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Mubarak's Thirty-Year Dictatorship
by Stephen Lendman
Throughout decades of brutal rule, Mubarak remained a steadfast US ally. As a result, Washington rewarded him generously. US administrations also ignored his crimes, corruption, and lawlessness, as late January released WikiLeaks cables reveal, showing Obama knew he kept power through ruthless state terror.
On January 15, 2009, ambassador Margaret Scobey called security force brutality "routine and pervasive," saying:
"(P)olice using force to extract confessions from criminals (is) a daily event. (US informants) estimate there are literally hundreds of torture incidents every day in Cairo police stations alone."
Political activists and opponents are also targeted, Scobey adding:
"(T)he GOE (government of Egypt) is probably torturing (an April 6 activist) to scare other....members into abandoning their political activities." It also referred to the "sexual molestation of a female 'April 6 activist,' " and that another victim's torture only stopped "when he began cooperating." Moreover, "standing orders from the Interior Ministry between 2000 and 2006 (instructed) the police to shoot, beat and humiliate judges in order to undermine judicial independence."
George Bush: Preliminary Indictment for Torture
by Stephen Lendman
A previous article addressed torture as official US policy under Bush, accessed through the following link:
http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2008/07/torture-as-official-us-policy.html
It remains so under Obama, authorized at the highest levels of government as part of America's bogus war on terror to instill fear and target suspected political opponents globally, including at home. No matter that it violates US and international law that prohibits torture at all times under all circumstances with no allowed exceptions. Nonetheless, on September 17, 2001, Bush issued a 12 page "memorandum of notification" directive to CIA's director and National Security Council members, authorizing CIA to capture suspected terrorists and Al Qaeda members, then hold and interrogate them in offshore detention facilities. It launched his torture program by vesting CIA operatives with unprecedented lawless power. It gave them carte blanche authority to function extra-judicially by whatever methods it chose.
Idiot or Evil Genius?
By Silver Shield
Back when I was a thoroughly indoctrinated Fox News Junkie, I was constantly confronted by people calling George W. Bush either a complete idiot or and evil genius. GWB was either a drooling buffoon who was incapable of doing the simplest of tasks or he was a third generation Fascist genius, who was hell bent on systematically destroying the American Republic. Being a kool-aide drinker myself, I just didn’t get why people didn’t see him as a warm, caring, strong, and patriotic president. This is what ultimately led me to ask a deeper question, how is it possible that one guy could be seen by so many people, in so many different ways?
Fast forward to the 2008 presidential election. Barack Obama (I love how his name still comes up as a misspelling) comes on the scene and the same thing happens again, only in reverse. Now Obama is either a complete idiot or an evil genius. He’s either an empty suit that cannot put two words together without his teleprompter or an evil communist bastard who’s plotting to destroy the America Republic. And yet to the average Obama supporter, they just don’t get why people don’t see him as a young, charismatic, intelligent and motivating president. Again, how is it possible that one guy can be seen by so many people in so many different ways?
Washington Faces the Arab Revolts: Sacrificing Dictators to Save the State
James Petras
Introduction
To understand the Obama regime’s policy toward Egypt, the Mubarak dictatorship and the popular uprising it is essential to locate it in an historical context. The essential point is that Washington, after several decades of being deeply embedded in the state structures of the Arab dictatorships, from Tunisia through Morocco, Egypt, Yemen, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority, is attempting to re-orient its policies to incorporate and/or graft liberal-electoral politicians onto the existing power configurations.
While most commentators and journalists spill tons of ink about the “dilemmas” of US power , the novelty of the Egyptian events and Washington’s day to day policy pronouncements, there are ample historical precedents which are essential to understand the strategic direction of Obama’s policies.
"They Call It “Pharming” And It’s Phrightening!" (OpEdNews 404 – Repost)
By Robert Singer
Click here to read why this “article is not currently available” at the OpEdNews link: http://www.opednews.com/articles/They-Call-It-Pharming-An-by-Robert-Singer-080916-752.html
They Call It “Pharming” And It’s Phrightening!
Biofuels are often blamed for 85% of corn price increases since 2002. Even Congress is growing weary of the corn/ethanol inflation.
Why were we on this road in the first place?
