Sand Wars: The Sands are Running Out!

It's time to draw a line in the sand because we've had our collective heads buried in this loose material consisting of rock or mineral grains for far too long. The impact of this elementary particle on our lives is second to only air and water. I had no idea!

Yes, I knew that sand is melted and transformed into glass, that it's crucial to the computer industry, and, of course, to the sabbaticals we take to rest and recreate, but I had no idea that it's the foundation of our modern development, our infrastructure, our way of life. From highways and habitats--reinforced concrete is two-thirds sand-- to cleaning products to cosmetics to food and wine to you name it, sand is at the core.

The construction of one average house takes 200 tons of sand; hospital takes 3,000 tons of sand; each km of highway takes 30,000 tons of sand, and construction of a nuclear plant requires 12 million tons of sand. That's a hell of a lot of sand! This kind of demand has created the never spoken of sand wars, sand mafias, and most important of all, to environmental damage the likes of which we've never seen.

No, the following documentary has absolutely nothing to do with "flat earth". So please do not disregard if you are not a "flat earther"; it's far too important. Having said that, I am very grateful to him for uploading this all important documentary.

So Watch! and then follow it up by reading Sand Wars: True Crimes Against Nature at Clint Richardson's Reality Blog and discover that the situation is much worse than even this documentary depicts.

Read more...

Is AIDS a Deliberately Created Biological Agent?

We've been led to believe that AIDS came from African Green Monkeys, but  many very intelligent people, including doctors, lawyers and Nobel Peace Prize winners seem to think that this fatal leap from ape to man theory is pure rubbish, backed up by politically motivated, psuedoscience. Moreover, they can prove Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) was created in a lab with documentation. And some, such as Dr. Body 'Ed' Graves, J.D., have experienced, first hand, the ramifications of not only exposing that evidence, but through his personal experience with HIV/AIDS.

In 2004, ecologist Wangari Maathai, the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, claimed that the AIDS virus was a deliberately created biological agent, a genocidal plot against the third world. She won the prize for her work in human rights and reversing deforestation across Africa.

How is this possible when genetic manipulation is, from what we've been told, fairly recent technology? Well, according to Dr. Romesh Senewiratne, if you read the work of Macfarlane Burnet (biological warfare expert) and publications of the Walter and Eliza Hall institute in the 1950s and 60s you will find that techniques for genetic manipulation of viruses through a range of means was underway long before the appearance of HIV. In fact, you can trace the genetic engineering/manipulation back to the early 1900s, beginning with the Rockefeller-funded research of Peyton Rous, who transplanted cancer between species in the early 1900s.

“When "kuru" (a New Guinean term [to represent] infective spongiform encephalitis [now referred to as prion]) ) was first described by Carlton Gadjusek and MacFarlane Burnet as an infective agent "spread by cannibalism" in the 1950s, it was described as a "slow virus". These were later termed "retroviruses". In fact, the infection they called "kuru" is pathologically indistinguishable from a sheep virus known as "scrapie". It so happens that the epidemic broke out very close to an ANZAC Second World War base, and that Macfarlane Burnet (from Melbourne University) and Gadjusek (from NIH) were both biological warfare experts.
[...]
HIV was developed as a retrovirus (previously called a 'slow virus') by scientists in Australia, USA, Japan and France. It was seeded into targeted populations through a number of means - infected batches of vaccines, blood transfusions and other blood products, and possibly specially bred mosquitoes (entomological warfare, at which Australia's CSIRO are world leaders)...
[...]
My research suggests that HIV was manufactured from selective splicing of pathogenic genes into the sheep retrovirus known as "scrapie" using bacteriophage technology (in which the Australian scientist Sir Frank MacFarlane Burnet was a pioneer in the 1940s, 50s and 60s). Infected batches of vaccines (notably hepatitis B vaccines, injected polio and smallpox vaccines) are implicated in the initial epidemics in Africa and the USA and subsequent epidemics in New Guinea and the Pacific Islands.-- Dr. Romesh Senewiratne

One more thing. HIV/AIDS is not a gay disease, which becomes evident once you begin looking at the epidemiological facts. Since this biological agent began ravaging sub-Saharan Africa--which is home to just over 12% of the world’s population but two-thirds of all people infected with HIV, 13 women for every 10 men--in the early 1980s it has NOT been associated with either homosexuality or injecting drug use there.












"Eugenics and Genocide in the Modern World - the Cause of the AIDS Epidemic"

Read more...

Narcocorridos: To the Glory of the Mexican Drug Cartels

 To a growing number Mexicans and Americans, narco traffickers have become iconic outlaws, a new  pathway out of poverty, and one step closer to the "American Dream".

Narcocorridos are popular on both sides of the border, with popular music videos, sold-out concerts and CDs sold at Wal-Mart. "We're bloodthirsty, crazy, and we like to kill," they sing. Modern day Robin Hoods? Hardly, but that's how many teens and young adults see them.

“I urge people to reconsider this idea that the cartels and the government are two distinct entities. On the contrary, it’s impossible for an organized crime organization — especially one that’s transnational — to function without employees inside the state at all levels." -- John Gibler, author of To Die in Mexico: Dispatches from Inside the Drug War

From the documentary Narco Cultura

“For Mexicans and Latinos in the Americas, there is no music more popular today than narcocorridos. These bloodthirsty and explicit odes to the exploits of narco traffickers and drug lords of Mexico openly glorify violence, narcotics and money. Like gangsta rap in the nineties, “Narco” is a movement threatening to burst into the mainstream.

