During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act. ~ George Orwell
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!Throughout America's adventure in free government, our basic purposes have been to keep the peace; to foster progress in human achievement, and to enhance liberty, dignity and integrity among people and among nations. To strive for less would be unworthy of a free and religious people. Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us grievous hurt both at home and abroad. ~ Dwight D. Eisenhower
Distant Relatives [Patience] via nabil elderkinDisclaimer #4
4. Life is like photography. You use the negative to develop.
Leningrad Cowboys, Happy Being Miserable via Leningrad Cowboys Official
Executive Branch Criminal Activities by Presidential Administration
Trump meets The Honeymooners via Mark Linstom
Def Leppard, Rock of Ages via Dina IvoryFeetlines 201811.27
Farm bankruptcies on the rise in Upper Midwest
South African bees: 'One million die in Cape Town'
Fearful of bias, Google blocks gender-based pronouns from new AI tool
Thousands lost their homes in epic fight to build GM’s Detroit plant. Now it’s closing.
Panel: More than 50 percent of Americans say Election Day should be federal holiday
One of the world's biggest steers, named Knickers, avoids the abattoir thanks to his size
Mars is for MartiansJohn Flores ~ Art / Graphics
Stonehenge by John Flores ~ Click to visit: John Flores Graphics pagesFeetlines 201811.25
Ricky Jay, (26 June 1946 ~ 24 November 2018)
DECEPTIVE PRACTICE, The Mysteries and Mentors of Ricky Jay ~ Trailer via SFFILMRichard Jay Potash (26 June 1946[1] – 24 November 2018), known professionally as Ricky Jay, was an American stage magician, actor, and writer. In a profile for the New Yorker, Mark Singer called Jay "perhaps the most gifted sleight of hand artist alive".[2] In addition to sleight of hand, Jay was known for his card tricks, card throwing, memory feats, and stage patter. He also wrote extensively on magic and its history. His acting credits included the films The Prestige, The Spanish Prisoner, Mystery Men, Heist, Boogie Nights, Tomorrow Never Dies, House of Games, and Magnolia, and the HBO series Deadwood. In 2015 he was the subject of an episode of PBS' American Masters, making him the first (and to this date only) magician to have ever been profiled in that series.[3] ~ [Continue reading at Wikipedia?]
Disclaimer #4
4. Life is like photography. You use the negative to develop.
Executive Branch Criminal Activities by Presidential Administration
What am I now that I was then? May memory restore again and again
The smallest color of the smallest day: Time is the school in which we learn,
Time is the fire in which we burn. - Delmore Schwartz
San Francisco 1968 via Vince CollinsDahbud Mensch ~ Stuck in the middle with WHO ?
Wealthy Drug Dealers
Destroying Lives
...As Usual !Summaries of the Guardian article (cause it’s long) via EnoughPM2020:
the Sackler family is known as the owners of Purdue Pharmaceuticals, the company behind OxyContin, a drug that became the Center of the opioid crisis and kills 200 people in a day across the US.
Suffolk County in Long Island, New York sued several members of the family over overdose deaths due to over-prescription, and Prosecutors in Connecticut and New York are laying criminal fraud and racketeering charges against certain family members over how OxyContin has been deceptively marketed to the doctors and prescribed to the public over the years.
The Sackler family has been known for their charitable contributions across the US and the UK, and is now inscribed in a law suit alleges that the family “actively participated in conspiracy and fraud to portray the prescription painkiller as non-addictive (which couldn’t be further from the truth)”
Named in the Suffolk county complaint filed in New York state court are Richard, Jonathan, Kathe and Mortimer David Alfons Sackler, and Ilene Sackler Lefcourt – adult children of deceased brothers Mortimer and Raymond Sackler who developed Purdue Pharma and launched OxyContin in the mid 1990s.
Also named are Theresa and Beverly Sackler, the widows of those two brothers, and David Sackler, son of Richard. Theresa Sackler lives in London and the others named lived in the US, mainly in New York and Connecticut.
OxyContin was originally widely marketed as a safe wonder drug because of the unique slow-release mechanism of its active ingredient, the narcotic oxycodone. But it turned out to be highly addictive and easily abused.
Led by New York Lawyer Paul Henly, these family members are sued in a multi district litigation in Ohio (Henly is also responsible for the Suffolk county lawsuit), the family (and corporate executives) are now being sued at 1,200 cities/counties/municipalities at the federal court level and at least 30 states. It is expected that all parties will be paid in a huge settlement similar to the $250 Billion deal in the big tobacco case in 1997.
According to studies, the opioid crisis has cost America $1 Trillion between 2002-2018, with some even argued that the yearly loss is $500 Billion.
According to anonymous sources, Purdue has argued behind close doors that they can’t possibly pay up the large scale damages mostly due to the financial siphoning of the Sackler family (and other family related through marriage), who is collectively worth $12 Billion.
Beyond any civil liberties some family members could face criminal charges in the future, with the US attorney offices conducting criminal investigation. It is worth nothing that in 2007 Purdue executives, excluding members of the Sackler family, was prosecuted and plead guilty in a federal criminal court to misleading regulators, doctors and patients. When responsible individuals were asked to clarify these claims, no one answered.
The attorney general at The state of Massachusetts estimated that the epidemic cost the state $15 Billion alone in 2017, and is confident that the family members and the company are well aware of the sheer act of criminality, and that they will pay up for the damage they done.
American art photographer Nan Goldin almost died from an addiction to OxyContin and is now in recovery. She leads a campaign to persuade cultural institutions to reject Sackler donations, and to shame the Sacklers into paying for treatment facilities for opioid dependency instead, not “reputation laundering” as she and other critics dub their philanthropy.
Mississippi lawyer Mike Moore, who helped secure the Big Tobacco settlement and the $20bn settlement against BP for the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, is involved in the federal case in Ohio and state cases. He said it was right the Sacklers should be targeted. “They’ve been hiding behind a corporate structure and it’s high time they paid a price,” he said. ~ Comments ~ Time for a Corporate Death Penalty?
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Boptime w/Even Steven Leech
We begin Saturday's Boptime at 6am ((EST)) with oldies back to back to back. After Rockabilly Ridge at 7am ((EST)) with Michael Ace, we go back to this day in 1954 at 8am ((EST)), during the waning days of the mambo craze and early days of mainstream rock n’ roll. At 9am ((EST)) we go back to this day in 1966 with Beatlemania, a few tunes from the Delaware Rock'n'Roll Hall of Fame, along with a lot of other music from this day in that year. ~ Steve
BOPTIME: Saturday, 6 AM Eastern time, 3 AM Pacific time
Go To: http://www.wvud.org/?page_id=24
Click on a listening link below the WVUD logo:
Boptime available locally on WVUD-FM 91.3,
Shoutcast [Search: WVUD], and TuneIn
Hockessin [Delaware] Art & Book Fair, November 10, 2018
Douglas Morea ~ Phillip Bannowsky ~ Steven Leech ~ Franetta McMillian
Myths of Mass Deception: Thanksgiving Is A Celebration of Genocide
Cree Prophecy
Only after the last tree has been cut down,
Only after the last river has been poisoned,
Only after the last fish has been caught,
Only then will you find money cannot be eaten.
Podcasts: Laura Allan ~ Ceremonial Song ~ Click-to-play
Podcasts: Robbie Basho ~ Wounded Knee ~ Click-to-play
THANKSGIVING
Is A Celebration of GenocideThe End of American Thanksgivings, The Black Commentator, Issue 66
Nobody but Americans celebrates Thanksgiving. It is reserved by history and the intent of "the founders" as the supremely white American holiday, the most ghoulish event on the national calendar. No Halloween of the imagination can rival the exterminationist reality that was the genesis, and remains the legacy, of the American Thanksgiving. It is the most loathsome, humanity-insulting day of the year - a pure glorification of racist barbarity.
We at [Black Commentator] are thankful that the day grows nearer when the almost four centuries-old abomination will be deprived of its reason for being: white supremacy. Then we may all eat and drink in peace and gratitude for the blessings of humanity's deliverance from the rule of evil men.
Thanksgiving is much more than a lie - if it were that simple, an historical correction of the record of events in 1600s Massachusetts would suffice to purge the "flaw" in the national mythology. But Thanksgiving is not just a twisted fable, and the mythology it nurtures is itself inherently evil. The real-life events - subsequently revised - were perfectly understood at the time as the first, definitive triumphs of the genocidal European project in New England. The near-erasure of Native Americans in Massachusetts and, soon thereafter, from most of the remainder of the northern English colonial seaboard was the true mission of the Pilgrim enterprise - Act One of the American Dream. African Slavery commenced contemporaneously - an overlapping and ultimately inseparable Act Two. [Continue reading at Source]
Thanksgiving, Celebration of Genocide
Native American Holocaust Absolution by PilgrimsSkipping past the signing of the Mayflower Compact, the first concerns of the new arrivals were finding something to eat and a place to settle. After anchoring off Cape Cod on November 11, 1620, a small party was sent ashore to explore. Pilgrims in every sense of the word, they promptly stumbled into a Nauset graveyard where they found baskets of corn which had been left as gifts for the deceased. The gathering of this unexpected bounty was interrupted by the angry Nauset warriors, and the hapless Pilgrims beat a hasty retreat back to their boat with little to show for their efforts. Shaken but undaunted by their welcome to the New World, the Pilgrims continued across Cape Cod Bay and decided to settle, of all places, at the site of the now-deserted Wampanoag village of Patuxet. There they sat for the next few months in crude shelters - cold, sick and slowly starving to death. Half did not survive that terrible first winter. The Wampanoag were aware of the English but chose to avoid contact them for the time being.
In keeping with the strange sequence of unlikely events, Samoset, a Pemaquid (Abenaki) sachem from Maine hunting in Massachusetts, came across the growing disaster at Plymouth. Having acquired some English from contact with English fishermen and the short-lived colony at the mouth of the Kennebec River in 1607, he walked into Plymouth in March and startled the Pilgrims with "Hello Englishmen." Samoset stayed the night surveying the situation and left the next morning. He soon returned with Squanto. Until he succumbed to sickness and joined his people in 1622, Squanto devoted himself to helping the Pilgrims who were now living at the site of his old village. Whatever his motivations, with great kindness and patience, he taught the English the skills they needed to survive, and in so doing, assured the destruction of his own people. [Continue Reading at Source]
Native American Issues & Causes & NDN News Website - http://www.ndnnews.com/The Thanksgiving Myth
by John Two-HawksLet me begin by stating that thousands of years before the 'official' Thanksgiving Day was proclaimed by Governor Winthrop of the Massachussetts Bay Colony in 1637, North American Indigenous people across the continent had celebrated seasons of Thanksgiving.
'Thanksgiving' is a very ancient concept to American Indian nations. The big problem with the American Thanksgiving holiday is its false association with American Indian people. The infamous 'Indians and pilgrims' myth.
It is good to celebrate Thanksgiving, to be thankful for your blessings. It is not good to distort history, to falsely portray the origin of this holiday and lie about the truth of its actual inception. Here are some accurate historical facts about the true origin of this American holiday that may interest you. [Continue Reading at Source]
Develop Your Mind, Not Sacred Sites
In an 1868 treaty, drafted at Fort Laramie in Sioux country, the United States established the Black Hills as part of the Great Sioux Reservation, set aside for exclusive use by the Sioux people. However, after the discovery of gold there in 1874, the United States confiscated the land in 1877. To this day, ownership of the Black Hills remains the subject of a legal dispute between the U.S. government and the Sioux.
I'm Sorry You Have Taken So Long to Say You're Sorry
by David Pego"I think America clearly knows the atrocities - the holocaust, the land theft, the boarding school experience completely wiping out the language and cultures of our Native brothers and sisters." ~ Source
A Question Of Honour, Sarah Brightman via Roland Baldwin
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
The Cult of TIPs and Convicted Felon PG&E
PG&E Investors Now An
Accessory to Murder?PG&E Getting Away With Murder... ...Again?
PG&E shares surge 40 percent on report regulator
wants to avoid bankruptcy from wildfireJail PG&E & CPUC Executives?
PG&E 2010 San Bruno pipeline explosion via Wikipedia ~ II Corinthians, 11:13-15Why are PG&E executives, CPUC executives, and Politicians allowed to get away with murder & maiming anybody they choose, only to walk free, just like in Bhopal?
Is it time for a Corporate Death Penalty or call for Public Execution of PG&E Executives? [Note: If public execution is too harsh, how about tar and feathering?]
Federal prosecutors get judge to cut $500 million plus dollars in natural gas pipeline explosion fines caused by criminal PG&E executives partying with funds set aside to protect residents of San Bruno, where eight people died, fifty-eight people were injured, and thirty-eight homes were destroyed.
Backtrack:
Politicians: Politicians race to San Bruno
PG&E diverted safety money for profit, bonuses
PG&E collected millions more for pipeline repair than it spent
PG&E charged: multiple violations of Natural Gas Pipeline Safety Act
PG&E slapped with a record $1.6 billion penalty for fatal San Bruno explosion
On September 16, 2014, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Carol Brown,
chief of staff for the president of the California Public Utilities Commission,
had communicated with PG&E executives to help move litigation to judges
they expected would be friendly to PG&E's side. [Judge scandal under federal
investigation ~ II Corinthians, 11:13-15]
PG&E customers face triple whammy in gas and electric bills
PG&E trial: Prosecution drops maximum penalty to $6 million
Mercury News editorial: PG&E leniency demands explanation
PG&E guilty on six charges connected to fatal San Bruno explosion
Mercury News editorial: Hold PG&E accountable
PG&E hasn’t learned lessons from San Bruno explosion, officials say
Editorial: PG&E found guilty, but it’s not enough (East Bay Times)
Politicians: Politicians’ talk of regulatory reform is just pious rhetoric
PG&E seeks to overturn guilty verdict in trial linked to San Bruno blast
Despite flawed records, PG&E raised pressure on pipe that exploded
PG&E criminal charges against agency ‘unwarranted,’ says it didn’t break the law
Politicians: Lawmakers kill major revamp of PUC, but some reforms get approved
PG&E: How does the piper pay?
By Tom Cushing ~ [Article Source]
Corporations are people, except when they're not. Four years after a natural gas inferno immolated eight people in their San Bruno homes, the Pacific Gas & Electric utility has been charged with twelve felony criminal violations of something called the US Pipeline Safety Act (PSA). If convicted, the company will not face execution for those deaths, or incarceration, or lose its corporate charter birthright. No executives or workers will even be charged with anything. So how do we make sense of such a situation? Incompletely, at best.
Despite PG&E's early, feeble attempts to deflect blame [Just like Lake County, and Santa Rosa, CA fires?] towards a later sewer contractor and even onto the charred remains of the victims, the record here is pretty clear. Over an extended time period, our local utility utterly failed to protect the California citizenry from the always-potentially-catastrophic effects of its gas transmission operations.
Records were shoddy to the point of not knowing that the 30-inch steel high-pressure line was even welded. Maintenance was so deferred that the company would like us to be impressed that it is now spending $2.7 billion in upgrades. Prevention and mitigation were ignored ? automatic shut-off valves that would have reduced the carnage after the pipe ruptured were never installed.
And it wasn't that the business was strapped for cash. These operations were quite profitable, due in-part to "cutting back on pipeline-replacement projects and maintenance, laying off workers, [and using cheaper but less effective inspection techniques," according to a later independent audit.
This is not Monday morning quarterbacking ? all these safety elements are very well-known to anyone dealing in hazards. The Pipeline Safety Act was first passed in 1968, and has itself been upgraded seven times. It's more like trying to play the Superbowl without bothering to employ a playbook, team practice or defense.
So what's to be done here to bring the wrongdoers to account, and to fail-safe the future?
We can start by acknowledging that utility companies are an odd creature ? a bastard amalgam of private and public sector genes. They are monopolies set-up for specialized circumstances ? we don't want two-or-more sets of gas lines and wires, after all. They are corporations, replete with charter, shareholders, a CEO, a Board of Directors. Yet, they are also heavily regulated by government ? in this case the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), as to rates and many other business practices, including whether rate-payers foot the bill for various expenses. Such regulators, engaged to serve the public's interests, have a rich tradition of 'capture' by their subjects. Utilities are thus a necessary evil from the inception, lest this needed function be turned-over to the government to run (horrors).
As to accountability, there are both criminal and civil lawsuit possibilities. The individual and civic victims of this tragedy can sue for their losses, including loss of life. And both the state and federal governments have authority to civilly and criminally prosecute, to the full extent of applicable laws. There are general laws, like fraud and criminally negligent homicide, and statutes specific to the operations in question.
But who do we prosecute? The company, certainly. The state-level prosecutors have allowed the applicable three-year statutes of limitations to pass without charges, and the feds are proceeding under their PSA. But in cases of sustained, abject malfeasance like this, there's a natural cry for retribution against the living, breathing, bonus-winning persons.
There is precedent ? corporate CEOs and other officials have been convicted of crimes for specific acts, like dumping that methyl-ethyl-death into the pristine river, or ignoring safety rules to the extent that a worker was killed on the job. And according to Mr. Twain, there's nothing like the prospect of hanging at dawn to focus the brain ? a few years upriver for a few corporate scions would focus many more execs' minds on taking fewer risks with other people's well-being.
Reasonably informed speculation here, however, suggests that the very fact that the company's abject malfeasance was sustained over such a long period militates against individual culpability. It is tough to find that one person that a jury would convict. It is terribly unsatisfying to say that if they're all guilty then nobody is accountable, but that's probably the case here. We can, and should, find disturbing the image of corporate cats enjoying fat bonuses bought by the death agonies of innocent San Brunans, but there it is.
Now, PG&E has paid, and will pay much more in those damages settlements (I've heard, but cannot confirm, $500 million), and the fines ($6 million max) and penalties ($many millions more) under the PSA. Assuming that those sums come from the shareholders, and not we rate payers, that may be the best we can do.
Corporations really are creatures of financial fiction, so wounding the wallet may be fairly effective in securing retribution for these sins. If, however, any of those reparations are paid by all of us customers, that would add insult to incendiary. I have not intended to pay for fatal, unforgivable sloppiness, nor would I seek a discount for it. These failures and their risks must be borne by the company's owners. (I also hope we aren't all paying for their misty, water-colored TV spots meant to humanize the 'new' PG&E. I'm with the zen master: we'll see.) All-in-all, incomplete, at best.
And what about fail-safe-ing the future? I just have to note here that the company continues to call this a tragic 'accident,' phraseology that just has to cast some doubt on their resolve. Their statements remind of the Exxon employees with whom I spoke after the Valdez tanker incident. They didn't really 'get it,' either. But here are a few thoughts, anyway.
Let's start by acknowledging that this era of limited government will not permit a public take-over of the gas supply function ? a tactic that, by itself, is no panacea anyway.
The first line of our defense simply must come from within the utility. There is surely some sober learning sinking into the PG&E culture (isn't there?). Let's hope the Board has required that those lessons appear, prominently, in the employment incentives (+ and - ) of workers as well ? top to bottom. It's not easy to change culture, but it's done by setting and reinforcing the message, every day, by everyone ? including/especially that guy in their commercials.PG&E also needs to have the right people in charge of safety and compliance ? normally staff functions. The financial wizardry talents of MBAs might be wasted in those jobs, but you can hire for proficiency skills -- fearless, methodical, skeptical, activist and detail-oriented individuals ? and you can give them a hot-line to the top if they need it.
There are two external legal approaches that deserve mention. First, CPUC oversight: if it must be strengthened to give regulators routine access to the utility's most intimate undergarments, will there ever be a better time, or reason why? So armed, those staffers must operate exclusively, transparently, and again fearlessly, in the public's interest. The public must demand it, not assume it ? because after all, it's the public who pays the price. Just ask San Bruno.
