Home · News · News Aug 2013
Friday August 30, 2013
News Articles

US intelligence spending has doubled since 9/11, top secret budget reveals
TheGuardian | Ewen MacAskill | 08/29/13

US Spending on intelligence has doubled since 9/11, with the National Security Agency and the CIA taking the biggest share, according to the top secret budget leaked by the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Details of the $52.6bn request for 2013 by America's 16 spy agencies were revealed by the Washington Post on Thursday. The NSA has requested $10.45bn from Congress, while the CIA is asking for $14.7bn. The NSA has long been regarded as the most productive of the spy agencies, so the higher spending by the CIA is one of the biggest surprises in the four-volume, 1,452-page budget. ... Read more

Leaked Pakistani report confirms high civilian death toll in CIA drone strikes
BIJ | Chris Woods | 07/22/13

A secret document obtained by the Bureau reveals for the first time the Pakistan government's internal assessment of dozens of drone strikes, and shows scores of civilian casualties.

The United States has consistently claimed only a tiny number of non-combatants have been killed in drone attacks in Pakistan -- despite research by the Bureau and others suggesting that over 400 civilians may have died in the nine-year campaign. ... Read more

Hypnotized by Ayn Rand and Reaganomics, Republicans Have Completely Lost Touch with Economic Reality
AlterNet | Bob Burnett | d08/23/13

On September 9th, when Congress returns from its summer vacation, negotiations will begin on a new Federal budget and a U.S. debt limit increase. As a quid pro quo Republicans will demand restrictions on Obamacare. Once again, this raises the specter of the GOP pushing the government into default. Why don't Republicans understand that's a terrible idea that would crater the economy?

Once upon a time, the GOP stood for responsible economic policy. I grew up in a middle-class family in Southern California, where my father and grandfather ran a small business. They were Republicans, as were most of the people we knew. In those days, the GOP attracted the middle class because it was the Party of common sense: it understood business and the economy.

Over the ensuing years the Republican Party abandoned the middle class and become the party of the wealthy -- the one percent. In the '80s, Republicans fell under the spell of Reaganomics. Conservative economists infused American political discourse with three malignant notions: helping the rich get richer would inevitably help everyone else; markets were inherently self correcting; and, "government is not the solution to our problems; government is the problem." Reagan's ideology produced deregulation, tax cuts for the rich and powerful, and monopoly capitalism. It resulted in unprecedented income inequality. The American ethos changed from "we're in this together" ("I am my brother's keeper") to "you are on your own." ... Read more

Ocean Acidification Happening at 10X Rate Than Ever Before
AlterNet | Alex Kane| 08/26/13

"Studies have shown that a more acidic environment has a dramatic effect on some calcifying species, including oysters, clams, sea urchins, shallow water corals, deep sea corals, and calcareous plankton," the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration states."When shelled organisms are at risk, the entire food web may also be at risk. Today, more than a billion people worldwide rely on food from the ocean as their primary source of protein. Many jobs and economies in the U.S. and around the world depend on the fish and shellfish in our oceans."   Poertner told The Guardiannewspaper that the ocean is already suffering because of global warming, but that acidification is going to exacerbate problems. ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Friday, August 30 [14:31]
DN | Juan González: Growing Charter School Chain Suspends Special Needs Kids in Bid to Raise Test Scores (08/30/13) [3:12]
DN | U.S. Prepares to Strike Syria Over Alleged Chemical Weapons as British Vote Not to Back Int'l Action (08/30/13) [13:56]
Edward Snowden and Security State - NSA
*Edward Snowden reveals the US 'black budget' of secret intelligence spending (08/30/13) [3:39]
A history of NSA wiretapping, Prism, Edward Snowden, William Binney and Thomas Drake (06/18/13) [10:42]
*Who are The Carlyle Group, and how are they connected to bin Laden? (08/16/13) [9:18]
*What you're not being told about Booz Allen Hamilton and Edward Snowden (08/06/13) [7:18]
Snowden's suspected encrypted email service forced to close (08/09/13) [3:10]
Who Really Controls Your Government
Serco and the private companies running your country (08/26/13) [6:02]
The Big Four and how they are helping tax avoidance (07/29/13) [4:25]
Drone Wars
CIA drone war - How has the US got away with it? (06/17/13) [4:59]
How many kids have US drones killed in Pakistan? (07/23/13) [3:32]
TRNN News
TRNN | US Prepares For Syria Intervention Without UN Approval (08/29/13) [12:24]
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Domestic News - Friday (08/30/13) [1hr]
International News - Friday (08/30/13) [1hr]
*Vacationing at Alberta's Oil Sands
Very Ethnic | author | date

