Big Brother Rules NSA Can Stay Silent on Google Ties

A US Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia, upheld a lower court decision, in EPIC v. NSA ruling that the NSA does not need to confirm nor deny (known as a “Glomar” response, a controversial legal claim that allows federal agencies to conceal the existence of records that might otherwise be subject to public disclosure) its collaborations with Google; how the two work together to spy on American citizens in the name of protecting the public from false flag “cyber-attacks”.

The ruling came in response to a Freedom of Information Act request from the public interest group, EPIC, which stated the public has a right to know about the government spying on citizens.

"Any information pertaining to the relationship between Google and NSA would reveal protected information about NSA's implementation of its information assurance mission," Judge Janice Rogers Brown wrote in the appeals opinion.

Then, there is the NSA's "Perfect Citizen" - how Orwellian - program. According to the Wall Street Journal, the program "would rely on a set of sensors deployed in computer networks for critical infrastructure that would be triggered by unusual activity suggesting an impending cyber attack," although the agency has claimed that there "is no monitoring activity involved, and no sensors are employed in this endeavor" but has refused to release the details of the program.

Suffice to say, they have been tapping into domestic communications since the 1950s, if not before. However, the ever increasing technology combined with the current civil-liberty-eliminating legislation - starting with the Patriot Act - provides the perfect infrastructure for some Hitler/Stalin wannabe to take Nazi like control of your daily existence. 

The bottom line is "Perfect Citizen" and this growing convoluted web of bureaucracies to surveil and control the flow of information on the Internet has nothing to do with protecting critical infrastructure and utilities from being hacked, because all that is required to defend or guard against attack is to disconnect command and control systems for critical infrastructure from the Internet ...a dedicated line that is closed to the net. In other words, this is a ruse to expand the scope of government and domestic spying.

The incremental loss of liberty and privacy marches on as we frogs, distracted by bread and circus, slow-boil in our pots.

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Did You Know a Hunger Strike Can Label You a Terrorist in the USA?

Brian Willson tries too late to get out of the way of oncoming train.

1n 1986, the FBI declared Vietnam Veteran (Air Force Captain) turned activist, and attorney, Brian Willson a domestic terrorist. Why? Because, after witnessing the carnage, resulting from Reagan’s policies of destruction and wonton murder in Nicaragua and El Salvador, he and Vietnam veterans, George Mizo, founder of the Vietnam Friendship Village Project near Hanoi (and in US) for Vietnamese victims of the US War against Vietnam, mostly Agent Orange victims, including the birth-deformed offspring of chemically effected parents, Charlie Liteky, a Catholic chaplain who won the Congressional Medal of Honor for saving the lives of over 20 of his comrades who had come under heavy fire, and World War II veteran Duncan Murphy participated in a “water-only” hunger strike on the steps of the Capitol building for 47 days protesting Reagan's illegal aid to fund Contra paramilitary activities seeking to overthrow the sovereign Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

On June 27, 1986, the International Court of Justice formally ruled that the United States had intervened by "training, equipping, financing and supplying the contra forces or otherwise encouraging, supporting and aiding military and paramilitary activities in and against" the Republic of Nicaragua, and had used "force" by "certain attacks on Nicaraguan territory," violating "sovereignty" by "authorizing overflights of Nicaraguan territory" while interrupting "peaceful maritime commerce." The Court declared that the US was "under a duty immediately to cease and refrain from all such acts" and "to make reparation to the Republic of Nicaragua for all injury caused to Nicaragua by the breaches of obligations under customary international law enumerated" herein. (Nicaragua v. United States of America), Merits, Judgment 27 June 1986 (I.C.J. Reports 1986, p. 14).

Brian Willson,  committed to non-violent struggle, non-violent tactics, and a non-violent way of life had no idea that the FBI had labeled him a terrorist. A year after the hunger strike, in the summer of 1987, two veterans and Wilson decided to go to Concord Naval Base in California to protest, once again, Reagan's policies of destruction. The men started a 40-day hunger strike on the three mile span of tracks where a 5-mile an hour train transports loaded munitions from the bunkers to the ships, in Reagan’s attempt to overthrow a revolutionary government in Nicaragua and stop protests in El Salvador.

