to protect their own, just as they have covered up for numerous terrorist acts by the Jewish Defense League in the past and also have covered up for a long history of criminal activity and gangland associations by the Jewish Anti-Defamation League.

Actually, there was more news coverage of this latest Jewish Defense League terrorism than I expected. The best coverage outside the Los Angeles area was in the Washington Times, which is not owned or controlled by Jews, but there also were two pretty good stories in the December 16 issue of the very Jewish New York Times. I hadn't yet seen those New York Times stories when I prepared last week's broadcast.

In my October 13 broadcast I quoted part of a cabinet meeting debate between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Israeli Foreign Minister Simon Perez that supposedly was broadcast on a Hebrew-language radio station in Jerusalem, Kol Yisrael, in which Sharon angrily told Perez to stop worrying about how Americans might respond to the actions of the Israeli government, because America is firmly under Jewish control.

A couple of listeners questioned me about that, saying that they were unable to find any source for the quote I used. Well, in my broadcast I mentioned that I hadn't been able to find Sharon's statement in print myself. What I meant was that I hadn't been able to find it in any English-language Jewish publication, which is what I normally require to establish the credibility of such a statement. I did see the statement in an English-language Palestinian publication, but I really shouldn't have relied solely on that. I should have gotten it straight from the horse's mouth.

I find the statement Sharon supposedly made easy enough to believe, because that's the sort of thing other Jews more cautious and less boastful than Sharon have said, but I should not have relied solely on a source hostile to Sharon and to the Jews generally. At this point I really don't know whether Sharon made the statement I quoted or not. I'll try to be more careful about my sources in the future.

Now let's talk about Attorney General John Ashcroft and his job as America's chief law-enforcement officer. Every time I see Ashcroft on television, he sends cold shivers down my spine. Look at that cold, Puritanical expression on his face. He's the type of man who believes he has a God-given right to read your mail, to listen to your private telephone conversations, and to torture a confession from you if he suspects that you have bad thoughts about the government. He is looking forward to the New World Order, where he expects that there will be an even greater degree of regimentation of citizens, and he really can crack down hard on anyone who gets out of line. Ashcroft's main regret is that he did not live in the Soviet Union 75 years ago, where he could have converted to Judaism, become commissar for the Cheka, and organized mass shootings of dissidents in the cellars of the secret police.

I don't know what sort of sexual abuse Ashcroft was subjected to as a child that made him what he is, but I believe that it is his chekist personality that makes him such a worshipful admirer of Israel and the Israelis. He really respects a country that permits its police to torture prisoners, that practices collective punishment of the families of children who throw rocks at soldiers and of villages that are suspected of harboring resistance fighters, and that has a genocidal mass murderer as its prime minister.

Ashcroft is an ardent supporter of George Bush's policy of collective punishment, a policy apparently inspired by Israel. If the Israelis suspect that a Palestinian resistance fighter has been hiding in a village, they send in tanks and bulldozers to level the village. If George Bush believes that an alleged terrorist is hiding in a country, he sends in cruise missiles and B-52s to bomb the country back into the Stone Age. That policy doesn't apply to Israel, of course. If it did, our Middle Eastern problem would have been solved a long time ago.

Unfortunately, that problem still is very much with us. One aspect of the problem recently came to light after the September 11 attack, when the FBI began rounding up and interrogating illegal aliens who came here from Middle Eastern countries, including Israel. What the FBI uncovered is the largest espionage ring ever to operate in America.

Actually, the investigation of Israeli spying began before September 11, and many Jewish spies already had been identified. According to a Fox News report two weeks ago, as many as 140 Jewish spies already had been arrested before September 11, but there had been very little publicity about these arrests. The Bush government and most of the media were hoping no one would notice. The post-September 11 roundup of Middle Easterners uncovered another 60 or so Israelis engaged in espionage inside the United States and brought the previously secret investigation of Israeli espionage into the open -- or at least, more nearly into the open than before. The lemmings still are so busy watching their ball games that they haven't noticed.

Several very disturbing revelations have come out of this roundup. One is a very strong hint that the Jews here, through their spying on other Middle Easterners in the United States, had gained prior knowledge of the September 11 attack but did not share their information with the U.S. government. I reported my own suspicions in this regard immediately after the attack, but since then Fox News has reported even stronger suspicions among FBI investigators. A Fox News report of December 12, by reporter Carl Cameron, says, and I quote: "There is no indication the Israelis were involved in the September 11 attacks, but investigators suspect that they may have gathered intelligence about the attacks in advance and not shared it." -- end of quote --

Well, of course, we expect that sort of behavior on the part of the Jews. Once they had gathered their own information about the impending attack, which they anticipated with glee because it could only generate hostility between the United States and Israel's enemies in the Middle East, they saw no reason to warn Americans and thereby forestall the attack. So they waited quietly for the attack and then as soon as it happened began urging that the United States wage war against Israel's enemies.

This is the sort of thing that both the Israelis and the Israel-worshipping Bush government would like to keep quiet, and the FBI is being very tight-lipped about it now, but I will not be surprised to see the beans spilled about the Jewish foreknowledge of the attack as the investigation proceeds. The reason I say that is that the roundup of Jewish spies has revealed many other things about Israeli activities that are damaging to Americans, and it will be very difficult for the government and the media to keep everything covered up.

Here's an example: As the government has become increasingly intrusive, snooping into every aspect of our lives, the need for telephonic wiretaps and other forms of electronic surveillance has risen dramatically. You might be surprised to learn that the government doesn't do most of the electronic snooping itself; the work has become quite high-tech these days and is farmed out to private companies that specialize in electronic eavesdropping and in the storage and analysis of intercepted data. There are a number of companies, in the United States and elsewhere, that have the equipment and the expertise to do this very sophisticated work. Guess which companies our government uses to spy on us: the two companies that do nearly all of this work for the Federal government are both located in Israel.

Did you get that? The politicians who run our government decided that the country that gave us Jonathan Pollard and the murderous assault on the USS Liberty, the country run by the most notorious war criminal now on the loose, the country that is the world capital of the White slave trade and that holds a monopoly on the distribution of several illegal drugs in the United States, is the country we should trust to help us catch our criminals and spies and keep an eye on the private business of our citizens. Really! Most state and local police agencies also depend on the same two Israeli companies.

I'll quote again directly from a Fox News report by Carl Cameron, this one dated December 13: -- quote -- "Here's how the system works. Most directory assistance calls and virtually all call records and billing in the U.S. are done for the phone companies by Amdocs, Ltd., an Israeli-based private telecommunications company. Amdocs has contracts with the 25 biggest phone companies in America, and more worldwide. The White House and other secure government phones are protected, but it is virtually impossible to make a call on normal phones without generating an Amdocs record of it. In recent years the FBI and other government agencies have investigated Amdocs more than once. The firm has repeatedly and adamantly denied any security breaches or wrongdoing. But sources tell Fox News that in 1999 the super-secret National Security Agency, headquartered in northern Maryland, issued what's called a Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmentalized Information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United States were getting into foreign hands -- in Israel, in particular." -- end of quote --

Indeed, there has been more than one warning about the misuse of confidential communications. Law enforcement officials have reported that they are certain that their own communications have been intercepted by criminals they were investigating. They believe that the interception of their communications has led to the murder of several of their confidential informants and otherwise has hampered their investigations of illegal drug distribution by crime syndicates. And I should mention that the fastest-growing illegal drug syndicate in the United States during the past decade is the syndicate that distributes the drug known as "Ecstasy." This syndicate is entirely Jewish, and most of the Jews in the illegal distribution of "Ecstasy" in the United States are Israeli nationals. No wonder that business has been good for them!

Well, Jewish organized crime got a big boost in 1994, during the Clinton administration, with the passage of a new law, the so-called "Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act," or CALEA for short. What the public was told about CALEA is that it would increase public safety by providing new tools for the cops to go after the bad guys. It would centralize and expedite the business of wiretapping, making it easier for law enforcement to eavesdrop on communications between criminals -- well, to tell the truth, easier to eavesdrop on everybody. The key to CALEA was its centralizing of wiretap operations, so that now any law-enforcement official in the country who needs a wiretap knows where to go. He goes to a private company that specializes in providing wiretapping services and equipment. Now I will quote again from a Fox News report. This one was broadcast last week. I quote:

"The company is Comverse Infosys, a subsidiary of an Israeli-run private telecommunications firm, with offices throughout the U.S. It provides wiretapping equipment for law enforcement. Here's how wiretapping works in the U.S.

"Every time you make a call it passes through the nation's elaborate network of switchers and routers run by the phone companies. Custom computers and software, made by companies like Comverse, are tied into that network to intercept, record, and store the wiretapped calls and at the same time transmit them to investigators.

"The manufacturers have continuing access to the computers so they can service them and keep them free of glitches. This process was authorized by the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA. Senior government officials have now told Fox News that while CALEA made wiretapping easier, it has led to a system that is seriously vulnerable to compromise and may have undermined the whole wiretapping system. . . . [T]he complaint about this system is that the wiretap computer programs made by Comverse have, in effect, a back door through which wiretaps themselves can be intercepted by unauthorized parties.

"Adding to the suspicions is the fact that in Israel Comverse works closely with the Israeli government and under special programs gets reimbursed for up to 50 per cent of its research and development costs by the Israeli Ministry of Industry and Trade. But investigators within the DEA, INS, and FBI have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying through Comverse is considered career suicide." -- end of quote --

Now I'll repeat just the last sentence of that quote from the December 17 Fox News report: "Investigators within the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying through Comverse is considered career suicide." Did you get that? And the Fox News report goes on to say that every FBI inquiry into Comverse has been halted before the actual equipment could be tested for leaks.

And that's not all that's been halted. This series of Fox News reports by reporter Carl Cameron from which I have quoted was available on the Internet from the Fox News Web site through the early part of last week. The report I just quoted, which was the third in what was intended to be a four-part series, was posted on December 17. But as you can imagine our "chosen" minority did not like the series. A December 20 story from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency says, and I quote, "Jewish organizations have been receiving frantic calls from Jews concerned that the reports may fuel anti-Semitism."

Did you get that? The Fox News reports were making Jews "frantic." The Jewish Telegraphic Agency story also says, and again I quote: "American Jewish leaders and Israeli officials said they are holding conversations with Fox News representatives but refused to elaborate." -- end quote -- Well, that JTA story was from December 20, and apparently the "conversations" between Jewish leaders and Fox News were effective, because within 24 hours the Fox News series on Israeli spying was cancelled, and the three installments that already had been broadcast were yanked from the Internet and dropped into the memory hole as if they never had existed. You'll look for them in vain at the Fox News site now. The only places you'll find them are on sites that copied them from the Fox News sites before Fox News was pressured into pulling them.

To me the most interesting information in this Fox News series really is old news to a lot of people in the government and the media. The FBI and other government agencies knew what these Jewish companies, Amdocs and Comverse Infosys, were doing a long time ago. They knew that Israeli organized crime was getting information about U.S. government, business, and private telephone conversations and also about U.S. law enforcement wiretaps and was using this information for criminal purposes to the detriment of Americans. They also knew that they were supposed to pretend that they didn't know, or else: career suicide.

The only Politically Correct position for the bureaucrats and politicians and media people to take is that Jews are just like us, except for a different religion, and that Israelis are just like Americans, with the same values and interests we have. Israel is our brave, friendly, little democratic ally. To suggest that the Jews not only are fundamentally and irremediably different from us but that they have been, since Old Testament times, in a state of undeclared war with the rest of the world, a war waged primarily through deception and betrayal and behind-the-scenes influence, and that Israel is no ally but is a vampire clinging to America's back and sucking our blood while betraying us at every turn -- to suggest this basic truth simply is unthinkable to this career-oriented crowd. So the politicians and bureaucrats looked on the Israeli access to our telephone information and the misuse of this information as merely a detail, an aberration, not to be mentioned lest it damage U.S.-Israeli relations -- and their careers, whereas to me it is one more confirmation of a basic and cosmically important truth.

Actually, the Jews reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency as screaming frantically about the series of Fox News reports weren't worried primarily about the revelations as to what Amdocs and Comverse Infosys have been up to. That's something too complicated for the lemmings to understand anyway. What worried the Jews about the Fox News reports was the suggestion that the Israelis knew in advance about the September 11 attack and didn't tell us. That's a betrayal that even the lemmings can understand. That's a betrayal that even the politicians and bureaucrats who take the position I just outlined -- namely, that Jews are just like us and Israel is our ally -- can use as an excuse to change their position. That's what the Jews really are afraid of.

I'll quote one more paragraph from the December 17 Fox News report about the Israeli penetration of our wiretap system. I quote: "And what troubles investigators most, particularly in New York, in the counter-terrorism investigation of the World Trade Center attack, is that on a number of cases, suspects that they had sought to wiretap and survey immediately changed their telecommunications processes. They started acting much differently as soon as those supposedly secret wiretaps went into place." -- end of quote --

It's information of this sort, hinting that the Israelis not only knew about the September 11 attack in advance but now are doing everything they can to hinder the American investigation into the attack, that the Jews don't want the American people to have. They don't want the American people to know that they have been betrayed by Israel. That is why the Fox News series was cancelled last week and the parts that already had been published were pulled from public access and tossed down the memory hole.

Well, regardless of what eventually comes out about what the Israelis knew before September 11, it is clear that Israel has been engaged in an ongoing betrayal of America. What is an even greater betrayal of America than that, however, is what Attorney General John Ashcroft and George Bush and the rest of the politicians and bureaucrats in Washington have been engaged in throughout their careers. ___

The text above is based on a broadcast of the American Dissident Voices radio program sponsored by National Vanguard Books. It is distributed by e-mail each Saturday to subscribers of ADVlist.

For more information about National Vanguard Books or the National Alliance see our web site at:

http://www.natvan.com or http://www.natall.com

To contact us, write to: National Vanguard Books Attention:

ADVlist P.O. Box 330 Hillsboro, WV 24946

email: MaulTo:national@NatVan.com

Source: http://www.rense.com/general18/bet.htm

1/3/02
12:01:31 PM

Global Citizen: Stealing the Sun

by Elizabeth Sawin

The energy of the sun, captured by plants and passed on to animals, makes everything possible -- dolphins arcing out of the ocean, geese moving across the sky, and also people, stirring their morning oatmeal, falling in love, or painting a barn.