Forget the Stampede and Niagara Falls. Instead visit Fort McMurray and behold the fulcrum of 21st century Canada. ... Read more
Sand Tars Oil Extraction [11:39]
Click to zoom
Click to zoom
Oil has always been a messy job

Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.30.2013. 12:52

Thursday August 29, 2013
News Articles

*Taxpayer Dollars Paid A Third Of Richest Corporate CEOs
HP | Zach Carter | 08/28/13

More than one-third of the nation's highest-paid CEOs from the past two decades led companies that were subsidized by American taxpayers, according to a report released Wednesday by the Institute for Policy Studies, a liberal think tank.

... IPS has been publishing annual reports on executive compensation since 1993, tracking the 25 highest-paid CEOs each year and analyzing trends in payouts. Of the 500 total company listings, 103 were banks that received government bailouts under the Troubled Asset Relief Program, while another 62 were among the nation's most prolific government contractors. ... Read more

For the record... Japanese CEO's are paid approximately 15X as much as their overage worker. In the U.S., CEO's are paid X1500 times as much their average worker. Perhaps we should get in step with less greedy nations.

*How Highly Paid CEOs Rip Off Their Companies and the Public Via Fraud and Walk Away With Their Pockets Bulging
AlterNet | Sarah Anderson | 08/27/13

After exposing CEO scoundrels for 20 years, it's hard to keep them all straight. The guy who cooked the books to buy a golden shower curtain blends together with the one who used ill-gotten Iraq war windfalls to pay for his wife's racehorses and plastic surgery and the one who cashed in on subprime mortgages and sailed off on a yacht before the bubble burst. But then you stumble into a story that makes you realize you can still get riled up

... Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) Report: "performance review" of CEOs who made the annual top 25 highest-paid lists over the past 20 years. Theoretically, these CEOs should be the cream of the crop of American corporate leadership. But instead of stellar performance, we found that nearly 40 percent were bad performers -- even by the most narrow, incontrovertible definitions.   Twenty-two percent led firms that crashed or got bailed out in the 2008 crisis. Another eight percent had to pay massive settlements for fraud. And yet another eight percent wound up getting fired. Even the guys who got the boot didn't suffer too much. The size of their average golden parachute: $48 million. Read more
Report: Executive Excess 2013: Bailed Out, Booted, and Busted Report.pdf

War Games: The Syrian Military Theater Of Operations In Two Charts
ZeroHedge | author | 08/28/13

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel says that US forces are "ready to go" if the administration decides to strike against alleged Syrian chemical weapon use. As Bloomberg notes in the infographic below, US Navy guided missile destroyers in the Mediterranean Sea are within range of Syrian targets.. and the ships have a combined inventory of more than 200 cruise missiles. On the other side, the Syrian Air Defense system is very robust, and as Stratfor notes, with an estimated 54,000 personnel, Syria's air defense network is twice the size of former Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's air force. ... Read more
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22 Reasons Why Starting a War In The Middle East Is A Really Bad Idea
ZeroHedge | author | 08/28/13
Read more

*Undercover at the Tar Sands: What It's Really Like Working for Big Oil
Rolling Stones | author | 08/28/13

In recent months, many climate activists have focused their efforts on Canada's tar sands and the companies set on extracting fossil fuels from them. With the debate raging louder than ever, Rolling Stone is in contact with one of the workers helping to build a pipeline to bring oil from the tar sands to the U.S. Read on for that anonymous correspondent's second dispatch from one of the world's most controversial jobs.

On its surface, Fort McMurray, Alberta, looks like any other small Canadian city, with rows of new houses, condo developments and a Wal-Mart. Recycling bins line the streets, and residents schlep cloth bags to the store because the community banned plastic bags. But there's one big difference between Fort Mac and other towns: This is ground zero for Canada's controversial tar sands operations. Like tens of thousands of others, I saw green in the tar-like bitumen-drenched sand, and I came here to cash in. (I'm writing anonymously to protect my colleagues, my friends and myself.) ... Read more
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Global Warming's Terrifying New Math
Rolling Stones | Bill Mckibben | 07/19/13 older, but good