Featuring powerful footage from the front lines of the drug wars and performances from some of the hottest Narcocorrido artists (including El Komander and Buknas de Culiacan) NARCO CULTURA takes viewers behind the scenes of the most explosive and violent music subculture in America.

It's hard to imagine the way it must feel to live in absolute fear in an increasingly poor and violent neighborhood, yet, at the same time, be able to see, literally, right over the fence--supposedly the safest city in America, El Paso, Texas--what appears to be a safe haven. 

Read more...

The Bizarre and Strange Circumstances Surrounding the Death of JFK Jr.

Mostly taken from the documentary Dark Legacy II The Murder of JFK Jr.

The report of the National Transportation Safety Board came out on August 8, 2000 (on January 8, 2001, the NTSB removed their original posting, and greatly edited the contents of the report. The unedited original NTSB report, downloaded from the NSTB website in August of 2000, can be read at link), 13 months after the plane crash of JFK Jr.  It contradicts many of the lies pushed in the media.

Timeline:

On John’s fatal last Friday, he told his staff not to worry about their jobs, because, “As long as I’m alive, this magazine will continue to publish.” This would be a really cruel thing for a guy to say who was planning to kill himself in a few hours.

At 8:30, 45 minutes after arriving, John, his sister-in-law, and his wife took off from Caldwell Airport in NJ, and headed northeast toward Martha’s Vineyard ascending to a cruising altitude of 5,500 feet. An NTSB radar analysis shows the final moments of the flight in great detail.

At 9:33, the plane, still headed northeast, began descending from its cruising altitude of 5,500 feet.

At 9:38 the plane while still descending began a slight turn to the right so that it was headed due east, lining itself up with the southern coast of Martha’s Vineyard.

At 9:38 and and 20 seconds the plane completed the turn and stopped its descent, leveling off at 2200 feet. But it’s against FAA regulations for a plane to fly below 2,500 feet without first contacting the tower. So in a manner that’s typical of John’s carefulness and following procedures, he brought the plant back up to 2,500 feet.

At 9:38 and 50 seconds, with wings level, the plane was on final approach, with 14 miles to go to the airport. At 200 mph, the plane would land in about 5 minutes.

At 9:39 John contacted the tower.

At 9:40 and 15 seconds, one minute and 15 seconds later, the plane suddenly dove out of the sky, falling 2,500 feet in 45 seconds, crashing into the water at 200 mph.

At 10:00 Adam Budd (link is cached page because link was removed from Boston.com) reported the missing plane to the FAA.

“An employee of Martha's Vineyard Airport alerted federal aviation officials that John F. Kennedy Jr.'s plane was unaccounted for nearly four hours before a phone call from a Kennedy family friend early Saturday morning triggered a massive air and sea search.

The first phone call - which cited Kennedy by name - prompted no action by the Federal Aviation Administration. It was made at 10:05 p.m. Friday, only 25 minutes after Kennedy's plane was lost on radar and presumably crashed into the ocean.

''Actually, Kennedy Jr.'s on board. He's, uh, they wanna know, uh, where he is,'' Adam Budd told an unidentified FAA employee at the Bridgeport Automated Flight Service Station.

Until the plane is found, there is no way to say if an earlier search would have made a difference in the survival chances of Kennedy, his wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, or her sister, Lauren Bessette.

However, a transcript of Budd's call, obtained by the Globe, adds fuel to questions about whether the FAA responded as promptly as it should have, and as quickly as its own regulations specify, to concerns about Kennedy's missing plane.

FAA officials said they responded appropriately to the call.

''We've researched the matter and found the FAA was not told that the aircraft was overdue, or that there was any indication there was a problem or a cause for concern that would raise warning flags,'' said Eliot Brenner, a senior FAA spokesman.

Kennedy was flying to Martha's Vineyard to drop off Lauren Bessette, after which he planned to fly to Hyannis to attend the wedding of his cousin Rory Kennedy. A well-dressed couple with a child who had come to the airport to meet Lauren Bessette grew concerned when the plane did not arrive as expected by 10 p.m.

They sought help from Budd, 21, a Bridgewater State College student from Sharon, Mass. In a telephone interview last night, Budd said he is also a licensed pilot who has worked for the past month as a ramp attendant at the airstrip.

Budd said he first called the airport tower, but was told Kennedy's plane was not expected - Kennedy had filed no flight plan - and that it had made no radio contact.

Budd then called the FAA outpost in Bridgeport, Conn., a repository for flight plans that also provides pilots with weather information and notices about flight restrictions.

During his conversation with the unidentified FAA employee, Budd asked if the FAA could track an airplane. Budd said he was with airport operations at Martha's Vineyard, then mentioned Kennedy's name and provided two possible aircraft numbers for Kennedy's plane.

The employee questioned Budd repeatedly about who he was and where he was calling from. After Budd gave his name, the FAA employee asked if he was, in fact, with airport operations. He ultimately told Budd, ''We don't give this information out to people over the phone.''

At that point Budd gave up, saying, ''I'll just have 'em wait,'' and then, ''All right, it's no big deal.''

In the interview, Budd said the transcript tells only part of the story.

''You have to hear his tone of voice, because the guy was kind of rude to me, making me feel uncomfortable,'' he said. ''I've called before and they were happy to help me out. The guy might have been having a bad day or something. I don't know.''

Brenner, the FAA spokesman, said the problem with the tone was Budd's. ''There was no tone of concern in the voice or anything out of the ordinary,'' Brenner said. ''There needed to be some expression that this airplane is overdue.''