In this truth lies beautiful poetry -- the realization that in our children's laughter we can hear sunlight laugh with joy. There are days when that simple thought can make the whole world feel like a cathedral to me.

In this truth also lies an unbendable rule -- there is only so much energy to work with on the Earth, and all the interconnected, complicated, essential parts of the living system cannot survive without a share of it. A healthy culture would hold this realization at its core.

A culture like that would be stunned to learn what is now true -- humans co-opt 32 percent of the total solar energy captured by land plants. That's according to a study in the December 21 issue of Science magazine. Ecologists know this because they can measure the plant biomass created each year, something called the Net Primary Production or the NPP. They can estimate how much of it is diverted away from the rest of life by human activities.

We use some of the NPP directly. We eat it, we wear it, we build our homes from it. But this accounts for only a small fraction of our total share. We also influence the productivity of land. Land covered with roads or cities can't contribute to the NPP. Plantation forests and monoculture crops are much less efficient at funneling solar energy into the biosphere than the forests and prairies they replace.

There is plenty of uncertainty in all of this. The human share of the NPP could be as low as 10 percent or as high as 55 percent. No one knows how small a share the rest of nature can get by on. Are we taking so much of the Earth's productivity that we risk damaging something we depend upon for survival? We cannot know that answer. No animal species in the history of life has taken such a large share of the photosynthetic pie, so there is no history to help judge how far we are from crisis.

The most sophisticated global ecologist cannot tell you how dangerous our appropriation of so much of the NPP is, but you don't have to be able to write a treatise on satellite imaging or statistical analysis to understand the prudence of sharing whatever we can with the life-forms who keep the world in working order.

Only a species with incredible creativity and drive could have claimed so much of life's energy stream for it's own. The challenge now is to redirect our talents to the work of learning to live on a smaller fraction of the Earth's productivity. Here and there, people are experimenting with this, starting with the conviction that humans can mimic and join into the natural processes that have been developed over billions of years of evolution. People like Wes Jackson and his colleagues at the Land Institute are learning how to partner with a prairie ecosystem to grow grain and also build the soil. Others, like John Todd assemble "Living Machines," mini-ecosystems that purify water and recycle nutrients.

Their prototypes are fascinating and will fill you with hope. But what they offer most of all is a question. What might happen if the best minds of a generation adopted this approach and began searching for ways to form partnerships with nature? What might we discover if even a fraction of the time and energy invested in developing technology for extracting from nature were invested in understanding how to work in concert with natural systems?

On the hill above my house a tree sapling grows on practically bare rock. It came to grow there, I think, because for years moss and lichens grew in that spot, meeting their own needs while creating out of rock, rain, and sunlight enough soil for a tree to sprout. There is some more poetry for you -- a life lived in a way that makes soil from rock. This is a kind of magic we can not accomplish on our own. But, by learning from and partnering with natural systems we could begin to share in that magic; we could learn how to meet our needs without degrading the natural riches all around us.

We are used to the idea that livers and gallbladders, and alfalfa and oaks function in ways that contribute to larger living systems. But most of us who have grown up in industrial cultures don't consider it our purpose to serve the life of the planet in some similar way. It is hard to find parts of the biosphere made richer by human activities.

Jackson's prairie agriculture and Todd's living machines prove that we could, at the very least, do less harm. Their work hints that we might even find a role in restoring land and water and building up natural capital.

The report on the NPP makes clear the need for this new approach, but in the end I think it will the poetry of it that brings us around.

Elizabeth Sawin writes a regular column on global systems for the Sustainability Institute of Hartland, Vermont.

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12153

1/3/02
11:53:46 AM

Bush's Enron Ties

by Edward B. Winslow

Almost 30 years have elapsed since the "third rate burglary" of the Democratic National Committee headquarters on June 17, 1972 that opened the dam of the Watergate scandal. The press and members of Congress largely ignored the crime, as then President Richard M. Nixon kept the nation's focus on the war in Vietnam.

Similarly, with the press and Congress distracted by President George W. Bush's war in Afghanistan, they are ignoring another scandal. No third rate burglary, the Enron Corp. scandal involves millions of dollars in campaign contributions to Bush, U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm and other members of Congress. The cozy relationship between the Bush White House and Enron enabled Kenneth L. Lay, then Enron's CEO, to meet in secret with Vice President Richard Cheney to help mold the nation's energy policy. Bush's presidential campaign received $1.14 million from Enron.

Shortly after taking office, President Bush waged a battle against the imposition of federal price controls in California that allowed Enron to price-gouge consumers by extending the energy crisis in California, costing the state billions of dollars. Enron reported increased revenues of almost $70 billion from the previous year.

Bush also resisted attempts to crack down on Enron's utilization of its 2,830 offshore subsidiaries in countries with lax banking-regulation laws. The consumer-rights watchdog organization Public Citizen alleges that some of these offshore havens helped Enron defraud its stockholders.

Moreover, while Sen. Gramm was working the Congress to pass legislation favorable to Enron (and collecting nearly $260,000 in campaign contributions from the company), his wife Wendy Gramm first was chairperson of a regulatory committee overseeing Enron's business activities and later a paid member of that company's board of directors. Enron paid her between $915,000 and $1.85 million, according Public Citizen. Sen. Gramm has announced his decision not to seek reelection for another term in the senate.

Enron, whose stock price plummeted from almost $85 per share to $0.25 per share within one year, forced its employees to invest their retirement plans in the company stock while corporate executives were free to make out like bandits by selling their stock when it was near its peak before anyone caught wind of the company's impending collapse. Jeffrey K. Skilling, who resigned his position as Enron's chief executive in August, sold more than $30 million worth of his stock in the company this year. Lay, who was Skilling's predecessor, was able to unload about $23 million worth of his Enron stock.

Meanwhile, employees, who invested in Enron stock through their company's 401(k) plan, were prohibited in diversifying into other securities. They lost their shirts while 500 of the company's top executives divided up $55 million worth of bonuses. The remaining 20,000 employees were given severance packages of not more than $4,500 each.

Eventually, during the Watergate scandal, members of Congress began to take a closer look at what first appeared to be an event that was unrelated to the White House. Armed with much more evidence of a White House conflict of interest than Watergate, Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) has opened a Congressional investigation on the Enron matter. In a letter dated Dec. 4, 2001 to Vice President Cheney, Waxman expresses concern about the administration's secret meetings with Lay and the company's subsequent failure.

Waxman also mentions "the fact that senior Enron executives were enriching themselves at the same time that Enron was lavishing large campaign contributions on President Bush and the Republican Party and apparently influencing the administration's energy policies."

Public Citizen urged Congress to bring Sen. Gramm and Wendy Gramm along with Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill to give sworn testimony about what they know about possible accounting fraud and the use of offshore tax and bank regulation havens. The consumer-rights organization also called for President Bush, Vice President Cheney and political adviser Karl Rove to answer questions about whether discussions involving energy price controls, energy regulations or tax havens took place with Enron executives.

Specifically, what investigators need to determine is who knew what and when did they know it? As Waxman wrote in his letter to the vice president, "It is appropriate to ask whether Enron communicated to (Cheney) or others affiliated with (his) task force information about its precarious financial position. This is especially important since this information was apparently hidden from investors and the public...."

Edward B. Winslow

2239 Meade St.

Denver, CO 80211

303-964-0820

MailTo:edwardwinslow@attbi.com

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12155

1/3/02
11:45:37 AM

AlterNet Headlines

http://www.alternet.org

ARGENTINA'S CRISIS, IMF'S FINGERPRINTS

Mark Weisbrot, AlterNet

Argentina's economic meltdown might seem far away from American borders, but our greedy support of short-sighted IMF policies is largely to blame.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12152

HUTCHINSON: ALI WAS NOT THE GOVERNMENT'S "GREATEST"

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, AlterNet

The government's star treatment of Muhammad Ali today is in stark contrast to its abusive treatment of him during much of his professional career.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12149

NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS I'D LOVE TO HEAR

Arianna Huffington, AlterNet

John Ashcroft: "I will start every day by reading the Bill of Rights." Osama bin Laden: "I will spend 2002 burning in hell." Tom Ridge: "I will stop scaring the bejeezus out of everyone."

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12146

THE PATRIOTISM ENFORCERS

Nat Hentoff, Village Voice

Is requiring students to blindly recite the pledge of allegiance miseducating the young on freedom?

* In Human Rights USA: http://www.alternet.org/?IssueAreaID=22

INVITING FUTURE TERRORISM

Aaron G. Lehmer, AlterNet

Reports from Afghanistan indicate that rising civilian deaths there and U.S. policy stubbornness may be encouraging further terrorist attacks.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12154

BUSH'S ENRON TIES

Edward B. Winslow, AlterNet

The Enron Corp. scandal involves millions of dollars in campaign contributions to Bush, U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm and other members of Congress.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12155

HIGHTOWER: BASEBALL OWNER'S POVERTY PLEA

Bud Selig, baseball's commisioner and himself a team owner, has been wailing that his league is broke. Well, they're not exactly broke ... just greedy.

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12139

GLOBAL CITIZEN: STEALING THE SUN

Elizabeth Sawin, AlterNet

According to a new study, humans gobble up 32 percent of the total solar energy captured by land plants. How much more can we steal without upsetting the Earth's ecology?

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12153

1/2/02
9:36:56 PM

t r u t h o u t

Bush to Ignore Rule on Written Notices of Intelligence Actions

http://www.truthout.com/01.03A.Bush.Ignore.Rule.htm

DAVID S. BRODER | Bush's Stealthy Pursuit of a Partisan Agenda

http://www.truthout.com/01.03B.Partisan.Agenda.htm

Afghan Fighters Plan Raid to Capture Taliban's Omar

http://www.truthout.com/01.03C.Raid.Planned.htm

More Bodies Found at Trade Center

http://www.truthout.com/01.03D.WTC.Bodies.htm

Israel Renews Ceasefire Demand

http://www.truthout.com/01.03E.Israel.7.Days.htm

Enron Is a Cancer on the Presidency

http://www.truthout.com/01.03F.Enron.Cancer.htm

Bush Alone Normalizes China's Trade Status

http://www.truthout.com/01.03G.China.Trade.htm

1/2/02
9:34:59 PM

Planet Ark World Environment News

U.S. to review Calif electric transmission line - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13896/story.htm

EPA says Senate office anthrax cleanup going well - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13905/story.htm

RESEARCH ALERT - CSFB cuts waste disposal firm ratings - USA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13909/story.htm

Scientists create cloned pigs - UK http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13904/story.htm

Local residents express environmental concern over gold mine - PERU http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13903/story.htm

Lithuanian Ignalina N-plant 2001 output up - LITHUANIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13902/story.htm

Tough emission norms to cost Indian refiners $7 bln - INDIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13907/story.htm

RWE in Russia-Finland electric link talks - paper - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13898/story.htm

German utilities raise retail power prices - GERMANY http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13901/story.htm

France says 10 nukes shut, 2 restarted last week - FRANCE http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13899/story.htm

French power prices track Germany, 10 nukes shut - FRANCE http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13900/story.htm

Finnish nuclear power output edged up in 2001 - FINLAND http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13897/story.htm

Fortum sees Porvoo oil clean-up taking 4-5 days - FINLAND http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13908/story.htm

Australia orders Japanese whaler from Antarctic waters - AUSTRALIA http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13906/story.htm

1/2/02
9:33:35 PM

UTNE WEB WATCH

The Best of the Alternative Web

INEQUALITY AND UNCLE SAM: THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE AGENTINEAN CRISIS

by Andrew Reding, Pacific News Service

-- Argentina's economic crisis stems from social problems, like inequality and corruption, that have plagued the country and the rest of Latin America since their governments were founded.

THE ANNUAL P.U.-LITZER PRIZES: THE LOWEST OF LOW IN AMERICAN MEDIA

by Norman Solomon, WorkingforChange.com

-- The winners of the 10th annual P.U.-litzer Prizes were awarded in December for the "stinkiest media performances" of 2001.

HOW MUCUS BENEFITS HUMANITY

by Brad Evenson, National Post

-- Though much maligned, mucus is a delicate and complex compound that Canadian researchers believe may unlock the door to curing cystic fibrosis and Crohn's disease.

Links to the above articles: http://www.utne.com/webwatch

1/2/02
9:31:28 PM

Public Citizen

New Jersey Officials Barred From Learning Identities of Citizens Who Posted Criticisms on Web

Court Cites First Amendment Rights of Critics, Adopts Arguments Set Forth by Public Citizen, ACLU

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Issuing a ruling that strongly upholds the First Amendment rights of anonymous Internet speakers, a New Jersey judge has refused an attempt by Emerson, N.J., public officials to learn who criticized them on the Internet. The superior court judge also dismissed the officials' suit against the Emerson citizen who created the Internet bulletin board devoted to public affairs in Emerson on which the citizens anonymously aired their views.

Two Emerson council members, a council candidate and the head of the local Republican Party had sued 60 John and Jane Does as well as the site's creator, claiming defamation and harassment. The officials sought information from Internet service provider VantageNet that would identify those who posted the messages. The Bergen County superior court judge, however, quashed the subpoena. The decision was made in late December but was released to the public today.

Adopting arguments advanced in an amicus brief by attorneys for Public Citizen and the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey (ACLU-NJ), Judge Marc Russello ruled that the plaintiffs had not met the strict tests established by New Jersey courts for a subpoena to be served to obtain the identities of anonymous Internet speakers. The court faulted the plaintiffs for not providing sufficient notice of the subpoena on the bulletin board and for not providing a sufficient basis to show that each of the allegedly defamatory statements was speech that could be the basis for a lawsuit. Also agreeing with the groups, the court extended the benefit of its ruling to all of the anonymous speakers, regardless of whether they were represented by attorneys.

"This suit is a clear attempt to intimidate the townspeople so they stop making comments about their officials," said Paul Alan Levy, an attorney for Public Citizen, which got involved in the case because it has a history of defending First Amendment rights. "The judge's decision protects citizens' rights to participate in anonymous debate about their public officials, without fear of being dragged into court."