Finally, I can't help returning to Twain's gallows at first light. Perhaps we can't determine who's to blame for the last thirty years' negligence, but we can control the next thirty ? and beyond. The Sarbanes Oxley law, for example, recognized this by ending the charlie-foxtrot 'out-of-the-loop' defense in favor of assigning personal accountability to the CEO for the accuracy of financial reporting. And that was only money at stake. Why not do that here, imposing accountability for 'tragically accidental' organizational lapses on a going-forward basis? There has to be some non-self-serving reason for CEO pay to exceed average workers' wages by over 354 times.
This would be a good way to earn some of those big bucks. I'll guess with you that the San Bruno Eight would tend to agree. Completely.
PG&E Diverted Safety Money
for Profit, BonusesEric Nalder, Chronicle Staff Writer, Friday, January 13, 2012, Article Source
Pacific Gas and Electric Co. diverted more than $100 million in gas safety and operations money collected from customers over a 15-year period and spent it for other purposes, including profit for stockholders and bonuses for executives, according to a pair of state-ordered reports released Thursday.
An independent audit and a staff report issued by the California Public Utilities Commission depicted a poorly led company well-heeled in its gas operations and more concerned with profit than safety.
The documents link a deficient PG&E safety culture - with its "focus on financial performance" - to the pipeline explosion in San Bruno on Sept. 9, 2010, that killed eight people and destroyed 38 homes.
The "low priority" the company gave to pipeline safety during the three years leading up to the San Bruno blast was "well outside industry practice - even during times of corporate austerity programs," said the audit by Overland Consulting of Leawood, Kan.
Making money
But PG&E wasn't hurting for cash, according to the audit. From 1999 to 2010, the company collected $430 million more from its gas-transmission and -storage operations than the revenue authorized by the California Public Utilities Commission, which sets the rates the company can charge its customers.
"PG&E chose to use the surplus revenues for general corporate purposes" rather than improved gas safety, the Overland audit said.
The audit was unable to trace exactly how PG&E spent the diverted money. But in a separate report on the San Bruno explosion released Thursday, the utilities commission staff noted that in the three years leading up to the San Bruno explosion, the company spent $56 million annually on an incentive plan for executives and "non-employee directors," including stock awards, performance shares and deferred compensation.
"A cursory review reveals that a significant portion, in the millions, has been awarded to the CEO," the commission staff report said in a reference to former PG&E head Peter Darbee, who retired last year.
Cutting corners
By cutting back on pipeline-replacement projects and maintenance, laying off workers, using cheaper but less effective inspection techniques and trimming other pipeline costs, PG&E saved upward of 6 percent of the money designated for pipeline safety, maintenance and operations programs, the Overland audit said.
Meanwhile, on the revenue side, transmission pipeline operations were "very profitable" for PG&E since March 1998, the audit said.
Assemblyman Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, whose district includes San Bruno, called the company's diversion of customers' money "criminal behavior."
"When you divert funds intended for maintenance and safety to profits, there is nothing clearer," Hill said. "It is criminal."
Hill noted that the San Mateo County district attorney, the state attorney general and the U.S. attorney's office are conducting a joint investigation of the San Bruno disaster. He said he would talk to them about incorporating the Overland audit in their probe.
However, it is unclear whether PG&E broke any criminal statutes governing its behavior at the time, unless there was fraud.
The utilities commission staff report said that under state law and agency regulations, PG&E could spend less than what it was authorized to spend "because the commission is generally precluded from asking for the money back if the company overestimated its revenue requirement."
The Legislature passed a law last year, sponsored by Hill and others, that requires a utility to account for any under-spending and explain where every dollar went.
'Truly unconscionable'
"It is truly unconscionable that PG&E was allowed by the CPUC to steal ratepayer monies that should have been spent on safety and, instead, was put in the pockets of PG&E shareholders," said Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Hillsborough, who represents the devastated San Bruno neighborhood. "All these monies identified in the audit should be returned to ratepayers, presumably as a credit against the work that PG&E should have done, but didn't."
PG&E officials declined to comment on specifics of the two reports.
"Our No. 1 priority is to make our system the safest in the nation," said PG&E President Chris Johns.
No new money
The utilities commission issued the documents as part of a process that could lead to millions of dollars in fines. In addition, the commission recommended changes in how PG&E spends money on gas-system maintenance and pipeline replacement.
Before PG&E "seeks additional ratepayer funds," the commission said, it should:
-- Allocate $95.4 million that the company under-spent on capital expenditures since 1997 - including pipeline replacement - for those purposes.
-- Use the $430 million in additional revenue it collected since 1999 "to fund future transmission and storage operations."
-- Use $39.3 million that it collected but failed to spend for pipeline-transmission operations and maintenance since 1997 for those purposes.
Those recommendations put the commission and PG&E on a collision course.
In August, PG&E outlined a plan to modernize its gas-transmission lines in response to the San Bruno disaster. Included was money to replace 185 miles of pipe segments in PG&E's 5,700-mile gas-transmission system and to upgrade 200 miles of other segments unable to accommodate a modern inspection tool known as a "smart pig."
The company pegged the price at $2.2 billion and said 90 percent of that would be paid by gas customers through rate increases, with the rest covered by company investors.
Meeting new rules?
On Wednesday, PG&E issued a statement promising that it won't dun customers for any expense required to upgrade its gas system to meet existing federal and state standards.
"That said, let's be just as clear about what PG&E is proposing," the company added. "The vast majority of the pipeline safety work going forward is not about correcting issues from the past. It's about meeting entirely new standards being established by the California Public Utilities Commission."
PG&E estimated that the average residential customer will pay $1.93 per month more through 2014 to finance the work.
A Chronicle investigation published in March revealed that in 2000, PG&E sharply curtailed a program started in the mid-1980s to replace hundreds of miles of aging gas-transmission pipe. Records obtained by The Chronicle showed the decision was made by PG&E and approved by the utilities commission's safety chief.
The Overland audit noted that PG&E's replacement of transmission pipelines for safety purposes all but ceased in 2000.
Complete coverage
To see Chronicle reports on pipeline safety since the 2010 explosion in San Bruno, video of the disaster and government investigative documents, go to www.sfgate.com/san-bruno-fire.
San Bruno blast findings
Some key revelations in reports by the California Public Utilities Commission and auditors hired to investigate the deadly 2010 explosion of a Pacific Gas and Electric Co. gas pipe in San Bruno.
Testing: PG&E violated U.S. law by not conducting pressure-test inspections of the San Bruno pipeline after the company spiked gas levels in 2003 and 2008. Such tests would have revealed the substandard condition of the pipe and averted the 2010 disaster.
Video: PG&E destroyed a video of events at its gas-control center in Brentwood the night of the explosion, violating a state order.
Upkeep: PG&E diverted over the years more than $100 million collected from customers for pipe maintenance, replacement and safety to other purposes, including profit and executive bonuses.
Money: PG&E's gas transmission and storage operations collected $430 million over what the PUC authorized from 1998 to 2010.
Read the full reports: cpuc.ca.gov/puc/sanbrunoreport.htm ~ Sources: California Public Utilities Commission, Overland Consulting ~ E-mail Eric Nalder at ericnalder@hearst.com.
California fire mystery:
[Convicted Felon & Murderer] PG&E lines
fell in winds that weren’t ‘hurricane strength’By PAUL ROGERS | progers@bayareanewsgroup.com, LISA M. KRIEGER | lkrieger@bayareanewsgroup.com and MATTHIAS GAFNI | mgafni@bayareanewsgroup.com | Bay Area News Group PUBLISHED: October 12, 2017 at 7:38 pm | UPDATED: October 13, 2017 at 6:01 pm ~ Photos, etc. at The Mercury News Source
The heavy winds that downed power lines Sunday night at the start of the deadly wildfires raging across Northern California were far from “hurricane strength,” as PG&E has claimed, according to a review of weather station readings.
On Tuesday, theBay Area News Group reported that Sonoma County emergency dispatchers sent fire crews to at least 10 reports of downed power lines and exploding transformers as the North Bay fires were starting around 9:22 p.m.
In response, PG&E said that “hurricane strength winds in excess of 75 mph in some cases” had damaged their equipment, but they said it was too early to speculate about what started the fires.
However, wind speeds were only about half that level, as the lines started to come down, the weather station records show. At a weather station in north Santa Rosa where the Tubbs fire started, the peak wind gusts at 9:29 p.m. hit 30 mph. An hour later, they were 41 mph.
Similarly, at another weather station east of the city of Napa, on Atlas Peak, where the Atlas fire started, wind gusts at 9:29 p.m. peaked at 32 mph. An hour later they were 30 mph.
Both speeds were substantially under the speed that power lines must be able to withstand winds under state law: at least 56 mph.
“This is classic PG&E — trying to spin things without first taking a look at the hard facts,” said Burlingame attorney Frank Pitre. “The winds were well within the threshold of design standards. If they failed, this was a failure in their system.”
Investigators are looking at power line failures as a possible cause of the historic fires.
PG&E officials did not respond to specific questions about the wind speeds and whether their power lines were in compliance with state safety laws.
“There will likely be reviews of these wildfires by the appropriate agencies, but right now we are focused on life safety and service restoration,” said PG&E spokesman Donald Cutler.
Pitre sued PG&E after the utility was found responsible by the state Public Utilities Commission for starting the Butte fire in Amador County in 2015 because of the utility’s failure to maintain its power lines. That fire burned for 22 days, killing two people, destroying 549 homes and charring 70,868 acres. The PUC fined PG&E $8.3 million and Cal Fire sent PG&E a bill for $90 million to cover state firefighting costs.
According to the National Weather Service, the “hurricane strength winds” that PG&E referenced were not “hurricane strength.”
“It’s not a good analogy,” said weather service meteorologist Roger Gass in Monterey.
To qualify as “hurricane strength,” winds must be sustained — lasting for more than 1 minute — at a minimum 74 mph. Such winds are the speeds in a Category 1 hurricane, the weakest of five categories.
In the Napa-Sonoma area, one weather station used by the National Weather Service, on Hawkeye Peak near Geyserville, recorded gusts of 79 mph at 11:56 pm on Sunday night. But gusts are defined as lasting only 3 to 5 seconds, and the sustained wind speed there at that time was 48 mph. Also, Hawkeye Peak is 22 miles north of Santa Rosa and 50 miles north of Napa, far from where the major fires broke out.
Under state law, utilities are required to maintain power lines safely and cut back trees to prevent fires. When they are found to have started fires, they are liable for fines and damages in court to people who have lost homes, businesses and family members in the blazes.
If PG&E is found to be at fault in this fire, the utility could use an “act of God” defense, arguing that weather conditions were so bad it couldn’t do anything to stop power lines from coming down.
“They could use that as a defense,” said Britt Strottman, an Oakland attorney representing Butte fire victims in Calaveras County. “Then it will be up to the PUC and Cal Fire — along with any judge and juries in civil cases — to decide whether that holds water.”
In 1994, PG&E was found guilty of 739 counts of negligence and fined nearly $30 million by state regulators when trees touched its high-voltage wires in Nevada County in the Sierra foothills, sparking a fire near the town of Rough and Ready that destroyed 12 homes and a 19th century schoolhouse. Afterward, prosecutors found that PG&E had diverted nearly $80 million from its tree-cutting programs into profits.
“If PG&E is at fault or partially at fault for these fires, it could be devastating to the company,” Strottman said. “PG&E could face significant fines and penalties.”
The company was fined $1.6 billion by the PUC after it was found negligent in causing the 2010 San Bruno gas line explosion, which killed eight people and destroyed 38 homes.
Investigators continue to probe the cause of the more than 20 fires that are still burning across Northern California, killing at least 35 people, destroying more than 5,700 homes and charring more than 220,000 acres.
“There isn’t anything we can talk about because those are active investigations,” Cal Fire Chief Ken Pimlott said Thursday. “We all want to get to the bottom of what caused the fires. But at the end of the day, they need to do their job and we need to do the job of putting these fires out — and that’s going to be our focus.”
On Thursday, the PUC’s Safety and Enforcement Division sent PG&E a letter requiring it to “preserve all evidence” from the fires in Napa, Sonoma and Solano counties, including “all failed poles, conductors and associated equipment from each fire event” and “all electronic (including emails) and non-electronic documents related to potential causes of the fires, vegetation management, maintenance and/or tree trimming.”
Friday, the PUC sent a similar letter to AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, Frontier, T-Mobile and Comcast with a similar order.
Despite strong winds this week, parts of the Napa and Sonoma valleys have experienced stronger winds this year. Atlas Peak had gusts of 66 mph last February, for example.
“It was a strong wind event, but not unprecedented,” Jan Null, a meteorologist with Golden Gate Weather Services in Saratoga, said of the winds Sunday night.
Strong windstorms commonly send trees into power poles, cutting off electricity to thousands of customers. But what was different on Sunday night was the time of year: In the winter, downed power lines don’t cause giant conflagrations.
“Trees and power lines go down in winter winds all the time,” he said. “But that’s on wet ground, not ground that is tinder dry.”
“We’ve had stronger wind events, but it was during a different time of year,” Null said. “This was a matter of everything lining up” to bring down poles and wires.
“Should that happen? That is the overriding question,” Null said. “It’s not for me to say.”
On 200904.29 - 18:26 UTC I wrote the following:
Finished morning and fire watch chores. Waiting for some work data to arrive.
We live in a remote rural area, on the sunny side of a mountain, where approximately twelve families live. It is whispered house developers are upset because we protect the mountain by refusing to release any of the land. On the other sides of the mountains, surrounding our little area, there are thousands of people.
According to my neighbors (one quarter mile south (late seventies) and one mile north (mid nineties and recently moved)) our utility services (electric and telephone) have not been upgraded for over sixty-five (65) years.
For the past fifteen (15) years a small group of neighbors have been trying to get PG&E to move utility poles out of a dangerous canyon below and up to the road above, where they belong, providing easy service access (about a 2 mile stretch).
Because of this, there are times during the Winter we sit without electricity while everybody else on the other side of the mountains has power and PG&E executives have no clue of, or obviously ignore dangers they expose their excellent service people to!
This is not an 'us against them thing' because this job was slatted four (4) times, for completion, and each time == PG&E pulled the funds. One time, a 'higher up' within PG&E messed up and sent a letter saying this was going to be done by a certain date and time. When that time had 'come and gone', with the job not completed, we inquired as to why, and never got an answer. It was about this time mysterious things began happening... to a point where they were recorded.
Ancient [Dangerous] PG&E Transformer Above Digger Pine Tree Containing Dry Pine NeedlesFor four (4) years PG&E has been asked to replace an ancient transformer that sits above a Digger Pine filled with dry pine needles because these transformers are known for catching on fire. Nobody from PG&E has ever looked at it; however, a company they contract showed up and poisoned a perfectly good tree that was 10 to 20 feet away from the tree below the transformer... and, PG&E now repeatedly calls our home to inform us our dog should be locked up when their meter reader arrives. ((fwiw) Meter Readers use some sort of binocular to read meters up here, never, ever, get out of their trucks, and we believe this is more PG&E executive harassment because we asked questions a long time ago.)
If the ancient PG&E transformer catches on fire,
this is probably what it will burn down; including the ranch.Finally, we are surrounded N/S/E/W by high speed Internet (I have a broadband map and RF detectors.) which we can not receive due to what is known as "FM Shadow", there is no cable access, satellite television and Internet have reception problems during the winter, there are no direct television signals, and we are forced to use DIAL-UP over a line with static noise to reach Internet.
I have been asking AT&T seventeen (17) years for something better than dial-up to no avail and THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT US!
Dial-up denies Pursuit of Happiness, eliminates Net Equality, and created a disgruntled dial-up 'tweet' called Bitter...
See What PG&E Did To Our Ranch
PG&E roads destroyed our water supply and were not there before the fire!
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Are Politicians Destroying Life As We Know It?
Politicians Are destroying
America, Freedom, & Democracy?The methodology of tyranny
http://www.constitution.org/tyr/prin_tyr.htm
The methods used to overthrow a constitutional order and establish a tyranny are well-known. However, despite this awareness, it is surprising how those who have no intention of perpetrating a tyranny can slip into these methods and bring about a tyranny despite their best intentions. Tyranny does not have to be deliberate. Tyrants can fool themselves as thoroughly as they fool everyone else.
Control of public information and opinion
It begins with withholding information, and leads to putting out false or misleading information. A government can develop ministries of propaganda under many guises. They typically call it "public information" or "marketing".
Vote fraud used to prevent the election of reformers
It doesn't matter which of the two major party candidates are elected if no real reformer can get nominated, and when news services start knowing the outcomes of elections before it is possible for them to know, then the votes are not being honestly counted.
Undue official influence on trials and juries
Nonrandom selection of jury panels, exclusion of those opposed to the law, exclusion of the jury from hearing argument on the law, exclusion of private prosecutors from access to the grand jury, and prevention of parties and their counsels from making effective arguments or challenging the government.
Usurpation of undelegated powers
This is usually done with popular support for solving some problem, or to redistribute wealth to the advantage of the supporters of the dominant faction, but it soon leads to the deprivation of rights of minorities and individuals.
Seeking a government monopoly on the capability and use of armed force
The first signs are efforts to register or restrict the possession and use of firearms, initially under the guise of "protecting" the public, which, when it actually results in increased crime, provides a basis for further disarmament efforts affecting more people and more weapons.
Militarization of law enforcement
Declaring a "war on crime" that becomes a war on civil liberties. Preparation of military forces for internal policing duties.
Infiltration and subversion of citizen groups that could be forces for reform
Internal spying and surveillance is the beginning. A sign is false prosecutions of their leaders.
Suppression of investigators and whistleblowers
When people who try to uncover high level wrongdoing are threatened, that is a sign the system is not only riddled with corruption, but that the corruption has passed the threshold into active tyranny.
Use of the law for competition suppression
It begins with the dominant faction winning support by paying off their supporters and suppressing their supporters' competitors, but leads to public officials themselves engaging in illegal activities and using the law to suppress independent competitors. A good example of this is narcotics trafficking.
Subversion of internal checks and balances
This involves the appointment to key positions of persons who can be controlled by their sponsors, and who are then induced to do illegal things. The worst way in which this occurs is in the appointment of judges that will go along with unconstitutional acts by the other branches.
Creation of a class of officials who are above the law
This is indicated by dismissal of charges for wrongdoing against persons who are "following orders".
Increasing dependency of the people on government
The classic approach to domination of the people is to first take everything they have away from them, then make them compliant with the demands of the rulers to get anything back again.
Increasing public ignorance of their civic duties and reluctance to perform them
When the people avoid doing things like voting and serving in militias and juries, tyranny is not far behind.
Use of staged events to produce popular support
Acts of terrorism, blamed on political opponents, followed immediately with well-prepared proposals for increased powers and budgets for suppressive agencies. Sometimes called a Reichstag plot.
Conversion of rights into privileges
Requiring licenses and permits for doing things that the government does not have the delegated power to restrict, except by due process in which the burden of proof is on the petitioner.
Political correctness
Many if not most people are susceptible to being recruited to engage in repressive actions against disfavored views or behaviors, and led to pave the way for the dominance of tyrannical government.