In the end, no action was taken until a 2:15 a.m. Saturday phone call from Carol Ratowell, a Kennedy family friend. Her call to the Coast Guard set in motion a multiagency search that began with calls to regional airports and officially became a search and rescue mission at 3:28 a.m.

Globe correspondent Jennifer Babson contributed to this report.

No search and rescue

Breaking news broadcasts at the time of the incident reported that there was final communication between the FAA and JFK Jr’s plane at the precise moment of 9:39 PM according to Petty Officer Todd Burgun from the Coast Guard base in Boston. This is absolutely consistent with the radar information from the NTSB that was used to reconstruct the last moments of the plane before it crashed therefore his report is credible, otherwise he could not have identified the exact minute that the plane was holding at 2,500 feet, waiting to get clearance from the tower before descending. He had to have gotten that information from FAA flight personnel in the tower at Martha’s Vineyard Airport.

This contact by JFK Jr. to the airport is very important for numerous reasons. Whenever you contact air traffic control, your particular radar blip is then entered into the FAA’s air traffic computer system. If anywhere on your flight path your plane should happen to descend below 100 feet, the computer will automatically set off an alarm at the FAA Traffic Control Facility. Therefore, as a result of Kennedy’s 9:39 contact with the tower, the computer should’ve set off a low altitude alarm in the FAA’s traffic control offices when the plane descended below 100 feet.

The FAA should’ve begun the search at 9:40 when this low altitude alarm went off. They knew before the plane hit the water. FAA regulations require that a search commence anytime a plane contacts the tower on its final approach and then fails to land within 5 minutes. As a result of JFK Jr’s contact with the tower,, the FAA also should’ve begun a search at 9:44 when JFK Jr’s plane failed to land.

How long did it take the FAA to begin a focused search... searching the approaches to the Martha Vineyard’s airport?

15 ½ HOURS!

The cover up:

The information containing JFK Jr’s contact with the FAA was disappeared. At 12:30 Burgun was removed/silenced from any further reports of any kinds. In fact, all government agencies went silent and reporters were referred to the Pentagon spokesman, Col. Steven Roark.

The report from Todd Burgun wasn’t the only on-the-scene reporting that disappeared from the news by the Pentagon. According to the Pentagon the families of both JFK Jr and Carolyn Bessette waited 4 hours to report them missing. Total lie! Friends of Lauren Bessette, Carolyn’s sister, were waiting at the airport and when the plane didn’t land at around 10:00, quickly reported it to the FAA officials, who did nothing.

One hour later, at 11 PM Senator Edward Kennedy contacted the FAA to let them know the plane was missing. The FAA officials did nothing.

Since the FAA refused to act, at 2:15 AM a family friend, Carol Radziwill, contacted the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard contacted the FAA. The FAA then contacted the Air Force who told the Coast Guard that they were in charge and sent the Coast Guard on a wild goose chase, to search an area 100 miles away from anywhere the plane may have gone down.

Linda Killian from People Magazine questioned Lt. Col. Steve Roark, the director of the U.S. Air Force's National Search and Rescue School at the time and former director of the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center, on TV about the time discrepancy regarding official notification of the missing plane. Raw uninterrupted static cut her off before she could even finish the question. This question never got answered and never got asked again and never got any mention in any media outlet.

At 6:30 AM Ted Kennedy woke up John Podesta, Clinton’s Chief of Staff. At 7:00 AM, Podesta woke up Clinton. At 7:15, Clinton told Podesta to call the Air Force and warn them if they didn’t have a search underway in 15 minutes, they shouldn’t bother to come to work Monday morning because they would all be fired, if they weren’t in jail.

So the Air Force scattered two planes and two helicopters across 20,000 square miles of ocean. The Air Force kept them searching this vast expanse for the next five and a half hours.

click image to enlarge

Of course, there were honest employees at the FAA who did their job, one of which is to perform what is called an “N-Tap” radar analysis. An “N-Tap” goes back to take-off, starting with the plane identifying itself to the tower, giving its “N number” its registration number, in this case, N529JK. The plane’s radar blip is identified at take-off. And this particular blip is then followed along its flight path until it disappears, indicating the crash site. The New York Times said this report was available at 5 AM.

When Col. Roark was asked why he his search was scattered all over the Atlantic, when the “N-Tap” report was available 8 hours earlier, pinpointing the location of crash, he said he would continue on the same track, stating that “we have nothing that absolutely pinpoints to one area as opposed to another, so we can’t rule out the entire flight.” When asked again about the radar position of the crash site, Roark lied and said it was just a “possible” position.

Moreover, all civil aircraft are required to carry an emergency beacon, an ELT (Emergency Locator Transmitter), which are crash activated. The ELT sends out a signal that is received by a network of satellites that can instantly locate the crash within a matter of a few feet. 

In other words, the FAA knew where JFK Jr's plane went down before it hit the water.  But, it wasn't until 1:00 the next afternoon when Lauren Bessette's suitcase washed up on shore that the Coast Guard was able to focus on something remotely near the crash site.

click to enlarge

JFK Jr was a careful and conscientious pilot, who did file a flight plan and who always flew his relatively new plane with a flight instructor as he was working on his instrument rating, not to mention his injured ankle.   He was not the careless, irresponsible daredevil that the media portrayed.  JFK Jr had a 17 year record--more than 300 hours--of careful, meticulous adherence to safety procedures.

Missing Pieces:

Where did the backup battery--necessary to preserve the last few words of the pilot on the radio and in the cockpit--to the cockpit voice recorder go?

Who was JFK Jr talking to minutes before he took off?  What as he talking about?  But it's missing despite the fact that it's supposed to be in the NTSB report.