The court also ruled that no legal action could be brought against the Web master for theallegedly defamatory statements published on the bulletin board by the anonymous posters, because a federal statute, the Communications Decency Act, places responsibility for Internet speech squarely on the speakers themselves while protecting Web masters and Internet service providers from being sued for statements made by others using their facilities.

"Steven Moldow's site, which is devoted to topics relating to local government, represents a terrific gift to the community," Levy said. "If someone like Moldow has to face the prospect of ruinous litigation from any person who is criticized on the Web site, then very few citizens would ever set up such valuable sites."

Public Citizen attorneys also participated as amicus curiae in the precedent-setting case of Dendrite v. Doe, where the New Jersey Appellate Division became the first appellate court in the country to apply First Amendment principles when setting standards for the identification of anonymous Internet speakers. Public Citizen's attorneys have represented Internet speakers in cases in California, Connecticut, Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and elsewhere.

Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.

For more information, please visit http://www.citizen.org

1/2/02
9:29:31 PM

DAILY GRIST

<http://www.gristmagazine.com>

TURNING OVER A NEW LEIF

With a new, government-approved plan to become the world's first hydrogen-based society, Iceland is emerging as the protagonist of the clean energy revolution. The nation plans to end its dependence on fossil fuels (and hence on foreign energy sources) through the use of fuel cells, which combine hydrogen and oxygen to produce energy, yielding water as a harmless byproduct. With much of its power coming from hydroelectric and geothermal sources, Iceland already leads the world in renewable energy; now that same clean energy will be used to power fuel cells and create an entirely eco-friendly energy loop.

straight to the source: BBC News, Tim Hirsch, 24 Dec 2001 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1727000/1727312.stm>

BUSINESS AS USUAL

The U.S. government will no longer consider a business's environmental track record when awarding federal contracts, following the Bush administration's decision to rescind 11th-hour Clinton-era "blacklisting" regulations. The regulations required a business to have a satisfactory record on ethical, environmental, tax, labor, antitrust, and consumer protection laws to win government contracts worth more than $100,000. Repeal of the regulations was a significant triumph for the private sector but a blow to environmental and labor organizations, which argue that the regulations are necessary to prevent the administration from doing business with companies that violate the government's own laws.

straight to the source: Wall Street Journal, Jeanne Cummings, 28 Dec 2001 (access ain't free) <http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB1009492984750029960.htm>

'TIS THE TREASON

It was a grim holiday season for Grigory Pasko, a Russian journalist who was sentenced on Dec. 25 to four years in prison on charges of high treason. A military reporter with an interest in environmental issues, Pasko documented the Russian Navy's practice of dumping old weapons and nuclear waste into the ocean. The treason charges stem from allegations that Pasko shared classified information about the Navy with colleagues in Japan. Russian civil liberties advocates say Pasko's case is an example of widespread state suppression of journalistic freedoms; the U.S. State Department has asked Russia to release Pasko pending his appeal and make sure he is given a prompt and fair trial. A Russian prosecutor, meanwhile, is also appealing the case, saying the four-year prison term is too lenient.

straight to the source: New York Times, Michael Wines, 26 Dec 2001 <http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/26/international/europe/26RUSS.html>

MINORITY REPORT

Officials in charge of reviving the Florida Everglades have created an outreach program to encourage minority involvement in the region's decades-long, multi-billion dollar restoration plan. The $11 million outreach program accords with 2000 legislation that granted federal funding for Everglades restoration and called on the South Florida Water Management District and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to involve minorities in the process. Coordinators of the outreach program hope black, Latino, Native American, poor, and rural Floridians will recognize the benefits of restoration and be given a fair share of related government contracts.

straight to the source: St. Petersburg Times, Associated Press, 02 Jan 2002 <http://www.sptimes.com/2002/01/02/State/Minorities_sought_for.shtml>

1/2/02
8:31:17 PM

Missing Pieces To The Amazing 911 Mystery Puzzle

by Michael Shore A View From Jerusalem, Israel

There are so many amazing possibilities to the true story of what really happened and who is the real mastermind behind 911, that some sort of independent peoples' committee (like that which revealed the TWA 800 coverup - ed) should be set up to investigate all the facts and questions that have never been answered since the horrific attacks on 911. This peoples' committee could be made up of intelligent independent citizens who have no connection to anyone in the U.S.government. Here is a list of some of the questions that might be answered with such an inquiry.

1. Let's start with an easy one. It was reported that an unusually large amount of thousands of put stock options were purchased on United and American airlines just before 911. You make money on put options when the price of a stock goes down. There were also reports of unusual stock transactions in Europe related to 911. The CIA supposedly monitors these kinds of unusual stock transactions so that people who have insider information can possibly be identified and apprehended as potential participants in a case like 911. To date, the identity of the person or persons, who were involved in these option and stock transactions, have not been made public. It was also reported that a $2,500,000 profit from one of the option trades has not been claimed by the person who made that trade. The FBI can easily identify the person or persons involved in these stock trades because in order to make a stock trade, you have to open an account with a stockbroker and deposit money in your account before you trade.

It would seem easy enough for the FBI and CIA to go to the stockbrokers where these trades were made and find out who made them. This is probably the closest link that can be established to someone who was involved in 911 but neither the FBI nor CIA is, apparently, pursuing this. Why?

2. It was reported that none of the names of the so-called Arab terrorists were on any of the passenger lists of any of the four planes involved in 911. Plus, the FBI and CIA with all their multi-billion dollar budgets claimed that they had no prior information that a "terrorist" act of this magnitude was about to happen. Yet within 48 hours, the FBI and CIA somehow managed to produce the pictures and names of 19 Arabs who were supposedly the "terrorists" on the planes, even though none of their names were on ANY of the passenger lists. How did they know? Just because you had an Arab name, they were able to determine that you were a "terrorist" on the planes? Plus, you may recall, when the names of the "terrorists" were first released to the press, there were reports in the media that some of the passports which the "terrorists" were using may have been stolen and the real names of the "terrorists" may have been different than the names released to the media.

3. It was reported that a number of passengers were able to make cell phone calls from the planes that were supposedly hijacked. You'll see why I used the term "supposedly hijacked" in number 4. It was also reported by some sources that these reported cell calls never showed up on the cell phone company billings. Why are hijackers letting anyone on the planes make cell phone calls to people on the ground? Can you remember any other hijacked airplane incident where people were making cell phone calls? Can you easily make cell phone calls from a plane that is 35,000 feet high and hundreds of miles away from your cell phone provider?

It was reported that the black boxes from the planes, which record conversations between the pilot and ground control, were all either destroyed or the conversations on recovered blackboxes could not be released for some rediculous reason. Number one, black boxes are built to survive the worst fiery plane crashes. By not releasing the black box communications and data, we cannot know what is really happening in the cockpit or on the aircraft and who is flying those planes. Additionally, there had to be some communication between the pilots and someone in the control towers. Yet no air traffic controller was interviewed to talk about their conversations with the pilots during the course of the "hijackings."

So, the only communication we are told about is some supposed cell phone conversations of a few passengers and a flight attendant on the planes. The only cockpit sounds that are released to the public are a few seconds of what we are told is a scuffle between passengers and hijackers in the cockpit of flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania. It is extremely important that any blackbox communication between the pilots and ground control be heard, if it still exists. This is probably the most important available part of the mystery in the puzzle. (To date, FBI Director Mueller refuses to release black box recordings saying they might impede the investigation and that they are too horrible for people to hear, especially familiy members. -ed)

4. It was reported there is a new technology that currently exists called onboard the UAV 'Global Hawk' platform. This technology was referred to by President Bush immediately following the 911 tragedy. Bush said that in the future, we must strengthen the cockpit doors and further the development of a new technology whereby a pilot on the ground can take over the controls of a hijacked aircraft and fly the plane, and land the plane, at a designated airport. Bush was referring to this technology being developed sometime in the future when he knew that this technology has been under development for many years and exists now!

In April 2001, a pilotless plane flew from the US to Australia and back to the U.S. Boeing has under development a pilotless fighter plane, whose final test was set for December 2001. With these new planes, you won't have to have live fighter pilots risking their lives in war. Plus it will save huge amounts of money training fighter pilots, which currently costs two to three million dollars each pilot. So what does all this mean?

It means that the "Global Hawk" pilotless plane technology that Bush talked about already exists and could have been used in the 911 events. Guess how many planes one trained pilot can fly sitting in front of his computer screens? Four. How many planes were involved in 911? Four. And according to a conference of professional commercial airline pilots, the supposed Arab "hijackers" could not have flown those planes at all, or as well as they were flown, if they only attended the flight schools that were reported in the news.

So, let's look at how all the above could might into play. None of the supposed Arab "terrorist" names were on any of the passenger flight lists and the U.S. government, within 48 hours, shows us pictures of 19 Arab "terrorists" - even though the FBI and CIA said they had no prior information that the 911 event could happen. You really don't need any live pilots in the cockpit to fly any of the four planes. They could all be flown by one very well-trained pilot using Global Hawk technology from somewhere on the ground.

Therefore, the 19 Arab "hijackers" didn't even need to board the planes. You didn't even need "hijackers." All you need is 'Global Hawk' technology to take over control of the aircraft from the ground. By the US government refusing to release any of the pilot-to-ground control communication from the (allegedly destroyed) blackboxes in the aircraft, the US government blacks out any conversation from the "hijacked" airline pilots possibly telling the control tower that the flight controls of their planes had been taken over.

You might ask, what happened to the fourth plane, Flight 93? According to one theory, Global Hawk technology malfunctioned on Flight 93. Somehow the pilots onboard were able to regain control of their aircraft. If Flight 93 lands safely on the ground, the secret of what was really happening on all four planes would be revealed. A back-up plan had to be implemented.

Flight 93 was then supposedly shot down by a US military jets. There are verifiable facts to substantiate this possibility. There were a number of eye witnesses who claimed to have seen flight 93 explode before it fell to the ground. These eye witnesses also saw a military jet in the sky near the crash site. Plus, there were reports of a small white private plane circling the crash site immediately after the crash - even though all private aircraft were supposed to be grounded at the time. Aircraft debris from flight 93 was strewn over an area six to eight miles from the crash site, which would be impossible,if as the government said that some passengers fought with the hijackers and intentionally crashed the plane to prevent the plane from hitting another terrorist target.Explaining how metal parts and other debris flew through the air and landed six to eight miles from the crash site, without there being an explosion in the air before the plane crashed to the ground, would be very hard for the government to do..Plus if the passengers did overtake the hijackers,why would they want to crash the plane? Couldn't the real flight 93 pilots fly the plane and land it safely?

Now comes the hero story from the government. This story is used to supply all the answers to all the questions about what happened on Flight 93 and to avoid any further inquiry by a gullible American public that accepts most anything their government officials say is truth. As George Bush, Sr. was quoted as saying: "Don't confuse people with the truth."

5. No US military planes were sent up to intercept any of the hijacked planes even though there were at least 30 minutes to one hour from the time it was known that the planes were hijacked. Much has been written about this by the alternatve free press on the internet. It is standard procedure for military planes to be sent up if a plane is off course and the plane is not or cannot communicate with ground control. This is just normal safety protocol because if a plane starts flying in a different flight pattern, it could crash into another plane in the sky. The big question is who gave the order to not "scramble" US military jets under these emergency and highly-dangerous conditions? If you think Bin Laden could have done this sitting in some cave in Afghanistan - think again. The only people who could have pulled this one off are high-ranking government officials who were part of the plan of the real "Mastermind" behind the attacks.

6} So why wage a war in Afghanistan as a result of 911, costing billions of dollars? Oil, oil, oil. Unocal, a huge American oil conglomerate, along with other connected individuals, wanted to take control of six trillion dollars of oil (that's trillion, not billion) in the Caspian Sea...right near Afghanistan. Need you be reminded that the Bush's and Vice President Cheny just happen to be wealthy oil men and Cheney's Haliburton Corporation will probably be building the multi-billion dollar oil pipeline across Afghanistan that will be needed to bring much of that oil to market. It is important to be aware that the new leader of Afghanistan used to work for Unocal. Isn't that convenient?

Another important major benefactor of the war on terrorists is the war industrialists. George Bush, Jr's father happens to be the main player in the fifth largest war corporation in the World: the Carlyle Corporation. Isn't this kind of father/son relationship called nepotism? Meaning, in government language,your father or relatives benefit financially from your governmental decisions. Just a side note: up until October 2001, the Bin Laden family were major investors in the Carlyle Corpration but were forced to sell out because of the controversy their relationship generated. The Bin Ladens and the Bush's have been doing business together for many years. How interesting.

The American people along with the Europeans have been told that the war on terrorism is going to be a long war. What a shame George Jr's father's corporation doesn't make peace products. Then his father would have an incentive to make money from having Peace in the World instead of war.

Another important reason for the war in Afghanistan was to get control of the opium poppies used to make most of the heroin in the World. You would think that President Bush with the 'war on drugs' would work to stop the manufacture of heroin in Afghanistan now that the U.S. has taken over control of the country. But insteadm it has been reported that the new ruling Nothern Alliance is expanding substantially the gowing of opium poppies and the manufacture of heroin in Afghanistan. Could it be that the Bushes,Cheney and the CIA really are involved, as long-rumoured, in heavy-duty drug trafficking all over the World?

7. Probably one of the biggest giveaways that Bin Laden is not the main "Mastermind" behind 911 is the fact that since 911, there have been NO additional "terrorist" acts perpetrated against, or in, the US or Europe. Not one bullet has been fired, not one bomb exploded by a Bin Laden "terrorist" in the US or Europe.

Here you have the supposed "master terrorist", Bin Laden, who supposedly committed the biggest terrorist act ever on U.S. soil and yet he has not been able to commit even a small terrorist act against his "enemy" the US since 911. Afghanistan is being bombed to smithereens and thousands of innocent defenseless Afghani men ,women and children have been killed by American forces -- shame, shame, shame. Bin Laden's Al Queda forces are being killed and destroyed and the "enemy terrorist" is not fighting back?? We are told by the U.S. government that Bin Laden has thousands of "sleeper operatives" just waiting in the wings to commit terrorist acts in the U.S. and Europe. We are shown videotapes of bin Laden that US officials say could contain hidden code words from Bin Laden that will send these "sleeper terrorists" on a killing spree in the US and Europe. But absolutely nothing is happening from the Bin Laden "terrorists" that are supposedly in the U.S. and Europe.