Avoiding tyranny
The key is always to detect tendencies toward tyranny and suppress them before they go too far or become too firmly established. The people must never acquiesce in any violation of the Constitution. Failure to take corrective action early will only mean that more severe measures will have to be taken later, perhaps with the loss of life and the disruption of the society in ways from which recovery may take centuries. ~ Tarnation ~ Dear Citizens ~ Rebirth of Evil
None of the Above
should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!Boptime w/Even Steven Leech
We begin Saturday's Boptime at 6am ((EST)) with oldies back to back to back. After Rockabilly Ridge at 7am ((EST)) with Michael Ace, we’ll visit this day in 1946 at 8am ((EST)) with the music heard on the radio and from the jukebox, at the end of our first full year, after World War II. At 9am ((EST)) WVUD listener Steve Ferris joins us for his Dream Hour. ~ Steve
BOPTIME: Saturday, 6 AM Eastern time, 3 AM Pacific time
Go To: http://www.wvud.org/?page_id=24
Click on a listening link below the WVUD logo:
Boptime available locally on WVUD-FM 91.3,
Shoutcast [Search: WVUD], and TuneIn
Feetlines 201811.14
Gamora, adopted daughter of Thanos and holding his hand [finger], is the last of her species.Why is no one talking about the uncounted, suppressed votes in Florida?
2000 United States presidential election recount in Florida
Trump's Continued Claims Of Fraud Without Evidence Undermine Legitimacy Of Elections
Anti-Pelosi Dem ‘100 percent confident we can forge new leadership’
Mattis approves U.S. troops at border with Mexico
Active-Duty Troops at Border Will Not Receive Hazard Pay
Trump's use of troops at border could cost $42M to $110M, study shows
How to Delete Facebook and Instagram From Your Life Forever
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
You Know Something Is Happening, But...
Ballad of a Thin Man via fleurant maxime...If Something Odd Would Happen To Mr. Trump,
Seriously Look At What Rudy Giuliani Was Up Too?I seldom do this, for specific reasons, but about a month ago I mentioned to some folks there were some strange things happening in regard to Mr. Giuliani and that his estranged wife claims he spent $900,000 on alleged mistress and travel in 7 months.
In this case, darthdiablo started a thread on Reddit titled FoxNews, Drudge, and Wikileaks on Twitter has went silent for 3 days (and in Drudge's case, deleted tweets), where he said:
Any ideas what's going on with those 3?
I think it was originally reported that FoxNews was boycotting Twitter due to Twitter's refusal to take down tweet that dox'd Tucker Carlson's address, but with Wikileak also going silent for 3 days, and now Drudge deleting tweets, I'm wondering if maybe those are implicated somehow by the Mueller probe? I just cannot think of anything else to explain what's happening here..
Edit: I didn't expect this to blow up. I'll leave above part intact (so others can see what was originally posted). I have since learned Drudge regularly delete their tweets, so one should not read anything into that. As for Wikileaks, also, apparently, no tweets for few days here and there isn't that unusual either. And we know about FoxNews (supposedly saying they're boycotting Twitter due to the Tucker Carlson doxxing incident). So overall, based on those, I'd say it's just random events happening close to each other but they're just that: random events. Hanlon's Razor if you would.
Also, check out this excellent summary on FoxNews, Wikileaks, and Drudge here
Edit 2: We've discovered more entities that has went dark on Twitter. Starting to think it's more than just a coincidence/Hanlon's Razor..
then Tyrion_Baelish_Varys, Moderator, posted the following:
Current list of people/organizations that strangely went silent in unison:
Entity Since Fox News 11/8 KimDotCom 11/8 Wikileaks 11/8 Jill Stein 11/9 National Enquirer 11/9 Rudy Giuliani 11/9 Brad Parscale 11/10 Matt Drudge Deleted all his tweets Please post other findings and I will update the list
This TheHill article is about Fox News' silence: Fox News Twitter account dark for days due to Tucker Carlson home threats
However it doesn't report on any of the other entities. What they all seemingly have in common is they are linked to Trump and/or the Special Counsel's broad and multi-pronged investigatory focus. Please post your speculations below and I will compile them here. Currently working on my own speculation.
Speculations
Dirk Schwenk
What would explain? A court order specific to certain accounts on Twitter. All parties would know about it; all parties would have to abide by it; and it could include an injunction against commenting on it via other channels. Such a court order would be very difficult to get - preventing speech in the future, especially against media, is a very, very hard thing to get. One of the few areas it is common, however, is to prevent parties in a criminal case from running to the media to infect jury pool. Such a court order would be very narrowly and carefully tailored to limit free speech concerns. Hence, it might apply only to certain outlets and only to twitter - not other outlets. Such an order might also be used to freeze a status quo so that investigators could go in, mirror everything on the accounts up to a specific moment without fear that there would be a moving target and small details missed.
If I am right, the parties involved include ghouliani, enquirer, wikileaks and FOX news. That almost certainly means that the charges are about the coordination between Trump, Inc., Wikileaks/GRU and the amplifying media outlets on HRC email. So also Don Jr, R Stone, etc. If I am right about that, 45 getting the news that the court had entered the order which allowed for search and gag across entire propaganda twitterverse might take some fun out of France. It would explain why Murdoch just dumped trump. It would support charge v Trump Jr.
So here's my bold prediction: the next thing we see is a criminal complaint about a Twitter based conspiracy including Trump, Inc., major right leaning media, Wikileaks and the dirty tricksters involved. 45 is UU Coconspirator. T Jr is named. Less bold but nearly as important: this Complaint/Indictment largely tames Fox News and the Nat'l Enquirer, two of the most vicious propaganda tools our nation has ever seen. And the dawn's early light slowly creeps toward Fox News Nation. OK one last detail and I am really going to bed. Don Jr. has not gone dark. That might mean that EVERYONE ELSE ENTERED A CONSENT ORDER. Which would be quite funny and also really, really, really, really bad for Don Jr.
Others
AFlyingMexican5: Obligatory Jill Stein
xf-: I haven't tweeted anything either. Please add me to the list!
InnocentVitriol: Or it could mean that even Nazi sympathizers took vacations, and we're not far from Thanksgiving.
Tyrion_Baelish_Varys [M]: Or it could mean that even Nazi sympathizers took vacations, and we're not far from Thanksgiving.
It's frankly outlandish to suggest that all of these twitter handles, some run by employees, would concurrently "go on vacation" a whole week before Thanksgiving, while their non-twitter counterparts remain active.
RadioMelon: Something big is about to happen.
Rumor has it that McConnell met with the infamous Murdoch, meaning there could be more string pulling than anyone really knows.
illegalt3nder: Not even a rumor. Murdoch was photographed meeting with McConnell on November 8th:
https://twitter.com/npfandos/status/1060586065860460544?s=21
RadioMelon: All the more reason to be worried.
insteadimawake: What does this imply? I’m completely lost.
BattlePope: It implies they are coordinating in some fashion -- whether how to spin events that are about to unfold, or otherwise work out a strategy to achieve their goals.
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
We Didn’t Start The Fire via Dayana Suncar
The Four Horsemen of Wholesomeness via misteragi
Dahbud Mensch ~ Stuck in the middle with WHO ?
Trump cancels First World War memorial
visit to US military cemetery because of
'poor weather'If a _football player kneeling during the national anthem_ is an act of disrespect to our military, what is it when the President of the United States refuses to go to the cemetery to honor fallen soldiers because of a little rain? via katgal
NOT FAKE
PRESIDENTS
In the Paris rain, May 1961, JFK and de Gaulle honor soldiers
who gave their lives via thenewyorkgod
Obama, with cemetery in background, shows
what a real President looks like, standing in the rain.
Clinton giving speech in rain via BBC News
Honoring the troops that fought in WWI in the rain
or Playing golf in the rain via SteveTheTuba
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
There’s a human in my forest and I don’t know what to do
narrated by Emma Thompson via Salon Alpin
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Boptime w/Even Steven Leech
We begin Saturday's Boptime at 6am ((EST)). During Clifford's Corner local sax musician Fostina Dixon will be our guest~ Steve
The Wilmington Youth Jazz Band (WYJB) consists of Wilmington’s finest young musicians aged 10 to 25. We offer our students the opportunity to improve their improvisational skills while developing the fundamentals of jazz musicianship in a fun group ensemble setting. We have developed a robust instructional program, as well as a summer concert schedule which serves to transform young students into confident jazz performers.
We are a non-profit organization that was founded in 2004 by Wilmington’s own Fostina Dixon-Kilgoe. Fostina was awarded a grant as an alumnus of Berklee College of Music to launch this program.
With the commitment and dedication of our students and staff, we are committed to our community and musical excellence.
Our Mission
Our mission is to expose, educate and culturally enrich students through learning jazz music in an effort to maintain and expand jazz throughout our communities. This effort reaches youth from economical and culturally diverse backgrounds.
Born 16 August 1953, Wilmington, Delaware, USA. Taking her early musical inspiration from the church, Dixon began playing clarinet at school, later adding the baritone saxophone. After leaving school, she studied medicine but a year later changed track and began studying at Berklee College Of Music. There she added bass clarinet and flute to her instrumental range, eventually becoming adept also on alto and soprano saxophones. As a child she had listened to pop music, much of it Motown Records, and while still at Berklee was hired to play in the band backing Marvin Gaye where she stayed for the next two years. Settling in Los Angeles, Dixon found work with several bands, backing artists such as Sammy Davis Jnr. and Nancy Wilson. She also formed a group of her own, named Collage, in which she pursued her own musical identity. She was also discovering jazz and gradually incorporating this into her work.
In addition to her considerable instrumental ability, Dixon is also a composer of distinction and a vocalist. With a broad appreciation of many varied musical forms, Dixon’s commitment is total, and she is also eager to extend her audience by finding a style in both playing and composing that appeals beyond the merely intellectual. She is acutely aware of the strictures placed upon her as a woman in jazz, which, added to her being black, has placed unwarranted pressures upon her. Although she often works in groups with other women, including Melba Liston and Company, her band, Collage, happened to be all male. This was not from deliberate choice but occurred because the musicians whose sounds she felt to be compatible with her aural image of how the group should play were men. ~ All Music ~ Samples via Amazon
Saxophone Maestra Fostina Dixon Blends Contemporary Jazz, Gospel, Funk And R&B On "Here We Go Again" ~ All About Jazz
BOPTIME: Saturday, 6 AM Eastern time, 3 AM Pacific time
Go To: http://www.wvud.org/?page_id=24
Click on a listening link below the WVUD logo:
Boptime available locally on WVUD-FM 91.3,
Shoutcast [Search: WVUD], and TuneIn
RAPID RESPONSE - NOBODY IS ABOVE THE LAW via Reddit
Who is Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker? The new Acting AG has the all the authorities of an Attorney General, Deputy AG Rosenstein no longer oversees the Russia probe, Mueller must report to the Acting AG. The Acting AG can refuse to indict anyone and can defund the investigation.**
via PoppinKREAM, Source
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was not appointed to the role of Acting Attorney General and Special Counsel Mueller will report to the new Acting AG as he is not recused from the Russia investigation. Jeff Session's Chief of Staff Matthew Whitaker has been appointed by President Trump to be the Acting Attorney General,[1] to reiterate he is not recused from the Russia investigation, will be receiving a complete briefing about the investigation from Rosenstein and will most likely interfere the Russia probe. Whitaker is a Trump supporter who has defended the infamous Trump Tower meeting claiming any campaign would have accepted a meeting with a foreign adversary during an election,[2] has attempted to obfuscate Russian interference,[3] and has mused about defunding the Mueller investigation.[4] Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker wrote an opinion piece denouncing Special Counsel Mueller claiming the investigation was going too far.[5]
Last month, when President Donald Trump was asked by The New York Times if special counsel Robert Mueller would be crossing a line if he started investigating the financesof Trump and his family, the President said,"I think that's a violation. Look, this is about Russia."
The President is absolutely correct. Mueller has come up to a red line in the Russia 2016 election-meddling investigation that he is dangerously close to crossing.
However, Special Counsel's purview includes any crimes discovered upon their investigation into Russia's interference.[6]
Context - Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions' Recusal from the Russia investigation and the Appointment of Special Counsel Mueller
Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions resigned at the request of the President and in an unusual move his Chief of Staff was appointed as Acting Attorney General.[7]
President Trump has repeatedly denigrated his former Attorney General for not doing enough to protect the President from the investigation and has gone as far as to ask Sessions to fire Mueller publicly.[8] However, former Attorney General Sessions was forced to recuse himself from the Russia investigation,[9] he met Russian Ambassador Kislyak during the 2016 campaign.[10] AG Sessions cited Title 28, Chapter 1, Section 45.2 of the Code of Federal Regulation, titled "Disqualification arising from personal or political relationship" as the reason as to why he recused himself from the Russia investigation.[11] Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein took over the Russia inquiry and subsequently appointed Special Counsel Mueller.[12] Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is a Republican, who appointed former FBI Director and Republican Robert Mueller as Special Counsel and was lauded by the Republican party,[13] Rosenstein was nominated by President Trump.[14]
1) Wall Street Journal - Attorney General Jeff Sessions Resigns from Trump White House
4) Washington Post - Trump’s new acting attorney general once mused about defunding Mueller
5) CNN - Mueller's investigation of Trump is going too far
7) The Globe and Mail - U.S. Attorney-General Jeff Sessions resigns at Trump’s request
9) Bloomberg - Mueller Investigated Sessions for Perjury on Russia Statements
10) Reuters - Mueller probing Russia contacts at Republican convention: sources
11) Cornell Law School - 28 CFR 45.2 - Disqualification arising from personal or political relationship.
12) U.S. Department of Justice - Appointment of Special Counsel
13) USA Today - Rare bipartisan moment: Both sides embrace Robert Mueller as special counsel
14) Reuters - Trump to nominate Rod Rosenstein to be deputy U.S. attorney general
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
We Have not Forgotten
About Election Meddling,
because NOBODY knows how it could have been
without Debbie, Hillary, & the DNC cheaters !!!
Corruption is Legal in America via Doku Mentor
Civet, You get what you pay for via LET 'EM HAVE IT! Productions
Stormy Weather via Jeff Reiter
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Election Day Bravo Sierra 201811.06
06:50 PST ~ Federal Judge Allows North Dakota Republicans to Block Native Americans From Voting
o6:50 PST ~ An Armed Extremist Group in Georgia Is Threatening Violence If Stacey Abrams Wins
06:50 PST ~ Voters turned away due to missing voting machines at precinct in Detroit
08:10 PST ~ Scum vs. Scum
08:10 PST ~ No, ICE will not be stationed at polling centers looking for immigrants
08:10 PST ~ Border Patrol To Conduct ‘Crowd Control’ Exercise on Election Day
09:00 PST ~ Election Hoax of Democrats Burning Flags to Celebrate ‘Blue Wave’ Goes Viral on Twitter and Facebook
09:00 PST ~ Humidity causes issues with ballot machines in Wake, other NC counties, officials say
09:00 PST ~ LIVE updates: Squirrel Hill polling place fails to open on time
09:00 PST ~ Problems at the polls? Here's what's happening now
09:00 PST ~ The right to vote is under siege in 2018
10:00 PST ~ Majority says Election Day should be a federal holiday, poll finds ;-) Nobody has all the answers!
10:00 PST ~ Georgia voters report long lines and malfunctioning machines
10:00 PST ~ Russians Meddling in the Midterms? Here’s the Data
10:00 PST ~ The Man Who Broke Politics
10:00 PST ~ Border Patrol cancels 'crowd control' exercise, doesn't clarify why it was happening to begin with
10:20 PST ~ Vote Scream via Paul Krassner
10:50 PST ~ Thousands of students are expected to walk out of classes today to go to the polls
10:50 PST ~ This is the best explanation of gerrymandering you will ever see
10:50 PST ~ Broken voting machines cause 4-hour lines outside Atlanta
10:50 PST ~ Tennessee polling sites without power forced to use paper ballots
12:00 PST ~ Man arrested after allegedly threatening to 'shoot up' polling place
12:00 PST ~ Voters in South Carolina say voting machines changed their choices
12:00 PST ~ 36 Million in U.S. Cast Early Votes, Shattering Records for Young People & People of Color
13:55 PST ~ Coordinated Trolling Efforts Are Serving Up Small-Scale Election Interference Across The Country
13:55 PST ~ A dozen U.S. states see problems with voting machines: rights groups
13:55 PST ~ Man charged in threat to PA poll workers
13:55 PST ~ What to Do When Voting Machines Fail
16:00 PST ~ Turned away twice from her polling place, Dallas teacher fought back — and then voted
16:00 PST ~ Bomb threat delays voting at York County polling site
16:00 PST ~ Hendersonville police investigating possible voter intimidation at polling site
19:10 PST ~ I hate group projects...
19:10 PST ~ More to come in a little while, maybe.
None of the Above
should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!What In Tarnation?
Life is deep & simple & what our society gives us is shallow & complicated. ~ Mr. Rogers
Pathological Lying
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
Pathological lying (also called pseudologia fantastica and mythomania) is a behavior of habitual or compulsive lying. [1][2] It was first described in the medical literature in 1891 by Anton Delbrueck.[2] Although it is a controversial topic,[2] pathological lying has been defined as "falsification entirely disproportionate to any discernible end in view, may be extensive and very complicated, and may manifest over a period of years or even a lifetime".[1]
Characteristics
Defining characteristics of pathological lying include
Some psychiatrists distinguish compulsive from pathological lying, while others consider them equivalent; yet others deny the existence of compulsive lying altogether; this remains an area of considerable controversy.[4]
HyperNormalisation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
HyperNormalisation is a 2016 BBC documentary by British filmmaker Adam Curtis. In the film, Curtis argues that since the 1970s, governments, financiers, and technological utopians have given up on the complex "real world" and built a simple "fake world" that is run by corporations and kept stable by politicians.
The term "hypernormalisation" is taken from Alexei Yurchak's 2006 book Everything was Forever, Until it was No More: The Last Soviet Generation, about the paradoxes of life in the Soviet Union during the 20 years before it collapsed. A professor of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, he argues that everyone knew the system was failing, but as no one could imagine any alternative to the status quo, politicians and citizens were resigned to maintaining a pretence of a functioning society. Over time, this delusion became a self-fulfilling prophecy and the "fakeness" was accepted by everyone as real, an effect that Yurchak termed "hypernormalisation".
Chapters
The film consists of nine chapters.
1975
The fiscal crisis in New York City and the emergence of the idea that financial systems could run society; shuttle diplomacy between then-US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Middle Eastern leaders in the Arab-Israeli dispute and the subsequent retreat by Hafez al-Assad of Syria; and the onset of hypernormalisation in the Soviet Union.
The Human Bomb
How, following the United States' involvement in the 1982 Lebanon War, a vengeful al-Assad made an alliance with Ruhollah Khomeini of Iran. They planned to force the US out of the Middle East by encouraging civilians to carry out suicide bombings on American targets in the region, thereby avoiding reprisals. In February 1984, the U.S. withdrew all its troops from Lebanon because, in the words of then-US Secretary of State George P. Shultz, "we became paralysed by the complexity that we faced".
Altered States
By the mid-1980s, banks and corporations were joining up through computer networks to create a hidden system of power, and technological utopians whose roots lay in the counterculture of the 1960s also saw the internet as an opportunity to make an alternative world that was free of political and legal restraints.
Acid Flashback
John Perry Barlow's vision of cyberspace as the 1990s equivalent of the Acid Tests. Barlow, who had been part of the LSD (also known as "acid") counterculture in the 1960s and founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation, wrote a manifesto called A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace. Addressed to politicians, it declared "the global social space we are building to be naturally independent of the tyrannies you seek to impose upon us". Two computer hackers—Phiber Optik and Acid Phreak—knew that in reality corporations were using the internet to exert more control over the lives of people than governments had done in the past, and they demonstrated that hierarchies did exist online by obtaining Barlow's credit record from TRW Inc. and posting it on the internet.