The three men knew, or thought they knew, the protocol - $5,000 fine and one year in jail – for dealing with protesters who block the munitions. After all, the naval base had a history of hosting protesters, without casualties, dating back to the 1960s.

So, on September 1, 1987, never expecting the train to exceed the 5 mph speed limit, three times over, to 17 mph, Wilson was sitting on the tracks as the train approached. He tried to escape the oncoming train, with two train-spotters looking straight at him. He failed. Four days later he awoke to find himself with no legs, one ear missing, 19 broken bones, a fractured skull, and a case of retrograde amnesia, leaving him with no memory of the event. The other two men barely escaped as they were standing at the time of the oncoming train. 40 people, five photographers and one videographer, documenting the hunger strike, witnessed the incident, capturing it on camera. Despite the abundant evidence, the military claimed it did not know the men were on the tracks.

The amazing thing about Brian Willson is that this horrendous attempt to take his life made him even more determined to "stand up" to the all powerful military industrial complex, strengthening his identity with millions of unnamed victims of U.S. policy around the world.

Rejected by 33 publishers, Mr. Wilson finally found a publisher for his book, “Blood on the Tracks: The Life & Times of S. Brian Willson”.

"We are not worth more, they are not worth less." This is the mantra of S. Brian Willson and the theme that runs throughout his compelling psycho-historical memoir. Willson's story begins in small-town, rural America, where he grew up as a "Commie-hating, baseball-loving Baptist," moves through life-changing experiences in Viet Nam, Nicaragua and elsewhere, and culminates with his commitment to a localized, sustainable lifestyle.

Decorated Vietnam veteran George Mizo (lower left),
sits on the east steps of U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C.,

An Important Lesson - by George Mizo

You, my parents, taught me that it was wrong to kill . . . except in war.

You, my church, taught me that it was wrong to kill . . . except in war.

You, my teachers, taught me that it was wrong to kill . . . except in war.

You, my government, taught me that it was wrong to kill . . . except in war.

Then you sent me to war

And when I had no choice . . . except to kill,

Then you told me I was wrong!

And now I will tell you . . . my parents.

. . . my church.

. . . my teachers.

. . . my government.

It is not wrong to kill . . . except in war.

It is wrong to kill period!

And this you have to learn . . .

Just as I had to!

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The Next Bubble Burst: Student Debt?

Private lenders have preyed upon unsuspecting young people desiring to further their education for years. Of course, they have intentionally targeted those coming from poor socio-economic backgrounds. What else is new?

Well, now that the student debt bubble has accumulated over $1 trillion in student loan debt, starting July 1, Federal Pell Grants are set to be cut for hundreds of thousands of students across the US. Whats more, the Senate "blocked President Obama’s student loan interest-rate reduction plan and also shot down a GOP proposal, leaving the chamber without a solution and little more than a month to go before rates are scheduled to double".

The reforms will save $11 billion over 10 years, according to reports. Students will lose the $5,550-a-year grants in order to find the savings.

"The loss of Pell Grants could put college out of reach" for many students with fiscal hardships, the newspaper reported.

Under old rules, students who had taken at least six units of college courses but who did not have a diploma were eligible for the loans. The new rule eliminates the Pell Grants as well as other subsidized loans for the students, known as "ability-to-benefit" students.

Here's the thing. We're told the government can't find a way to pay for extending student loan rates, yet, we're not told that the government earns more money on these student loans than they pay out!  Meanwhile, half of all college graduates are either unemployed or underemployed.  And unlike a mortgage, one cannot walk away from one's student loan debt, even if one can't walk, can't talk...in other words,  in a coma, as student loan debt cannot be expunged, nor forgiven.

