Link: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,621450,00.html

The current debate in the US on the "special interrogation methods" sanctioned by the Bush administration could soon reach Europe. It has long been clear that the CIA used the Szymany military airbase in Poland for extraordinary renditions. Now there is evidence of a secret prison nearby.

Link: http://www.truthout.org/042709R

Last week found Iraq swimming in blood once again. Attacks last Thursday brought the worst violence Iraq has seen in over a year, with at least 96 Iraqis killed and 157 wounded in two massive suicide bombings. Over 35 bombings have rocked Baghdad this month alone. There appears to be no end in sight for the escalating violence. For an Obama administration that plans to keep at least 50,000 US troops in Iraq indefinitely, look no further for a justification in doing so.

Link: http://theuglytruth.wordpress.com/2009/04/27/send-in-the-clowns-jewish-interests-attempt-to-turn-conference-against-racism-into-episode-of-the-jerry-springer-show/

On April 20, the day before sirens wailed and moaned in the Jewish state for a full two minutes commemorating the one event said to be the greatest manifestation of racism in mankind’s history–the Holocaust–the United Nations held a conference in Geneva Switzerland to discuss that same topic of racism and its role in real-life present day events. However, in contrast to the solemn, serious, sober demeanor demanded by Jewish groups whenever “racism” and how it affects their peculiar history of suffering and persecution is discussed, the gathering in Geneva might as well have been a scene from the 1970’s movie Animal House. Rather than proceeding as a serious-minded congress of world leaders dealing with matters of life and death for millions of people around the world, it was marked with catcalls, boorish jeers and locker-room antics on the part of Jewish “activists“. Hell-bent on preventing any substantive, rational discussion from taking place...

Link: http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat/430261?rel=hp_picks

When House Appropriations Committee chairman David Obey, the Wisconsin Democrat who has long championed investment in pandemic preparation, included roughly $900 million for that purpose in this year's emergency stimulus bill, he was ridiculed by conservative operatives and congressional Republicans.

Link: http://socialistworker.org/2009/04/27/capitalism-and-the-flu

Mike Davis, whose 2006 book The Monster at Our Door warned of the threat of a global bird flu pandemic, explains how globalized agribusiness set the stage for a frightening outbreak of the swine flu in Mexico. THE SPRING Break hordes returned from Cancún this year with an invisible but sinister souvenir. The Mexican swine flu, a genetic chimera probably conceived in the fecal mire of an industrial pigsty, suddenly threatens to give the whole world a fever.

Link: http://www.examiner.com/x-9423-NY-Libertarian-Examiner~y2009m4d27-Hundreds-rally-in-NYC-to-demand-Federal-Reserve-audit

At City Hall Park on Saturday – the location of the Tax Day Tea Party a week and a half earlier – hundreds of grassroots activists turned out to demand an audit of the Federal Reserve. Many of the activists preferred to abolish the Fed altogether and return to real money backed by something more than fairy dust and good wishes from Ben Bernanke, but there was general agreement that an audit was an important first step.04/27/09

Link: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2009/04/fox-says-no-we-cant-to-obama.html

Fox Broadcasting is taking a pass on President Obama's Wednesday news conference, opting instead to run a new episode of its crime drama "Lie to Me," starring Tim Roth...this is the first time in the Obama presidency that a broadcast network has turned down a request for airtime.

Link: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/04/carona-sentence.html

Former Orange County Sheriff Michael S. Carona was sentenced this afternoon to 66 months in federal prison and fined $125,000 in a high-profile corruption case. Larry King dubbed him “America’s Sheriff.” The White House made him a homeland security adviser. He was groomed as a prospective candidate for lieutenant governor. Its the ones who make it that are the worst criminals, the ones that don’t get caught, the ones that are our ‘leaders’.

Link: http://dissidentvoice.org/2009/04/hindenburg-digest-more-tales-from-the-housing-bust/

Why is the media misleading the public about housing? The housing market is crashing. There are no “green shoots” or “glimmers of hope”; the market is worn to a stump, it’s kaput. Still, whenever new housing figures are released, they’re crunched and tweaked and spin-dried until they tell a totally different story: a hopeful story about an elusive “light in the tunnel.” But there is no light in the tunnel; it’s a myth. The truth is, there’s no sign of a turnaround or a “bottom” in housing at all.

Link: http://www.democracynow.org/2009/4/27/humanitarian_aid_is_not_a_crime

The Sonora Desert along the Arizona-Mexico border is a deadly place. Over the past decade, nearly 2,000 men, women and children died while trying to cross the border into Arizona. Dan Millis is a volunteer with the humanitarian and advocacy organization No More Deaths. In February of 2008, he found the body of a fourteen-year-old girl from El Salvador in the southern Arizona desert.

Link: http://www.infowars.com/flu-pandemic-hype-another-pretext-for-world-government/

During the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) Summit in Montebello, Canada in 2005, the “three amigos” (Bush, Harper and Calderon) released “North American Plan for Avian and Pandemic Influenza,” described as a “collaborative North American approach that recognizes that controlling the spread of avian influenza or a novel strain of human influenza, with minimal economic disruption, is in the best interest of all three countries.” The plan outlines how “Canada, Mexico and the United States intend to work together to prepare for and manage avian and pandemic influenza.”

Link: http://www.counterpunch.org/martens04272009.html

One of the most audacious and cynical corporate-backed social experiments in living memory, the Free State Project in New Hampshire, has now shifted into damage control mode. Free State operatives learned this past week of my article that appears in the current subscription edition of CounterPunch, taking the first in-depth look at their plan to entice 20,000 out-of-state ultra libertarians and anarchists to move to New Hampshire and implant an extremist brand of free market capitalism: a brand the corporate backers hope will lead to a gutting of business regulations, environmental laws, and return the state to the right wing of the Republican fold.