The Colonel
This chapter describes the Reagan administration using Muammar Gaddafi as a pawn in their public relations (PR) strategy of creating a simplified, morally unambiguous foreign policy by blaming him for the 1985 Rome and Vienna airport attacks and the 1986 Berlin discotheque bombing that killed US soldiers, both of which European security services attributed to Syrian intelligence agencies. Gaddafi is described as playing along for the sake of increasing his profile in the Arab world as a revolutionary. The 1986 United States bombing of Libya, 10 days after the disco bombing, is described as an operation carried out mainly for PR reasons, because attacking Syria would have been too risky.
The Truth Is Out There
[See also: Paul Bennewitz and Mirage Men]
This chapter begins with a montage of unidentified flying object (UFO) sightings recorded by members of the public in the United States. It argues that the phenomenon surrounding UFOs in the 1990s was born out of a counter-intelligence operation designed to make the public believe that secret airborne high-technology weapons systems the US military tested during and after the Cold War were alien visitations. Top secret memos forged by the United States Air Force Office of Special Investigations were allegedly leaked to ufologists who spread the manufactured conspiracy theory of a government cover-up to the wider public. The method, called perception management, aimed to distract people from the complexities of the real world. American politics are described as having become increasingly detached from reality. Curtis uses the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of the 1980s as an example of an event that took the West by surprise because reality had become less and less important. A Jane Fonda workout video is shown to illustrate that socialists had given up trying to change the real world and were instead focusing on the self and encouraging others to do the same. The video is intercut with footage of Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife, Elena, being executed by firing squad and buried following the Romanian Revolution in 1989.
Managed Outcomes
Ulrich Beck is identified as a left-wing German political theorist. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, he saw the world as too complex to change, and Beck asserted that politicians should merely keep the West stable by predicting and avoiding risks. Curtis looks at Aladdin, a computer that manages about 7% of the world's financial assets, analysing the past to anticipate what may happen in the future; and how anti-depressant drugs and social media both stabilise the emotions of individuals.
A Cautionary Tale
The start of this chapter is about the flaws of trying to predict the future by using data from the past. Curtis tells the story of how a card counter named Jess Marcum was recruited by Donald Trump to analyse the gambling habits of Akio Kashiwagi at his casino, the Trump Taj Mahal, in Atlantic City, after Trump had lost millions of dollars to Kashiwagi. In an effort to avert the impending bankruptcy of the casino, Marcum devised a model that predicted a way of recouping the money from Kashiwagi, who lost US$10 million. However, before he could pay, he was killed by yakuza gangsters, and the casino went bankrupt, with Trump having to sell many of his assets to the banks.
Attention turns back to the Middle East and the Lockerbie Bombing in 1988. Curtis says that immediately after the bombing, journalists and investigators blamed Syria for carrying out the attack on behalf of Iran in revenge for the shooting down of Iran Air Flight 655 by the United States Navy. It was generally accepted as true until US security agencies announced that Libya was behind the attack. Some journalists and politicians believed that the West had made the volte-face to appease Syria's leader, whom the US and the United Kingdom required as an ally in the coming Gulf War.
He focuses on the spread of suicide bombing tactics from Shia to Sunni Islam and the targeting of civilians in Israel by Hamas during the 1990s. The resulting political paralysis led to a stalling of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process. It is described as an unintended consequence of Israel's response to the 1992 killing of an Israeli border guard.
A montage is shown of clips from pre-9/11 disaster films in which New York City landmarks are variously destroyed by alien invaders, meteorites, and a tsunami. Curtis argues that such films were characteristic of a mood of uncertainty that pervaded the United States at the end of the 20th century.
Curtis shows how Muammar Gaddafi was turned into the West's "new best friend."
A World Without Power
The effect of the Iraq war wreaks havoc on the American psyche and the people retreat into cyberspace. Judea Pearl creates Bayesian networks that mimic human behavior. Judea's son, Daniel Pearl is the first American to be beheaded on a video uploaded to YouTube.
Meanwhile, social media algorithms show information that is pleasing to its users and hence doesn't challenge previously held beliefs. Despite this, Occupy Wall Street emerges in an attempt to disrupt the system by imitating the leaderless system that the internet was once imagined to become. Using a similar method, the Egyptian revolution of 2011 commenced.
Britain, France and the U.S. turn their backs on Muammar Gaddafi once the people rise up against him. The U.S. drops bombs with drones, and then footage of Gaddafi being captured by rebels is shown.
Neither Occupy Wall Street, nor the Arab Spring turn out very well for the revolutionaries.
In Russia, Vladimir Putin and his cabinet of political technologists create mass confusion. Vladislav Surkov uses ideas from art to turn Russian politics into a bewildering piece of theater. Donald Trump used the same techniques in his presidential campaign by using language from Occupy Wall Street and the extreme racist right-wing. Curtis asserts that Trump "defeated journalism" by rendering its fact-checking abilities irrelevant.
The American Left's attempt to resist Trump on the internet had no effect. In fact, they were just feeding the social media corporations who valued their many additional clicks.
Syria's revolution becomes more vicious and violent. The technique of suicide bombing that Curtis argues Hafez al-Assad introduced in order to unite the Middle East has instead torn it apart. Russia uses Surkov's concept of "non-linear warfare" to keep Syria destabilized. Russia claims to leave Syria, but doesn't.
Abu Musab al-Suri in Syria argues terrorists should not carry out large scale attacks such as Osama Bin Laden did, but should instead carry out random small-scale attacks throughout the West to create fear and chaos, that would be more difficult to retaliate against. This destabilization of the West's psyche leads to the passing of the Brexit and the popularity of Donald Trump.
The film closes with a montage, played over a Barbara Mandrell performance.
Don't help me set the table ~ Cause now there's one less place ~ I won't lay mama's silver ~ For a man who won't say grace ~ If home is where the heart is ~ Then your home's on the street ~ Me, I'll read a good book ~ Turn out the lights and go to sleep
— "Standing Room Only" from This Is Barbara Mandrell
Collective Narcissism
From WikiZer, Open wikipedia design ~ Source
Collective narcissism (or group narcissism) extends the concept of individual narcissism onto the social level of self. It is a tendency to exaggerate the positive image and importance of a group the individual belongs to – i.e. the ingroup.[1][2] While the classic definition of narcissism focuses on the individual, collective narcissism asserts that one can have a similar excessively high opinion of a group, and that a group can function as a narcissistic entity.[1] Collective narcissism is related to ethnocentrism; however, ethnocentrism primarily focuses on self-centeredness at an ethnic or cultural level, while collective narcissism is extended to any type of ingroup, beyond just cultures and ethnicities.[1][3] While ethnocentrism is an assertion of the ingroup's supremacy, collective narcissism is a self-defensive tendency to invest unfulfilled self-entitlement into a belief about ingroup's uniqueness and greatness. Thus, the ingroup is expected to become a vehicle of actualisation of frustrated self-entitlement.[2] When applied to a national group, collective narcissism is similar to nationalism: a desire for national supremacy.[4] However, the two constructs differ not only because collective narcissism can refer groups other than the nation. Nationalists are openly dominant and deny weakness. They seek international supremacy. Collective narcissism is related to a sense of weakness and preoccupation with the lack of recognition for the ingroup. Collective narcissism, but not nationalism, is related to hypersensitivity to intergroup threat and retaliatory hostility. While nationalistic intergroup hostility is actively aggressive and openly dominant, collective narcissistic intergroup hostility is subjectively defensive. Collective narcissists protect the ingroup’s image rather than assert the ingroup’s dominance. However, these constructs are functionally distinct: they make different predictions for intergroup attitudes, they are related to different emotional profiles and different attitudes towards the self. Positive overlap between ingroup satisfaction and collective narcissism suppresses collective narcissistic intergroup hostility.[2]
Development of the concept
In Sigmund Freud's 1922 study Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego, he noted how every little canton looks down upon the others with contempt,[5] as an instance of what would later to be termed Freud's theory of collective narcissism.[6] Wilhelm Reich and Isaiah Berlin explored what the latter called the rise of modern national narcissism: the self-adoration of peoples.[7] "Group narcissism" is described in a 1973 book entitled The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness by psychologist Erich Fromm.[8] In the 1990s, Pierre Bourdieu wrote of a sort of collective narcissism affecting intellectual groups, inclining them to turn a complacent gaze on themselves.[9] Noting how people's desire to see their own groups as better than other groups can lead to intergroup bias, Henri Tajfel approached the same phenomena in the seventies and eighties, so as to create social identity theory, which argues that people's motivation to obtain positive self-esteem from their group memberships is one driving-force behind in-group bias.[10] The term "collective narcissism" was highlighted anew by researcher Agnieszka Golec de Zavala[1][2][11] who created the Collective Narcissism Scale[1] and developed research on intergroup and political consequences of collective narcissism. People who score high on the Collective Narcissists Scale agree that their group's importance and worth are not sufficiently recognised by others and that their group deserves special treatment. They insist that their group must obtain special recognition and respect.
The Scale was modelled on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory. However, collective and individual narcissism are modestly correlated. Only collective narcissism predicts intergroup behaviours and attitudes. Collective narcissism is related to vulnerable narcissism (individual narcissism manifesting as distrustful and neurotic interpersonal style), rather than grandiose narcissism (individual narcissism manifesting as exceedingly self-aggrandising interpersonal style) and to low self-esteem. This is in line with theorising of Theodore Adorno who proposed that collective narcissism motivated support for the Nazi politics in Germany and was a response to undermined sense of self-worth.
Characteristics and consequences
Collective narcissism is characterized by the members of a group holding an inflated view of their ingroup which requires external validation.[1] Collective narcissism can be exhibited by an individual on behalf of any social group or by a group as a whole. Research participants found that they could apply statements of the Collective Narcissism Scale to various groups: national, ethnic, religious, ideological, political, students of the same university, fans of the same football team, professional groups and organizations[1] Collectively narcissistic groups require external validation, just as individual narcissists do.[12] Organizations and groups who exhibit this behavior typically try to protect their identities through rewarding group-building behavior (this is positive reinforcement).[12]
Collective narcissism predicts retaliatory hostility to past, present, actual and imagined offences to the ingroup and negative attitudes towards groups perceived as threatening.[2][11] It predicts constant feeling threatened in intergroup situations that require a stretch of imagination to be perceived as insulting or threatening. For example, in Turkey, collective narcissists felt humiliated by the Turkish wait to be admitted to the European Union. After a transgression as petty as a joke made by a Polish celebrity about the country's government, Polish collective narcissists threatened physical punishment and openly rejoiced in the misfortunes of their "offender".[11] Collective narcissism predicts conspiracy thinking about secretive malevolent actions of outgroups.[13]
Golec de Zavala et al. state some parallels between individual and collective narcissism:
Individual/Collective Narcissism Equivalencies[1] Individual Collective I wish people would recognize my authority I wish other people would recognize the authority of my group I have natural talent for influencing people My group has all predispositions to influence others If I ruled the world it would be a much better place If my group ruled the world it would be a much better place I am an extraordinary person My group is extraordinary I like to be the center of attention I like when my group is the center of attention I will never be satisfied until I get what I deserve I will never be satisfied until my group gets all that it deserves I insist upon getting the respect that is due to me I insist upon my group getting the respect that is due to it I want to amount to something in the eyes of the world I want my group to amount to something in the eyes of the world People never give me enough recognition for the things I've done Not many people seem to understand the full importance of my group Collective vs. individual
There are several connections, and intricate relationships between collective and individual narcissism, or between individual narcissism stemming from group identities or activities. No single relationship between groups and individuals, however, is conclusive or universally applicable. In some cases, collective narcissism is an individual's idealization of the ingroup to which it belongs,[14] while in another the idealization of the group takes place at a more group-level, rather than an instillation within each individual member of the group.[1] In some cases, one might project the idealization of himself onto his group,[15] while in another case, the development of individual-narcissism might stem from being associated with a prestigious, accomplished, or extraordinary group.[1][16]
An example of the first case listed above is that of national identity. One might feel a great sense of love and respect for one's nation, flag, people, city, or governmental systems as a result of a collectively narcissistic perspective.[14] It must be remembered that these feelings are not explicitly the result of collective narcissism, and that collective narcissism is not explicitly the cause of patriotism, or any other group-identifying expression. However, glorification of one's group (such as a nation) can be seen in some cases as a manifestation of collective narcissism.[14]
In the case where the idealization of self is projected onto ones group, group-level narcissism tends to be less binding than in other cases.[15] Typically in this situation the individual—already individually narcissistic—uses a group to enhance his own self-perceived quality, and by identifying positively with the group and actively building it up, the narcissist is enhancing simultaneously both his own self-worth, and his group's worth.[15]However, because the link tends to be weaker, individual narcissists seeking to raise themselves up through a group will typically dissociate themselves from a group they feel is damaging to their image, or that is not improving proportionally to the amount of support they are investing in the group.[15]
Involvement in one's group has also been shown to be a factor in the level of collective narcissism exhibited by members of a group. Typically a more involved member of a group is more likely to exhibit a higher opinion of the group.[17] This results from an increased affinity for the group as one becomes more involved, as well as a sense of investment or contribution to the success of the group.[17] Also, another perspective asserts that individual narcissism is related to collective narcissism exhibited by individual group members.[3] Personal narcissists, seeing their group as a defining extension of themselves, will defend their group (collective narcissism) more avidly than a non-narcissist, to preserve their own perceived social standing along with their group's.[3] In this vein, a problem is presented; for while an individual narcissist will be heroic in defending his or her ingroup during intergroup conflicts, he or she may be a larger burden on the ingroup in intragroup situations by demanding admiration, and exhibiting more selfish behavior on the intragroup level—individual narcissism.[3]
Conversely, another relationship between collective narcissism and the individual can be established with individuals who have a low or damaged ego investing their image in the well-being of their group, which bears strong resemblance to the "ideal-hungry" followers in the charismatic leader-follower relationship.[1][18] As discussed, these ego-damaged group-investors seek solace in belonging to a group;[18] however, a charismatic, strong leader is not always requisite for someone weak to feel strength by building up a narcissistic opinion of their own group.[15]
The charismatic leader-follower relationship
Another sub-concept encompassed by collective narcissism is that of the "Charismatic Leader-Follower Relationship" theorized by political psychologist Jerrold Post.[18] Post takes the view that collective narcissism is exhibited as a collection of individual narcissists, and discusses how this type of relationship emerges when a narcissistic charismatic leader, appeals to narcissistic "ideal-hungry" followers.[18]
An important characteristic of the leader follower-relationship are the manifestations of narcissism by both the leader and follower of a group.[18] Within this relationship there are two categories of narcissists: the mirror-hungry narcissist, and the ideal-hungry narcissist—the leader and the followers respectively.[18] The mirror-hungry personality typically seeks a continuous flow of admiration and respect from his followers. Conversely, the ideal-hungry narcissist takes comfort in the charisma and confidence of his mirror-hungry leader. The relationship is somewhat symbiotic; for while the followers provide the continuous admiration needed by the mirror-hungry leader, the leader's charisma provides the followers with the sense of security and purpose that their ideal-hungry narcissism seeks.[18] Fundamentally both the leader and the followers exhibit strong collectively narcissistic sentiments—both parties are seeking greater justification and reason to love their group as much as possible.[1][18]
Perhaps the most significant example of this phenomenon would be that of Nazi Germany.[18] Adolf Hitler's charisma and polarizing speeches satisfied the German people's hunger for a strong leader.[18] Hitler's speeches were characterized by their emphasis on "strength"—referring to Germany—and "weakness"—referring to the Jewish people.[19] Some have even described Hitler's speeches as "hypnotic"—even to non-German speakers[18]—and his rallies as "watching hypnosis on large scale".[18] Hitler's charisma convinced the German people to believe that they were not weak, and that by destroying the perceived weakness from among them (the Jews), they would be enhancing their own strength—satisfying their ideal-hungry desire for strength, and pleasing their mirror-hungry charismatic leader.[18]
Intergroup aggression
Collective narcissism has been shown to be a factor in intergroup aggression and bias.[1] Primary components of collectively narcissistic intergroup relations involve aggression against outgroups with which collective narcissistic perceive as threatening.[20][1][2][11] Collective narcissism helps to explain unreasonable manifestations of retaliation between groups. A narcissistic group is more sensitive to perceived criticism exhibited by outgroups, and is therefore more likely to retaliate.[21] Collective narcissism is also related to negativity between groups who share a history of distressing experiences. The members of a narcissistic ingroup are likely to assume threats or negativity towards their ingroup where threats or negativity were not necessarily implied or exhibited.[1][2][11] It is thought that this heightened sensitivity to negative feelings towards the ingroup is a result of underlying doubts about the greatness of the ingroup held by its members.[18]
Similar to other elements of collective narcissism, intergroup aggression related to collective narcissism draws parallels with its individually narcissistic counterparts. An individual narcissist might react aggressively in the presence of humiliation, irritation, or anything threatening to his self-image.[22] Likewise, a collective narcissist, or a collectively narcissistic group might react aggressively when the image of the group is in jeopardy, or when the group is collectively humiliated.[1]
A study conducted among 6 to 9 year-olds by Judith Griffiths indicated that ingroups and outgroups among these children functioned relatively identical to other known collectively narcissistic groups in terms of intergroup aggression. The study noted that children generally had a significantly higher opinion of their ingroup than of surrounding outgroups, and that such ingroups indirectly or directly exhibited aggression on surrounding outgroups.[23]
Ethnocentrism
Main article: EthnocentrismCollective narcissism and ethnocentrism are closely related; they can be positively correlated and often shown to be coexistent, but they are independent in that either can exist without the presence of the other.[3] In a study conducted by PhD Boris Bizumic, some ethnocentrism was shown to be an expression of group-level narcissism.[3] It was noted, however, that not all manifestations of ethnocentrism are narcissistically based, and conversely, not all cases of group-level narcissism are by any means ethnocentric.[3]
It is suggested that ethnocentrism, when pertaining to discrimination or aggression based on the self-love of one's group, or in other words, based on exclusion from one's self-perceived superior group is an expression of collective narcissism.[1] In this sense, it might be said the collective and group narcissism overlap with ethnocentrism depending on given definitions, and the breadth of their acceptance.
In the world
In general, collective narcissism is most strongly manifested in groups that are "self-relevant", like religions, nationality, or ethnicity.[15] As discussed earlier, phenomena such as national identity (nationality) and Nazi Germany (ethnicity and nationality) are manifestations of collective narcissism among groups that critically define the people who belong to them.
In addition to this, the collective narcissism that a group may already possess is likely to be exacerbated during conflict and aggression.[1] And in terms of cultural effects, cultures that place an emphasis on the individual are apparently more likely to see manifestations of perceived individual greatness projected onto social ingroups existing within that culture.[1] Also, and finally, narcissistic groups are not restricted to any one homogenous composition of collective or individually collective or individual narcissists.[3] A quote from Hitler almost ideally sums the actual nature of collective narcissism as it is realistically manifested, and might be found reminiscent of almost every idea presented here: "My group is better and more important than other groups, but still is not worthy of me".[3]
Identity Fusion
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
Identity fusion, a psychological construct rooted in social psychology and cognitive anthropology, is a form of alignment with groups in which members experience a visceral sense of oneness with the group. The construct relies on a distinction between the personal self and the social self. The personal self refers to the characteristics that make someone a unique person (e.g., tall, old, intelligent), while the social self pertains to the characteristics that align the person with groups (e.g., American, fraternity brother, student council member, etc.). As the name suggests, identity fusion involves the union of the personal and social selves. When fusion occurs, both the personal and social selves remain salient and influential but the boundaries between them become highly permeable. In addition, the theory proposes that fused persons come to regard other group members as “family” and develop strong relational ties to them as well as ties to the collective. Therefore, fused persons are not just bound to the collective; they are tied to the individual members of the collective.