Where is the aquamarine duffel that JFK Jr kept his flight log, which records who was on the plane?

What about the flight instructor who was reported--by family friend, Carol Radziwill--to be on the plane taken from the earliest statements after the crash? JFK Jr never flew his new plane without a flight instructor.  Later on, "the family" reported the flight instructor was not on the plane and that JFK Jr didn't even have a license to pilot the plane that crashed, when he most certainly did.

So who is this person identifying themselves as "the family" and spreading lies?  
Arnold Schwarzenegger, perhaps?



And where did the missing airplane seat go? Portions of five of the six seats were recovered. Could it be the reason for the delayed search?  They had to recover the body of the flight instructor who wasn't on the plane according to unreliable or coerced sources?

Read more...

A Giant Step Towrd the National Security State: The Dirty Secrets of George H. W. Bush

Although, I'm always a little leery of ex-CIA or ex-intelligence, as I find it hard to believe former intelligence officials are allowed to expose anything, this documentary on former President George H. W. Bush is very interesting.

Recorded December 10, 1988



Here are some of the questions that former CIA Station Chief in Angola under Director George H. W. Bush, and author of "In Search of Enemies", John Stockwell addresses:

How does the United States economic and political system really work?

Why doesn't anyone expose the corruption/scandal?

How did the establishment ensure Jesse Jackson's failure in the 1988 primaries?

Ronald Reagan gave us the most corrupt administration in history with almost 200 people indited or jailed for corruption, so why didn't the Democrats--Governor Michael Dukakis--fight harder to win the 1988 election?

Why did Bush choose Dan Quayle? Impeachment insurance?

Read more...

Predators in Your Backyard

Across the world scientists are releasing predators, nature’s ultimate killers, close to where people live. In Florida, a new population of panthers, feared as ambush predators, have been released near to the busy town of Naples. In the Italian Alps, bears have been reintroduced after they became virtually extinct, and now try to get into people’s homes in the middle of the night. And in Yellowstone National Park, wolves have been brought back 70 years after they were exterminated.

Horizon meets the scientists behind this radical scheme, and the people who now have to share their backyards with these dangerous predators.

Read more...

The Secret World of Gold

Read more...

President Obama: The More Effective Evil?

For some time now, Black Agenda Report has been calling the Obama administration not the lesser of two but the more effective evil, able to enact measures that white Democrats or Republicans could not without massive public opposition.

Is President Obama the black face of white supremacy?
So what has the impact of Barack Obama's presidency--America's first black presidency--been on the African American community, who has always possessed an "instinctive distrust of power" as Glen Ford says, and humanity at large?  What happens when that power has a black face? Is the Obama administration simply the continuation of the Bush administration?  Is President Obama the white establishment's perfect weapon to pacify the black community, normally the most progressive constituency?  Is Obama's "Race to the Top" Bush's "No Child Left Behind" on steroids?What impact has Obama's presidency had on the legacy of African American's resisting and opposing the United States' imperial wars?  What impact have Barack Obama's policies had on the African continent?  Was the election of Barack Obama the death of black politics?  All of these questions and more are answered in the documentary below.

"The more we have black people reaching the higher ranks of the presidency, the business world, politics, entertainment, even...it  makes it appear to people on the outside looking in that we're co-signing onto this or that we actually are doing much better than we are.  You wouldn't know that there are 2.3 million people in prison--we make up almost half of them--that we're being murdered in the streets...and you can just go through the list of all the social problems that exist.  But it makes it look as though we're doing much better than we are even though things are just as bad, if not worse since Martin Luther King died.  It makes it look as if we're co-signing onto these things being done."--  Ben Woods, Students Against Mass Incarceration

Millions of Americans suffered a loss of wealth during the recession and the sluggish "recovery" that followed. But the last half-decade has proved far worse for black and Hispanic families than for white families, starkly widening the already large gulf in wealth between non-Hispanic white Americans and most minority groups, according to a new study from the Urban Institute. “It was already dismal,” Darrick Hamilton, a professor at the New School in New York, said of the wealth gap between black and white households. “It got even worse.”

Read more...

Choosing Between Christ and the Church: A Little Matter of Genocide

Rev. Kevin Annett's documentary (below) reveals Canada's darkest secret: under the guise of religion, the deliberate extermination of native peoples and the theft of their land.

The Indian Residential School System in Canada was an extension in evolution of an older system of genocide that began as early as 1540 in Eastern Canada and during the 1840s on the Pacific coast. It's foundational purpose was the deliberate and systematic eradication of all indigenous populations that would not leave their lands and resources, abolish their own cultures and languages. That purpose has never wavered but has assumed different forms and strategies over the last century and adapted to the times and regions of which it played out as European conquest moved westward across the continent. By the time that residential schools were established across Canada, around 1900, "the plague" itself had exterminated most Aboriginal people in a genocide whose details are largely unrecorded and perhaps, forgotten.

The parents of the children who attended these schools were forced into signing away guardianship to the principal who ran the residential school in accordance with "The Indian Act", race based legislation that legally separates indigenous into a separate and inferior class of citizenship under the control of one man, the federal administrator of Indian Affairs. The Indian Act allows aboriginal people to be expelled from their homes on reserves lands, arbitrarily jailed, subjected to involuntary medical treatment and denied the right to elect their own leaders. Under the Indian Act, native people are legal wards of the Canadian state in perpetuity, having the same status as children or mentally incompetent. This racist legislation has remained relatively unchanged since it was enacted in 1876.