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New Scientific Study Provides Evidence That Morgellons Is a Physical Illness

Contrary to what so many medical practitioners claim, the controversial illness, Morgellons Disease (MD) does, indeed, have a physiological basis, according to a new research report, "Morgellons Disease: A Chemical and Light Microscopic Study,” published in the Journal of Clinical and Experimental Dermatology Research.

Characteristics of MD commonly described in the medical literature, include: insidious onset, dermatological signs and systemic symptoms, lack of response to immunosuppressive treatment and serological and clinical evidence linking this phenomenon with tickborne diseases such as Lyme borreliosis.

Patients with MD experience symptoms including fatigue, cognitive disability (described as “brain fog”), Fibromyalgia, joint pain, vision decline, neurological disorders, hair loss, disintegration of teeth, intermittent fever, low body temperature, sleep disturbances, reduced exercise capacity, peripheral neuropathy, delayed capillary refill, abnormal Romberg’s sign, decreased body temperature, cardiac arrhythmias, and tachycardia, and many patients with MD report inability or impaired ability to work.

For the first time, this study showed that MD filaments contain keratin (fibrous structural proteins, and the key of structural material making up the outer layer of human skin). "These observations suggest that hyperkeratosis and keratin filament production associated with spirochetal infection is a plausible explanation for the clinical and microscopic findings in MD."

Links:

Filament formation associated with spirochetal infection: a comparative approach to Morgellons disease

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The Knowledge Graph: Google's Ministry of Truth.

If you remember, Orwell's "Ministry of Truth" concerned itself with spreading lies in order to manipulate public opinion; film and radio carried this process even further. The Ministry of Truth coined phrases like "War is Peace", Freedom is Slavery" and "Ignorance is Power". In other words, fiction became truth. So, what does this have to do with Google?

Well, anyone with an IQ of a bat - a baseball bat, that is -  knows Google has a monopoly on information distribution. It's hard to come up with anything on the net that Google hasn't, at the very least, tried to take over. Take YouTube, for example. Prior to Google's takeover, censorship was not an issue on YouTube. Today, it most certainly is. "Copyright School", anyone?

So, now, under the guise of of trying to produce semantically meaningful results, I suppose, Google will replace the old strategy of matching keywords to webpages, and employ Metaweb algorithms to generate search results in the form of a new search tool,  "The Knowledge Graph". This tool will return answers or “facts” from pre-selected sources  such as the CIA Factbook, Wikipedia, the World Bank, and Freebase, an open database generated by Metaweb, which Google acquired in 2010.

In addition to providing traditional search results, the Knowledge Graph results will offer a wide range of answers to search queries directly on the results page. In other words, instead of finding the correct Wikipedia article that has the answer, the information will appear in a type of Googlepedia display.

Instead of using the typical search strength of a particular answer, this new feature will draw "facts" from places like Wikipedia for historical information, CIA World Factbook for geopolitical answers, the World Bank for economic facts, Freebase for information about people and other predetermined

But, do we really want to abdicate the role of "decider" to Google, who plans to supply lowest common denominator search results, considering the aforementioned underlying sources that will embed meaning into the content?  Not me. Personally, I prefer unstructured ambiguity. It assures better access to unbiased information.

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The Abortion Industry: Baby Flesh Pills, Roasted Human Fetuses and the Harvesting of Fetal Baby Parts

Sound like a horror movie? It's not. Although, it seems as if real life is becoming a horror movie, especially considering our grisly human fetal industry.

A British man of Taiwanese origin,has been arrested by the Thai police for having six roasted human fetuses in his luggage. Reports say he intended to sell the fetuses in Taiwan where some believe they would bring luck and wealth.  He could have made about $40,000

The fetuses were wrapped in gold leaf which led the police to believe that they were meant to be used in a black magic ritual called Guman Thong, which translate to 'golden child'. A traditional Guman Thong is made from the dead baby of a woman who died in childbirth.In the past, monks would cut the baby's body out of the mother', which they had exhumed from the grave, performed a ritual over it and then baked it. The recent arrest, along with the 2,000 fetuses found hidden in a Buddhist temple morgue that appear to have come from illegal abortion clinics.over 2,000 fetuses found in a Buddhist temple in Thailand less than two years ago,  has revealed that the ancient, illegal practices are still ongoing, catering to an international black market of the occult.