The potency of the personal self and relational ties distinguish identity fusion from other forms of alignment with groups, such as “group identification”. In group identification, allegiance to the collective eclipses the personal self and relational ties to other group members. Because of this, the personal self and relational ties are not as involved in theories of group identification. Identity fusion theorizes that fusion measures should be more predictive of extreme pro-group behavior than previously proposed measures of identification. In fact, there is growing evidence of this. Measures of identity fusion are particularly powerful predictors of personally costly pro-group behaviors, including endorsement of extreme behaviors, such as fighting and dying for the group.
Why Understanding Identity
Fusion Is So ImportantIdentity Fusion - aka “Sports team” mode
A majority of the United States is confused by the behavior of ~34% of the rest of the country.
To grasp what has happened, you just have to realize that some political supporters have gone into “Sports Teams” mode. They have turned politics into an Identity Fusion issue.
Basically, they have stopped thinking about the representative government as a functional group of public servants. They are thinking about it as if it's their "team" and everything political has become "us versus them."
Some characteristics of a team fanatic
[ I'm using Trump Supporters as an example because it's currently the most obvious example, but it can apply to both sides to some degree. ]
Once you realize this is what's happening, the common attributes are there to see:
✓ Wearing identifying clothing (hats, badges, colors, logos, slogans) in everyday life.
✓ Loyalty regardless of performance or behavior of their "team."
✓ Instant disrespect for any member of the opposing team based solely on team affiliation.
✓ Hatred of any perceived disloyalty from fellow team fans.
✓ Having rallies and parades even when there is no pending game with the primary goal to celebrate and reenforce being loyal.
✓ At gatherings, fans chant slogans and/or sing.
✓ Team players (not fans, but players) are 100% supported unless they leave the team. Then they are ostracized and demonized even though they are basically the same person.
This simple concept explains the logic-defying behavior we are constantly seeing in politics today.
I debated posting this on Memorial Day. It's a day Americans look back and remember the sacrifices other Americans made for us.
We need to stop with the divisive team fanaticism against each other. We are Americans and our government is made up of civil servants who [are supposed to?] swear loyalty [to?] the Constitution... they are NOT your sports team.
Want to know more?
Paper on Identity Fusion from University of Texas:
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/c5c0/9988102c68dea5cfd34d67a28dab59a99932.pdf
More readable version of this information from Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_fusion
[Note: this content is OC and probably contains spelling and/or grammar errors. I'm not a professional journalist or writer. Just a long time Imgurian who likes to make memes. Please let me know of any mistakes.] ~ Complete [Local] Article w/Graphics: Understanding Identity Fusion
Fascism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
Fascism is a form of radical authoritarian ultranationalism, characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition and control of industry and commerce, which came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe. The first fascist movements emerged in Italy during World War I before it spread to other European countries. Opposed to liberalism, Marxism and anarchism, fascism is usually placed on the far-right within the traditional left–right spectrum.
Fascists saw World War I as a revolution that brought massive changes to the nature of war, society, the state and technology. The advent of total war and the total mass mobilization of society had broken down the distinction between civilians and combatants. A "military citizenship" arose in which all citizens were involved with the military in some manner during the war. The war had resulted in the rise of a powerful state capable of mobilizing millions of people to serve on the front lines and providing economic production and logistics to support them, as well as having unprecedented authority to intervene in the lives of citizens.
Fascists believe that liberal democracy is obsolete and they regard the complete mobilization of society under a totalitarian one-party state as necessary to prepare a nation for armed conflict and to respond effectively to economic difficulties. Such a state is led by a strong leader—such as a dictator and a martial government composed of the members of the governing fascist party—to forge national unity and maintain a stable and orderly society. Fascism rejects assertions that violence is automatically negative in nature and views political violence, war and imperialism as means that can achieve national rejuvenation. Fascists advocate a mixed economy, with the principal goal of achieving autarky through protectionist and interventionist economic policies.
Historians, political scientists and other scholars have long debated the exact nature of fascism. Each interpretation of fascism is distinct, leaving many definitions too wide or narrow.
One common definition of the term focuses on three concepts: the fascist negations (anti-liberalism, anti-communism and anti-conservatism); nationalist authoritarian goals of creating a regulated economic structure to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture; and a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence and promotion of masculinity, youth and charismatic leadership. According to many scholars, fascism—especially once in power—has historically attacked communism, conservatism and parliamentary liberalism, attracting support primarily from the far-right.
Blackshirts
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
The Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale (MVSN, "Voluntary Militia for National Security"), commonly called the Blackshirts (Italian: Camicie Nere, CCNN, singular: Camicia Nera) or squadristi (singular: squadrista), was originally the paramilitary wing of the National Fascist Party and, after 1923, an all-volunteer militia of the Kingdom of Italy. Its members were distinguished by their black uniforms (modelled on those of the Arditi, Italy's elite troops of World War I) and their loyalty to Benito Mussolini, the Duce (leader) of Fascism, to whom they swore an oath. The founders of the paramilitary groups were nationalist intellectuals, former army officers and young landowners opposing peasants' and country labourers' unions. Their methods became harsher as Mussolini's power grew, and they used violence and intimidation against Mussolini's opponents.[1] In 1943, following the fall of the Fascist regime, the MVSN was integrated into the Royal Italian Army and disbanded.
History
The Blackshirts were established as the squadristi in 1919 and consisted of many disgruntled former soldiers. It was given the task of leading fights against their bitter enemies – the Socialists. They may have numbered 200,000 by the time of Mussolini's March on Rome from 27 to 29 October 1922. In 1922 the squadristi were reorganized into the milizia and formed numerous bandiere, and on 1 February 1923 the Blackshirts became the Volunteer Militia for National Security (Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale, or MVSN), which lasted until the 8 September 1943 Armistice of Cassibile. The Italian Social Republic, located in the areas of northern Italy occupied by Germany, reformed the MVSN on 8 December 1943 into the National Republican Guard (Guardia Nazionale Repubblicana, or GNR).
Sturmabteilung
a.k.a. BrownshirtsFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
The Sturmabteilung (SA) primary purposes were providing protection for Nazi rallies and assemblies, disrupting the meetings of opposing parties, fighting against the paramilitary units of the opposing parties, especially the Red Front Fighters League (Rotfrontkämpferbund) of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), and intimidating Slavs, Romanis, trade unionists, and, especially, Jews – for instance, during the Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses.
The SA were also called the "Brownshirts" (Braunhemden) from the color of their uniform shirts, similar to Benito Mussolini's blackshirts.
In violent riots, members of the SA shattered the glass storefronts of about 7,500 Jewish stores and businesses, hence the name Kristallnacht (Crystal Night) given to the events.[30] Jewish homes were ransacked throughout Germany.
**** The downfall of Brownshirts was initiated by Night of the Long Knives and finished by Hitler SS.
Treason
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
In law, treason is the crime that covers some of the more extreme acts against one's nation or sovereign. Historically, treason also covered the murder of specific social superiors, such as the murder of a husband by his wife or that of a master by his servant. Treason against the king was known as high treason and treason against a lesser superior was petty treason. A person who commits treason is known in law as a traitor.
At times, the term traitor has been used as a political epithet, regardless of any verifiable treasonable action. In a civil war or insurrection, the winners may deem the losers to be traitors. Likewise the term traitor is used in heated political discussion – typically as a slur against political dissidents, or against officials in power who are perceived as failing to act in the best interest of their constituents. In certain cases, as with the Dolchstoßlegende (Stab-in-the-back myth), the accusation of treason towards a large group of people can be a unifying political message. Treason is considered to be different and on many occasions a separate charge from "treasonable felony" in many parts of the world.
§2381. Treason
Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason and shall suffer death, or shall be imprisoned not less than five years and fined under this title but not less than $10,000; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.
(June 25, 1948, ch. 645, 62 Stat. 807 ; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, §330016(2)(J), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2148 .)
Cult
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
The term cult usually refers to a social group defined by its religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs, or its common interest in a particular personality, object or goal. The term itself is controversial and it has divergent definitions in both popular culture and academia and it also has been an ongoing source of contention among scholars across several fields of study.[1][2] In the sociological classifications of religious movements, a cult is a social group with socially deviant or novel beliefs and practices,[3] although this is often unclear.[4][5][6] Other researchers present a less-organized picture of cults saying that they arise spontaneously around novel beliefs and practices.[7] Groups said to be cults range in size from local groups with a few members to international organizations with millions.[8]
Beginning in the 1930s, cults became the object of sociological study in the context of the study of religious behavior.[9] From the 1940s the Christian countercult movement has opposed some sects and new religious movements, and it labelled them as cults for their "un-Christian" unorthodox beliefs. The secular anti-cult movement began in the 1970s and it opposed certain groups, often charging them with mind control and partly motivated in reaction to acts of violence committed by some of their members. Some of the claims and actions of the anti-cult movement have been disputed by scholars and by the news media, leading to further public controversy.
The term "new religious movement" refers to religions which have appeared since the mid-1800s. Many, but not all of them, have been considered to be cults. Sub-categories of cults include: Doomsday cults, personality cults, political cults, destructive cults, racist cults, polygamist cults, and terrorist cults. Various national governments have reacted to cult-related issues in different ways, and this has sometimes led to controversy.
Ineligibility Clause
Emoluments ClauseFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office.
The Ineligibility Clause (sometimes also called the Emoluments Clause,[1] or the Incompatibility Clause,[2] or the Sinecure Clause[3]) is a provision in Article 1, Section 6, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution[4] that makes each incumbent member of Congress ineligible to hold an office established by the federal government during their tenure in Congress; it also bars officials in the federal government's executive and judicial branches from simultaneously serving in either the U.S. House or Senate. The purpose of the clause is twofold: first, to protect the separation of powers philosophy (upon which the federal frame of government is built); and second, to prevent Congress from conspiring to create offices or increase federal officials' salaries with the expectation that members of Congress would later be appointed to these posts.[5][6]
Old Post Office
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ~ Source
The Old Post Office has been a Trump International Hotel since 2016 under a lease agreement between Donald Trump and the federal government. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Old Post Office and Clock Tower and located at 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., was begun in 1892, completed in 1899, and is a contributing property to the Pennsylvania Avenue National Historic Site.[1] It was used as the city's main General Post Office until 1914 at the beginning of World War I, succeeding an earlier 1839 edifice, G.P.O. of Classical Revival style, expanded in 1866 on F Street, which later was turned over to the Tariff Commission and several other agencies (today, the Hotel Monaco). The Pennsylvania Avenue 1899 landmark structure functioned primarily as an federal office building afterward, and was nearly torn down during the construction of the surrounding Federal Triangle complex in the 1920s. It was again threatened and nearly demolished in the 1970s to make way for proposals for the completion of the enveloping Federal Triangle complex of similar Beaux Arts styled architecture government offices, first begun in the 1920s and 30s.
Lease to The Trump Organization
On February 6, 2012, GSA announced that it had chosen The Trump Organization as the potential redeveloper of the Old Post Office Building. The company partnered with Colony Capital, a private equity firm, in its bid. The Trump Organization bid pledged to spend $200 million to turn the structure into a 250-room[102] (later sources said 261-room)[116] luxury hotel. Much of the investment would be in cash, not debt.[116] The hotel would include a conference center,[102] spa,[102] three high-end restaurants,[116] and a 35,000-square-foot (3,300 m2) meeting and banquet facility.[116] The company also pledged to create a small museum dedicated to the history of the building and the Bells of Congress,[116] and to maintain the historic exterior.[102] The Trump Organization also tentatively agreed to pay GSA $3 million a year in rent.[117]
Legal challenges associated with Trump's presidency
After Donald J. Trump was inaugurated as President of the United States, the Trump International Hotel became the focus of legal controversy.[164] World leaders stated Trump was encouraging emissaries to stay at Trump hotels while visiting.[165] Trump family members, such as Ivanka, have profited from their stake in the hotel while Donald Trump has been president.[166] ~ Emoluments Clause lawsuits
Political protests
During the presidency of Donald Trump, the Old Post Office has become a frequent location of political protests. During the evening of May 15, 2017, artist Robin Bell projected messages onto the hotel's facade that stated, among other things, "Emoluments Welcome," along with an animation of the flags of nations in which Trump had business projects.[178] On January 13, 2018, after Trump reportedly used the word "shithole" at a meeting, Bell projected onto the facade the message "Not a D.C. resident?" / "Need a place to stay?" / "Try our shithole".[179] Following the March for Our Lives anti-gun violence rally on March 24, 2018, many rally-goers left their signs by the hotel.[180][181]
Science Faction
43+ years ago an anonymous cassette tape was
shoved through my mail slot and is worth a Listen.
Pathological Lying, HyperNormalisation, Collective
Narcissism, Identity Fusion, Treason, Traitor, Fascism, etc.
Why is this important?
Mr. Hitler, like some folks, thought
he was doing the world a favor, too.Continue reading Tarnation at:
http://www.flyingsnail.com/tarnation.html
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
8 guys in this country have more money than 4 billion people combined, but yeah the mom buying groceries with food stamps is the problem
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
{͡ʘ ͜ʖ ͡ʘ} Is Daylight Saving Time Dangerous? {͡ʘ ͜ʖ ͡ʘ}
_or_ Politicians Intentionally Trying To Wreck Lives?
100 years later, the madness
of daylight saving time enduresBy Michael Downing, The Conversation, March 9, 2018, Phys.org, Article Source
One hundred years after Congress passed the first daylight saving legislation, lawmakers in Florida this week passed the "Sunshine Protection Act," which will make daylight saving a year-round reality in the Sunshine State.
If approved by the federal government, this will effectively move Florida's residents one time zone to the east, aligning cities from Jacksonville to Miami with Nova Scotia rather than New York and Washington, D.C.
The cost of rescheduling international and interstate business and commerce hasn't been calculated. Instead, relying on the same overly optimistic math that led the original proponents of daylight saving to predict vast energy savings, crisper farm products harvested before the morning dew dried and lessened eye strain for industrial workers, Florida legislators are lauding the benefits of putting "more sunshine in our lives."
It's absurd – and fitting – that a century later, opponents and supporters of daylight saving are still not sure exactly what it does. Despite its name, daylight saving has never saved anyone anything. But it has proven to be a fantastically effective retail spending plan.
Making the trains run on time
For centuries people set their clocks and watches by looking up at the sun and estimating, which yielded wildly dissimilar results between (and often within) cities and towns.
To railroad companies around the world, that wasn't acceptable. They needed synchronized, predictable station times for arrivals and departures, so they proposed splitting up the globe into 24 time zones.
In 1883, the economic clout of the railroads allowed them to replace sun time with standard time with no legislative assistance and little public opposition. The clocks were calm for almost 30 years, but for an annual debate in the British Parliament over whether to pass a Daylight Saving Act. While proponents argued that shoving clocks ahead during summer months would reduce energy consumption and encourage outdoor recreation, the opposition won out.
Then, in 1916, Germany suddenly adopted the British idea in hopes of conserving energy for its war effort. Within a year, Great Britain followed suit. And despite fanatical opposition from the farm lobby, so would the United States.
From patriotic duty to moneymaking scheme
A law requiring Americans to lose an hour was confounding enough. But Congress also tacked on the legal mandate for the four continental time zones. The patriotic rationale for daylight saving went like this: Shifting one hour of available light from the very early morning (when most Americans were asleep) would reduce the demand for domestic electrical power used to illuminate homes in the evening, which would spare more energy for the war effort.
On March 19, 1918, Woodrow Wilson signed the Calder Act requiring Americans to set their clocks to standard time; less than two weeks later, on March 31, they would be required to abandon standard time and push their clocks ahead by an hour for the nation's first experiment with daylight saving.
It didn't go smoothly. In 1918, Easter Sunday fell on March 31, which led to a lot of latecomers to church services. Enraged rural and evangelical opponents thereafter blamed daylight saving for subverting sun time, or "God's time." Newspapers were deluged by letter writers complaining that daylight saving upset astronomical data and made almanacs useless, prevented Americans from enjoying the freshest early morning air, and even browned out lawns unaccustomed to so much daylight.
Within a year, daylight saving was repealed. But like most weeds, the practice thrived by neglect.
In 1920, New York and dozens of other cities adopted their own metropolitan daylight saving policies. The Chamber of Commerce spurred along this movement on behalf of department store owners, who had noticed that later sunset times encouraged people to stop and shop on their way home from work.
By 1965, 18 states observed daylight saving six months a year; some cities and towns in 18 other states observed daylight saving for four, five or six months a year; and 12 states stuck to standard time.
This wasn't exactly ideal. A 35-mile bus trip from Steubenville, Ohio, to Moundsville, West Virginia, passed through seven distinct local time zones. The U.S. Naval Observatory dubbed the world's greatest superpower "the world's worst timekeeper."
So, in 1966, Congress passed the Uniform Time Act, which mandated six months of standard time and six of daylight saving.
Great for golf – but what about everyone else?
Why do we still do it?
Today we know that changing the clocks does influence our behavior. For example, later sunset times have dramatically increased participation in afterschool sports programs and attendance at professional sports events. In 1920, The Washington Post reported that golf ball sales in 1918 – the first year of daylight saving – increased by 20 percent.
And when Congress extended daylight saving from six to seven months in 1986, the golf industry estimated that extra month was worth as much as US$400 million in additional equipment sales and green fees. To this day, the Nielsen ratings for even the most popular television shows decline precipitously when we spring forward, because we go outside to enjoy the sunlight.
But the promised energy savings – the presenting rationale for the policy – have never materialized.
In fact, the best studies we have prove that Americans use more domestic electricity when they practice daylight saving. Moreover, when we turn off the TV and go to the park or the mall in the evening sunlight, Americans don't walk. We get in our cars and drive. Daylight saving actually increases gasoline consumption, and it's a cynical substitute for genuine energy conservation policy.
Lawmakers in Florida, of all places, ought to know that year-round daylight saving is not such a bright idea – especially in December and January, when most residents of the Sunshine State won't see sunrise until about 8 a.m.
On Jan. 8, 1974, Richard Nixon forced Floridians and the entire nation into a year-round daylight saving – a vain attempt to stave off an energy crisis and lessen the impact of an OPEC oil embargo.
But before the end of the first month of daylight saving that January, eight children died in traffic accidents in Florida, and a spokesperson for Florida's education department attributed six of those deaths directly to children going to school in darkness.
Lesson learned? Apparently not.
Explore further: The dark side of daylight saving time
Daylight saving time in the United States
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaTime to wake up: Daylight saving time is dangerous and unnecessary
By David Wagner March 9, 2018 Professor of Management, University of OregonProof Daylight Saving Time Is Dumb, Dangerous, and Costly
By Ben Steverman March 10, 2017, 3:00 AM PST, Bloomberg.comThe Dangers of Daylight Savings Time
By Joseph Krainin, M.D., FAASMHow Daylight Saving Time Can Be Dangerous
By Justin Worland October 31, 2014, Time.comDangerous 'microsleeps' follow daylight saving time
By Neal Colgrass, Newser staff Published 9:26 a.m. ET March 9, 2015
| Updated 9:31 a.m. ET March 9, 2015, USAToday.comDaylight Saving Time Is Stupid and Expensive and Dangerous
By Sandy Hingston 10/30/2015, 11:25 a.m., PhillyMag.com5 Weird Effects of Daylight Saving Time
By Laura Poppick, Staff Writer | November 2, 2013 10:11am ET, LiveScience.com
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Pittsburgh Synagogue Massacre and Joint-Responsibility Rule?
Charles Manson, Donald Trump, Pittsburgh Synagogue Massacre, & Joint-Responsibility RuleJoint-Responsibility Rule?
Considering recent violence surrounding President Trump's rhetoric [Source 1, Source 2], could he be charged with murder and inciting violence under the Joint-Responsibility Rule for the Pittsburgh Synagogue Massacre, et al.?