Not only this. The so-called "mastermind terrorist", Bin Laden, that President Bush sent a huge military force to capture or kill, has amazingly disappeared. It has cost the American taxpayers billions of dollars and now Pentagon officials have said they may never be able to find Bin Laden. What gives? If you really wanted to get Bin Laden, wouldn't it have been easier and cheaper to have offered a one billion dollar reward for him and his cronies and not send any military force to Afghanistan which has killed thousands of innocent Afghani civilians, along with Taliban and American military personnel? (It is reported the US had plans to invade Afghanistan and oust the Taliban months before 911...remember the oil in the Caspian and the big pipeline project?)

Hello Americans, wake-up and stop the flag-waving already. Get yourselves a new President, Vice President, Attorney General, Secretary of State and Defense, and new leaders of the FBI and CIA. Get some people who can do a better job PROTECTING you and NOT REMOVING your civil rights and freedom. Get someone who can find Bin Laden and someone who can find the anthrax killers. Get a President who will find better ways to keep you out of wars and who works to make peace in the World - and who does not have a father who is making money from a war corporation that makes money from the wars that his son precipitates. Get a President and government officials who are honest and wouldn't start a war in Afghanistan and kill thousands of innocent Afghani civilians in order to pipe out some of the six trillion dollars of oil in the Caspian Sea, and who would gain control of the heroin/opium producing drug market in Afghanistan. Americans, please wake up now before it really is too late.

Since so much is being written on the internet about what could be the true story of the 911 tragedy and it's aftermath, it would be really great if someone organized and put together and publicized the 911 People's Investigating Committee described at the beginning of this article, with all the financing and lawyers it would take in order to do a proper and fair investigation, so that the truth can come to light and justice can be done. Maybe a case can be made and tried in a court of law and the real 911 "Mastermind" and all his accomplices can be brought to justice.

Source: http://www.rense.com/general18/myss.htm

1/2/02
8:13:07 PM

It's Time For A New Bottom Line: A Spiritual Dimension

People yearn for a connection to others, not just material wealth

By Jonathan Freedland

Giving up smoking? Wimp. Vowing to shed the pounds? Loser. More regular trips to the gym? Skipping dessert? You're a big girl's blouse. Changing the world? That's different. That's a serious new year's resolution.

The man making it is Michael Lerner, erstwhile spiritual guru to Hillary Clinton, editor of Tikkun magazine and coiner of one of the buzz-phrases of 1990s America: the politics of meaning. Later this month he will found a new movement at a conference in New York, inaugurating his most ambitious project yet: the Tikkun Community, a worldwide fraternity dedicated to nothing less than the transformation of modern life.

Sure, his nerdy spectacles and bird's-nest haircut make Rabbi Lerner easy to dismiss. And yes, his Tikkun.org website strays dangerously close to flaky psychobabble. And yes, he is based in San Francisco. Yet Lerner - with a track record in the movements for US civil rights and against the Vietnam war, as well as a clutch of death threats against him for his peacenik stance on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict - has become an unlikely hero of the American left. The cult may even be spreading here: when the IPPR thinktank played host to him recently, the large London venue was crammed - with an overflow crowd pressed up against the windows outside.

His message is, in his own words, "unashamedly utopian," aimed at the ancient, Jewish goal of tikkun olam -healing the world. That partly translates into the same wish-list sought by most progressives - peace, social justice, a clean environment - but with one key difference. His starting point is not anger with economic inequality or a raging desire to redistribute wealth (although that's a Tikkun aim). No, he begins in the realm where the left has for so long feared to tread: the spiritual.

What Lerner diagnoses as the 21st century world's great sickness is the triumph of the material over the spiritual. Materialism - the belief that the only things that exist are those we can verify with our senses - is, he says, the "dominant religion" of mankind. One can challenge it in one's own home or at the weekend, but in the public sphere, materialism rules.

The result is that we value only what we can measure or see. Maximising wealth and power are the sole goals of work -since more abstract (Lerner would say spiritual) notions of duty, service or creativity cannot be measured. What's worse, says Lerner, "We take those values home," regarding even our friends and family as means to an end. Note the way old people, who need friends the most, have the fewest, because they have less tangible rewards to give back. Note the commitment-phobes who shop around for a partner who can satisfy all their needs: governing their heart by the rules of the shopping mall.

Yet this creed of materialism, spreading across the planet via globalisation, is making us miserable. We all work too hard, complaining that we have no time for the things that really matter. If in doubt, read Jonathan Franzen's outstanding new novel, The Corrections, for a survey of the new American depression - the anomie and ennui that comes from placing prosperous consumption above simple human connection.

Once again, Lerner is straying out of traditional left terrain here, calling on psychotherapy as much as economics. And yet he is surely on to something -realising why politics has been losing out to the self-help manuals as the place people look for solutions. His message is a wake-up call for the left, telling them they have to address not just people's pay and the services they use, but their inner, emotional lives, too.

He has some more alarming news for progressives: the far right, he says, has already cottoned on to this spiritual deficit. Nationalists and fundamentalists of various hues have understood people's yearning for something larger, for connection with others, and they have sought to feed it - by telling people they are valuable, not as generators of income, but as members of a tribe. (Think of the imams who converted Richard Reid from a petty criminal into a would-be suicide bomber.)

The social-democratic left has offered no such compelling message. Tony Blair, like Bill Clinton before him, promises education that will equip kids to compete in the global economy - regarding children as mini-earners, not small people. The old left's demands for economic equality were incomplete, too, amounting to a plea for "an equal chance to get our snouts in the trough". Economic sustenance matters, of course, says Lerner; but it's not enough.

Instead, what's needed is a "new bottom line" - a way of seeing the world which refuses to accept the current, materialist premise. Corporations would no longer be judged by their profit and loss, but by their impact on the environment and the lives of the people they affect. They would have to submit to an "ethical impact report," and could be denied the right to trade if they failed to meet the terms of a social responsibility charter. Likewise, schools would be rated not just on exam results but on their success in turning out caring children, respectful of the people and space around them. The new bottom line would apply similar, enlightened standards to every institution in our lives, from supermarkets to hospitals and prisons.

It sounds like dreamer's pie, high in the sky. But Lerner is ready for that charge. "Feminists refused to be realistic - and they were right!" he says. They set out to change the world, too, with a list of demands dismissed at the time as utopian, flaky nonsense. Three decades later, nobody is laughing. The same goes for civil rights or gay rights.

But Lerner's confidence has deeper roots. He is an American Jew and both America's founding fathers and Judaism share an animating creed, as worth hearing in 2002 as it ever was: that humankind does not have to inherit the world - it can make the world anew.

MailTo:j.freedland@guardian.co.uk

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,626590,00.html

1/2/02
8:08:39 PM

Happy New You

Wishing you 12 months of happiness

52 weeks of fun

365 days of laughter

8,760 hours of good luck

525,600 minutes of Joy

31,536,000 seconds of success

HAPPY 2002 to you!

BON VOYAGE as you embark on another cosmic orbit around the sun

1/2/02
8:04:21 PM

t r u t h o u t

Stocks | Worst Year in Quarter Century

http://www.truthout.com/01.02A.Stocks.2001.htm

JAMES M. JEFFORDS | My Way, the High Way

http://www.truthout.com/01.02B.JJ.High.Way.htm

Monsanto Hid Decades Of Deadly Pollution

http://www.truthout.com/01.02C.Monsanto.Hid.htm

Winning With the Military Clinton Left Behind

http://www.truthout.com/01.02D.Clinton.Military.htm

Egyptian TV Tries Hebrew Experiment

http://www.truthout.com/01.02E.Egypt.TV.Hebrew.htm

Jewish School Near Paris Attacked

http://www.truthout.com/01.02F.Attack.Paris.htm

1/2/02
8:02:42 PM

THE STAR-TELEGRAM Austin, Texas

760,000-plus pot (hemp) plants destroy

By John Moritz

AUSTIN, Texas — Narcotics officers from the Texas Department of Public Safety, with help from the Air National Guard and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, destroyed more than 760,000 marijuana plants across the state in 2001, officials said.

The bulk of the plants were growing wild in the Panhandle, but tens of thousands of others had been carefully cultivated by growers bent on profiting through illegal sales of their crops, DPS spokeswoman Tela Mange said.

“We found some pretty sophisticated operations, including one that was being irrigated by an automatic pump, and it appeared that there was some genetic engineering going on with the plants,” said Mange, who spent three days in late summer in the field with drug agents.

The program led to the arrest of 160 people and the seizure of 77 firearms.

The marijuana eradication program has operated in Texas since 1987. In 2000, more than 415,700 marijuana plants were eradicated, 71 people were arrested and 53 weapons were seized.

The program, funded by a DEA grant, “has helped make Texas a safer place,” said Col. Thomas Davis Jr., director of the DPS. “This is a program that shows definite, immediate results. Many burglaries and other crimes are directly related to drugs and drug use.”

Mange said most of the wild marijuana plants were remnants of previous legal cultivation for hemp in wartime 1940s.

“Some of those wild plants grew to about 20 feet tall and were 2 inches in diameter,” Mange said. “We took them down with gasoline-powered weed eaters with steel rotary blades.”

State offices worked with local law enforcement agencies to locate both the wild plants and those cultivated for profit. Officers patrolled in National Guard helicopters and could easily spot the plants from the air, Mange said.

The marijuana that had been cultivated was held as evidence and slated for destruction after the legal process had run its course. The wild plants were left to decompose naturally.

“Those plants have a really low THC content,” Mange said, referring to tetrahydrocannabinol, the most potent mood-altering component in marijuana, “So it's unlikely that people are going to be smoking it and getting high.” (END)

NOTE: In America's "Drug War" 99.2% of all "marijuana" eradicated in the United States is actually low-THC non-psychoactive "hemp". Check out the unbelievable facts in Vermont's State Legislative study on the federal government's "Domestic Cannabis Eradication/Suppression Program" at:

http://www.state.vt.us/sao/pages/CAN_final.HTM

John Moritz, 512 476.4294

mailto:jmoritz@star-telegram.com

1/2/02
7:59:19 PM

Planet Ark World Environment News

Pollution linked with birth defects in U.S. study - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13879/story.htm

AEP buys Texas wind project from Enron Wind - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13867/story.htm

US wants Russia journalist released pending appeal - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13894/story.htm

Enron to sell two new wind power plants - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13869/story.htm

EVTC to acquire waste treatment company - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13890/story.htm

NRC mulls reissue of nuclear plant status report - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13871/story.htm

FEATURE - With or without celebrities, nightclubs shed fur - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13872/story.htm

Anthrax fumigation of U.S. Senate offices complete - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13874/story.htm

Bush yanks "blacklisting" for federal contractors - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13884/story.htm

Analysts see robust Canada hog shipments to U.S. - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13883/story.htm

U.S. orders $340 mln California Superfund cleanup - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13882/story.htm

White House energy plan far from being implemented - USA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13866/story.htm

UK Plc fails Blair's 2001 green challenge - report - UK

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13889/story.htm

UK police investigate nuclear 'guinea pig' claim - UK

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13895/story.htm

British green activist heads for U.S. trial - UK

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13880/story.htm

Russian prosecutor seeks tougher sentence for Pasko - RUSSIA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13878/story.htm

Peru sees 2002 fishing exports flat at $1 bln - PERU

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13892/story.htm

Israel Electric to sign natgas supply deal soon - ISRAEL

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13868/story.htm

Natural disasters kill 25,000 worldwide in 2001 - GERMANY

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13886/story.htm

Germany protests Russia's jailing of journalist - GERMANY

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13887/story.htm

FEATURE - Monkey brains off the menu in Central Africa - GABON

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13873/story.htm

FEATURE - Shy Ivory Coast elephants wreak rare havoc - IVORY COAST

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13877/story.htm

Greenpeace targets travellers in HK dolphin protest - CHINA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13876/story.htm

Canada scores against salt with new "pucks" - CANADA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13885/story.htm

Wild elephants kill two Bangladeshis, injure 10 - BANGLADESH

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13881/story.htm

Wildlife groups fear few survivors in Sydney fires - AUSTRALIA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13875/story.htm

(See financial appeal for the injured animals below)

Australia bushfires part of an ancient cycle - AUSTRALIA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13888/story.htm

Winds fan Australia bushfires, fireworks still on - AUSTRALIA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13891/story.htm

New Year brings more fire fears around Sydney - AUSTRALIA

http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/13893/story.htm

1/2/02
7:56:08 PM

Children and mobile phone use: Is there a health risk?

by Don Maisch

The paper, "Mobile Phone Use: its time to take precautions", published in the April 2001 issue of the Journal of the Australasian College of Nutritional & Environmental Medicine, examines what is currently known about the possible hazards of mobile phone use.

At first, this subject may not seem relevant to children's lives until it is realised that today the fastest growing group of mobile phone users are children and young people, This growth is actively encouraged by professional advertising campaigns from the mobile phone industry, extolling how indispensable the phones are to their life styles. Concerns about this were even voiced by the managing director of the Australian Telecommunications User Group (ATUG), Mr. Allan Horsley, who expressed concerns about mobile phone companies deliberately targeting youth."They have really gone out after the young people with prepay cards and coloured handsets," he said.

With this advertising blitz, produced by the same transnational public relations corporations that previously gave us such delightful cartoon characters as "Joe Camel" for the tobacco industry, no words of warning are heard. However, within the scientific community, there is a growing chorus of expert voices that are urging caution because if there are adverse health effects from mobile phone use, it will be the children who will be in the front line, and who may pay the highest price. For the sake of the future of our children's health we need to seriously heed these voices and limit children's unnecessary use of mobile phones.

The voices of reason:

1) In 1999, as a result of public concerns about possible health hazards from mobile phone technology, the UK Government formed the Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones (IEGMP) to examine possible effects of mobile phones and transmitter base stations. This group was headed by Sir William Stewart, the famous British biochemist and president of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. What made the Stewart Inquiry unique, was that it was made up almost entirely of biomedical specialists -- and so were able to focus many man-years of acquired specialist knowledge on the problem.