So approximately two decades ago, Annett blew the whistle on his own church, regarding the more than "50,000 children [at Indian Reservation Schools in British Columbia Canada] who died from beatings, starvation, rape and torture, or being deliberately exposed to tuberculosis and left to cough their lives away in squalor and terror: all at the hands of Christian men and women who have never been prosecuted for their crimes." The annual death rate at the Indian Reservation Schools was 50%!

Read more...

Art of Deception

Read more...

9/11's Orwellian Talking Points

Green Party candidate, in the 2008 presidential election, Cynthia McKinney, having served six terms in the House of Representatives,   is a very rare individual who speaks truth to power. One of the first things that she questioned directly after 9/11, were the slick brochures, magazines with photographs, etc, that appeared on the newsstands immediately after the attacks that day.

Moreover, as a congresswoman in September 2001, all of the representatives received talking points that consisted of, in the words of former Black Party Panther member and former chairman of the Chicago chapter, Fred Hampton (assassinated by cointel program), "answers that don't answer, explanations that don't explain, and conclusions that don't conclude."

In a nutshell, these "talking points" said the United States was hit because we are free. Oh, the irony! They were only "free" to say, we are free. That's it! If you dared to go beyond those talking points, if you did not subscribe to 'groupthink' the powers that be made sure you would give up your seat in Congress to someone who would obey.

Here are two of the many examples of representatives who would've tried to truly investigate 9/11, but because they acted as if they were free, never got the chance. Earl Hilliard, the first black representative elected in the state of Alabama since reconstruction, served on the House International Relations Committee, but he dared to travel to Libya to establish relations with the people and government so he was not reelected in 2002.

Curt Weldon is another representative from Pennsylvania who stumbled upon Able Danger. Because of that, the FBI raided his house and his daughter's house, resulting in him losing his bid for reelection.

Furthermore, documentation from the 1999 trial to ascertain the complicity of the U.S. government in the assassination of Martin Luther King, proves that the CIA spent one-third of its budget to buy the media, Operation Mockingbird. Fast forward to 2003, and the United States media can legally lie to the American people with impunity. That is now U.S. law!

That's not all. McKinney said all 535 politicians on Capitol Hill have to sign a pledge of allegiance to Israel. If they don’t sign it, their funds are cut, and the American Israeli Political Action Committee (AIPAC).







Links:


Freedom Rider: Silence on Cynthia McKinney

Read more...

The Best Connected Company in the World.

A revealing documentary about the international world of private equity banking.

The Carlyle Group, one of the largest investment banks in the world, is based in Washington and has accumulated its capital mainly by investments in the defence industry. On their list of employees are people like Lou Gerstner (former chairman of IBM), George Bush Sr., James Baker III, John Major (former British Prime Minister) and Fidel Ramos (former Prime Minister of the Philipines). The Carlyle Group invests in areas that are closely tied to government policy: aero space and defense, telecom, real estate, health care and the banking business. With 16 billion dollar under management they have the reputation of being the best-connected company in the world. Their list of private investors include George Soros, the Saudi Royal Family and the Bin Laden Family. How does the Carlyle Group operate, who are the people behind the Carlyle Group and how much power does Carlyle have? This film explores the fine line between the conflict of interests and a new global way of doing business.

Read more...

History Shows Copyright Monopolies Slow Down Innovation

Copyright and patent monopoly is supposed to encourage innovation and creativity, right? Well, that's what we're told. However, history shows the opposite is true. It's clear that the push for more severe laws and enforcement in the area of copyright/intellectual property is nothing more than a power move.

Let’s start around the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. In that day and age, copyright monopoly laws were in force in the United Kingdom, and pretty much the United Kingdom alone (where they were enacted in 1557). You know the “Made in Country X” that is printed or engraved on pretty much all our goods? That originated as a requirement from the British Customs against German-made goods, as a warning label that they were shoddy goods made in Germany at the time. It spread to pretty much global use.

But Germany didn’t have copyright monopoly laws at this point in time, and historians argue that was the direct cause of Germany’s engineering excellence overtaking that of the United Kingdom. In the UK, knowledge of handicrafts was expensive to come by. Books and the knowledge they carried were locked down in the copyright monopoly construct, after all. In Germany, however, the same knowledge was available at print cost – and thus, engineering skills proliferated. With every new person learning engineering, one more person started to improve the skill set for himself and for the country at large. The result is that Germany still, 200 years later, has an outstanding reputation for engineering skills – the rise of which are directly attributable to a lack of the copyright monopoly.

Everything is a Remix:

"All inventions are not so much original ideas but advances or tipping points along a continuous line of invention by many different people, but the most dramatic results can happen when ideas are combined. By connecting ideas together, creative leaps can be made producing some of history’s greatest breakthroughs.
[...]The interdependence of our creativity has been obscured by powerful cultural ideas but technology is not exposing this connectedness." -- Kirby Ferguson, creator of "Everything is a Remix"

"Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery. celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: 'It’s not where you take things from – it’s where you take them to.'” -Jim Jarmusch

Read more...

Slavery By Consent

Read more...

Hollywood Makes Nazi Filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl Efforts Look like Child's Play

To be sure, the multi-billion dollar Hollywood movie machine makes Nazi filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl efforts look like child's play in comparison. The Department of Defense, the CIA, and just about every branch of the military has an entertainment industry liaison.