Charles Milles Manson (né Maddox, November 12, 1934 – November 19, 2017) was an American criminal and cult leader. In the late 1960s, he formed what became known as the Manson Family, a quasi-commune in California. Manson's followers committed a series of nine murders at four locations in July and August 1969. In 1971, he was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder for the deaths of seven people, all of which members of the group carried out at his instruction. Manson was also convicted of first-degree murder for two other deaths. ~ [Click to Continue Reading at Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia]
Although Charles Manson did not personally kill anyone during the Tate-LaBianca murders, he was convicted under the Joint-Responsibility Rule of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder for the deaths of seven people, all of which members of the family carried out at his instruction.
One window of Cesar Sayoc's Van (Pittsburgh Synagogue Massacre)Joint and several liability ~ Where two or more persons are liable in respect of the same liability, in most common law legal systems they may either be:
Joint liability
If parties have joint liability, then they are each liable up to the full amount of the relevant obligation.[2] So if a married couple takes a loan from a bank, the loan agreement will normally provide that they are to be "jointly liable" for the full amount. If one party dies, disappears or is declared bankrupt, the other remains fully liable. Accordingly, the bank may sue all living co-promisors for the full amount.
However, in suing, the creditor has only one cause of action; i.e., the creditor can sue for each debt only once. If, for example, there are three partners, and the creditor sues all of them for the outstanding loan amount and one of them pays the liability, the creditor cannot recover further amounts from the partners who did not contribute to the liability.[3]
Several liability
The converse is several or proportionate liability, where the parties are liable for only their respective obligations.[4] A common example of several liability is in syndicated loan agreements, which will normally provide that each bank is severally liable for its own part of the loan. If one bank fails to advance its agreed part of the loan to the borrower, then the borrower can sue only that bank, and the other banks in the syndicate have no liability.
Joint and several liability
Under joint and several liability or all sums, a claimant may pursue an obligation against any one party as if they were jointly liable and it becomes the responsibility of the defendants to sort out their respective proportions of liability and payment.[2][4] This means that if the claimant pursues one defendant and receives payment, that defendant must then pursue the other obligors for a contribution to their share of the liability.
Joint and several liability is most relevant in tort claims, whereby a plaintiff may recover all the damages from any of the defendants regardless of their individual share of the liability. The rule is often applied in negligence cases, though it is sometimes invoked in other areas of law.
In the United States, 46 of the 50 states have a rule of joint and several liability, although in response to "tort reform" efforts, some have limited the applicability of the rule. About two dozen have reformed the rule, with several (Alaska, Arizona, Kansas, Utah, Vermont, Oklahoma, and Wyoming) abolishing. In some instances it is abolished except where the defendants "act in concert".[5] ~ [Click to Continue Reading at Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia]
Comparing face motions of Donald Trump and Charles Manson
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Dahbud Mensch ~ Stuck in the middle with WHO ?
Relax. Trump Won't Put
All the Jews in Camps.
Only the DemocratsAfter all, if you can get people to gradually forget about the thousands of children whom you've stripped of their parents, caged, and now packed off to a camp in a desert area outside El Paso, you can get away with anything
via Bradley Burston 22.10.2018 | 20:15 ~ Read complete article at:
Meme Source:
https://old.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/9ra3cq/relax_trump_wont_put_all_the_jews_in_camps_only/
https://old.reddit.com/r/hmmm/comments/9qz197/hmmm/
https://old.reddit.com/r/PoliticalHumor/comments/9r1mhx/and_they_say_the_left_are_the_mobs/
Copied from above link:
via TheRealMarkB
First the right leaves a bomb at Soros’ home then they leave bombs at the Clinton’s and Obama’s New York homes and the CNN headquarters yet the Trump still says :”democrats make mobs, republicans make jobs” and it’s also been proven that the economy does better under democrats interesting....
++++
via US-person-1
Bombs sent to:
- Clinton
- Obama
- Soros
- CNN
Trump Supporter Killers:
Portland Trump Supporter Throat slasher - 2 Dead
Charlottesville Trump Supporter runs car into protesters - 1 dead
Florida Trump Supporter School Shooter - 17 dead
Trump Supporter Stabs His Father - 1 dead
Iowa Trump Supporter shoots two officers - 2 dead
But the left are the uncivilized ones...
++++
via July-1-1982
I believe the current count is:
- Clinton
- Obama
- Soros
- addressed to John Brennan at CNN address
- Andrew Cuomo
- addressed to Eric Holder, returned to Debra Wasserman Schultz (the same return address put on the ones sent to Clinton, Obama, CNN, maybe others)
- Rep. Maxine Waters
- Sen. Kamala Harris?
++++
via moose2332
Cuomo was not a bomb it was a thumb drive meant to launch a cyberattack.
++++
via score_
Didn't some Qtard try to blow up the Hoover Dam?
++++
via abyss6
yes
++++
via harrySUBlime
what? when?
++++
via score_
July https://www.thedailybeast.com/qanon-the-crazy-pro-trump-conspiracy-melts-down-over-oig-report
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Who are Ministers of Satan?
Who are Ministers of Satan?
Before we discuss raising taxes on the poor & middleclass, adding $1 trillion to
the deficit, taking health insurance away from 13 million, raising premiums by
10%, defending treason and swearing in a pedophile, let's begin with a prayer.
Senate GOP Meeting this morning ~ via EagleLover69 ~ Original2 PETER 2:1 ~ But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.
2 PETER 2:2 ~ And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of.
2 PETER 2:3 ~ And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not. ~ [Click to continue reading]
The Worship of the Golden Calf by Filippino LippiHe required everyone to have an ID card.
Nobody could buy groceries or anything
without that GOP/DNC Republican ID!
666
The GOD of Jews, Christians, and Muslims said,
Thou Shalt Not Kill
Thou Shalt Not Steal
Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery
Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbors Wife
Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness Against Thy Neighboramongst other things, and Jesus extended this concept when he said:
Christians are to no longer execute sinners, so they should not wage carnal war, but spiritual warfare ~ (John 18:36; 2 Corinthians 10:1-6; Ephesians 6:10-18; 1 Timothy 1:18-20; 6:11-14; 2 Timothy 2:3-5; 4:6-8)
Christians must be peacemakers forgiving those who do them harm treating their enemies with love and not seeking revenge ~ (Matthew 5:9, Romans 14:19), (Ephesians 4:29-32; Colossians 3:12-14; Matthew 6:9-15; Mark 11:25-26), (Luke 6:27-36) (Romans 12:17-21; 1 Peter 3:8-12)
Hatred, which is the same as murder, is unforgiving, vengeful and hostile towards one's enemies ~ (1 John 3:15) ~ [Click to continue reading]
Satan's demons take on the image of God
similar to that done in Eden ~ II Corinthians, 11:14
(How else do they take control of earth?)Antichrist is variously understood as being a consummately evil system of government or leader.
Antichrist will be a leader who deceives many people.
Antichrist will divide the world and create war without end.
Antichrist will declare that things which are evil to be good.
Antichrist will refer to war as peace, death as a solution for justice, & serving the wealthy as a means of helping the poor.
Many nations will recognize that he is evil, but his own people will be inclined to believe his deceptions.
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
So... How Will Sarah Huckabee Sanders Explain This To Her Daughters?
Transcript: Donald Trump’s
Taped Comments About Women[Attention Censors: This crude conversation with the President of the United States is public record and presented 'as is' for exactness or proof.]
In a 2005 recording obtained by The Washington Post before the presidential election, Donald J. Trump talks about women in vulgar terms to Billy Bush, then the host of “Access Hollywood.”
Following is an unedited transcript of the tape in which Donald J. Trump repeatedly made vulgar comments about women. Mr. Trump was filmed talking to the television personality Billy Bush of “Access Hollywood” on the set of “Days of Our Lives,” where Mr. Trump was making a cameo appearance. They are later joined by the actress Arianne Zucker. The transcription is by Penn Bullock of The New York Times.
Donald J. Trump: You know and ...
Unknown: She used to be great. She’s still very beautiful.
Trump: I moved on her, actually. You know, she was down on Palm Beach. I moved on her, and I failed. I’ll admit it
Unknown: Whoa.
Trump: I did try and fuck her. She was married.
Unknown: That’s huge news.
Trump: No, no, Nancy. No, this was [unintelligible] — and I moved on her very heavily. In fact, I took her out furniture shopping.
She wanted to get some furniture. I said, “I’ll show you where they have some nice furniture.” I took her out furniture — I moved on her like a bitch. But I couldn’t get there. And she was married. Then all of a sudden I see her, she’s now got the big phony tits and everything. She’s totally changed her look.
Billy Bush: Sheesh, your girl’s hot as shit. In the purple.
Trump: Whoa! Whoa!
Bush: Yes! The Donald has scored. Whoa, my man!
[Crosstalk]
Trump: Look at you, you are a pussy.
[Crosstalk]
Trump: All right, you and I will walk out.
[Silence]
Trump: Maybe it’s a different one.
Bush: It better not be the publicist. No, it’s, it’s her, it’s —
Trump: Yeah, that’s her. With the gold. I better use some Tic Tacs just in case I start kissing her. You know, I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything.
Trump: Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.
Bush: Uh, yeah, those legs, all I can see is the legs.
Trump: Oh, it looks good.
Bush: Come on shorty.
Trump: Ooh, nice legs, huh?
Bush: Oof, get out of the way, honey. Oh, that’s good legs. Go ahead.
Trump: It’s always good if you don’t fall out of the bus. Like Ford, Gerald Ford, remember?
Bush: Down below, pull the handle.
Trump: Hello, how are you? Hi!
Arianne Zucker: Hi, Mr. Trump. How are you? Pleasure to meet you.
Trump: Nice seeing you. Terrific, terrific. You know Billy Bush?
Bush: Hello, nice to see you. How you doing, Arianne?
Zucker: Doing very well, thank you. Are you ready to be a soap star?
Trump: We’re ready, let’s go. Make me a soap star.
Bush: How about a little hug for the Donald? He just got off the bus.
Zucker: Would you like a little hug, darling?
Trump: O.K., absolutely. Melania said this was O.K.
Bush: How about a little hug for the Bushy? I just got off the bus.
Zucker: Bushy, Bushy.
Bush: Here we go. Excellent. Well, you’ve got a nice co-star here.
Zucker: Yes, absolutely.
Trump: Good. After you.
[Break in video]
Trump: Come on, Billy, don’t be shy.
Bush: Soon as a beautiful woman shows up, he just, he takes off. This always happens.
Trump: Get over here, Billy.
Zucker: I’m sorry, come here.
Bush: Let the little guy in here, come on.
Zucker: Yeah, let the little guy in. How you feel now? Better? I should actually be in the middle.
Bush: It’s hard to walk next to a guy like this.
Zucker: Here, wait, hold on.
Bush: Yeah, you get in the middle, there we go.
Trump: Good, that’s better.
Zucker: This is much better. This is —
Trump: That’s better.
Zucker: [Sighs]
Bush: Now, if you had to choose honestly between one of us. Me or the Donald?
Trump: I don’t know, that’s tough competition.
Zucker: That’s some pressure right there.
Bush: Seriously, if you had — if you had to take one of us as a date.
Zucker: I have to take the Fifth on that one.
Bush: Really?
Zucker: Yup — I’ll take both.
Trump: Which way?
Zucker: Make a right. Here we go. [inaudible]
Bush: Here he goes. I’m gonna leave you here.
Trump: O.K.
Bush: Give me my microphone.
Trump: O.K. Oh, you’re finished?
Bush: You’re my man, yeah.
Trump: Oh, good.
Bush: I’m gonna go do our show.
Zucker: Oh, you wanna reset? O.K.
Ride the Fence via Rip & Roy
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Dahbud Mensch ~ Stuck in the middle with WHO ?
U.S. Government Repressed
Marijuana-Tumor Researchhttps://projectcensored.org/22-us-government-repressed-marijuana-tumor-research/
April 30, 2010
Alternet, May 31, 2000
Title: Pot Shrinks Tumors; Government Knew in ‘74
Author: Raymond Cushing
[Invalid Old Link] ~ http://www.alternet.org/print.html?StoryID=9257Faculty Evaluator: Mary King M.D.
Student researchers: Jennifer Swift, Licia MarshallCorporate media coverage: AP and UPI news wires 2/29/00
A Spanish medical team’s study released in Madrid in February 2000 has shown that tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active chemical in marijuana, destroys tumors in lab rats. These findings, however, are not news to the U.S. government. A study in Virginia in 1974 yielded similar results but was suppressed by the DEA, and in 1983 the Reagan/Bush administration tried to persuade U.S. universities and researchers to destroy all cannabis research work done between 1966 and 1976, including compendiums in libraries.
The research was conducted by a medical team led by Dr. Manuel Guzman of Complutence University in Madrid. In the study, brains of 45 lab rats were injected with a cancer cell, which produced tumors. On the twelfth day of the experiment, 15 of the rats were injected with THC and 15 with Win-55, 212-2, a synthetic compound similar to THC. The untreated rats died 12-18 days after the development of the tumors. THC treated rats lived significantly longer than the control group. Although three were unaffected by the THC, nine lived 19-35 days, while tumors were completely eradicated in three others. The rats treated with Win-55,212-2 showed similar results.
In an e-mail interview for this story, the Madrid researcher said he had heard of the Virginia study, but had never been able to locate literature on it. “I am aware of the existence of that research. In fact I have attempted many times to obtain the journal article on the original investigation by theses people, but it has proven impossible,” Guzman said. His response wasn’t surprising, considering that in 1983 the Reagan/Bush administration tried to persuade American universities and researchers to destroy all 1966/76 cannabis research work, including compendiums in libraries, reports Jack Herer. “We know that large amounts of information have since disappeared,” he says.
Guzman provided the title of the work-“Antineoplastic Activity of Cannabinoids,” an article in a 1975 Journal of the National Cancer Institute-and author Raymond Cushing obtained a copy at the UC Medical School Library in Davis, California, and faxed it to Madrid. The 1975 article does not mention breast cancer tumors, which were featured in the only newspaper story ever to appear about the 1974 study in the local section of the Washington Post on August 18, 1974. The headline read, “Cancer Curb Is Studied,” and was followed in part by, “The active chemical agent in marijuana curbs the growth of three kinds of cancer in mice and may also suppress the immunity reaction that causes rejection of organ transplants, a Medical College of Virginia team has discovered. The researchers found that THC slowed the growth of lung cancers, breast cancers, and a virus-induced leukemia in laboratory mice, and prolonged their lives by as much as 36 percent.”
Drug Enforcement Agency officials shut down the Virginia study and all further cannabis research, according to Jack Herer, who reports on these events in his book, The Emperor Wears No Clothes. In 1976, President Gerald Ford put an end to all public cannabis research and granted exclusive research rights to major pharmaceutical companies. These companies set out-unsuccessfully-to develop synthetic forms of THC that would deliver all the medical benefits without the “high.”
Update by Raymond Cushing
When I was a cub reporter twenty-eight years ago at the daily Advocate in Stamford, Connecticut, my first city editor-a white-haired veteran of the International Herald Tribune named Marian Campbell-told me that the cure for cancer was the holy grail of all news stories.
“Unless they discover the cure for cancer,” she would say over the clackety-clack of the manual typewriters, “this paper goes to press on time.”
What I found out a quarter-century later is that not even the cure for cancer is a big enough story to crack the Berlin Wall of media censorship in this country. Toss in the facts that the cure appears to be a benign substance that has been illegal for 63 years, and that the government knowingly suppressed evidence of its curative powers 25 years, and you get twice the storyæand twice the censorship.
I won’t name the “investigative journalists” who didn’t respond when I sent them this story. I won’t list the numerous “progressive” publications that ignored it. I won’t describe the forbidding sense of professional isolation I endured in the months I tried to place the story.
Suffice it to say that it’s what one would expect in a society that has criminalized its own young for two generations around the cannabis issue simply because we were told to do so.
Thousands of innocent people who are in U.S. prisons for possessing or selling “the cure for cancer” await liberation and reparations. Someday our grandchildren will look back and ask, “What did you do to set the cannabis prisoners free?”
Here’s what any responsible journalist should be doing:
Go to primary sources when evaluating cannabis research. The AP and other news organizations love to elevate “bad science” and suppress “good science” when it comes to cannabis. You have to read the original research articles yourself and make your own judgments.
Investigate and report on the war on children that is a major component of the war on drugs. The marijuana laws are the main tool the police use to persecute minors. No other policy affects more families in more insidious and devastating ways than cannabis prohibition.
Learn about the history of cannabis prohibition and about the pharmaceutical, liquor, and tobacco giants that are behind it. If you don’t know the history of cannabis and hemp prohibition, you’re too ignorant to justifiably call yourself a journalist.
If it turns out-as my story would seem to indicate-that cannabis is the cure for cancer and the government suppressed this information for 25 years (and continues to suppress it), then the body count alone will make this the biggest holocaust in recorded history. Virtually all federal drug policy makers of both parties since 1975-including legislators, presidents and the DEA-will be complicit and criminally liable.
That’s why they don’t want this story covered.
To learn the history of cannabis prohibition, read http://www.jackherer.com.
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Disclaimer #3 ~ Tell-A-Vision
Grateful Dead - Estimated Prophet (Egypt 1978) via BakoushGrateful Dead Story
Egypt 1978In 1978, when I got fired from Hustler, Ken Kesey had invited me to come to Egypt with the Merry Prankster, where the Grateful Dead would be playing at the pyramids. Now, Cairo was buzzing with pedestrians--some barefoot, others wearing platform shoes from the Third World Dumping Ground Bazaar. Automobiles were busy trafficking in anarchy, and taxicab drivers hailed you. Donkeys were pulling carts, bicyclists were avoiding goats, and kids were playing soccer on dirt roads in front of stores selling gold souvenirs.
The same merchants who were suspicious that Israel's Six Day War had been a convenient way of testing U.S. weapons would gladly sell you a bomb casing which had been engraved with hieroglyphics and was now an umbrella stand for your foyer. And the same tourists who swatted away beggars trying to sell simulated scarabs for pennies were quite willing to pay a few bucks for a glass of 7-Up.
Suddenly an incongruous quartet of semi-trailer trucks invaded the rhythm of the city. They were bearing sound equipment lent by the Who to the Dead. Kesey's Day-Glo sneakers were peeking out from under his galabea--a long skirt-like piece of clothing worn by Egyptian men. We each chose our own fabric. Kesey described rock impresario Bill Graham's fabric as "the wallpaper on the upper rooms in the old Fillmore." I had a resistance to buying a galabea but I stood reluctantly on the measuring table.
"Okay," I said, "I'll get one to wear here in Egypt, but I'm definitely not gonna walk down Castro Street with it on."
So there we were, the Merry Pranksters and the Grateful Deadheads, a roving gang of professional weirdos in tie-dye T-shirts, foreigners in our own country yet serving now as unofficial good will ambasadors while, simultaneously, Jimmy Carter was bringing Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin together at Camp David. But we had our own agenda--to make the Sphinx smile.
This trip was a personal vision of the Dead's manager, Richard Loren, who had been to Egypt five times. He had read the Koran thoroughly and had built this musical pilgrimage from the bottom up, just the way the Pyramids themselves were originally constructed, with a foundation held together by a combination of sweat, manure and dedication.
Bob Weir looked up at the Great Pyramid and cried out, "What is it!"
Actually, it was the place for locals to go on a cheap date. The Pyramids were surrounded by moats of discarded bottlecaps. The Dead were scheduled to play on three successive nights at an open-air theater in front of the Pyramids, with the Sphinx looking on. A bootleg tape of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis doing filthy schtick was being used for a preliminary sound check. Later, an American general would complain to stage manager Steve Parish that the decadence of a rock'n'roll band performing here was a sacrilege to five thousand years of history.