... Meteorologists reported that this spring was the warmest ever recorded for our nation -- in fact, it crushed the old record by so much that it represented the "largest temperature departure from average of any season on record." The same week, Saudi authorities reported that it had rained in Mecca despite a temperature of 109 degrees, the hottest downpour in the planet's history. ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Thursday, August 29 [12:37]
*DN | Syria Debate: Does U.S. Have the Evidence & Authority to Hit Assad for Alleged Chemical Attack? (08/29/13) [13:40], Part 2 [20:59]
Environment - Tar Sands
*The Alberta Tarpits Abomination [6:31]
*Peak oil, energy, growth & the future (02/11/12) [34:53]
Comment: The above video is long and you could easily dismiss it because it contains a lot of animation. But, I think it is one of the best videos I have seen in a long time, because it covers ALL the issues facing civilization, what caused them, and uses animation skillfully to make the issues understandable by ALL of us.
Aljazeera News
Aljazeera | To the Last Drop: Canada's Dirty Oil Sands (07/27/11) [23:31], Part 2 [24:04]
Executive Excess
Executive Excess 2013: Bailed Out, Booted, and Busted (08/17/13) [2:19]
Over two decades, Institute for Policy Studies researchers have examined how extremely high levels of compensation affect executive behavior. Such massive jackpots, we've found, give executives incentives to behave in ways that may boost short-term profits and expand their own paychecks at the expense of our nation's long-term economic health. Tax dodging, mass layoffs, reckless financial deals, offshoring jobs, "creative accounting" --all of these appear to boost CEO pay. But they have dealt one body blow after another to the American middle class, leaving a deeply skewed distribution of income and wealth.
Executive Excess 2013: Bailed Out, Booted, and Busted Report.pdf
TRNN News
TRNN | Vijay Prashad: Allowing big firms to enter your country to modernize agriculture is very dangerous because essentially you are losing sovereignty over your food (08/29/13) [9:37]
TRNN | Dr. Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor: If Dr. King Was Alive Today He Would Be In The Streets Holding Leaders Accountable (08/28/13) [8:53]
TYT News
TYT | NYPD: Mosques Are Terrorist Organizations (08/28/13) [11:50]
TYT | Martin Luther King Jr Was A Republican (Say Republicans) (08/28/13) [7:32]
TYT | Science Vs Religion: Which Makes You Moral? (08/28/13) [7:20]
More News Articles

*6 Facts About the Rich
AlterNet | Paul Buchheit | 08/25/13

First of all, who are they? Mostly the 1%. But the top 2-5% have also done quite well, increasing their inflation-adjusted wealth by 75 percent from 1983 to 2009 while average wealth went down for 80 percent of American households. The rest of the top 20% have been prosperous, realizing a 32 percent gain in inflation-adjusted wealth since 1983

  1. Accumulating almost all the wealth - As evidence of the extremes between the very rich and the rest of us, the average household net worth for the top 1% in 2009 was almost $14 million, while the average household net worth for the bottom 47% was almost ZERO. For nearly half of America, average debt is about the same as average asset ownership.
  2. Creating their own wealth - In another alarming testament to wealth at the top, the richest 10% own almost 90 percent of stocks excluding pensions. Consider what that means. The stock market has historically risen three times faster than the GDP itself. Since the recession, as the U.S. economy has "recovered," 62 percent of the gain was due to growth in the stock market, which surged as much in four years as it did during the "greatest bull market in history" from 1996 to 2000.
  3. Taking ALL the income gains - If the richest 1% had taken the same percentage of total U.S. income in 2006 as they did in 1980, they would have taken a trillion dollars less out of the economy. Instead they tripled their share of post-tax income. And then they captured ALL the income gains in the first two years of the post-recession recovery.
  4. Donating a smaller share than the poorest Americans
  5. Making enough to feed 800 million people - In 2012, three members of the Walton family each made over $4 billion just from stocks and other investments. So did Charles Koch, and David Koch, and Bill Gates, and Warren Buffett, and Larry Ellison, and Michael Bloomberg, and Jeff Bezos.
  6. Taking two-thirds of a trillion dollars in subsidies - Even all that is not enough for the very rich. About two-thirds of nearly $1 trillion in individual "tax expenditures" (tax subsidies from special deductions, exemptions, exclusions, credits, capital gains, and loopholes) goes to the top quintile of taxpayers. An astounding 75 percent of dividend and capital gain subsidies go to the richest 1%.
Much of Congress wants to cut the $4.35 a day food benefit to hungry Americans, almost half of them children, so that money can keep flowing to the top. Read more

Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.29.2013. 13:52

Wednesday August 28, 2013
News Articles

*Colin Powell Worried U.S. Got Steamrolled Into Iraq War, Calls Out Dick Cheney
HP | Danny Shea | 08/26/13