Their report, Mobile Phones and Health, was released in April 2000. In regards to the use of mobile phones by children the IEGMP stated:

"If there are currently unrecognized adverse health effects from the use of mobile phones, children may be more vulnerable because of their developing nervous system, the greater absorption of energy in the tissues of the head and a longer lifetime of exposure. In line with our precautionary approach, we believe that the widespread use of mobile phones by children for non-essential calls should be discouraged. We also recommend that the mobile phone industry should refrain from promoting the use of mobile phones by children."

Sir William said at a science conference at Glasgow University in September 2001 that mobile phone makers often presented their products in adverts as essential "back to school" items for children. Such adverts were irresponsible, said Sir William. He added: "They are irresponsible because children's skulls are not fully developed. They will be using mobile phones for longer, and their effects won't be known for some time to come. Mobile phone technology has been led by the physical sciences. My own view is we ought to be doing more work on the potential biological effects."

Sir William also said he would not allow his grandchildren to use mobile phones.

2) On December 8th 2000, the German Academy of Pediatrics issued a statement advising parents to restrict their children's use of mobile phones. They advised that all mobile phone users should keep conversations as brief as possible but that additional precautions are appropriate for children in view of "special health risks" associated with their growing bodies.

3) On July 31, 2001, Wolfram Koenig, the new head of the "Bundesamt fur Strahlenschutz, which is the federal authority for radiation protection in Germany, stated in an interview in the "Berlin Morenpost" that "Parents should take their children away from that technology [mobile phones]". Mr Koenig, also a member of Germany's Greens party, said that "Some people are very sensitive to radiation." and urged companies not to target children in their advertising campaigns.

4) At a recent Australian Senate Inquiry, CSIRO Telecommunications and Industrial Physics chief, Gerry Haddad warned that the new telecommunications exposure standards being drafted neglected to take a high enough level of protection, particularly in relation to children. Mr. Haddad said, "Restrict use of mobile phones to children for essential purposes".

5) Statement from Olle Johansson, Assoc. Professor, The Experimental Dermatology Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, 171 77 Stockholm Sweden. (September 10, 2001).

"...Already in 1996, I started to warn in public of the effects on microwave irradiation on children through their use of mobile telephones. The debate has also very much focussed on the responsibility regarding ads and products directly aimed for children, and here in Sweden great alarm has been raised around the propositions to even develop and sell cellphones for the ages up to 5 years."

6) Statement from Sianette Kwee, Professor, Department of Medical Biochemistry, University of Aarhus, Denmark. (September 10, 2001) Member of the Editorial Board of Bioelectrochemistry. Danish expert representative in the European Union's COST 281 project "Potential health effects from Emerging Wireless Communication systems", Basic Research group.

Fields of research: Bioelectrochemistry : electroporation -electrochemistry of biological systems, Bioelectromagnetics: biological effects of environmental electromagnetic fields (extremely low frequency /ELF and microwave /MW), on cell growth in human amnion cells.

"Our studies showed that there was a significant change in cell growth in these cells after being exposed to EMF fields from both power lines (ELF) and from mobile phones (MW). These biological effects were greatest in young and vigorously growing cells, but much less in old cells. These results tell us, that e.g. microwave fields from mobile phones can be expected to affect children to a much higher degree than adults."

7) Statement from Dr. Gerard Hyland, University of Warwick, Department of Physics, Coventry, England. Exerpt from his Report for the STOA Committee of the EU. (Specifically dealing with childre and mobile phone use)

The Increased Vulnerability of Pre-adolescent Children:

Pre-adolescent children can be expected to be (potentially) more at risk than are adults - as recognised in the recently published Report of the UK Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones - for the following reasons:

* Absorption of microwaves of the frequency used in mobile telephony is greatest in an object about the size of a child's head, the so-called head resonance whilst, in consequence of the thinner skull of a child, the penetration of the radiation into the brain is greater than in an adult. * The still developing nervous system and associated brain-wave activity in a child (and particularly one that is epileptic) are more vulnerable to aggression by the pulses of microwaves used in GSM than is the case with a mature adult. This is because the multi-frame repetition frequency of 8.34Hz and the 2Hz pulsing that characterises the signal from a phone equipped with discontinuous transmission (DTX), lie in the range of the alpha and delta brain wave activities, respectively. The fact that these two particular electrical activities are constantly changing in a child until the age of about 12 years when the delta-waves disappear and the alpha rhythm is finally stabilised means that they must both be anticipated to be particularly vulnerable to interference from the GSM pulsing. * The increased mitotic activity in the cells of developing children makes them more susceptible to genetic damage. * A child's immune system, whose efficiency is, in any case, degraded by radiation of the kind used in mobile telephony, is generally less robust than is that of an adult, so that the child less able to cope with any adverse health effect provoked by (chronic) exposure to such radiation.

What the Australian authorities say:

The Australian Communications Authority (ACA) has recently sent out to every school in the nation a pamphlet titled "Mobile phones . . your health and regulation of radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation". In relation to possible health effects, the ACA pamphlet states only that "The weight of national and international scientific opinion is that there is no substantiated evidence that using a mobile phone causes harmful health effects."

This pamphlet was not written by scientists or medical experts but public relations (PR) professionals employed to promote the technology. They have identified children and young people as a major growth area for taking up mobile phone use and view evidence of health hazards as a risk to profits that needs to be "managed". They call it "environmental crisis management". Unfortunately, the Australian Communications Authority, as a promoter of telecommunications technology, is closely allied with mobile phone industry and in fact uses the same PR firms. Interestingly most of the PR firms now working for telecommunications previously worked (or still do) for the tobacco industry and created what is now known as "Tobacco Science".

When the ACA pamphlet refers to "The weight of national and international scientific opinion" it is basically referring to the opinion and radio frequency exposure guidelines set by the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP). What is not said however, is that the ICNIRP guidelines are only based on high level-short term animal exposure studies, conducted to determine exposure limits set to avoid immediate hazards to health (such as heating of body tissue, called a thermal effect) from high level exposures.

Most importantly, ICNIRP does not examine the possibity of other non-thermal health effects arising from long term-low level radiofrequency/microwave exposure, such as from using a mobile phone for years. As such, it is scientifically irrelevant to the issue. From a PR viewpoint however, statements like "The weight of national and international scientific opinion" do sound impressive.

In 1995, Dr. Ross Adey, one of the world's most respected and senior research scientists commented on the "The weight of national and international scientific opinion"by stating:

"The laboratory evidence for non-thermal effects of both ELF [power frequency] and RF/microwave fields now constitutes a major body of scientific literature in peer-reviewed journals. It is my personal view that to continue to ignore this work in the course of standard setting is irresponsible to the point of being a public scandal."

In conclusion:

So what we have is an ideological battle between a few voices of reason, based on sound science, calling for a precautionary approach to safeguard our children's health, versus the might of the mobile phone industry and their supporters, based on maximising corporate profits. The outcome of this conflict may not be known for many years, until today's young mobile phone users are well into their adulthood. By then, if the warnings of health hazards prove to be true, irreversible damage to the health and wellbeing of many of these people will have been done.

For every parent who is tempted to allow unrestricted mobile phone use by their children, they need to ask themselves: Is it worth the risk?

EMFacts Consultancy

Tasmania, Australia

email: mailto:emfacts@trump.net.au

Web: http://www.tassie.net.au/emfacts

Source: http://www.tassie.net.au/emfacts/mobiles/children.html

1/2/02
7:54:09 PM

The Child Scrambler

What a mobile can do to a youngster's brain in 2 minutes.

Scientists have discovered that a call lasting just two minutes can alter the natural electrical activity of a child's brain for up to an hour afterwards.

And they also found for the first time how radio waves from mobile phones penetrate deep into the brain and not just around the ear.

The study by Spanish scientists has prompted leading medical experts to question whether it is safe for children to use mobile phones at all.

Doctors fear that disturbed brain activity in children could lead to psychiatric and behavioural problems or impair learning ability.

It was the first time that human guinea pigs were used to measure the effects of mobile phone radiation on children. The tests were carried out on an 11-year-old boy and a 13-year-old girl called Jennifer.

Using a CATEEN scanner, linked to a machine measuring brain wave activity, researchers were able to create the images above.

The yellow coloured part of the scan on the right shows how radiation spreads through the centre of the brain and out to the ear on the other side of the skull. The scans found that disturbed brain wave activity lasted for up to an hour after the phone call ended.

Dr Gerald Hyland - a Government adviser on mobiles - says he finds the results "extremely disturbing".

"It makes one wonder whether children, whose brains are still developing, should be using mobile phones," he adds.

"The results show that children's brains are affected for long periods even after very short-term use.

"Their brain wave patterns are abnormal and stay like that for a long period.

"This could affect their mood and ability to learn in the classroom if they have been using a phone during break time, for instance.

"We don't know all the answers yet, but the alteration in brain waves could lead to things like a lack of concentration, memory loss, inability to learn and aggressive behaviour."

Previously it had been thought that interference with brain waves and brain chemistry stopped when a call ended.

The results of the study by the Spanish Neuro Diagnostic Research Institute in Marbella coincide with a new survey that shows 87 per cent of 11- to 16-year-olds own mobile phones and 40 per cent of them spend 15 minutes or more talking each day on them. And disturbingly, 70 per cent said they would not change the use of their phone even if advised to by the Government.

Dr Hyland plans to publish the latest findings in medical journal The Lancet next year.

He said: "This information shows there really isn't a safe amount of mobile phone use. We don't know what lasting damage is being done by this exposure.

"If I were a parent I would now be extremely wary about allowing my children to use a mobile even for a very short period. My advice would be to avoid mobiles."

Dr Michael Klieeisen, who conducted the study, said: "We were able to see in minute detail what was going on in the brain.

"We never expected to see this continuing activity in the brain.

"We are worried that delicate balances that exist - such as the immunity to infection and disease - could be altered by interference with chemical balances in the brain."

A Department of Health spokesman said: "In children, mobile phone use should be restricted to very short periods of time."

Source: http://www.sundaymirror.co.uk/shtml/NEWS/P15S3.shtml

1/2/02
7:52:25 PM

Family Members of 9/11 Victims to Lead DC-NYC Peace Walk:

Our Grief is Not a Cry for War

WASHINGTON - November 24 - Amber Amundson, whose husband Craig was killed in the attack on the Pentagon, wrote shortly after the attack, “I call on our national leaders to find the courage to break the cycle of violence.” Sentiments like these have come from others who lost spouses, children, brothers or sisters. This week some of these mourners are going beyond words, joining a walk that will link the two cities that were struck. Their message to all they meet as they walk or assemble along the way: Our grief is not a cry for war.

The group of survivors and friends will set off at 9 AM Sunday, November 25, from the front gates of Georgetown University in Washington, DC (37th and O Street). They will arrive the next Sunday, December 2, in New York City. In between they will walk some distances and shuttle others, stopping in Baltimore, Philadelphia, Paterson and other locations to take parts in events being organized by local churches and other groups.

Craig Amundson’s brother, Ryan, will also join the walk. He states, “We don’t want to see more widowed mothers like my sister-in-law, more little kids without a dad like my niece and nephew, more moms and dads outliving their son like my parents, or more brothers losing brothers like me. The current reliance on military force does not confront the political, social, and economic foundations of terrorism. By emphasizing a military solution, the United States will not effectively combat terrorism.”

Buddhist and Franciscan monks will join the walk, as will leaders from various faith-based and peacemaking communities. Any persons who support a call for nonviolence are welcome to join in the walk as it moves north. On November 25, walkers will proceed to St. Aloysius Church (19 Eye Street) where they will welcome the public to a 6:30 p.m. gathering at the McKenna Center.

A large decorated school bus will shuttle walkers between cities. Daily itinerary updates available this website. This walk is endorsed by AFSC, FOR, Pax Christi USA, Peace Action USA, Veterans for Peace, War Resister’s League, Voices in the Wilderness, and Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, among others.

1/2/02
7:46:48 PM

Coming to a Mall Near You: Just War

by David Potorti

The phrase, 'Just War,' used in reference to the battle being waged in Afghanistan, is beginning to resonate. Not as a deep philosophical concept, but like the names of those specialty stores you find in shopping malls: 'Just Lamps,' 'Just Bulbs,' and 'Just Paper.' In fact, 'Just War' turns out to be an eerily accurate marquee for the little shop known as The United States of America. War, to the increasing exclusion of everything else, is the only thing that America collectively cares about anymore.

We don't manufacture much of anything; just war. We don't concern ourselves with education; just war. We don't attend to the 40 million Americans without health coverage; just war. We don't focus on the 30 million American children living in poverty; just war. We don't support the arts; just war. Even though a a multitude of human needs were in existence prior to September 11, and have only increased since then, we continue to direct our attention and our resources into what we do best: war. Just war.

Need a billion dollars a day for the military? No problem. Need an extra $40 billion for the war on terrorism? Here it is. Need a blank check to pursue an undeclared struggle with unexplained means and undefined ends? You got it, because that's what America is all about: just war. America is the world's biggest supplier of conventional weapons. America is the world's biggest supplier of torture devices. America manufactures and exports terrorists at its School of the Americas (now the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation). America exports violent entertainment around the globe. Prison construction remains one of our top industries. Global slavery is the secret behind our economic success. The military remains our biggest budget item. Whether it's war on people of color overseas, or war on our rights at home, that's what we're all about: just war.

And we've now codified that reality. President Bush's guarantee of 'a long, long struggle,' absent a measurable goal, and without a quantifiable conclusion, suggests that America will be in a permanent militarized state until the end of our days, forever erasing the distinction between 'war time' and 'peace time.' There was an era when wars were ugly spectacles, dreaded from a distance, entered reluctantly, and ended as swiftly as possible. There were victory parades and celebrations, and a return to 'life as we knew it.' There was a 'peace dividend'--the billions of dollars no longer needed for war could finally be used for the benefit of public health, welfare and the arts.