"Listen," Parish said, "I lost two brothers in 'Nam, and I don't wanna hear this crap."
The general retreated in the face of those imaginary brothers. But there were a couple of real injured veterans. Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann had fallen off a horse and broken his arm. The horse was unscathed but recommended that Kreutzmann be shot. However, he would still be playing with the band, using one drumstick. Or, as an Arabian fortune cookie might point out, "In the land of the limbless, a one-armed drummer is king."
Basketball star and faithful Deadhead Bill Walton's buttocks had been used as a pincushion by the Portland Traiblazers so that he could continue to perform on court even though the bones of his foot were being shattered with pain he coudn't feel. Having been injected with painkilling drugs to hide the greed rather than heal the injury, he now had to walk around with crutches and one foot in a cast under his extra-long galabea. Maybe Kreutzmann and Walton could team up and enter the half-upside-down sack-race event.
The proceeds of the three concerts would go to the Department of Antiquities and Madame Sadat's Faith and Hope Society, a charity for handicapped children. The official program had an Arabic translation of Grateful Dead biographies. An air of incredible excitement permeated the first night. Never had the Dead been so inspired. Backstage, Jerry Garcia was passing along final instructions to the band.
"Remember," he said, "play in tune."
The music began with Egyptian oudist Hamza el-Din, backed up by a group tapping out ancient rhythms on their 14-inch-diameter tars--pizza-like drums--sooned joined by Mickey Hart, a human butterfly with drumsticks, then Garcia ambled on with a gentle guitar riff, then Kreutzmann, then Phil Lesh, Donna, Keith, and as the Dead meshed with the percussion ensemble, basking in total respect of each other, Bob Weir segued into the opening chords of Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away."
Not Fade Away - Grateful Dead - February 11, 1970 via The Grateful Jams"Did you see that?" Kesey said. "The Sphinx's jaw just dropped!"
Sound engineers John Cutler and Dan Healy had attempted to wire the Pyramid for a special echo effect. They set up an FM transmitter on top of the Sphinx, a battery-operated receiver on top of the Great Pyramid, and ran cable around two sides and into the King's Chamber where the acoustics were most favorable. But it didn't work. One theory was that the permission of the gods had not been sought, but Cutler blamed it on tourists who had trampled on the cables.
"I'm a total realist," he said. "I don't believe in any magic or supernatural power ascribed to the Pyramids. I know it's an unpopular attitude around here, but I paid no attention to Pyramid power. Maybe next year."
I had heard that the sound of the universe was D-flat, so that's the note I chanted while sitting in the tub-like sarcophagus at the center of gravity in the Great Pyramid after having ingested liquid LSD that a Prankster had smuggled into Egypt in a plastic Visine bottle. It was only as I breathed in deeply before each extended Om that I was forced to ponder the mystery of those who urinate there.
Outside, I interviewed a camel named R2D2 after the Star Wars character.
Q. What's your theory on who goes in there to urinate?
A. I don't know. And what's more, I don't gve a dung.Q. Why are you so bitter?
A. Well, if you must know, my testicles still hurt. My master squeezed my scrotum between a pair of bricks.Q. Jeez, what a terrible accident.
A. Accident, my hump! He did it on purpose so that in my painful response I would skwoosh up enough water to last for twenty days. The lazy bastard!Q. Wow, I guess it's not easy being a camel.
A. You ain't kidding, pal. These Pyramids may represent the cradle of civilization to you, but to me they are simply reminders of 5,000 years of oppression.Q. Things haven't improved much for you, huh?
A. We have always been the victims of human chauvinism. Did you know that the first interuterine birth control devices were used in camels? My great-grandmother had pebbles put into her uterus to prevent her from getting pregnant on long journeys.Q. Well, at least it wasn't permanent sterilization. I mean you're here, right?
A. Yeah, and I have the freedom to piss wherever I want.Q. Except inside the Pyramid.
A. Listen, you seem like an okay guy, so I'll answer your question. It ain't sacrilegious visitors who take a leak inside the dead king's temple, it's just jaded guides. Hey, you wanna go for a ride now?Q. Sure, why not?
A. [Singing] I'll never be your beast of burden....
Beast of Burden by The Rolling Stones via The Power Of MusicEvery morning, my Prankster roommate, George Walker, climbed to the top of the Pyramid. He was in training. It would be his honor to plant a Grateful Dead flag on top of the Great Pyramid. He attached it to a wooden pole at the peak of the pyramid where the stone block that should've been the final piece was missing. It was a thrill to see that flag waving in the breeze. Athough the skull-and-lightning-bolt image was now an international symbol, the Dead remained a purely American band--they had performed at benefits for the San Francisco Diggers, the Black Panther Party, the anti-Vietnam-war movement--and so now the planting of this flag was our Iwo Jima.
* * * * *
There was something especially magical about the third concert on Saturday. I had a strong feeling that I was involved in a lesson. It was as though the secret of the Dead would finally be revealed to me, if only I paid proper attention. Kesey had arranged for a full eclipse of the moon, and Egyptian kids were running through the streets shaking tin cans filled with rocks in order to bring it back.
"It's okay," I assured them, "the Grateful Dead will bring back the moon."
And, sure enough, a rousing rendition of "Ramble On Rose" would accomplish that feat. The moon returned just as the marijuana cookie that Bill Graham gave me started blending in with the other drugs. Graham no longer wore two wristwatches, one for each coast. He now wore one wristwatch with two faces.
Grateful Dead - Ramble on Rose (JFK ‘89) via Relix StagingThere was a slight problem with an amplifier, but a sound engineer said that it was "getting there."
"Getting there ain't good enough," Jerry Garcia replied. "It's gotta fuckin' be there."
His sense of perfectionism was matched by his sense of absurdity.
Between songs, I said to him, "I'm from the Jewish Defense League, and we demand equal time. Never again!" Garcia looked puzzled, so I added, "Well, maybe sometimes?"
He shrugged and said, "Once in a while."
This was a totally outrageous event. The line between incongruity and appropriateness had disappeared along with the moon. The music was so powerful that the only way to go was ecstatic. That night, when the Dead played "Fire On the Mountain," I danced my ass off with all the others on that outdoor stage as if I had no choice.
Fire on the Mountain, Capitol Theatre November 24, 1978 Passaic, NJ via Mark Messina"You know," Bill Graham confessed, "this is the first time I ever danced in public."
"Me too," I said.
That was the lesson.
The next day, a dozen of us had a farewell party on a felucca--an ancient, roundish boat, a kind of covered wagon that floats along the river. Garcia was carrying his attache case, just in case he suddenly got any new song ideas. There were three guides who came with our rented felucca: an old man whose skin was like corrugated leather; a younger man who was his assistant; and a kid whose job was to light the "hubbly-bubbly"--a giant water pipe which used hot coals to keep the hashish burning.
We were all completely zonked out of our minds in the middle of the Nile. The Egyptians kept us dizzy on hash and we in turn gave them acid. The old man mumbled something--our translator explained, "He says he's seeing strange things"--and he gave me the handle of the rudder to steer, which I managed to do in my stoned stupor. The felluca was now the vehicle of our cultural exchange.
My psyche had become a study in paradox on this trip. While I was still unwinding from my experience at Hustler, I was simultaneously adapting to Egyptian consciousness, where a woman had to be clothed from head to foot with a chador so that only her eyes were showing. The mere sight of her flesh was officially barred because it could create anxiety and excitement in a man. A woman was not permitted to worship with men because her presence would serve as a distraction from Allah.
Although I had never driven a car by choice, if I were a Moslem woman, I wouldn't even be permitted to learn. I would be allowed to walk, but it would have to be several feet behind a man. While the men in my family were enjoying a hearty meal in the dining room, my place would remain--literally--in the kitchen. I would not be allowed to vote, let alone run for office. If I wanted to go shopping, I would not only have to be accompanied by a man who would make the purchase, but I would also have to keep my gaze down because eye contact might upset the shopkeeper.
The women in our group were indpendent, though. I went to a hashish parlor with Mountain Girl and Goldie Rush, and the men there stared in disbelief because this was usually an exclusively male stronghold. Nikki Scully decided to walk around the streets of Cairo wearing chador. She said that the non-verbal message she kept getting from her eye contact with Egyptian women was: We are one! We are one! We are one! Of course, she might well have been projecting her own feminist attitude.
Coincidentally, Ruth Carter Stapleton was visiting Egypt. She had been conducting prayer meetings and inner healing sessions. When Washington Post reporter Rudy Maxa told her I was in Cairo, she asked him to invite me to meet with her.
"After all," she said, "mine is supposed to be a ministry of reconciliation, isn't it?"
But when Maxa wrote in the Post, "Only the inability to determine Krassner's whereabouts saved him from a dose of inner healing at the base of the Pyramids that afternoon," he had no idea that I'd been tripping on acid and chanting inside the Pyramid that same afternoon.
On the return flight from Egypt, many of us ate whatever dope was left, and we had an extremely pleasant trip. I joined the Mile High Club, making love with Mobilia Growlight in the airplane bathroom.
"This," said Mobilia, "is really flying United."
Back in the States, I wrote to Ruth Carter Stapleton, expressing my surprise that she wanted to meet me inasmuch as she had previously asked Larry Flynt to fire me. She phoned in response to my letter.
"I want to apologize," she said. "I had been advised that you were not the correct individual to change the image of Hustler, but I shouldn't have judged you before I met you. I don't usually judge people before I meet them."
"Well, if you were a true Christian," I teased, "you wouldn't judge me even after we had met."
She laughed graciously. Then we talked about the blatant contrast between Hustler and Egypt.
"I went from one extreme to the other," I told her. "It was like getting out of a hot sauna and jumping into the freezing snow."
"How do you mean that?"
"Well, I had gone from showing pink to wearing chador."
More information on Paul Krassner is located at: http://www.flyingsnail.com/Scrapbook/Paul_Krassner.html and on Paul's Home Page: http://www.PaulKrassner.com
The Persuasions Visit Murmur ~ Muddy River by Jerry Garcia & Robert Hunter via Rhumba
"Without love in the dream, It will never come true."
J. Garcia / R. Hunter
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Notes from ~@~
Every once in a while it is necessary to
review the past in order to keep an eye on
history repeating itself!
The Newsroom - America is not the greatest country in the world anymore… via Jacob Hernandez
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Dahbud Mensch & Balzac's Blog ~ Who Voted For or Against Illegal Iraq War based on Politician (WMD) Lies
Political Perverts
Belong In Prison?Who Voted to Murder
Women and Children
Based On GOP Lies?
It was widely known before the Iraq war over
50% of Iraq's population
were children under the age of 15.1,455,590+ innocent Iraqi’s were murdered in order to eliminate one man based on an outright lie sent by Neocon Republicans on January 26, 1998.
And the war began with
this act of sheer cowardice by
Republicans w/Democrat Support
H J RES 114 - YEA & NAY - 10 Oct 2002 - 3:05 PM
To Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against IraqDemocrat Senators Voting To
Maim and murder Women & ChildrenBaucus (MT) Bayh (IN) Biden (DE) Breaux (LA) Cantwell (WA) Carnahan (MO) Carper (DE) Cleland (GA) Clinton (NY) Daschle (SD) Dodd (CT) Dorgan (ND) Edwards (NC) Feinstein (CA) Harkin (IA) Hollings (SC) Johnson (SD) Kerry (MA) Kohl (WI) Landrieu (LA) Lieberman (CT) Lincoln (AR) Miller (GA) Nelson (FL) Nelson (NE) Reid (NV) Rockefeller (WV) Schumer (NY) Torricelli (NJ)
Republican Senators Voting To
Maim and murder Women & ChildrenAllard (CO) Allen (VA) Bennett (UT) Bond (MO) Brownback (KS) Bunning (KY) Burns (MT) Campbell (CO) Cochran (MS) Collins (ME) Craig (ID) Crapo (ID) DeWine (OH) Domenici (NM) Ensign (NV) Enzi (WY) Fitzgerald (IL) Frist (TN) Gramm (TX) Grassley (IA) Gregg (NH) Hagel (NE) Hatch (UT) Helms (NC) Hutchinson (AR) Hutchison (TX) Inhofe (OK) Kyl (AZ) Lott (MS) Lugar (IN) McCain (AZ) McConnell (KY) Murkowski (AK) Nickles (OK) Roberts (KS) Santorum (PA) Sessions (AL) Shelby (AL) Smith (NH) Smith (OR) Snowe (ME) Specter (PA) Stevens (AK) Thomas (WY) Thompson (TN) Thurmond (SC) Voinovich (OH) Warner (VA)
Democrat Senators Voting Against
Maim & Murder of Women and ChildrenAkaka (HI) Bingaman (NM) Boxer (CA) Byrd (WV) Conrad (ND) Corzine (NJ) Dayton (MN) Durbin (IL) Feingold (WI) Graham (FL) Inouye (HI) Kennedy (MA) Leahy (VT) Levin (MI) Mikulski (MD) Murray (WA) Reed (RI) Sarbanes (MD) Stabenow (MI) Wellstone (MN) Wyden (OR)
Republican Senators Voting Against
Maim & Murder of Women and ChildrenChafee (RI)
...And Never Forget
GOP/DNC Child RapingHersh:
Children sodomized
at Abu Ghraib, on tapeby GERALDINE SEALEY, JULY 15, 2004 4:26PM (UTC), Salon Source
After Donald Rumsfeld testified on the Hill about Abu Ghraib in May, there was talk of more photos and video in the Pentagon's custody more horrific than anything made public so far. "If these are released to the public, obviously it's going to make matters worse," Rumsfeld said. Since then, the Washington Post has disclosed some new details and images of abuse at the prison. But if Seymour Hersh is right, it all gets much worse.
Hersh gave a speech last week to the ACLU making the charge that children were sodomized in front of women in the prison, and the Pentagon has tape of it. The speech was first reported in a New York Sun story last week, which was in turn posted on Jim Romenesko's media blog, and now EdCone.com and other blogs are linking to the video. We transcribed the critical section here (it starts at about 1:31:00 into the ACLU video.) At the start of the transcript here, you can see how Hersh was struggling over what he should say:
"Debating about it, ummm ... Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib ... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."
"It's impossible to say to yourself how did we get there? Who are we? Who are these people that sent us there? When I did My Lai I was very troubled like anybody in his right mind would be about what happened. I ended up in something I wrote saying in the end I said that the people who did the killing were as much victims as the people they killed because of the scars they had, I can tell you some of the personal stories by some of the people who were in these units witnessed this. I can also tell you written complaints were made to the highest officers and so we're dealing with a enormous massive amount of criminal wrongdoing that was covered up at the highest command out there and higher, and we have to get to it and we will. We will. You know there's enough out there, they can't (Applause). .... So it's going to be an interesting election year."
Notes from a similar speech Hersh gave in Chicago in June were posted on Brad DeLong's blog. Rick Pearlstein, who watched the speech, wrote: "[Hersh] said that after he broke Abu Ghraib people are coming out of the woodwork to tell him this stuff. He said he had seen all the Abu Ghraib pictures. He said, 'You haven't begun to see evil...' then trailed off. He said, 'horrible things done to children of women prisoners, as the cameras run.' He looked frightened."
So, there are several questions here: Has Hersh actually seen the video he described to the ACLU, and why hasn't he written about it yet? Will he be forced to elaborate in more public venues now that these two speeches are getting so much attention, at least in the blogosphere? And who else has seen the video, if it exists -- will journalists see and report on it? did senators see these images when they had their closed-door sessions with the Abu Ghraib evidence? -- and what is being done about it?
(Update: A reader brought to our attention that the rape of boys at Abu Ghraib has been mentioned in some news accounts of the prisoner abuse evidence. The Telegraph and other news organizations described "a videotape, apparently made by US personnel, is said to show Iraqi guards raping young boys." The Guardian reported "formal statements by inmates published yesterday describe horrific treatment at the hands of guards, including the rape of a teenage Iraqi boy by an army translator.")
GERALDINE SEALEY ~ Geraldine Sealey is senior news editor at Salon.com. ~ MORE FROM GERALDINE SEALEY
CRASH AT THE WHITE HOUSE:
Intruder Crashes Plane
Into White House9/11 Should Have Never Happened: Corporate Media failed to mention new air space rules were in place after a small plane crashed into White House
By MAUREEN DOWD,
Published: Tuesday, September 13, 1994Shortly before 2 A.M. today, a small red-and-white plane flew low over 17th Street in the heart of the capital's downtown, banked left in a U-turn near the Washington Monument, and headed straight toward the President's bedroom in the White House.
No one [Nobody] tried to stop it. [Click to continue reading]
11 Questions Avoided by
the Media On NORAD Tapeshttp://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0608/S00053.htm
1. *Who was responsible for scheduling multiple war games and terror exercises involving aircraft for Sept. 11th
2. Who moved "Global Guardian" normally scheduled for October to September?
3. Who designed the war games to involve 'hijackings'?
4. Who planned and scheduled the movement of Airforce aircraft north to Canada, Alaska and Greenland?
5. Who planned the terror exercise at the NRO (National Reconnaissance Office) involving an evacuation in response to threat from the air?
6. Who was "hands-on" responsible for coordinating all the war games the morning of September 11th?
7. Who would have been responsible for turning off the war games to enable a timely real world response to the attacks?
8. How were as many as 21 false radar blips or possible targets (per Jane Garvey) inserted into FAA radar screens?
9. Who was responsible for the identification of ghost flight 11 which allegedly continued to fly south past Manhattan and which may have caused NORAD's Langley intercept jets to vector North toward NYC rather than D.C.? * [NOTE: John Farmer of the 9/11 Commission said to me personally that the 9/11 Commission was never able to identify the individual for this information--to resolve this anomaly.]*
10. Why was there no reference to the pattern of 9/11 Commission cover-up including that of Able Danger as revealed by Capt. Scott Philpott?
11. *The bottom line question that corporate media refuse to answer and which the 9/11 Commission ignored is who, specifically, would have been responsible for creating the circumstances that led to the confusion or fog the morning of 9/11 and who should have immediately ceased any and all war gaming activity and deceptive radar data?
YOU ARE LOOKING AT
A US GOVERNMENT LIEhttp://www.whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/osamatape.html
On Friday 14 December 2001 a videotape of Osama bin Laden "confessing" to the 9/11 attacks was released. The tape was supposedly found in a house in Qandahar, Afghanistan. The recording was of very poor audio and visual quality and the authenticity of the tape was questioned.
This annoyed President Bush who said "[It is] preposterous to think this tape was doctored."
Okay, let's have a look...
Here's 5 Osama's ~ which is the odd one out?Political Lies,
about Iraq, Have Cost American
tax Payers $5.6 Trillion Dollars
Telecom Crimes ~ Patriot Act ~ Denialist ~ He Said It ~ Rethinking 9/11 ~ Are you better off?
Is Neocon GOP War Criminal JOHN BOLTON In Prison, Yet?
http://flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/neocon.htmlWe know where your kids live!
John Bolton ~ Ethan Miller/Getty Images via Business Insider SourceArrest of Pentagon Official May Help
Unravel Neo-Conservative CabalThis article appears in the May 13, 2005 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
by Jeffrey Steinberg, Executive Intelligence Review, Article Source, Local Source
Pentagon Iran desk officer and neo-con patsy Larry Franklin was arrested on May 4, on charges that he passed classified information based upon secret Pentagon documents to two American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) officials in June 2003, at a restaurant in Arlington, Va. The two AIPAC officials, who were not named in the complaint, were Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, who were both fired by AIPAC in recent weeks.