In a new documentary airing Monday on the National Geographic Channel, former Secretary of State Colin Powell opens up about the U.S. invasion of Iraq and claims that he warned President Bush that the U.S. was being steamrolled into war. In the clip from National Geographic's "America vs. Iraq," by Paul Mitchell which was previewed Monday on HuffPost Live, Powell is also heard calling out former Vice President Dick Cheney. ... Read more
Executive Producer Paul Mitchell Talks about new documentary, 'America Vs. Iraq.' (08/26/13) [3:12]

NSA Officers Spy on Love Interests
WSJ | author | date

NSA officers on several occasions have channeled their agency's enormous eavesdropping power to spy on love interests, U.S. officials said.   The practice isn't frequent -- one official estimated a handful of cases in the last decade -- but it's common enough to garner its own spycraft label: LOVEINT. ... Read more

Loose Lips on Syria
WSJ | author | 08/27/13

U.S. leaks tell Assad he can relax. The bombing will be brief and limited.

An American military attack on Syria could begin as early as Thursday and will involve three days of missile strikes, according to "senior U.S. officials" talking to NBC News. The Washington Post has the bombing at "no more than two days," though long-range bombers could "possibly" join the missiles. "Factors weighing into the timing of any action include a desire to get it done before the president leaves for Russia next week," reports CNN, citing a "senior administration official." ... Read more

Rachel Maddow Calls For Congress To Debate Syria Before Attack
HP | author | 08/28/13

Rachel Maddow called on Tuesday for Congress to debate and vote on a potential American attack on Syria before President Obama takes any action.

... She read from an interview with former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix which appeared on The Huffington Post. Blix, who oversaw the UN's aborted inspection of Iraq's (ultimately non-existent) weapons program in 2003, said he saw echoes of those days now. ... Read more
Rachel Maddow | Rachel Maddow Calls For Congress To Debate Syria Before Attack (08/26/13) [22:03]

*U.S. Bank Legal Bills Exceed $100 Billion
Bloomberg | Donal Griffin |08/28/13

The six biggest U.S. banks, led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) and Bank of America Corp., have piled up $103 billion in legal costs since the financial crisis, more than all dividends paid to shareholders in the past five years.   That's the amount allotted to lawyers and litigation, as well as for settling claims about shoddy mortgages and foreclosures, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The sum tops the banks' combined profit last year.

... "They've crossed the point of no return when it comes to the effects that these expenses are going to have on earnings," said Jeffrey Sica, who helps oversee more than $1 billion as head of Sica Wealth Management LLC in Morristown, New Jersey, and doesn't recommend bank stocks. "This is going to keep on hurting them, and people will start paying more attention." ... Read more

Forest Fires | Fire Fighting
Click to zoom
DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Wednesday, August 28 [8:08]
DN | As Strikes on Syria Loom, Is U.S. Ignoring a Diplomatic Track That Could Prevent More Violence? (08/28/13) [21:55]
DN | As Fukushima Raises Severity Level, Nuclear Expert Warns Radioactive Leaks Will Only "Get Worse" (08/28/13) 3:35]
*DN | "Inside Job" Director Charles Ferguson: Wall Street Has Turned US Into a "Predatory Nation" (05/29/12 older, but good) [21:51]
*"Inside Job" by Director Charles Ferguson [1:48:39]
*"No End in Sight: Iraq's Descent Into Chaos" by Director Charles Ferguson [1:41:54]
*Lone Gunmen March 4, 2001 PILOT EPISODE [44:31]
Remember the X-Files and these three characters. Well, there was a spin-off from the X-Files called the Lone Gunmen and this episode aired 1/2 year before 9/11.   As President Bush said "I don't think anyone could ever imagine anyone flying a couple of airplanes into the side of buildings" ... yeah right!
TRNN News
TRNN | Phyllis Bennis: US policy should emphasize direct diplomacy to negotiate a ceasefire with all sides including Syrian President Bashar Assad, but direct military intervention will lead to more bloodshed and Obama fighting on the side of an Al-Qaeda affiliated organization (08/28/13) [14:02]
TRNN | America's Water Problem (08/23/13) [2:57]
TYT News
TYT | NSA Spying Powers Abused For Sex & Love Interests (08/27/13) [4:35]
TYT | Your Facebook Friends May Harm Your Credit Score (08/27/13) [5:29]
TYT | How US Media Is Pushing For War With Syria (08/27/13) [3:19]
TYT | US About To Intervene In Syria (08/27/13) [5:01]
Hedgehogs | Sloths
Hedgehog Boat [2:24]
How to Pick Up and Hold a Hedgehog [5:16]
Before You Buy A Hedgehog Watch This! [5:46]
Sloth Prince and her best friend Daisy [4:15]
Why Did the Sloth Cross the Road? [1:20]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.28.2013. 14:05