But no longer. With no legal declaration of war, there can be no cessation of hostilities. With no nations from which to demand surrender, there will be no surrender ceremonies. In the absence of negotiations, there will be no realignments, treaties or agreements. Terrorists, whoever they are, wherever they are, will be rounded up in secret, tried in secret, and executed by secret tribunals. The waging of war will become a regularly-occurring municipal function, like trash collection or street cleaning--all the while draining money out of our schools and hospitals, food out of our children's mouths, and peace and beauty out of the rest of our lives.

There is a moral corruption that comes from living in a militarized society. When military demands continually defy debate, hold center stage at the expense of monumental human need at home, and consume resources essential for the well-being of people, our culture is diminished, and we are diminished along with it. Our national dialogue becomes a monologue. And our interactions become brutal and coarse.

It's a corruption evident in Congressional disregard for the needs of laid-off workers and Americans without health coverage. In the Attorney General's contempt for the civil rights and freedoms he purports to defend. In the continuing debasement of our language into 'war is peace' doublespeak. And in the creeping fascism of pundits who define those opposed to the war as 'irrelevant,' academics teaching history as 'un-American,' and anyone calling for alternatives as 'lending aid and comfort to the enemy.'

It's a corruption that extends to our high schools, where kids can visit ROTC recruiters on campus--whose presence, more and more, is a condition of receiving state funds for education. It's a corruption that extends to our colleges--where, we are told, kids are flocking to CIA recruiters in droves, perhaps as the result of watching the new crop of network TV dramas which employ official CIA script consultants.

And it's a corruption that extends to our smallest kids. Enlisted by a president who spends billions of dollars on a military campaign that destroys the homes and lives of Afghan children, American children have been asked to send money to clean up the wreckage of his dirty war. Here's a better idea: don't bomb civilians (by one estimate now numbering 3,500 dead) in the first place. Use the money to build and stabilize rather than to bomb and terrorize. And teach our kids from their earliest days that they -- and their money -- have value beyond supporting the war effort.

The corruption extends across the breadth of increasingly harsh American mass cultural offerings, where you can take your pick of cop chases, spectacular crashes, or real-life fights caught on tape. If you're tired of watching crimes being committed, you can choose from a gaggle of court shows, where a judge of your gender and racial preference will verbally terrorize pairs of arguing litigants. You can get all the blood and gore you could possibly want on the local news--just don't ask the folks at the network to report how many civilians have actually been killed in Afghanistan. Apparently, that information could have a negative effect on the war. And war is, after all, what we're all about. Just war.

With no end to the struggle in sight, no perceivable opposition party in Washington, and no balancing voices of reason being given the light of day by the mainstream media, there's ample cause to believe that America, like its counterparts that sell just lamps, bulbs, and Scotch tape, is becoming a one-product economy: Just War. And where there is just war, there will be no justice.

David Potorti is the brother of a 9-11 World Trade Center victim and recently took part in the Victims DC-NYC Peace Walk. He lives in North Carolina. See:

Family Members of 9/11 Victims to Lead DC-NYC Peace Walk: Our Grief is Not a Cry for War

http://www.commondreams.org/news2001/1124-01.htm

1/2/02
7:44:17 PM

We'd like to introduce a new campaign highlighting easy ways to reduce America's dependence on oil. It's being launched by our friends Larry Rockefeller and Rob Stuart. We encourage you to take the SaveABarrel pledge as a New Year's resolution:

http://www.SaveaBarrel.org/index.cfm?S=1

1/2/02
7:43:24 PM

Birds Missing After US Bombing - BBC News

Saturday, 29 December, 2001 Birds 'missing' after US bombing By Jill McGivering BBC South Asia correspondent

Ornithologists in Pakistan fear that populations of birds whose migration route takes them over Afghanistan may have been devastated by the weeks of bombing there.

On the shores of Rawal Lake, a key conservation area only about 10 minutes drive from the centre of Islamabad, there is a sound that cannot be heard this year - a whole bird population which has suddenly gone missing.

Dr Masoud Anwar, a bio-diversity specialist who monitors wildlife here, usually he sees several thousand ducks and other wildfowl migrating here from Central Asia via Afghanistan.

So far this year, not one has arrived. It is a conservation disaster.

"We are trying to conserve bio-diversity here, and we need the bird for that. If there's no birds, we cannot go for the conservation," he says.

Killed or derouted?

The same reports are coming from all over Pakistan: tens of thousands of ducks, cranes and other birds depend on Pakistan as a winter habitat, and Afghanistan is a key migration route.

For the birds, the timing of the bombing could not have been worse.

Oumed Haneed, an ornithologist with Pakistan's National Council for Conservation of Wildlife, says it is unclear why the birds have not appeared.

"One impact may be directly the killing of birds through bombing, poisoning of the wetlands or the sites which these birds are using.

"Another impact may be these birds are derouted, because their migration is very precise. They migrate in a corridor and if they are disturbed through bombing, they might change their route," he says.

Devastation

Cranes are perhaps the most at risk. Three species of crane winter in Pakistan - all of them are rare. One, the Siberian Crane, is globally endangered.

Asheik Ahmed Khan of the Worldwide Fund for Nature says the signs so far are very disturbing.

"Previously the hunters, they used to see cranes in a group of 50 or 55. This year, they could not see them in a group of more than three. The group has become very small, and it means something is happening, somewhere."

Down at the lake, monitoring teams are waiting in the hope of late arrivals.

The real impact on migrating birds will not be known until surveys are completed.

But ornithologists fear the bombing in Afghanistan could have devastated bird populations, some of which will struggle to recover.

1/2/02
7:41:47 PM

t r u t h o u t

Over 100 Said Killed in U.S. Afghan Air Raid

http://www.truthout.com/01.01A.100.killed.htm

DASCHLE | White House Must Compromise

http://www.truthout.com/01.01B.Daschle.WH.Must.htm

BOB GRAHAM | Bin Laden Still Alive

http://www.truthout.com/01.01C.Graham.OBL.htm

Israel/Palestine | Anger over Gaza killings

http://www.truthout.com/01.01D.Gaza.Kill.htm

Al-Qaida Files Revealed on Computer

http://www.truthout.com/01.01E.Qeada.Computer.htm

Will Medicare Reform Take a Backseat to War

http://www.truthout.com/01.01F.War.Medicare.htm

Massive Food Delivery Averts Afghan Famine

http://www.truthout.com/01.01G.Famine.Averted.htm

Race to Rescue Endangered Turtles From Chinese Meat Market

http://www.truthout.com/01.01H.China.Turtles.htm

1/2/02
7:30:40 PM

"One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors." Plato

1/2/02
7:29:30 PM

Having Trouble Paying Rent & Groceries on $145,000 a Year?

Congress 'Quietly' Allows Automatic Pay Increase

Congress quietly allows automatic pay increase

Third lawmaker pay hike in four years

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The hour was late, the issue radioactive. Under cover of darkness, members of Congress let their third pay increase in four years go through. Come January, their pay will jump $4,900 a year to $150,000.

Defenders say the raise is well-deserved -- too small, if anything. Critics call it excessive, not to mention ill-timed during recession and war. But on one thing, many on both sides agree: The way the raise came about stinks.

Under a complex system approved in 1989, many congressional pay raises are automatic unless Congress acts to block them -- a debate that often plays out in the dead of night.

"It looks bad. It smells bad. It hurts Congress in the eyes of the public," said Paul Light, a Brookings Institution expert on government who nonetheless thinks legislators are underpaid. "They are terrified of pay increases. They always have been."

Not scared enough to suit Gary Ruskin, director of the nonprofit Congressional Accountability Project, one of a number of watchdog groups that opposes the raise.

He points to the steady upward march of congressional pay in recent years, from $98,400 in 1990 to $150,000 come January.

As for the coming raise, he says: "This is an effort by some of the most greedy people on the planet to stuff more taxpayers' money into their own wallets. The bipartisan greed caucus is alive and well."

Although statistics are hard to come by, pay-raise defenders say that legislators are paid considerably less than those who do equivalent work for private companies, yet lawmakers have many extra expenses, such as maintaining homes in both Washington and their districts.

They also say that since congressional pay rates affect the salaries for federal judges and other senior government officials, pay for others in government also is being kept too low.

Light called the system "the worst of all possible worlds." The whole idea behind tying congressional pay to that of others in government was to give legislators some political cover to raise their own salaries, he said.

But in reality, "Congress still shies from needed pay increases and these other positions are lagging," Light said.

Critics insist it's wrong to compare legislators' pay with their counterparts in business.

"The purpose of the private sector is to earn money for shareholders," said Ruskin. "The purpose of the public sector is to do the public's will."

Furthermore, critics point to congressional perquisites, such as a generous pension plan, that create a "princely" compensation package. And they argue that now is the time to forego a raise to show solidarity with struggling Americans.

The National Taxpayers Union sent members of Congress a letter after the September 11 terror attacks urging them to give up the raise, noting that Congress cut its own pay twice during the Depression and suspended its two-month-old pension plan and froze its pay during World War II.

This time, Pete Sepp, a spokesman for the union, says: "Apparently, they're having trouble paying the rent and buying groceries on $145,000 a year."

Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wisconsin, pushed for a vote December 7 to block the pay raise from taking effect. But in a late-night maneuver, legislators used a 65-33 vote on a procedural matter to thwart Feingold's effort.

Feingold, who will turn down the raise and holds his own salary to the $136,700 he earned when first elected, says legislators are neither overpaid nor underpaid.

"I just think the process of an automatic pay raise system is wrong," he said. "If we deserve a pay raise, we should have to vote on it." Feingold, who has been mentioned in some lists of possible Democratic presidential hopefuls, also stood to get some publicity for his effort, which he knew in advance was a lost cause.

In trying to block the raise, he said, "I probably caught more flak on this than on anything else. ... People don't like people upsetting the apple cart on this one."

It's an old debate. Benjamin Franklin considered proposing that no one in government be paid, but the founding fathers decided that would be unfair. More than 200 years later, legislators and Americans are still uncertain how to strike the right balance.

"You want to be fair with your pay," Light said, "but you don't want government officials to be so well paid that they have no clue what the general public is feeling."

http://www.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/12/24/congress.stealth.raise.ap/index.h tml

1/2/02
7:24:55 PM

A war can only be judged 'just' in retrospect

Is war against Osama bin Laden and the Taliban of Afghanistan morally justifiable?

Patrick Comerford considers the concept first used by Aristotle

Pope John Paul has expressed his "anguish and worry" following the US-led attacks on Afghanistan, but did not say whether he condemned or approved the military action.

The Vatican said last month that it would understand if the US had to resort to force to protect its citizens from future attacks. But the Pope yesterday called the attacks a dark day for humanity and said religion could not be used to justify conflict between peoples.

The caution of Church leaders underlines the fact that most Christians hold that war is inconsistent with the teachings of the New Testament and the participation of Christians in war must be limited by the demands for justice and peace.

But when is a war just? Is the "just war" theory simply a formula to allow Christians to take part in any and all wars? And, can the war against Osama bin Laden and the Taliban be regarded as a just war? Over the centuries, the Christian tradition has produced three contrasting approaches to the dilemma posed by war: pacifism, Crusades, and the just-war theory.

Christian pacifism, with its roots in the Sermon on the Mount and the practice of the early church, demands total opposition to all wars. However, the call to peace-making in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:9) is not a call to maintain an unjust cessation of violence or to seek peace at any cost. Nor must the demands of peace always take priority over the demands of justice.

Those who invoke the principles of pacifism in the present conflict are open to condemnation if they have not spoken out against the tyranny of the Taliban in Afghanistan, condemned bin Laden's attacks, or challenged racism and violence towards Muslims.

President Bush has spoken of a "crusade" against terrorism. The Crusades found their initial justification as defensive action aimed at protecting Christian pilgrims to Jerusalem, but quickly took on the characteristics of the jihad or Muslim holy war.

The theological justification of Crusades has long been abandoned, and there is no place in international law for either a crusade or a jihad. But the Crusades continued to have resonances in the Cold War, in talk about a crusade against Communism, and was reflected in debates about a "clash of civilisations" between the West and the Islamic world.

The third Christian approach has been the just-war theory. The concept of a just war owes its original formulation not to Biblical principles but to Aristotle (who first used the term), Cicero and others.

The theory was first framed by Saint Augustine, who was exercised by the problem of when a Christian might take part in war with a good conscience.

For Augustine, all wars remained sinful and could only be waged in "a mournful spirit". War involved resorting to a lesser evil only in the hope of preventing a greater evil and of restoring justice.

He accepted that the command to love the neighbour included a duty to defend the vulnerable against attack, while the commandment to love the enemy placed moral limits on the use of force in defending the vulnerable.

Augustine's theory was developed in the 13th century by Thomas Aquinas, and by 16th century Spanish and Dutch theologians. Their formula for a just war passed into international law.

The just-war theory does not seek to legitimise, and still less to glorify, war. Jurists and theologians alike accept that seven conditions must govern a decision to go to war (jus ad bellum) and three conditions must govern its conduct (jus in bello).

The seven conditions governing a decision to go to war are: there must be a just cause; war must be waged by a legitimate authority; it must be formally declared; those waging it must have a right intention; it must be the last resort; there must be reasonable hope of success; and must be a due proportion between the benefits sought and the damage done.

Three conditions govern the conduct of war: non-combatants must have immunity; prisoners must be treated humanely; and international treaties must be honoured. Each condition must be met for any conflict to be regarded as a just war. Is the present conflict a just war?

It might even be asked whether this is a war.

Has there been a formal declaration? Bin Laden is not a head of state with competence in international law; and it is questionable whether the Taliban regime is an appropriate authority to have war declared against it.

Undoubtedly, there is a just cause if the intention is to stop further similar attacks. But revenge is not a just cause, for vengeance has no place in international law; nor could it justify bombing cities or creating hundreds of thousands of civilian refugees.

The refusal of the Taliban to hand over bin Laden, despite four weeks of international pressure, may support the argument that war has become a last resort. But is there a reasonable hope of success? Or is it a predictable failure?

The just war theory also demands a due proportion between the benefits sought and the damage caused. If further terrorist attacks on the West are a foreseen consequence, who can weigh the damage caused in Afghanistan against the damage that may be caused afterwards?