Let's face it. Most people form their beliefs about, not only, war - because, after all, most of us have not experienced the horrors of battle first hand - from Hollywood's heroic visions, but, in addition, America's beliefs about the invincibility and elevated moral status of the United States, itself. Therefore, Hollywood became, and continues to be the Pentagon's greatest recruiting tool, ensuring that the drama played out between American "war heroes" and the fill-in-the-blank "villains" on a larger than life screen always painted a pro-war, pro-militarist picture. Children, of course, were and are their biggest target.

Where's the proof? Well, there are tens of thousands of documents: letters/correspondence between the Pentagon and movie producers, internal memos written by the military.

"Perhaps the worst thing about the collaboration between Hollywood and the military is not the censorship, but the self censorship. When you know that you are going to need Hollywood's assistance (film footage), and you know they will be looking at your script, you write it to make them happy right from the beginning." - Dave Robb, Investigative Journalist

Read more...

Read more...

Core of Corruption: In the Shadows

Core of Corruption: In the Shadows

..is a documentary film series which details a comprehensive investigation into clandestine intelligence operations and conspiracies. The project is surfacing exclusive whistle blowers, insiders and critical evidence for the very first time. Over 2,000 hours of credible network news clips have been surfaced for this ground breaking event, most of which have never been seen since they aired and have never been available on the internet. Some of the video news segments for this project, when requested from the networks, were denied access to and corporate representatives would say that the information sought does not exist or has been misplaced. Someone doesn’t want the public to see these stories, that when put together, establish a conspiracy of the magnitude that could change the way one views the world. Countless millions of people are being manipulated and lied to by a network of individuals within government that work on behalf of private interests. The individuals were involved in the terrorist attacks of September 11th. Many of those same figures are are connected to historical events that have shaped our understanding of government crime. For instance, the Iran Contra affair involved many figures that showed up in the 9/11 attacks.

See documentary...

Read more...

To Rule the World, or Save It?

“The comfort of the rich depends upon an abundance of the poor.” -Voltaire

Below, Lewis Lapham (former editor Harper's Magazine) takes two young Ivy-League graduates on a tour of the corridors of power. The novice careerists must decide: should they seek to rule the world, or to save it?

The American Ruling Class

Read more...

Bringing Ethics to Life Through Film.

The book International Relations on Film by Robert W. Gregg, explores the ways in which feature films depict the various aspects of international relations, considers the utility of the medium as a vehicle to dramatize issues and events, challenge conventional wisdom, rouse an audience to anger and even revise history and includes a very comprehensive movie list.

The Carnegie Council, through their programs, publications, and website,aims to be the world's central address for ethical decision in international affairs. Listed below you can find is the list of films from their website:


OPPRESSION AND CONFLICT, COLONIALISM AND ANTI-COLONIAL MOVEMENTS:

The Battle of Algiers(1966)
Shot in documentary style, this classic about the Algerian struggle for independence from France in the 1950s has become a learning tool both for rebel movements and those fighting them. The film graphically raises issues of what is justified in an assymetrical guerrilla war: Bombs killing innocent civilians? Torture of presumed terrorists?

Gandhi (1982)
This film, winner of eight Academy Awards, covers Ghandi's time in South Africa; the anti-colonial protest campaign that led to India's liberation from Britain; and his assassination after his efforts to restore peace between Hindus and Muslims.

The Home and the World (1984)
The story of a love triangle between a rich, English-educated Bengali, his wife, and a radical nationalist politician,this film dramatizes the political, cultural, and religious differences among Indians under British colonial rule at the turn of the 20th century.

Khartoum (1966)
After a messianic leader and his troops massacred a British-led Egyptian force in Sudan in 1883, the British sent General Gordon to Khartoum to evacuate British and Egyptian citizens. But Gordon disobeyed orders and stayed on to fight. It was his last stand. "A good example of Eurocentrism in filmmaking, as well as a cautionary tale about the perils of imperialism," says Gregg.

The Mission (1986)
In this visually spectacular film, Spanish Jesuits and Portuguese colonizers struggle over a group of Guarani Indians. It tells of clashes between cultures, between faith and greed, a struggle for redemption, and well-meaning efforts that go badly wrong. Of course, the biggest losers are the Guarani.

Rabbit-Proof Fence (2002)
From about 1870-1970, the Australian government forcibly took many aboriginal and mixed-race children from their parents and brought them to boarding schools where they were taught to forget their past. Rabbit-Proof Fence is based on the true story of three girls who escaped from one such school in 1931 and trekked 1,500 miles home. For an article on this topic, see The Stolen Generation.

The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)
In 1920s Ireland, two brothers join the IRA, which is fighting a guerrilla war the British. Both sides behave brutally and become brutalized. With the announcement of the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1922, there is initial rejoicing. But the situation soon turns into a civil war: idealism against pragmatism, brother against brother.

Zulu (1964)
Based on a true story, the film shows the 1879 battle of Rorke's Drift, when around 100 British soldiers stationed at a remote missionary outpost faced an assault from 4-5,000 Zulu warriors. Though seen from the British point of view this is a rousing tale of heroism on both sides, as well as a portrait of individuals, both good and bad, who did the work of imperialism in far-flung parts.

TOTALITARIANISM:

The Lives of Others (2006)
Taking place in East Berlin both pre-and-post the fall of the Berlin Wall, this subtle and gripping film tells the story of a playwright and his actress girlfriend, the Stasi agent assigned to spy on them. It lays bare their secrets, moral choices, and compromises, and the changes they and their society go through.

INSIDE THE WAR ROOM

Why We Fight (Documentary, 2005)
In 1961, Eisenhower warned that the interests of the increasingly powerful "military-industrial complex" might one day determine the direction of U.S. policy. Has that day come to pass?