Tuesday August 27, 2013
News Articles

*Book Excerpt: The Evolution of "This Town"
Bill Moyers | Mark Leibovich | 08/23/13

A hundred pages into his study of Washington's elite "Club," Mark Leibovich pauses to "proffer a brief tutorial on the recent history of the Washington entourage." This excerpt recounts the evolution of the entourage -- back some four decades, to the days when "Big Money" first rolled into town

The biggest shift in Washington over the last forty or so years has been the arrival of Big Money and politics as an industry. The old Washington was certainly saturated with politics, but it was smaller and more disjointed. There were small and self-contained political consultancies that worked on campaigns or raised money for elected officials or contracted a service (i.e., direct mail). ... Read more

France 'Ready To Punish' Syria Over Gas Attack
HP | author | 08/27/13

French President Francois Hollande said Tuesday that his country is prepared to take action against those responsible for gassing people in Syria.

"France is ready to punish those who took the heinous decision to gas innocents" in Syria last week, Hollande said at a conference with France's ambassadors. He did not elaborate. ... Read more

Invasion of Iraq: How the British and Americans got it wrong [1:19:36]

*On The Global QE Exit Crisis
ZeroHwdge | author | 08/27/13

The global economy could be in the early stages of another crisis. Once again, the US Federal Reserve is in the eye of the storm.   As the Fed attempts to exit from so-called quantitative easing (QE) -- its unprecedented policy of massive purchases of long-term assets -- many high-flying emerging economies suddenly find themselves in a vise. Currency and stock markets in India and Indonesia are plunging, with collateral damage evident in Brazil, South Africa, and Turkey.

The Fed insists that it is blameless -- the same absurd position that it took in the aftermath of the Great Crisis of 2008-2009, when it maintained that its excessive monetary accommodation had nothing to do with the property and credit bubbles that nearly pushed the world into the abyss. It remains steeped in denial: Were it not for the interest-rate suppression that QE has imposed on developed countries since 2009, the search for yield would not have flooded emerging economies with short-term "hot" money. ... Read more

*Flashback On May 15, 2008 Keith Olbermann Blasted George Bush For WMD Lies (05/15/08) [12:08]
"This Country is Finished" George Carlin on Countdown (older) [7:40]


DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Tuesday, August 27 [15:54]
DN | Civil Rights Pioneer Gloria Richardson, 91, on How Women Were Silenced at 1963 March on Washington (08/27/13) [15:12]
Bill Moyers
Bill Moyers | The End Game for Democracy (08/23/13) [3:15]
*Bill Moyers | Mark Leibovich new book "This Town on Glitz and Greed in Washington (08/23/13) [49:02]
Mark Leibovich of The New York Times has written a book "This Town" about the city's bipartisan lust for power, cash and notoriety in a book that everyone who's anyone in the nation's capital is talking about.
60 Minutes
60 Minutes | Did she really just say that? China's Xin on democracy (08/11/13) [5:16]
*TRNN News
TRNN | Part 1 | Vijay Prashad: Jobless growth wasn't an accidental product it was indeed how the rules were framed (08/26/13) [9:11]
TRNN | Part 2 | Vijay Prashad: North South Trade Negotiations: The relationship between trade rules and the operations of multinational corporations (08/27/13) [9:26]
PBS Frontline
PBS Frontline | Sex Slaves Kidnapping and Prostitution Rings (05/13/13) [55:27]
TYT News
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Battling Wildfires In The West (08/27/13) [1hr]
MSNBC Chris Hayes All - In
Chris Hayes | Kerry: There must be accountability for chemical attack in Syria (08/26/13) [13:21]
*Chris Hayes | Hospial costs are incredibly out of line in America (08/26/13) [3:39]
MSNBC Rachel Maddow
*Rachel Maddow | US preps for military rebuke to Syria chemical weapons (08/26/13) [15:39]
Rachel Maddow | Defense of voting rights spread nationally (08/26/13) [9:35], Part 2 [4:58]
Rachel Maddow | Landmark ruling for marriage equality in New Mexico (08/26/13) [1:12], Part 2 [5:40]

08.27.2013. 12:25

Monday August 26, 2013
News Articles

Nuclear Operator Raises Alarm on Fukushima Crisis
NYTimes | Hiroko Tabuchi | 08/23/13

The operator of Japan's tsunami-hit nuclear power plant sounded the alarm on the gravity of the deepening crisis of containment at the coastal site on Friday, saying that there are more than 200,000 tons of radioactive water in makeshift tanks vulnerable to leaks, with no reliable way to check on them or anywhere to transfer the water.