And while the principle of proportionality may sustain the argument that saving the lives of another 5,000 people justifies killing one bin Laden, can 5,000 bin Ladens be killed to save 5,000 future lives? Or 5,000 bin Laden supporters to save, perhaps, 10 lives?

In a just war, non-combatants must be guaranteed safety. The conditions do not allow us to dismiss any large-scale death of civilians as mere "collateral damage".

One of the weaknesses of the just-war theory is that it is only long after a war is over that we have the time and the luxury to determine whether all conditions have been met.

In the meantime, we can only accept that all moral decisions are contingent and, at best, penultimate. We are left to confess that war is evil, and accept that many people of good will resort to a lesser evil in the hope of preventing the perpetration of a further, greater evil.

Rev Patrick Comerford is an Irish Times journalist and an Anglican theologian.

Contact: MailTo:theology@ireland.com

Source: http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/opinion/2001/1009/opt3.htm

1/2/02
7:21:39 PM

"Do everything with so much love you would never want to do it another way."

Yogi Amrit Desai

1/2/02
7:20:30 PM

t r u t h o u t

Eyewitness at Tora Bora

http://www.truthout.com/12.31A.Tora.Bora.htm

Israel Signals Syria on Talks

http://www.truthout.com/12.31B.Israel.Syria.htm

Cuban Officials Oppose US Use of Guantanamo Bay for Al-Qaeda Prisoners

http://www.truthout.com/12.31C.Cuba.Qaeda.htm

Pakistan Frezees Accounts of Two Nuclear Scientists With Links to Bin Laden

http://www.truthout.com/12.31D.Pak.Freeze.htm

China Sentences Christian Church Leader to Death

http://www.truthout.com/12.31E.China.Death.htm

Afghan Birds MIA After US Bombing

http://www.truthout.com/12.31F.Afghan.Birds.htm

BBC | Poppy Season Opens in Afghanistan

http://www.truthout.com/12.31G.Poppy.Season.htm

1/2/02
7:01:30 PM

The Enemy Is Inside The Gates

by Donn de Grand Pré ( Retired Army Colonel )

A dedicated group of experienced civilian and military pilots, including combat fighter pilots and commercial airline captains, just finished a marathon 72 hours of non-stop briefings and debate over the current crisis evolving from the use of commercial aircraft as cruise missiles against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on 11 September.

The so-called terrorist attack was in fact a superbly executed military operation against the United States, requiring the utmost professional military skill in command, communications and control. It was flawless in timing, in the choice of selected aircraft to be used as guided missiles, and in the coordinated delivery of those missiles to their pre-selected targets.

As a tactical military exercise against two significant targets (world financial center and the citadel of world strategic military planning), the attack, from a psychological impact on the American public, equaled the Japanese "surprise" attack on Pearl Harbor 7 Dec 1941.

The over-riding question: If we are at war, who is the enemy?

The group determined that the enemy is within the gates, that he has infiltrated into the highest policy-making positions at the Federal level, and has absolute control, not only of the purse strings, but of the troop build-up and deployment of our military forces, including active, reserve and National Guard units.

PRELUDE TO PANIC

The 9-11 activity and horrific destruction of US property and lives was intentionally meant to trigger a psychological and patriotic reaction on the part of the US citizens, which is paving the way for "combined UN activity" (using the fig leaf of NATO) for striking key targets in both the Middle East/ South Asia and the Balkans. The goal continues to be ultimate destruction of all national sovereignty and establishment of a global government.

The trigger for the 9-11 activity was the imminent and unstoppable world-wide financial collapse, which can only be prevented (temporarily) by a major war, perhaps to become known as WW 111. To bring it off (one more time), martial law will probably be imposed in the United States.

In each of the major wars of the 20th century, the financial manipulators (located in the City of London and New York City) had placed the US (and much of the Western world) in a monetary expansion mode, followed by an ever-tightening vice of a gigantic credit squeeze. We now have two ongoing and tightly controlled simultaneous events (emanating from the two symbolic targets of 911:

1) Alan Greenspan, Fed chairman, promising to flood the market with up to $200 billion in FRNs and to further lower interest rates, thus bringing about hyperinflation and dollar devaluation. Much of these multi billions in largesse will be dumped into the coffers of Wall Street, Defense, bankrupt airlines, insurance companies and into the willing arms of debt-ridden third-world countries in the form of debt repudiation (forgiveness). Call it bribery, in order to get these often reluctant nations to join our coalition of "freedom fighters" in "the war against terrorism".

2) Paul Wolfowitz, deputy Defense secretary, promised that the US will launch "sustained military strikes against those behind the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington". He said that the "military retaliation would continue until the roots of terrorism are destroyed."

This bit of saber rattling was seconded by select NATO allies (especially Britain), and by our chief ally in the Middle East, the Butcher of Beirut, Ariel Sharon, while Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld, with the blessings of Pres. Bush 11, is activating thousands of national guard and reservists, not only to guard the vulnerable airports, but to do fly-overs of our Nation's capital in F16s from the North Dakota Air Guard. Other National Guard units are being jockeyed into potential combat "hot spots" throughout the Middle East/South Asia and the Balkans.

WHO IS THE ENEMY?

Following is a summary of the near-unanimous views of the assembled military and civilian pilots concerning certain critical factors relating to the WTC/Pentagon hit of 9-11:

Troubling questions arose about the alleged pilot-hijackers of the four aircraft, who were supposedly trained on Cessna aircraft over the past year at fields in Florida and Oklahoma. One General officer remarked, "I seriously question whether these novices could have located a target dead-on 200 miles removed from takeoff point...-- much less controlled the flight and mastered the intricacies of 11FR (instrument flight rules) -- and all accomplished in 45 minutes."

The extremely skillful maneuvering of the three aircraft at near mach speeds, each unerringly hitting their targets, was superb. As one Air Force officer -- a veteran of over 100 sorties over North Vietnam -- explained, "Those birds (commercial airliners) either had a crack fighter pilot in the left seat, or they were being maneuvered by remote control."

Another pilot warned that "we had better consider whether electro-magnetic pulse or radio frequency weapons were used from a command and control platform hovering over the Eastern Seaboard... I'm talkin' AWACS."

Another comment: "If there was an AWACS on station over the targeted area, did it have a Global Hawk capability? I mean, could it convert the commercial jets to robotic flying missiles?

A hotly debated question: Who would be in command of such an Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS)? Were they Chinese -- Russians -- Saudis -- Israelis -- NATO ? All of these countries possess AWACS-type aircraft. All (except the Saudis) have the capability to utilize electro-magnetic pulsing (EMP) to knock out on-board flight controls and communications of targeted aircraft, and then, to fly them by remote control.

One of the Air Force officers explained that we had already flown a robot plane the size of a Boeing 737 across the Pacific to Australia -- unmanned -- from Edwards AF13 in California to a successful landing on an Aussie base in South Australia. It flies along a pre-programmed flight path, but is "monitored" (controlled remotely) by a pilot from an outside station.

He explained that the London Economist (20 Sep 2001) published comments from the former CEO of British Airways, Robert Ayling, who stated that an aircraft could be commandeered from the ground or air and controlled remotely in the event of a hijack.

COMMERCIAL JETS AS GUIDED MISSILES

An AP story, dateline Brussels - 7 Oct 01 -- "At Washington's request, NATO will soon deploy surveillance aircraft for anti-terrorist operations in the United States in response to the attacks on New York and Washington, NATO officials said Sunday, an unprecedented use of foreign military forces to defend the U.S. homeland."

The assembled group of pilots debated why we would ask for foreign forces to fly AWACS over our sovereign territory when we have a fleet of 33 of them, of which 28 are stationed in Oklahoma. The debate also centered on whether such NATO surveillance aircraft were already here prior to 11 September.

Could one of them have commandeered the four airliners?

There seems to be wide discrepancies between what the Federal government is proclaiming -- and their media moguls reporting --as opposed to the calm and reasoned and rational views of those men who fly the planes and defend the nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

This writer has been a general aviation pilot since 1946. 1 have flown a variety of single engine prop aircraft since, and installed an FAA-approved airstrip here on my farm in 1980. Two local pilots periodically joined me for short hops; one, a Madison County lawyer, a graduate of the Air Force Academy, who flew for the Air Force before coming home to practice law.

The other, Kent Hill, who lives with his wife, Carol, on a farm close to mine, is an American Airlines captain assigned to the European route. He was a lifelong friend of "Chic" Burlingame, They were graduates of the Naval Academy and flew F-4 Phantoms in Vietnam. Both left the Navy 28 years ago and joined American Airlines. Both planned to retire in 2002. Chic was the captain of AA flight 77, a Boeing 757, which departed Washington Dulles for Los Angeles at 8: 10 am on I I September, with 58 passengers and a crew of 6. Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon at 9:41 am.

"We were totally trained on the old type of hijack," Capt Hill said, "where you treat the hijacker cordially, punch a 4-digit code into your transponder to alert ground control you're being hijacked, and then get him where he wants to go, set the plane safely on the ground and let them deal with it on the ground. However, this is a totally new situation... Not one of the planes alerted ground control that they were being hijacked." How come?

"The fact is, all the transponders were turned off on the doomed flights virtually at the same time." Look at their departure times --two from Logan (Boston), one from Newark, another from Dulles (Washington DC) -- all between 8 am and 8:15.

"Shortly after climb-out to flight level, their transponders are de-activated.. (they are no longer a blip on the radar screens). This is something that really needs to be looked into. The only reason we turn them off is so they don't interfere with ground systems when we land."

(Note: Transponders identify a particular aircraft in flight on the radar screens of FAA flight controllers located throughout the country. Various codes are punched into the transponder, one displaying, "I am being hijacked.")

Although there is much talk among the various flight crews, Hill says they are not privy to any of the investigations into the events of I I September. "We're in the dark -- very much so ... They're playing it pretty tight to the vest."

He is convinced none of the pilots had control of their aircraft when they were flown into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The question then becomes, who was really in control?

"Even if I had a gun at my head, I'd never fly a plane into a building. I'd try to put it in anywhere -- a field or a river --and I'd be searing the hell out of them (the hijackers) by flying upside down first," Hill said.

In fact, the pilot has the best weapon in his hand when threatened with imminent death by a hijacker, namely, the airplane.

Another airline pilot stated. "On hearing a major scuffle in the cabin, the pilot should have inverted the aircraft and the hijackers end up with broken necks."

That none of the four pilots executed such a maneuver points toward the fact that none of them had control of their aircraft, but had been overridden by an outside force, which was flying them by remote control.

As an old and not so bold pilot, I became more convinced that the four commercial jets were choreographed by a "conductor" from a central source, namely an airborne warning and control system (AWACS). They have the electronic capability to engage several aircraft simultaneously, knock out their on-board flight controls by EMP (electro-magnetic pulsing) and assume command and remote control of these targeted aircraft.

As we consider all the options -- and enemies -- who performed this act of war, whether from China, Russia, Israel, an Islamic country, or from NATO, we must also consider that the enemy may be within the gates.

If so, then we are dealing with high treason.

IS THERE A CHINA - ISRAEL CONNECTION?

Under a heading "High-powered Microwave weapons' (Regnery Pub 1999) reported: ', the authors of Red Dragon Rising,

High-powered microwave weapons (sometimes known as radio frequency weapons) which the PLA calls the 'superstars' of warfare, represent the new armaments that may define twenty-first century warfare. These very dangerous weapons can jam electronic equipment by emitting an extremely powerful pulse of electromagnetic energy over a wide area, or their energy can be focused in a narrow beam for use against American satellites I or commercial airliners - Ed 1.

In that startling and factual work, the authors highlight the exceptional efforts on the part of the PLA to acquire the latest hi-tech data from the United States, especially for the "superstars of radio frequency and electro-magnetic pulse weaponry." In their chapter on "Targeting America", the authors refer to a bipartisan Cox-Dicks Committee given the task to investigate "U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial concerns with the Peoples Republic of China".

They point out that the Clinton administration changed the export control regulations (Jan 1996) and that by the end of 1998 the PRC had 600 American super computers.

In 1997-98 the Congressional Joint Economic Committee held hearings on "Radio Frequency Weapons and Proliferation: Potential Impact on the Economy". Several experts appearing before the Committee warned that these weapons pose a distinct threat to the United States. It was revealed during the hearings that China (PLA) has had a high-powered microwave weapon program for 25 years under the direction of one of many Chinese students educated at Berkeley over the years.

The key statement was that the PLA has access to American research -- "through espionage".

Let's fast-forward to 1999 and to a New York Times Op Ed piece by A. M. Rosenthal (22 Oct 1999), in which he described the long-secret arms deals between Israel and Red China He was the managing editor of the New York Times for 15 years prior to that article appearing and a dedicated supporter of Israel. However, as a result of that article, he was fired.

The title of his Op Ed was "The Deadly Cargo", and the lead sets the theme:

More often now, the special cargo arrives in China from Israel -- riles from Israeli military computers, crates with the makings of missiles and other weapons, and the men in the lab coats, the engineers and scientists who know how to put it all together...

And now I see the Chinese minister of defense, who is one of the ranking Tiananmen killers, visits Israel. I read obsequious Israeli speeches praising him and his government...

The two countries talk openly about bigger arms deals in the making. I learn that the Chinese have knit together Russian and Israeli specialties...

The Russians are converting Ilyushin planes into the framework of U.S.-type flying command posts (AWACS) and will ship them to Israel...

In an astounding interview by Tom Valentine (24 Oct 1999) on Radio Free America with Andrew St. George the two developed the emerging scandal of Israel's secret arms deal with Red China. They referred to the Cox Committee hearings and stated that "unfortunately , the official Cox 'investigation' into China's capture of American technology covered up Israel's involvement."

Valentine stressed that the Reagan administration allowed the trade to escalate in the 1980s, with the help and encouragement of such officials as Richard Perle, Stephen Bryen, Fred Ickle and Paul Wolfowitz ..."They were the kingpins of the Defense Department in the Reagan years."

In case you missed it, they are now back as key advisers to President Bush II; in fact, the leading war hawk pressing for our armed forces to go to war against the Muslim World is the Deputy Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz.