A number of senior intelligence sources, reached for comment on the Franklin charges, all had the same essential reading: The FBI has a prima facie case against Franklin. In FBI raids on his home, Federal agents confiscated 83 classified documents, which he was not authorized to have there. The case is cut and dried, and a charge of mishandling classified documents carries a ten-year Federal jail sentence. Franklin is being squeezed to provide prosecutors with a complete picture on the AIPAC/Israel espionage operation, including Pentagon officials who were part of the effort. These include, but are not limited to: Doug Feith, William Luti, Harold Rhode, and Abram Shulsky.
In addition, one source emphasized the importance of Franklin's December 2001 trip to Rome, accompanied by Rhode and Michael Ledeen. The trip centered around a meeting with former Iran-Contra swindler Manucher Ghorbanifar, whom Ledeen sought to reactivate as a Pentagon channel to the Iranian government, and as a source on activities inside Iraq and Afghanistan. The Rome trip coincided with the surfacing of the forged Niger government documents, falsely charging that Saddam Hussein was seeking large quantities of yellow cake uranium from the African nation.
Franklin was arrested on a criminal complaint, even as a grand jury continues to consider his case. He is widely considered to be providing information to prosecutors. A closer look at his associations with the neo-con crowd shows that by targetting him, FBI officials might be able to unravel a whole skein of wrongdoing, which could help bring down the inner circle linked to Vice President Dick Cheney.
Preparing To Hit Iran?
The investigation of Franklin, and his dealings with the AIPAC officials, first was made public in August 2004, in the immediate wake of a major propaganda barrage promoting pre-emptive military action against Iran. As head of the Iran desk at the Pentagon, Franklin had access to classified documents related to that area; according to the criminal complaint, he allegedly disclosed Top Secret information related to potential attacks upon U.S. forces in Iraq, to the two individuals, neither of whom had the security clearance to receive that information. At the time, Lyndon LaRouche estimated that patriotic sections of the U.S. intelligence community were acting to defuse a potential Israeli "breakaway ally" hit against Iran.
It was not only AIPAC officials with whom Franklin was in touch. He is reported to have also had meetings with Naor Gilan, until recently an Iran specialist at the Israeli Embassy in Washington. And, according to both the New York Times and Associated Press on May 5, FBI officials recently questioned a former senior Mossad official about his ties to Franklin. The official was Uzi Arad, a former senior official with the Israeli intelligence agency. Arad is reported to have told the FBI that he had met Franklin twice, and received an academic paper from him.
Arad is no garden variety Mossad agent. He held senior posts from 1975 to 1999, and served as the Foreign Policy Advisor to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. After the FBI probe of Franklin was announced Aug. 29, 2004, Azad was one of the Israelis who jumped to defend Israel against the allegations that Franklin had passed them classified documents, saying that at worst the analyst (Franklin) "crossed the line" by inappropriately disseminating sensitive material. "That is not espionage," he said.
Azad is also notable for the fact that, in a speech at the Jerusalem Institute for Contemporary Affairs on March 26, 2003 (five days into the Iraq War), he called on the United States and Israel to take military action against Iran as well. The luncheon meeting which Franklin had with the AIPAC officials, at which he allegedly passed them classified information, occurred on June 26, 2003.
Who Is Larry Franklin?
Sources in the military and intelligence community have provided this news service with a profile of the suspected Israeli mole: Larry Franklin is a Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) analyst, who shifted from Cold War Soviet studies, to a specialty in Iran-Iraq. A protégé of DIA Sovietologist Winnifred Joshua, Franklin also studied at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where he was reportedly picked up by Paul Wolfowitz, then-Deputy Secretary of Defense, and an individual who has been probed for passing U.S. secrets to Israel since 1978, according to a February 2004 study by Stephen Green, which catalogued long-standing espionage allegations against, and investigations into Wolfowitz, Feith, Michael Ledeen, Stephen Bryen, and Richard Perle.
In the Summer of 2001, Franklin was transferred from DIA to the Pentagon's policy office under Feith, where he took charge of the Iran desk in the Near East South Asia (NESA) section, and later worked for the Office of Special Plans (OSP), the Iraq war-planning unit under Feith and NESA head William Luti. Luti had been a military aide to former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, and had been in the Office of Vice President Cheney at the start of the "Bush 43" Administration. According to Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski (USAF, ret.), who served in NESA from June 2002 to March 2003, Luti bragged at staff meetings, that he was reporting directly to "Scooter," which, she learned, was a reference to Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
As an Air Force Reserve officer, Franklin had served several tours of duty at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv, where, according to one military source, he had gotten in trouble for unauthorized contacts with Israeli intelligence officials. According to one news account, the current FBI probe into Franklin's activities was triggered by a June 2002 leak in the New York Times, which detailed American war plans against Iraq. While on the NESA Iran desk, Franklin was also reportedly the subject of a probe into his mishandling of classified documents; however, a serious probe into that incident was blocked by the intervention of Luti and Feith, according to a confidential Pentagon source.
Franklin, according to an eyewitness, was part of a neo-con inner circle that met frequently, behind closed doors, in the office of Doug Feith. The group included Feith, Luti, OSP official Abram Shulsky, Office of Net Assessment Mideast specialist Harold Rhode, former Defense Policy Board Chairman Richard Perle, David Wurmser, and Michael Maloof. As a group, they worked closely with Wolfowitz and with Libby, whose own ties to the Israeli Mafiya and Israeli intelligence run deep: Libby was the former attorney for Israeli "Mafia" boss Marc Rich.
Franklin, Rhode, and Ledeen
In the Summer of 2003, it was revealed that Larry Franklin had been part of a Pentagon team, composed also of Rhode and self-professed "universal fascist" Michael Ledeen, which had travelled to Rome, in December 2001, to open unauthorized channels to the Iranian government, through a widely discredited Iran-Contra figure, Manucher Ghorbanifar. According to one news account of the trip, the troika sabotaged talks then under way between the State Department and the Iranian government, involving the turning over to the United States of five top al-Qaeda figures, who were in custody in Iran.
Virtually every member of the neo-con grouping has been under investigation for espionage, fabrication of intelligence, and other treachery against the United States. Sources, for example, have identified Rhode, a longtime protégé of British intelligence's Dr. Bernard Lewis, and a close collaborator of Ledeen, as the target of a separate espionage probe, involving his passing of U.S. national security secrets to Israel, while he was in Baghdad as part of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). While in Baghdad, Rhode practically lived out of the home and office of Iraqi National Congress (INC) head Ahmed Chalabi.
Ledeen is also, according to law enforcement sources, a target of inquiry, concerning his suspected role in passing forged Niger government documents to the Italian intelligence service, SISMI. The forged documents purported to "prove" that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger, to build a nuclear bomb. Vice President Cheney and other Bush Administration officials used the threat of Iraq's alleged imminent possession of a nuclear bomb, as a bludgeon to force Congressional approval of the Iraq War. When President Bush cited alleged Iraqi efforts to obtain uranium "yellow cake" from an African state in his Jan. 28, 2003 State of the Union address, the whole issue blew up, leading to the ongoing Federal criminal probe.
Although both the State Department and CIA had cautioned that the Niger yellow cake story was dubious, Bush and Cheney went ahead with their shrill allegations. Then-International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director Dr. Mohammed ElBaradei revealed in early March 2003, that the Niger documents were shoddy forgeries. According to several former U.S. intelligence officials, one prime suspect in the document forgeries scam was Chalabi's INC. Ledeen, a longtime Chalabi booster, has also long been a paid "consultant" to SISMI. A September 2004 Washington Monthly article reports that when Ledeen, Franklin, and Rhode met in December 2001 with Iranian government officials in Rome, the head of SISMI and Italy's Minister of Defense also attended the meetings.
A Bolton Angle?
While the issue of Pentagon illegal activity with Israel, in order to provoke a war against Iran, or Syria, is still a live one, so is the matter of the Niger "yellow cake" concoction, a story which has never been solved, and which is intimately connected with the still live investigation of what is known as the Plame leak.
It was December 2001, after the Ledeen, Franklin, Rhode trip to Rome, that fraudulent documents surfaced, alleging that Iraq was negotiating for yellow cake from Niger. In the Spring of 2002, reportedly on the recommendation of Vice President Cheney, former U.S. Ambassador Joe Wilson was sent to investigate the charges, and returned a report saying that the claim was false. In the Summer of 2003, Wilson was subjected to an attempt to discredit him in the media, including through the disclosure of the identity of his wife, covert CIA operative Valerie Plame. The disclosure of Plame's identity was a violation of Federal law, but, as yet, the Administration has not "solved" the case. A Federal Special Prosecutor is still pursuing the case of the leak, which many sources report to have originated from the vicinity of Cheney's office.
On the strength of Wilson's report, and other analysis, the CIA and the State Department removed the Niger report from their intelligence estimates of Iraq's pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. Yet, in December 2002, Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs John Bolton played a key role in putting this false information in a widely circulated State Department Fact Sheet on "Omissions From the Iraqi Declaration of the United Nations Security Council."
In a March 1, 2005 letter to the chairman of the National Security Subcommittee of the House Government Reform Committee, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) asked for a committee investigation into State Department efforts to conceal the role of Bolton in the creation of the Fact Sheet, and in insisting that the Niger reference be kept in the Fact Sheet, despite objections from both State Department intelligence and CIA officials.
This inquiry has relevance not only to Bolton's potential connection to an espionage network, but to his persistent role in "fixing" intelligence which he and his neo-con friends did not like. It was this cooking of intelligence which provided the justification for pushing the United States into war against Iraq, in pursuit of WMD which were not there, and which the neo-con circles around Dick Cheney continue to carry out in pursuit of the new wars they have on their agenda. +++ More on John Bolton Here and Here.
Grand Theft America ~ Neocon City
via GTA Neocon City
Ride the Fence via Rip & Roy
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
SnailMain ~ Where Have All the Flowers Gone?
Where Have All the Flowers Gone?
Reflections on the Spirit and Legacy of the Sixties
by Fritjof Capra ~ December 1, 2002The 1960s were the period of my life during which I experienced the most profound and most radical personal transformation. For those of us who identify with the cultural and political movements of the sixties, that period represents not so much a decade as a state of consciousness, characterized by "transpersonal" expansion, the questioning of authority, a sense of empowerment, and the experience of sensuous beauty and community.
This state of consciousness reached well into the seventies. In fact, one could say that the sixties came to an end only in December 1980, with the shot that killed John Lennon. The immense sense of loss felt by so many of us was, to a great extent, about the loss of an era. For a few days after the fatal shooting we relived the magic of the sixties. We did so in sadness and with tears, but the same feeling of enchantment and of community was once again alive. Wherever you went during those few days - in every neighborhood, every city, every country around the world - you heard John Lennon's music, and the intense idealism that had carried us through the sixties manifested itself once again:
In this essay, I shall try to evoke the spirit of that remarkable period, identify its defining characteristics, and provide an answer to some questions that are often asked nowadays: What happened to the cultural movements of the sixties? What did they achieve, and what, if any, is their legacy? [Click to continue reading]
How? by John Lennon, sung by: Ozzy Osbourne via Beatriz Gonçalves
NONE of the ABOVE should be a valid choice on Voter Ballots!
Disclaimer #6
6. If we want world peace, we must let go of our attachments and truly live like nomads. That's where I no mad at you, you no mad at me. That way, there'll surely be nomadness on the planet. And peace begins with each of us. A little peace here, a little peace there, pretty soon all the peaces will fit together to make one big peace everywhere.
Nothing else matters, Metallica arr. Karianne Brouwer violin, Maaike Schoenmaker cello
Notes from ~@~
Carlin Step, DJ Steve Porter & Eli Wilkie from Roland Kardeby
The Great Bell Chant (The End of Suffering) from R Smittenaar
One Day, Matisyahu from 100%
Unsung Hero from Rattakarn Srithavatchai "Garn"
Bruce Springsteen & Tom Morello ~ The ghost of Tom Joad via Guitar Music
Nobody for President via Tom Morello ~ Home Page ~ Nobody will love you forever!
Freedom of expression and freedom of speech aren't really important unless they're heard...It's hard for me to stay silent when I keep hearing that peace is only attainable through war. And there's nothing more scary than watching ignorance in action. So I dedicated this Emmy to all the people who feel compelled to speak out and not afraid to speak to power and won't shut up and refuse to be silenced. ~ Tom Smothers
Amestizo [Randy CrazyHorse] ~ Shaman
The Siege of Chaco Canyon ~ Stop Fracking New Mexico ~ Fracking Versus Ancient Astronomy
Boptime w/Even Steven Leech
We begin Saturday's Boptime at 6am ((EST)) with oldies back to back to back. After Rockabilly Ridge at 7am ((EST)) with Michael Ace we’ll hear the Morrie Sims Show at 8am ((EST)). On the Delaware Rock'n'Roll Hall of Fame we’ll pay a musical tribute to recently departed Delaware Hall of Famer Vic Holveck, then we’ll hear a recording from Johnny & the Dreams followed by two never heard recordings Johnny & the Dreams member Johnny Southerland made in the mid 1970s. On the Club Baby Grand we’ll play some recordings that include local alto saxophone musician Vince Lardear, first with the Jackie Browne Jazz Nonnette then with Marty Nau. We round out the hour with selections from Clifford Brown and Lem Winchester. ~ Steve
BOPTIME: Saturday, 6 AM Eastern time, 3 AM Pacific time
Go To: http://www.wvud.org/?page_id=24
Click on a listening link below the WVUD logo:
Boptime available locally on WVUD-FM 91.3,
Shoutcast [Search: WVUD], and TuneIn
Carolyn Garcia ~ Mountain Girl
On the Bus, Carolyn Mountain Girl Garcia from vimeo
Karl Cohen ~ Association International du Film d'Animation SF Newsletter
ASIFA-SF
November 2018 Newsletter.pdf
Mike Wilhelm ~ Charlatans, Flamin' Groovies, Loose Gravel, and more
Mike Wilhelm Interview ~ December 2001 via Jesse BlockThe San Francisco Rock Band
That Was Too Wild For the Sixtiesby Ben Marks ~ July 19th, 2017 ~ Article Source
George Hunter of the Charlatans never shot Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead, not even once. But in the spring of 1966, on the grounds of Rancho Olompali just north of San Francisco, Garcia had reason to believe Hunter was gunning for him, causing the great guitarist to royally freak out. The misunderstanding unfolded when Hunter decided to drop some LSD and bring a loaded .30-30 Winchester rifle to a party at the Dead’s new Marin County hangout. Hunter never intended to strike fear into the heart of his genial host, but when he did, he was so high that he began to panic—perhaps he had accidentally shot someone, if not Garcia, after all. It took a long bummer of a night, and three of Hunter’s closest friends, to shake that demon thought from his troubled mind. [Click to Continue Reading] ~ Great MP3 Podcast via Mike Wilhelm:
Hear The People ~ Sympathy for the Devil ~ When You Got A Good Friend
Paul Krassner ~ The Realist, Investigative Satirist
Paul Krassner: Who’s To Say What’s Obscene? via Dangerous Minds50 years after the Chicago
Democratic National Convention,
Paul Krassner still hasn't sold outNot as well-known as his fellow Yippie co-founders,
Desert Hot Springs resident Paul Krassner's legacy endured.
Abbie Hoffman (left) & Paul Krassner address crowd at 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention.
(Photo: Courtesy of Paul Krassner)by Bruce Fessier, Palm Springs Desert Sun, Source
Published 3:43 p.m. PT Aug. 22, 2018 | Updated 2:34 p.m. PT Aug. 23, 2018Revolution was in the air 50 years ago this weekend.
The Chicago Democratic National Convention was supposed to be an opportunity for Vice President Hubert Humphrey to build momentum for a presidential run against Republican nominee Richard Nixon. Instead, an alternative nation of 10,000 mostly young people demonstrated on the streets and in nearby city parks, only to be beaten, gassed and arrested by a force that included 12,000 cops, 6,000 National Guardsmen, 1,000 Secret Service and FBI agents and 7,500 Army troops — many traveling in tanks. ~ Continue reading Bruce Fessier's Paul Krassner article [Video and Photographs at Desert Sun site] ~ Desert Sun Video Feed, Paul Krassner ~ Desert Sun Twitter Feed, Paul Krassner ~ Reprint at: THE OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF LENNY BRUCE
Sprung ~ Springer Enthusiast
The Final Days Of Stockton via Guru
Heyókȟa ~ Sacred Clowns
Sacred Clowns: The Heyókȟa symbolize and portray many aspects of the sacred, the Wakȟáŋ. Their satire presents important questions by fooling around. They ask difficult questions, and say things others are too afraid to say. By reading between the lines, the audience is able to think about things not usually thought about, or to look at things in a different way.
Principally, the Heyókȟa functions both as a mirror and a teacher, using extreme behaviors to mirror others, thereby forcing them to examine their own doubts, fears, hatreds, and weaknesses. Heyókȟas also have the power to heal emotional pain; such power comes from the experience of shame--they sing of shameful events in their lives, beg for food, and live as clowns. They provoke laughter in distressing situations of despair and provoke fear and chaos when people feel complacent and overly secure, to keep them from taking themselves too seriously or believing they are more powerful than they are.
In addition, sacred clowns serve an important role in shaping tribal codes. Heyókȟa's don't seem to care about taboos, rules, regulations, social norms, or boundaries. Paradoxically, however, it is by violating these norms and taboos that they help to define the accepted boundaries, rules, and societal guidelines for ethical and moral behavior. This is because they are the only ones who can ask "Why?" about sensitive topics and employ satire to question the specialists and carriers of sacred knowledge or those in positions of power and authority. In doing so, they demonstrate concretely the theories of balance and imbalance. Their role is to penetrate deception, turn over rocks, and create a deeper awareness.
Develop Your Mind, Not Sacred Sites
Cree Prophecy
Only after the last tree has been cut down,
Only after the last river has been poisoned,
Only after the last fish has been caught,
Only then will you find money cannot be eaten.
Nobody for President ~ NONE of the ABOVE should be a choice on voter ballots
Curtis Spangler & Wavy Gravy, Nobody for President Rally, 197610.12 ~ Photo: James Stark
[Not Work Safe] American Dream, George Carlin via Ishtar [Not Work Safe]
Above sometimes has audio problems ~ Alternative via Ignas Laugalis and Alternative via FellyNobody should have that much power
Oh, I hope that I see you again I never even caught your name As you looked through my window pane ~ So I'm writing this message today I'm thinking that you'll have a way Of hearing the notes in my tune ~ Where are you going? Where have you been? I can imagine other worlds you have seen ~ Beautiful faces and music so serene ~ So I do hope I see you again My universal citizen You went as quickly as you came ~ You know the power Your love is right You have good reason To stay out of sight ~~ But break our illusions and help us Be the light ~ Message by Mike Pinder
Why I Think This World Should End ~ Prince EA
Cinematography & Editing, Brandon Sloan ~ Video via Prince EA
Without love in the dream, it will never come true. ~ Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter
And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make. ~ John Lennon
The man whispered, "God, speak to me" and a meadowlark sang. But the man did not hear. So the man yelled "God, speak to me" and the thunder rolled across the sky. But the man did not listen. The man looked around and said, "God let me see you" and a star shined brightly. But the man did not notice. And the man shouted, "God show me a miracle" and a life was born. But the man did not know. So the man cried out in despair, "Touch me God, and let me know you are there" Whereupon God reached down and touched the man, But the man brushed the butterfly away and walked on.
Don't miss out on a blessing because
it isn't packaged the way you expect!
DuckDuckGo ~ The search engine that doesn't track you
{͡ʘ ͜ʖ ͡ʘ} Is Daylight Saving Time Dangerous? {͡ʘ ͜ʖ ͡ʘ}