The latest disclosures add to a long list of recent accidents, leaks and breakdowns that have underscored grave vulnerabilities at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant site more than two years after a powerful earthquake and tsunami set off meltdowns at three reactors. ... Read more

Alternative to a Military Response to 9/11
costsofwar.org/ | author | date

Comparisons have been made between states that have used military responses to terror tactics (for example, France in Algeria in the 1950s and 1960s) and states that have taken alternative policing and political approaches (for example, Italy in the 1970s in response to the Red Brigades).

A Rand report made systematic examination and comparison of 268 groups using terror tactics in the period from 1968 to 2006. It showed that several approaches have been much more effective than military responses at eliminating future attacks. They include criminal justice responses and attempts to address the well-being concerns of both combatants and the broader populace that might support them. ... Read more
Click to zoom

Corporate Power and Profiteering
costsofwar.org | author | date

Large defense contractors have played a central role in fighting the post-9/11 wars, as well as in arming and supplying coalition forces and the new Iraqi and Afghan governments. Their involvement raises major economic and security concerns among critics.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with an increase in the Pentagon's budget, have led to an increase in total military contracts to nearly $400 billion, their highest levels since World War II. Private contracting has grown to such a level that, by 2011, there were more private contract employees involved in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan than uniformed military personnel. Pentagon contracts awarded in the 2000s have been concentrated in the hands of just five contractors- Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon and General Dynamics. These five companies account for over one-third of all Pentagon contracts. ... Read more
Click to zoom

Halliburton's Iraq gravy train
Salon | Farhad Manjoo | 02/27/04 old, but good

Bunting, who has recently been telling his story to congressional Democrats, says that Halliburton, which has been awarded billions of dollars of contracts for work in Iraq, routinely purchased the most expensive equipment and services on the government's tab. Bunting claims that Halliburton managers frowned on any attempts to save the military any money. They had no incentive to do so: taxpayers would pick up the cost. In fact, they had an incentive to bill high: the more they spent, the more money their company would make.

Bunting worked as a buyer for Halliburton's "Logcap" contract with the U.S. Army, a $3.7 billion deal under which Halliburton provides the military with logistics support -- it builds bases, runs mess halls, does the laundry, supplies water and performs dozens of other tasks necessary to keep the Army running. The contract is a "cost-plus" contract, meaning that the military reimburses Halliburton for all of its expenses, and then gives it an extra percentage as a profit. Experts have long criticized cost-plus contracts as being economically inefficient; companies that work under cost-plus deals have no reason to reduce their expenses, meaning that the government may end up paying more than it should for services. ... Read more

Comment: Remember, the "Too Big To Fail" banks are acting just like big hedge funds.
Colorado Republican Legislator, State Sen. Vicki Marble said: "Blacks Are Poor Because They Eat Too Much Fried Chicken".

Right-Wing Wannabe Obama Impeachers Are Living in Dreamland
AlterNet | Joan Walsh | 08/23/13

Tom Coburn, Ted Cruz and other crackpots can't stand up to their base and face reality. Can this party ever change?

Read more

Will the American Right Kill Us All?
AlterNet | Robert Parry | 08/21/13

That is because the scientific consensus continues to solidify that human activity is causing global temperatures to increase dangerously, possibly causing a catastrophic rise of three feet in sea levels by the end of the century. Yet, right-wing obstructionism, which deems federal environmental activism unconstitutional, has hobbled any effort to enact a timely response to the emergency.