We are being deluged by the current crop of Israel Firsters, all shouting "It's time to declare war". and "First war of 21st Century" ( Alan Dershowitz on CNN - William Kristol, Washington Times - Leonard Piekoff, Washington Post)), and former Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, appearing before the U.S. Congress,

QUO VADIS? (Whither Goest?)

To better grasp where we are heading (other than to the Khyber Pass), we can dip back to recent history (Vietnam, Korea, Desert Storm, Kosovo) to get a better focus of the direction we are going, even though our commander-in-chief has yet to define the specific enemy.

"Terrorism is like sin; everybody is agin'it."

To those of us who have actually engaged an enemy (often contrived) on the battlefield, and/or who have an-n-chaired other wars from a vantage point, say, the E-Ring of the Pentagon, the pomposity and solemnity and the speechifying of our fearless politicians, as well as their favorite talking heads on the idiot box, is eerily familiar. It is in fact d~ja vous all over again.

Once again, we will rely on "perpetual war for perpetual peace" to bring us out of the abyss of a major financial collapse. We either turn out the Barbarians Inside the Gates, or we prepare for the long dark night of no return. There is no longer a third option.

It's curtain call at the Little Theater off Times Square... Be There!

For more detailed view of air routes see:

http://www.usatoday.com/graphics/news/gra/gflightpath2/flash.htm

Donn de Grand Pré, a retired Army colonel, is author of A Window on America, Confessions of an Arms Peddler and his latest, Barbarians Inside the Gates.

1/2/02
6:26:58 PM

"Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time: the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love."

-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, Stockholm, Sweden, December 11, 1964

"A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death."

-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967

"Man was born into barbarism when killing his fellow man was a normal condition of existence. He became endowed with a conscience. And he has now reached the day when violence toward another human being must become as abhorrent as eating another's flesh.

-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Why We Can't Wait, 1963

"Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor in America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours."

-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The Trumpet of Conscience, 1967.

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.... The chain reaction of evil -- hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars -- must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.

-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Strength To Love, 1963

1/2/02
6:23:48 PM

Peace, in the sense of the absence of war, is of little value to someone who is dying of hunger or cold. It will not remove the pain of torture inflicted on a prisoner of conscience. It does not comfort those who have lost their loved ones in floods caused by senseless deforestation in a neighboring country. Peace can only last where human rights are respected, where people are fed, and where individuals and nations are free.

Responsibility does not only lie with the leaders of our countries or with those who have been appointed or elected to do a particular job. It lies with each of us individually. What is important is that we each make a sincere effort to take seriously our responsibility for each other and for the natural environment."

His Holiness the Dalai Lama From his acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize, 1989

1/2/02
6:21:56 PM

Support and join peace-oriented organizations and initiatives.

Here are just a few:

http://www.womenwagingpeace.net/

http://nowarcollective.com/

http://www.peace-action.org/

http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org

http://www.peacebrigades.org/

Seeds of Peace Youth Camps:

http://www.seedsofpeace.org/

The Compassionate Listening Project:

http://www.mideastdiplomacy.org/clp.html

Creating Hope International:

http://www.creatinghope.org/index.htm

International Peace Bureau:

http://www.ipb.org/index.html

The World Federalist Association

http://www.wfa.org/

1/2/02
6:18:17 PM

t r u t h o u t

LEAHY | On Military Tribunals

http://www.truthout.com/12.30A.Leahy.Tribunals.htm

Pakistan Sees Mounting War Risk

http://www.truthout.com/12.30B.Pak.War.Risk.htm

Bin Laden, Mulla Omar Hiding in Pakistan

http://www.truthout.com/12.30C.OBL.Omar.Pak.htm

Airport Security | Back to 'Business as Usual'

http://www.truthout.com/12.30D.Airport.Same.htm

Convoy Bombing Upsets Afghan Elders

http://www.truthout.com/12.30E.Bomb.Elders.htm

NYT Editorial | Selling the Forests

http://www.truthout.com/12.30F.Selling.Forests.htm

Mississippi Sheriffs Ignore Public Law

http://www.truthout.com/12.30G.Miss.Sheriff.htm

1/2/02
6:15:29 PM

A New Contract With The Planet

1. Attack World Hunger and Poverty as if Our Life Depends on it: It Does.

Anchor our foreign policy in the compassion for the poor that unites all the world's religions. Reduce the debts of impoverished countries. End America's sad history as the world's leading exporter of weapons. Shift foreign aid from buying weapons to feeding people.

2. Champion the Rights of Every Child, Woman and Man.

Make America stand for justice, not expediency. Stop turning a blind eye to governments that abuse their own people. Ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. If punishing a foreign tyrant means, in actual practice, punishing the women and children who are his victims, desist, and find another path.

3. Pay our UN Dues Ungrudgingly and End our Obstructionism to the World's Treaties.

Throw America's full weight behind the United Nations. Pay our UN dues on time and without conditions. Withdraw our lonely vetoes of the landmine ban, the bans on chemical and biological weapons, the Kyoto accords and the International Criminal Court. Show once again the "decent respect for the opinions of mankind" that our Declaration of Independence affirms.

4. Reduce our Dependence on Oil.

Oil holds us hostage to regimes hated by their own people; their hatred transfers to us. America is 5% of the world's people but we generate 25% of the pollution that causes global warming. It's our duty to lead. We will reduce our consumption 25% by 2010.

5. Lead the World to an Age of Renewable Energy.

Make a Moon Mission scale commitment to develop solar and wind power technologies. Set and meet a goal of 20% of our energy from renewable sources by 2010.

6. Close the Book on the Cold War and End the Nuclear Nightmare Forever.

Cast a cold eye on giant weapons designed to destroy giant enemies that no longer exist. Cancel obsolete Cold War weapons. We applaud the nuclear force cuts announced by President Bush, but even 2,000 warheads poised and aimed at Russia are unwise. We squander $35 billion a year on this obsolete arsenal. Save most of that money, take our missiles off "launch on warning" and invite all nuclear nations to negotiate a nuclear weapons ban.

7. Renounce Star Wars and the Militarization of Space. Reaffirm the ABM treaty.

After spending $134 billion dollars (twice our lifetime commitment to cancer research!) our military has nothing to show for its obsession with a dubious National Missile Defense but the deep suspicions of our new allies. Enough is enough.

8. Make Globalization Work for, not against, Working People.

Open the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to the public. Let sunshine into the councils of the World Trade Organization and the North American Fair Trade Agreement. Affirm that the welfare of the planet's people supersedes corporate patents and profits.

9. Get Money out of Politics.

Curtail the vast corrupting influence of corporate campaign contributions, which make Congress beholden to private interests. Enact public campaign financing--we can fund it entirely by closing a single offshore tax loophole!

10. Close the Gap between Rich and Poor at Home.

All these words will ring hollow to the world if America does not close the chasm between Rich and Poor in our own society. We will fully fund Head Start and healthcare insurance for the millions of American children who can't get either, and invest the money needed to build and nourish schools worthy of this great nation.

To sign on and learn more about "A New Contract with the Planet," visit

http://www.contractwiththeplanet.org/main.html

1/2/02
6:11:38 PM

In Addition To Jets, Were SAMs And AA Also Stood Down On 911?

From Top View top_view@planetmail.com

Thanks for continuing to emphasize the inexplicable FAILURE TO DEFEND.

You know, I keep thinking about other aspects of defense.

We have already considered fighter aircraft intercepts, but I remember, years ago, hiking upon Mt. Tom in central Massachusetts and being surprised and challenged by guards of a Nike (SAM) installation.

Why is it that I don't think that NYC, DC, and Camp David are guarded ONLY by jet aircraft?

So, why was it that the SAMs were not launched (on 911)?

I was stationed outside of DC in the early 1970's. I think that nothing has changed since then. Airplane-to-airplane combat was not required then to take out a rogue aircraft that had hostile intentions in noticed airspace. And I don't think it is required now.

So, who ordered the SAMs to stand down?

Who ordered the ack-ack to stand down?

WHO ORDERED NYC AND DC TO BE SO DEFENSELESS?

It is just not the question of unscrambled fighter/intercept aircraft.

Also, I trust that all who watched television on Christmas eve enjoyed CNN's coverage of NORAD's surveillance of St. Nick's flight. It was particularly interesting as Cheyenne Mtn demonstrated how geosynchronous satellites, over the entirety of the US, MONITORED ALL AIRBORNE OBJECTS in real time...and how Cheyenne Mtn operators observed them on crt screens.

As I once said in the matter of Chandra Levy, there are satellite tapes that reveal all that occurred in that matter. So, too, in the matter of Vince Foster. and so, too, in the matter of these commercial airliners that strayed from their flight plans on September 11.

When the course deviations first occurred, NORAD [Cheyenne Mtn and other military monitoring facilities] WATCHED them, NOTED them, and LOGGED them.

That is the way it works. Anyone who works there will tell you that I am not mistaken.

Peace and freedom.... Ace

Source: http://www.rense.com/general18/inadditiontojets.htm

1/2/02
6:07:53 PM

NTSB Destroys Incriminating Evidence

by Reed Irvine

The National Transportation Safety Board, NTSB, has secretly sent a large part of the wreckage of TWA Flight 800 to a Long Island junkyard for recycling.

Millions of dollars were spent recovering the wreckage from the ocean and transporting it to Calverton, where the fuselage was assembled as a mock-up to impress the public with what a thorough job the investigators - the NTSB and the FBI - were doing.

That was for show, but there was other wreckage that they didn't want shown. Journalists and private investigators were not allowed inside the Calverton hangar to inspect the bulk of the recovered wreckage, but even members of the official investigating team were not allowed into a special area where the FBI secreted items that they didn't want the representatives of the NTSB, TWA, Boeing and the interested unions to see.

CLIP

Maj. Fritz Meyer was piloting an Air National Guard helicopter when he saw TWA Flight 800 hit by missiles. Later he viewed the wreckage in the Calverton hangar and was struck by the heavy damage done to a nose wheel and tire. An NTSB official with him remarked that experts told him it was caused by a bomb.

The "bomb" must have been attached to a missile. That was also evidence that had to be destroyed.

The destruction of so much evidence that could be used to prove that the government has covered up the real cause of the crash of TWA 800 may have been legal. However, those who ordered it apparently feared they might not have been allowed to get away with it if they did so openly, because it is morally outrageous.

Reed Irvine is chairman of Accuracy in Media.

http://www.newsmax.com/commentarchive.shtml?a=2001/12/13/234829

1/2/02
6:05:53 PM

Why Did WTC TOWERS Fall In Such A Strange Way?

From: http://www.nexusmagazine.com/bskies5.html

BRIGHT SKIES

Top-Secret Weapons Testing? Were Tesla-style EM weapons used in the Kobe earthquake, the Oklahoma City bombing and the downing of TWA Flight 800, in a secret war between unidentified factions?

(...) "The development of apparently magical EM weapons capable of initiating earthquakes or nuclear-force-level explosions over or within targets located at a great intercontinental distance by transmission of scalar or Tesla EM ray-waves from two or three transmitter sites - or EM weapons able to strike target sites from an orbiting satellite, spacecraft or aircraft-or ground-based EM beam-pulse weapons capable of taking out orbital or airborne targets, has for the first time in our planetary history allowed the use of 'deniable' massive-force weapons in terrorist acts directed against the general population.

These EM weapons effects are "deniable" in that they can be blamed upon natural earthquakes, meteor air-burst explosions or bolide ground-impacts, or can be set up as terrorist-bomb, ground-to-air missile or even alien UFO scenarios. The ability to cause apparently magical-force events implies an enormous advantage to certain individual power groups who appear to have stolen these weapons (from the states that originally developed them) to use solely for their own advantage.

Such weapons in the hands of secret power groups who are willing to use them without mercy against the innocent citizens of planet Earth, represents a horrifying future prospect in the power struggles of this planet. Defence against such weapons and the curs who control them must now be our primary objective. The nuclear terror has been replaced by something far worse: a usable, high-energy weapon.

'BLACK HOVERING OBJECT' connected with hoaxing and disparagement of worldwide Crop Pattern phenomenon:

http://www.world-action.co.uk/triangle1.html

'BLACK HOVERING OBJECT' involved in 1992-1997 North Atlantic 'Battle':

http://www.world-action.co.uk/atlantic.html

'BLACK HOVERING OBJECT' and Psychotronic abuse of 6 soldiers in UK around 1990:

http://www.world-action.co.uk/triangle2.html

Image of a 'Black Hovering Object':

http://www.world-action.co.uk/enemybtone12.jpg

Possible 'Black Hovering Object' and Aerial Pulse Beam Attack on Murrah Building, OKC:

http://www.nexusmagazine.com/bskies5.html

Note from Jean: There is indeed an intriguing black movie object seen in these TV video shots

'BLACK BLURRY OBJECT' at WTC/911:

Still Images: http://www.world-action.co.uk/object18.jpg

http://www.world-action.co.uk/object15.jpg

Video: http://www2.justnet.ne.jp/~kiti/Ufo/wtc/wtc2x.gif

[2] 'BLACK BLURRY OBJECT' at WTC/911:

Still Image: http://www.world-action.co.uk/object24.jpg

Video: http://www2.justnet.ne.jp/~kiti/Ufo/wtc/wtc1x.gif

See also at http://www.ufocongress.com/indexpastfour.htm

(...) Colin Andrews showed a photo of an unidentified black object hovering over a crop formation. Then he showed a photo from La Guardia Airport of the World Trade Towers over the wing of an airliner. A similar black object hovered over the South tower. I think he said it was taken about a week before 11 Sep 01.

BLACK HOVERING TRIANGLE OBJECT and sabotage of Crop Pattern phenomenon in 1990:

http://www.world-action.co.uk/triangle1.html

1/2/02
6:00:34 PM

"The Bush family fortune came from the Third Reich."

John Loftus, former US Justice Dept. Nazi War Crimes investigator and President of the Florida Holocaust Museum - More details in "Author links Bush family to Nazis" at

http://www.newscoast.com/headlinesstory2.cfm?ID=35115

"In a time of universal deceit, TELLING THE TRUTH is a revolutionary act."

George Orwell

"Most people are ignorant as to what is going on. When persons do learn of the depths and heights of the conspiracy, it boggles the mind, so the mind shuts it out."

Anonynous