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)
In this classic black comedy, an insane U.S. General launches an unauthorized nuclear attack on the USSR, and the U.S. War Room tries to stop him. The film, says Gregg, "provides a veritable clinic on deterrence theory, the problems of command and control, and that high-wire act known as crisis decisionmaking."

Fail-Safe (1964)
Shot in black-and-white documentary style, this nightmarish film is the story of a fictional Cold War nuclear crisis. Due to a technical failure, U.S. nuclear bomber crews get the wrong orders and both the Americans and the Russians try frantically to abort their mission.

Thirteen Days (2000)
A recreation of the 13 tense days of the Cuban Missile Crisis, from the perspective of President Kennedy, his advisors, and military commanders, Thirteen Days portrays the hawks in the military as nearly as much of a threat as the Soviets.

The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (Documentary, 2003)
In a series of interviews, former U.S. Secretary of State McNamara reviews his life, focusing on the difficult decisions he made and the lessons he learned from the failure of the Vietnam war.

COVERT OPERATIONS AND ESPIONAGE:

Breach (2007)
A dramatization of the operation leading to the arrest and prosecution of Robert Hanssen, the FBI agent found guilty in 2001 of spying for the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation, Breach explores one man's motivations for betraying the secrets of his country.

The Good Shepherd (2006)
Following 35 years in the life of a character who joins the CIA at its founding after World War II and becomes a star counter-intelligence agent, The Good Shepherd presents an unromantic picture of a career in espionage.

Missing (1982)
After the kidnapping of U.S. journalist Charles Horman during the 1973 coup in Chile, his wife and father embarked on a desperate search for him. Along the way they discovered evidence suggesting the involvement of the CIA in the coup as well as in Horman's disappearance. Based on a true story, this film urges viewers to consider the dark side of U.S. covert operations abroad.

State of Siege (1973)
In 1970 a USAID official in Uruguay was kidnapped and executed by leftist guerillas. Shortly after his death it was reported that the official had been secretly involved in training the military and police in counterinsurgency tactics, including torture. State of Siege, based loosely on this episode, sympathizes with the guerillas' actions.

Three Days of the Condor (1975)
A thriller about a CIA agent who learns of a secret CIA plot to infiltrate and destabilize the Middle East and who becomes a target as a result, this film illustrates the dangerous consequences, globally and domestically, of corruption in the CIA.

GENOCIDE

Au Revoir les Enfants (1987)
Tragic, autobiographical film about two French boys in a Catholic boarding school during WWII. One of them is secretly Jewish, being hidden by the priests from the Nazis. The film raises issues of courage, greed, and betrayal.

The Diary of Anne Frank (1959)
This film is an adaptation of a play based on the diary of Anne Frank, a 13-year-old Jewish girl who, with her family and others, hides in a crowded attic during the Nazi occupation of Holland. The DVD includes interviews with the actors, historians, and members of the Frank family. Best to read the diary itself (The Diary of a Young Girl) but the film is powerful too.

Ghosts of Rwanda (Documentary, 2004)
This tells the story of the genocide through interviews with UN peacekeepers and other Westerners who were there at the time; Tutsi survivors of the slaughter; confessed Hutu killers; and high-level government officials and diplomats, including Madeleine Albright and Kofi Annan.

The Killing Fields (1984)
The true story of reporter Sidney Schanberg, and his colleague and friend, Cambodian journalist Dith Pran. Like most westerners, Schanberg fled Cambodia after the murderous Khmer Rouge regime seized power in 1975, but Pran could not. For the next four years, Pran labored in rice paddies as the genocide unfolded around him. He finally escaped and reunited with Schanberg.

Hotel Rwanda (2004)
Based on the true story of a Rwandan hotel manager who saved the lives of over 1,200 refugees during the 1993 genocide, this film points blame at the international community and the UN for doing almost nothing to intervene.

Triumph of the Will (1934)
Probably the most famous propaganda movie ever made, this film documents the Nazi Party Congress and in Nuremberg in 1934. Hitler commissioned it and plays a starring role.

THE EXPERIENCE OF WAR

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)
A moving adaptation of Remarque's antiwar novel that follows a group of young German recruits from idealism to disillusionment in the trenches of World War I.

Apocalypse Now (1979) and(1986)as the two best movies about the Vietnam War (or the American War, as the Vietnamese call it). Based loosely on Heart of Darkness, it follows a U.S. Army captain on a mission to kill a rogue Green Beret colonel, Kurtz, who has deserted the military to lead a band of Cambodian tribesmen in the jungle. The film suggests that there is little difference between Kurtz's murderous escapades and the American soldiers' killing of Vietnamese peasants.

Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima ( 2006)
These companion films recreate the famous World War II battle on the island of Iwo Jima from the perspective of the Americans (Flags of Our Fathers) and then the Japanese (Letters), who, though vastly outnumbered by American forces, fought for nearly 40 days to defend the island.

Casualties of War (1989)
The story of a five-man patrol in Vietnam that kidnaps and eventually kills a young girl and the one soldier in the group who refuses to participate, Casualties of War, based on an actual event, depicts war as a destroyer of men’s morals.

Gallipoli (1981)
Almost an entire Australian army unit was wiped out by Turkish machine gunners in a futile offensive later known as the Battle of the Nek, which took place during the Gallipoli campaign of World War I. Gallipoli tells the story of two young Australian friends who enlist in the army and wind up fighting side by side in this tragic battle.

Grand Illusion (1938)
In this story of French prisoners of war held by the Germans during WWI, we see friendships by social class that cut across national lines, and a call for humanism rather than patriotism. An anti-war classic, without a single battle scene.