It would seem an easy road to avoid, considering over 140% more energy—mostly high value oil and natural gas, is expended to produce a gallon of corn ethanol than is in the ethanol itself. In 2007, 20% of the U.S. corn crop was converted into 6 billion gallons of ethanol—to replace only 1% of U.S. oil consumption.
President, Bush 42 — known for his insight into our energy problems (We need an energy bill that encourages consumption), on April 29, 2008 told reporters at the Rose Garden “the solution now is to make ethanol out of switchgrasses or wood chips.” Later in that same speech he said, “…it's in our national interest that our farmers grow energy.” Really? I thought that’s what our food supply was supposed to provide—energy for our bodies to survive.
Switchgrass and growing energy is not a solution to our energy and global warming problems. They worsen Global Warming and are a Trojan Horse for Genetic Modified Organisms (GMOs), promising not only whole new markets for biotech products, but the irreversible entrenchment of genetically modified crops throughout the world.
When GMOs were first introduced into agriculture, farmers and consumer groups questioned the lack of basic protections. Since then, GMO contamination has spread from the cornfields in the Midwest to the birthplace of corn in the remote mountains of Mexico. Farmers have not been able to protect themselves from this genetic trespass. Instead of holding GMO manufacturers liable, the courts are upholding the patent rights of seed companies and making the farmers pay!
The latest proposals are to produce biofuels from more cellulose-rich plants like switchgrass rather than food crops. This may seem like a solution to the food v. fuel conflict inherent in ethanol production, because people will not directly starve when we fill up our gas tanks (of course they probably wouldn’t starve if we subsidized alternative fuels, mass transit or just demanded automakers produce cars that get 50+ miles per gallon). However the energy it takes to unlock the energy in cellulosic ethanol is far greater than the energy it produces, making it a net energy loser, but a winner for genetically modified organisms or GMOs because the cellulosic plants will be grown from these high tech seeds, which independent sources have warned of emerging human health and environmental problems.
With the advent of biofuels, however, Monsanto and other biotech companies have found a market that is more insulated from public rejection because none of these crops are directly destined for our food supply only our gas tank.
The problem is that once Genetically Modified or GM seeds are planted in the field, there is no way to prevent GMO fuel crops from contaminating their food-crop cousins. Because these crops are wind-pollinated, cases of genetic contamination are commonplace. In the past two years alone, there were at least 73 publicly documented cases of genetic contamination. Once GM agrofuels have entered the agricultural gates, they will soon escape into the wild, contaminating food crops across the globe.
Briana Waters: Victimized by Green Scare State Terrorism
by Stephen Lendman
An earlier article discussed her case, accessed through the following link:
http://sjlendman.blogspot.com/2008/04/green-scare-state-terrorism.html
Content from it is repeated below before updating her status. An innocent woman, she's one of many victims of US state terrorism, in her case for courageous environmental activism. Her web site provides more information, accessed through the following link:
Her Case
On March 30, 2006, she was arrested, then falsely accused of being a lookout in connection with a 2001 arson at the University of Washington Center for Urban Horticulture.
In fact, she's a California resident, a professional musician, violin teacher, and mother of a young child. Yet, she was bogusly indicted, then reindicted with other defendants on May 10, 2006, including charges of using a destructive device, carrying a mandatory 30 year sentence if convicted.
More torture unpunished
Mary Shaw
In January, former Chicago police Cmdr. Jon Burge was sentenced to 4 1/2 years in prison. He had been charged with perjury and obstruction of justice. But he has been accused of some things that are far more disturbing than those charges might suggest.
Burge, who is white, allegedly spent decades torturing black murder suspects - shocking, burning, and suffocating them - until they confessed. Kind of like what happens to the brown detainees at Gitmo, but in Chicago instead.
While I am pleased to see Burge behind bars, I am disappointed that he was convicted not for torturing the suspects but merely for lying about the torture.
Field Notes on American-Style Democracy
by Stephen Lendman
Perhaps George Bernard Shaw was thinking of Obama's administration when he said, "Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for the appointment of the corrupt few."