... From the Tea Party to the "libertarians," oil money from fossil-fuel energy tycoons, such as Charles and David Koch of Koch Industries. has fueled "populist" propaganda challenging the case for global warming, first by funding "scientists" who quibble with the research or who assert that the warming will be modest and manageable. ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Monday, August 26 [12:17]
DN | 50 Years After March of Washington, Tens of Thousands Say Struggle for MLK's "Dream" Continues (08/26/13) [10:44]
DN | Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq (2007) [31:00]
Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II, by William Blum (website)
Military Industrial Congress Complex (article)
We Are Living in the World Dick Cheney Made
TRNN News
TRNN | Ring of Fire hosts Mike Papantonio and Sam Seder discuss more NSA Revelations Emerging (08/24/13) [3:56]
TRNN | Paul Bucheitt: From healthcare to education, research shows an increase in privatization leaves the public with the losses and corporations with the gains (08/26/13) [12:00]
Giant sinkhole swallows trees in Assumption Parish, Louisiana (08/22/13) [2:02]
FIRE burning near Yosemite
INSANE! FIRE burning near Yosemite grows to 15 square miles (08/24/13) [5:31]
Wildfire rages near Yosemite National Park (08/22/13) [1:22]
Yosemite Wildfire Near National Park Growing || Alert As California Wildfire Grows (08/23/13) [1:19]
Wildfire near Yosemite park sends tourists fleeing (08/23/13) [1:23]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Chris Hayes | Matt Taibbi: How can the nation deal withthe scary cost of college? (08/23/13) [13:27]
Chris Hayes | Ex-McDonald's CEO battles Chris Hayes over minimum wage (08/23/13) [6:33]
Chris Hayes | Russia and the the LGBT community (08/23/13) [3:27]
Chris Hayes | The march on Washington, and MLK's "I have a dream" speech (08/23/13) [8:45], Part 2 [6:31]
Aljazeera
Note: Al Jazeera America has changed their video EMBEDDING policies. So for right now please scroll down .5 - 1 inch to see the video.
Duke University researchers are using one deadly disease to eradicate another (08/20/13) [2:54]
Massive sinkhole makes Louisiana town uninhabitable (08/22/13) [3:06]
Aljazeera | Faultlines: Made In Bangladesh (08/20/13) [2:52]
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Growing Pressure On The U.S. To Respond To Events In Syria (08/26/13) [1hr]
Judith Flanders: "The Invention Of Murder" (08/26/13) [1hr]
More News Articles

America's New Landlords
Aljazeera | Kristyn Martin | 08/23/13

It's a new phenomenon sweeping across the nation: big institutional investors buying up foreclosed homes by the hundreds -- even thousands -- in distressed communities.

"Looking back a year and a half ago, not one institution owned more than 1,000 single family rental homes," says David Bragg, Managing Director at Green Street Advisors. "However, today the top six players combined own 80,000 single family rental homes."

"Hedgefunds across the country are realizing that our market is going from what they refer to as an owner nation, to a renter nation…so the rental market is huge," says Sheree Villar, a local realtor with ERA Atlantic Realty in Gwinnett County, Georgia. She buys homes for two large institutional investors every month at the foreclosure auction from the steps of the Gwinnett County courthouse. "What they're doing is buying these homes in blocks to turn around, put on the rental market, and resell when the market really is strong." ... Read more

The Surprising Reason Americans Are Far Less Healthy Than Others in Developed Nations
AlterNet | Sam Pizzigati | 08/20/13

Back in 1990, shouts a new study just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the United States ranked a lowly 20th on life expectancy among 34 major industrial nations. The United States now ranks 27th -- despite spending much more on health care than any other nation.

Media reports on this new study blamed all the usual suspects for America's disappointing health: poor personal health habits, inadequate access to health care, and just plain poverty.   If Americans exercised more and ate and smoked less, this conventional wisdom holds, the United States would surely start moving up in the global health rankings.

But many epidemiologists -- scientists who study health outcomes -- have their doubts. ... Read more

Interesting Videos
One of the best Tatoo I've ever seen
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.26.2013. 14:14

Friday August 23, 2013
News Articles
Income Inequality
Wealth Inequality in America [6:25]
*Ring-of-Fire| Cash Hoarders Devastate Economy (08/21/07) [12:28]
The wealthiest Americans are sitting on trillions of dollars in cash. They aren't reinvesting, they aren't giving workers a raise, and they aren't spending. Ring of Fire host Mike Papantonio talks about how this affects our economy with Richard Eskow, a senior fellow at the Campaign for America's Future.
Dick Cheney | War Profiteer! | War Criminal!
How Dick Cheney Convinced 'Insecure' Bush To Make Him Vice President (03/16/13) [6:57]
CTV911 | Unauthorized Biography of Dick Cheney (01/22/11) [42:58]
*Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers (2006) [1:15:40]
Click to zoom
There are still 14,000 contractors, including 5,500 security guards, in Iraq even though the last troops left in December 2011.