However, this is just the tip of a very dark iceberg.  The "abortion industry" is a huge profit making business. On March 8, 2000, ABC's news weekly 20/20 produced evidence of "a thriving industry in which aborted fetuses women donate to help medical research are being marketed for hundreds, even thousands of dollars." Chris Wallace interviewed several people involved in the harvesting of fetal body parts and produced a price list from one firm, Opening Lines, offering fetal spinal cords for $325, fetal reproductive organs for $550, fetal brains for $999 (if less than eight weeks), and the like.  A 1999 brochure from Opening Lines, a Division of Consultative and Diagnostic Pathology, Inc. stated purpose is to “maximize the utilization of fresh fetal tissue [they] process.”

Here is a current price list.

Partial-birth abortion, much more risky to mothers, are favored over other late-term methods of abortion because it affords the greatest opportunity to profit from the harvesting of fetal parts.  A hearing before congress revealed that most of the babies are 'harvested' alive, without anesthesia, to secure freshest organs. 

A new product warning label is needed: Fetal Free.

"Unborn babies at 20 weeks development actually feel pain more intensely than adults,” reports Dr. Ranalli, a neurologist at the University of Toronto. He adds, “[This is a] uniquely vulnerable time, since the pain system is fully established, yet the higher level pain-modifying system has barely begun to develop”

Despite this known fact, abortions are still routinely performed without the use of pain-mitigating interventions for the fetus".

While many companies tout humane and cruelty-free practices in industries involving animals (poultry) and in product-testing methodologies, abortion techniques are decidedly painful for the fetus and include one of the following procedures,

• Partial-birth abortion(D X): The unborn baby is delivered feet first, except for the head, which is punctured at the base of the skull with a sharp object. Thebrain is then suctioned out, killing the child.
• Dilation and Evacuation (D E): Sharp-edged instruments are used to grasp,twist, and tear the baby’s body into pieces, which are then removed from the womb.
• Saline abortion: Salt water is injected into the womb through the mother’s abdomen. The unborn baby swallows this fluid, is poisoned and dies in a process that sometimes takes 24 hours. The toxic saline solution causes severe burns over the unborn child’s entire body

In 1999, fifty U.S. company's purchased the stem cells, one company under the name American Society for Anti-Aging, and a company called Senomyx uses embryonic stem cells to test popular foods that we all eat. Pepsi just recently stopped using them , but Nestle, and Lipton are patrons of Senomyx. The latest company to hit the headlines is StemCells Inc, which has just gained federal approval in the US to harvest the brains from abortions, and use them in experiments.

I guess if you believe a fetus is not really a human, just a clump of cells, then you should have no objection to to this grisly industry.  At the same time, I bet you can't help but feel a twinge of disgust.   .

Links:

Thousands of pills filled with powdered human baby flesh discovered by customs officials in South Korea

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Predatory Banksters Push Man to Suicide.

Banks like Wells Fargo destroy lives every single day, and get away with it despite their cruel and unethical practices. Here is one of those stories that ended in tragedy.

Right from the start, homeowners, Norman and Oriane Rousseau provided proof to Wells Fargo, that they - the bank - had, indeed, received the Rousseau's mortgage payment and cashed their check; but had misapplied the payment. The bank lied, claiming they ordered a stop payment on the cashier's check, despite the fact that a  cashier's check payment can't be stopped.  Like a well-oiled machine, the bank continued their process of destruction. The bank "lost" their payment three times in the last eight months of the loan. The bank continued to lose every shred of Norman’s evidence: the cashier’s check receipts; certified mail from him with returned signatures from them; certified mail from his attorney; documentation that they were cashing the checks, etc.