Obama upholds the tradition and then some, doing more harm globally in two years than most of history's tinpot despots in decades, yet most of it gets little attention. Imagine what's planned ahead. Already, his legacy includes:
-- breaking every key promise he made across the board;
-- looting the nation's wealth, wrecking the economy, and consigning growing millions to impoverishment without jobs, homes, savings, social services, or futures;
"Give Us the ANWAR and Keep Shopping" (OpEdNews 404 – Repost)
By Robert Singer
Click here to read why this “article is not currently available” at the OpEdNews link: http://www.opednews.com/articles/-Give-Us-the-ANWAR-and-Kee-by-Robert-Singer-080914-244.html
September 14, 2008
"Give Us the ANWAR and Keep Shopping"-They Found They Can't Have Both
Associated Press (AP) reported on September 13th, 2008 that the unprecedented rise in gas prices has brought a change to the American way of life that even a drop in oil prices below $100/barrel won’t erase. As AP put it, “Public transportation is in. Hummers are out. Frugality is in. Wastefulness is out.”
Apparently, the worst gas price hike has produced the worst-case scenario for the select group of people who raised the price of gasoline to almost $5.00/gallon smug in their belief they could get Americans to give up their last Arctic wilderness while continuing to buy useless, wasteful consumer goods.
Two significant things happened recently after gas approached $5 a gallon and oil was selling for $142 a barrel.
• Retail sales fell in July as shoppers shunned autos and other big-ticket items. In spite of government stimulus payments to U.S. households retail sales dipped 0.1 percent last month when a variety of economic woes including skyrocketing gas prices combined to blunt America's shopping habits—habits which wreak havoc on the environment.
• August 14, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) signaled her willingness to consider opening up more coastal areas to oil and gas exploration. Just weeks before Pelosi was resolved to block any votes to allow offshore drilling.
Once the environment's last bastion of defense (Congress) had fallen, and gasoline prices rose so high, it tremendously curbed American buying habits, gasoline prices mysteriously came down almost a dollar and oil is now under $100 a barrel.
Really? Just because a month ago we agreed to consider more drilling? Oil drops by $45 a barrel, is that possible?
No. It appears the price of gasoline stayed high too long. A $45/barrel drop in oil isn’t enough to fool anyone into thinking the “economy” is back to normal. You can’t cover up bank failures, home foreclosures, high unemployment and the experts like Warren Buffett predicting major disruptions in financial markets.
Even with the recent drop in gas prices, Americans seem to have realized they can live comfortable lives by returning to a time when they valued stewardship, resourcefulness, and thrift…and that just might be good for everyone who has to live on this planet.
So the same select group of people who were betting on trashing the ANWR and on trashing the planet by getting the public to shop for billions of dollars of useless, non-recyclable consumer goods appear to be losing. As the AP press said, “Americans have changed; being frugal is the thing.” And that makes winners of the rest of us, for now.
There's a 20-minute documentary storyofstuff.com that lays this all out in a manner that even a child could understand and shows the path to saving the planet is no more complicated than controlling our addiction to all that "stuff."
Authors Bio: Robert Singer is a retired information technology professional and an environmental activist living in southern California. In 1995 he and his cousin Adam D. Singer founded IPC The Hospitalist Company, Inc., where he served as chief technology officer. Today the company manages more than 130 practice groups, providing care in some 300 medical facilities in 18 states. Prior to that he was president of Useful Software, a developer and publisher of business and consumer software for the personal computing Industry.
We're All Egyptians Now!
by Stephen Lendman
And Tunisians, and Yemenis, and Algerians, and Jordanians, and Lebanese, and, of course, Palestinians, suffering for over six decades after Israel stole their historic homeland, over 43 years under brutal, suffocating occupation. Their struggle is ours, and it's high time we reacted, showing spirit as courageous as theirs.
In her latest January 31 article, Phyllis Bennis headlined, "Tunisia's Spark and Egypt's Flame: the Middle East is Rising," asking:
"Is this how empires end, with people flooding the streets, demanding resignation of their leaders and forcing local dictators out? Maybe not entirely, (but the) legacy of US-dominated governments across the region will never be the same. The US empire's reach in the resource-rich and strategically vital Middle East has been shaken to its core....The years of Washington calling the shots (based on its) version of 'stability' are definitively over."
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