Platoon (1986)
Told from the point of view of a middle-class college student who volunteers to fight in the Vietnam War and whose idealism about the war vanishes, Platoon realistically portrays the chaos and confusion that American soldiers faced in the jungles of Vietnam.

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
In Burma in WWII, British prisoners of war are forced to build a railway bridge for the Japanese. "With an all-male lead cast, themes of heroism, pride, military tradition, hierarchy, and power are masterfully interwoven into a plot that is ambiguous enough to allow for various viewpoints and perspectives," says reviewer Tom Dirk.

MILITARY JUSTICE

Breaker Morant (1979)
In 1902, near the end of the Boer War, "Breaker" Morant and two other Australian soldiers were tried before a British court-martial for killing Boer prisoners of war. They were found guilty, even though their commanders had authorized to carry out such killings. The film raises questions about the accountability of soldiers for their conduct in war and the independence of military courts.

Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)
Based on the Judges' Trial before the U.S. Nuremberg Military Tribunal in 1947, which charged judges under the Nazi regime with war crimes, this film with Spencer Tracy, Marlene Dietrich and a host of other stars raises the question of whether judges and other officials who carry out morally repugnant laws should be held accountable.

Paths of Glory (1957)
Loosely based on the true story of four French soldiers during World War I who were wrongly found guilty of mutiny and executed, Paths of Glory shows the terrible consequences of unprincipled military leadership, both on the battlefield and in the military courts.

The Execution of Private Slovik (1974)- The story of Eddie Slovik, who was executed by the Army in 1945, the only American soldier to be executed for desertion since the Civil War.

NATIONALISM, ETHNIC AND RELIGIOUS CONFLICT

Before the Rain (1994)
Set primarily in Macedonia during the Balkan wars of the 1990s, Before the Rain tells the story of intersecting lives devasted by the escalating violence between Muslims and Christians in Macedonia, where an all-out war fueled by religious and ethnic hatred appeared to be on the horizon.

Bloody Sunday (2002)
Docudrama of the events of January 30, 1972, when the British Army opened fire on unarmed civilians taking part in a civil rights march in Northern Ireland. None of the soldiers was disciplined, and the massacre caused the "Troubles" to swell to a new level of violence.

Cal (1984)
Set amidst the violence and bitterness of 1980s Northern Ireland, this is the doomed love story of Cal, a young Irish Catholic involved with the IRA, and Marcella an Irish-Italian (Catholic) widow whose Protestant husband was killed by the IRA.

SOCIAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES
BUSINESS ETHICS

Blood Diamond (2006)
Set in Sierra Leone in 1999 in the midst of a civil war, Blood Diamond draws attention to the responsibility of citizens and businesses in the developed world to ensure that the diamonds they buy have not been used to fund conflicts abroad. It also highlights the plight of child soldiers.

The Constant Gardener (2005)
When a British diplomat stationed in Nairobi investigates his activist wife's murder—supposedly a crime of passion—he uncovers an unsavory conspiracy involving government officials and the pharmaceutical industry. Based on a book by John le Carré, who wrote in the afterword, "By comparison with the reality, my story [is] as tame as a holiday postcard."

The Corporation (2003)
What if corporations were human beings? According to a pyschiatrist in this documentary tracing the history and activities of corporations, they have ''all the characteristics of a prototypical psychopath.''

Rogue Trader (1999)
The true story of Nick Leeson, a Barings Bank trader, who unbeknownst to his employers, was gambling with company money. His staggering losses force Barings into bankruptcy.

Syriana (2005)
Set in the Middle East and inspired by the true story of former CIA agent Robert Baer, this is a political thriller with multiple story lines about the machinations of the global oil industry.

Wall Street (1987)
"Greed is good", says ruthless Wall Street corporate raider Gordon Gecko, in this morality tale of 1980s excess.

ACROSS BORDERS

Clandestins (1997)
This tragic story of six refugees from different countries trying to get to from France to Canada is set almost totally within the confines of a ship's cargo container.

El Norte (1983)
A Guatemalan brother and sister risk death to become illegal immigrants in "El Norte," the United States, but their dreams of a better life do not come true.

Dirty Pretty Things (2002)
Two illegal immigrants in London plumb the depths of the migrant experience, including uncovering the ultimate in exploitation, a ghastly trade in human organs.

Maria Full of Grace (2004)
Maria is 17, pregnant, and the sole breadwinner for her family in a small Columbian village. When loses her job over a request for a bathroom break she becomes a drug mule, flying to New York with 62 pellets of cocaine in her stomach. But once in New York, things go badly wrong. "Based on 1000 true stories," runs the film's tagline.

THE ENVIRONMENT
(These films could equally be classified under Business Ethics.)

An Inconvenient Truth (Documentary, 2006)
Al Gore explains the science of global warming, describes its present-day effects, and forecasts what the future may hold in store. We can reverse this trend, he declares, but we are running out of time.

The China Syndrome (1979)
This fictional thiller about a reporter and cameraman who discover safety coverups at a U.S. nuclear power plant was released just 12 days before the Three-Mile Island nuclear power plant suffered a partial melt-down.

A Civil Action (1998)
Based on a real-life case, a lawyer agrees to represent eight families whose children died from leukemia after two large corporations leaked toxic chemicals into the water supply of Woburn, Massachusetts, even though the case could mean financial and professional suicide for him.

Erin Brockovich (2000)
The true story of Brockovich, a legal clerk who brings a case against a company in California which had contaminated local drinking water.

Read more...