“In May 2009 the bank claimed the couple had missed their April payment. They proved they had made a payment in person at the bank, using a cashier’s check and that the check had been cashed by the bank. The bank then claimed they had ordered a stop payment on the check, even though a cashier’s check payment cannot be stopped,” writes Johnson. “The runaround began. The bank began harassing them for payment, sometimes as many as six-eight calls per day, sometimes even late at night. On August 3, 2009 the bank claimed the Rousseaus hadn’t paid June or July’s payments either, demanding $3,406.50. But then on August 8 the bank assured them they were current on payments. Then the bank again claimed it had not been paid and that the bank had been trying to contact them without success, and that they now owed $3,478,25.”

The Rousseaus soon learned that the loan they believed they were paying was entirely different from what they received — a loan loaded with prepayment penalties, unnecessary fees, and one that had them paying less than the amount of interest on the loan, making it reset and actually add to the cost of their debt. The longer they continued to make minimum payments, the further they fell behind, and with the “lost” check they fell into a cycle they were unable to ever get out of.

Norman tried to make his voice heard. He took his case to authorities at every level: local, state, and national to no avail. Norman lost his job and used all their savings on lawyers and the legal fight. Eventually, pushed by banksters to the brink of homelessness, Norman Rousseau shot and killed himself. An evicted Oriane Rousseau, his wife, doesn’t even have the money to bury her husband.


Rousseau v. Wells Fargo

Husband’s Suicide Yesterday, Wells Fargo to Evict Wife Tomorrow Anyway

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Another Effort to Take the Internet Away From the People.

Behind closed doors, in Dallas Texas, trade representatives of big corporations are secretly negotiating a massive trade agreement called the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which includes regulations for the Internet – including intellectual property provisions that could potentially "harm online expression, privacy and innovation on the Internet".

This Agreement may be even worse than ACTA as it could tie the hands legislators and create new, international standards for intellectual property enforcement. Internet users and free expression advocates like EFF aren’t allowed in the room and are forbidden from seeing the text, even though U.S. Trade Representatives claim  they have made “extraordinary efforts” to include public stakeholders in negotiations. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Like ACTA, negotiations exclude the public, while welcoming private industry representatives with open arms.

Last week, 32 legal scholars sent a letter to the office of the USTR demanding transparency in the process. Including the release of the text and demand for real participation from civil society, they demanded the immediate release of “reports on US positions and proposals on intellectual property matters that are currently given only to Industry Trade Advisory Committee members under confidentiality agreements.” This is key because there is nothing that could justify the withholding of such reports that simply outline the U.S. position on intellectual property from the public. This is especially true given the fact that the U.S. government’s proposals could impede Congress from engaging in domestic legal reform of legislation regulating IP.

US Congressman Darrell Issa just released the Trans Pacific Partnership Intellectual Property Rights Chapter on KeepTheWebOPEN.com. Only problem is, it's the old 15-month old version. How stupid do they think we are?

Via Public Citizen:

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is being negotiated in secret and the stakes for the 99% couldn't be higher...The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) "free trade" agreement is a stealthy policy being pressed by corporate America, a dream of the 1 percent, that in one blow could:

• offshore millions of jobs,

• free Wall Street and its banksters from oversight,

• reduce Internet freedom,

• ban policies needed to create green jobs and rebuild local economies,

• decrease access to medicine by extending drug company monopolies,

• empower corporations to attack our environmental and health safeguards, such as tobacco control and clean air and water regulations.

Closed-door talks are on-going between the U.S. and Australia, Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam; with countries like Japan and China potentially joining later.

600 corporate advisors have access to the text, while the public, Members of Congress, journalists, and civil society are excluded. And so far what we know about what's in there is very scary!

But there's still time to organize to shine a light on the horrors of the TPP and convince our governments to instead pursue policies that benefit the 99% in our countries. Watch this video (you may want to mute) and then take action by signing our petition calling for an end to secrecy in the TPP negotiations.

TPP: Spreading NAFTA to Asia and Chile...Guaranteed to screw you and me.

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49 Headless Corpses Found in Northern Mexico

The gruesome discovery of nearly 50 headless, footless, and handless corpses were found outside Monterrey, Mexico, producing the latest casualties in a brutal war between the country's top two drug cartels: the Zetas, who claimed responsibility for these headless corpses, and who were trained by the US Special Forces for the so-called “War on Drugs”, and the Sinaloas 

Mexican drug cartels have diversified into money laundering, extortion, kidnapping and trafficking in illegal migrants.

Below are some of the worst attacks since President Felipe Calderon took office in December 2006 and declared war on powerful drug cartels. About 50,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence since then.

* Sept 15, 2008 - Suspected members of the Zetas drug gang tossed grenades into a crowd celebrating Mexico's independence day in the western city of Morelia, killing eight people and wounding more than 100.

* Jan 31, 2010 - Suspected cartel assailants killed 13 high school students and two adults at a party in Ciudad Juarez across from El Paso, Texas.

* March 13 - Hitmen killed three people linked to the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juarez in March, provoking "outrage" from U.S. President Barack Obama.

* June 28 - Suspected cartel gunmen shot and killed a popular gubernatorial candidate in the northern state of Tamaulipas in the worst cartel attack on a politician to date. Rodolfo Torre, 46, and four aides from the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, were ambushed on their way to a campaign event for the July 4 state election.

* July 18 - Gunmen burst into a birthday party in the northern city of Torreon, using automatic weapons to kill 17 party-goers and wound 18 others.

* July 24 - Police unearthed 51 bodies in a grave outside Mexico's business capital, Monterrey, in northern Mexico over several days. Some corpses were burned beyond recognition.

* Aug 25 - Marines found the bodies of 58 men and 14 women at a ranch near the Gulf of Mexico in Tamaulipas state, 90 miles (150 km) from the Texas border, after a firefight with drug hitmen in which three gunmen and a marine died.

* April, 2011 - Officials unearthed the first of what turned out to be more than 450 bodies buried in mass graves in the northern states of Durango and Tamaulipas.

* Aug 20 - Five headless bodies were found in Acapulco, taking the number of people killed in the popular Pacific resort to at least 25 in that one week.

* Aug 25 - Masked gunmen torch a casino in Monterrey, killing 52 people, most of them women. The attack takes less than three minutes.

* Sept 20 - Thirty-five bodies are found abandoned in two trucks on an underpass in the eastern Gulf city of Veracruz, which had been largely untouched by the violence.

* Oct 6 - Mexican security forces find 32 bodies at several locations around Veracruz, just two days after the government unveiled a plan to bolster security in Veracruz state.

* Nov 24 - More than 20 bodies are found in cars in Mexico's second city, Guadalajara, a day after the burned bodies of 16 people are found in the home state of the country's powerful drug lord, Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman.

* Feb 19, 2012 - A fight between rival gangs at a prison just outside Monterrey in northern Mexico leaves 44 dead.

* May 4 - The bodies of nine people were found hanging from a bridge and 14 others found dismembered in the city of Nuevo Laredo, just across the U.S. border from Laredo in Texas.

* May 13 - Eighteen people who were found decapitated and dismembered near Mexico's second-largest city, Guadalajara.

Links:

Operation Fast and Furious Outrage is Real

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FBI Pushing Plan to Force Surveillance Backdoors on Social Networks, Web Email Providers and VOIP

The FBI wants Internet companies to support a proposal that would require firms like Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, and Google, to build in backdoors for government surveillance. If passed, these ompanies would have to provide the bureau with decryption tools to make sense of the information that it captures.

The Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) already provides assistance to law enforcement by requiring that they cooperate with police in order to conduct lawfully-authorized electronic surveillance.  The FCC extended CALEA in 2004 to apply to broadband providers, but web companies are not covered under this law.  

Of course, once again, it's all in the name of national security and public safety.

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