*Obama DOJ Asks Court to Grant Immunity to George W. Bush For Iraq War
GlobalResearch | Inder Comar | 08/22/13

In court papers filed today (PDF), the United States Department of Justice requested that George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Paul Wolfowitz be granted procedural immunity in a case alleging that they planned and waged the Iraq War in violation of international law.

Plaintiff Sundus Shaker Saleh, an Iraqi single mother and refugee now living in Jordan, filed a complaint in March 2013 in San Francisco federal court alleging that the planning and waging of the war constituted a "crime of aggression" against Iraq, a legal theory that was used by the Nuremberg Tribunal to convict Nazi war criminals after World War II. ... Read more

Study: Iraq War Cost U.S. More Than $2 Trillion
Study: Iraq War Cost U.S. More Than $2 Trillion (03/14/13) [3:00]

Click to zoom
Cost of War website

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Friday, August 23 [10:17]
DN | Syrian Activist on Ghouta Attack: "I Haven't Seen Such Death in My Whole Life" (08/23/13) [20:49]
DN | "Empowering, So Brave": Trans Activists Praise Chelsea Manning, Raise Fears over Prison Conditions (08/23/13) [15:30]
TRNN News
TTY News
Who's The 'Traitor' - Dick Cheney or Edward Snowden? (06/17/13) [3:16]
*TYT | WHO Got Shorter Sentences Than Bradley Manning? (08/22/13) [5:09]
TYT | Bradley Manning Is Now Chelsea Manning And... (08/22/13) [6:50]
*TYT | Obama DOJ Wants Immunity For War Criminals (08/22/13) [3:52]
Collateral Murder - Wikileaks - Iraq (2007) [17:47]
WarIsAChrime.org website
Click to zoom
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Domestic News - Friday (08/23/13) [1hr]
International News - Friday (08/23/13) [1hr]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Chris Hayes | A look into LGBT life in Russia (08/22/13) [10:54]
Chris Hayes | Fox News ghastly undertaking on race and crime (08/22/13) [4:05]
Chris Hayes | Surveillance, Stop & Frisk, Black & White (08/22/13) [8:04], Part 2 [4:22]
MSNBC Rachel Maddow
Rachel Maddow | Dark chapter in North Carolina voting success story (08/22/13) [20:37]
Interesting Article
Virgin launches glass-bottomed plane
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.
Click to zoom (long to load)
Edward Snowden papers (slow to loads, many documents)
Iraq War
Ed Asner: The Oil Factor: Behind the War on Terror () [1:29:17]
Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers (2006) [1:15:40]
Dick Cheney
How 'Monster' Dick Cheney Convinced 'Insecure' Bush To Make Him Vice President (03/16/13) [6:57]
CTV911 | Unauthorized Biography of Dick Cheney (01/22/11) [42:58]
Halliburton moves to Dubai
CNN | Halliburton moves to Dubai (03/14/07) [1:37]
Reuters | Halliburton moves to Dubai (03/14/07) [2:30]
Halliburton Scene from the movie Fahrenheit 9/11 [5:26]
Media Mayhem : 9/11 and Cheney's Oil Grab w/ Michael Ruppert (03/07/13) [4:52]
Media Mayhem : "Collapse" Author, Michael Ruppert on Dick Cheney, War Chrimes, Peak Oil and etc. [49:21], Part 2 [49:24]
Leah Costello: Dick Cheney book tour (09/26/11) [31:17], Part 2 [43:13]
Michael Ruppert
Collapse - Michael Ruppert (03/07/13) [1:20:46]
Neocons
HooverInstitution | Uncommon Knowledge: George W. Bush (07/17/12) [1:03:21]
HooverInstitution | Uncommon Knowledge: Condoleezza Rice (02/22/12) [1:09:44]
Yet more neocons. I got to go and wash my hands.
HooverInstitution | Uncommon Knowledge: White America Is 'Coming Apart' (04/11/12) [47:50]
Peter Robinson talks to Charles Murray about America's failing civic culture. According to Murray, America's white working class has been "coming apart," and has been since the death of JFK. From the decline of marriage, to the lack of religious participation, to declining labor participation, could white working class men be falling even farther behind white upper class America? And could this change in American culture be exacerbating class differences?
HooverInstitution | Uncommon Knowledge: Suicide of a Superpower: Pat Buchanan on the Death of Western Civilization (04/25/12) [1:00:55]
Journalist and former presidential candidate, Patrick J Buchanan. From declining birth rates, to shifting values, to the decline of Christianity, Buchanan thinks Western civilization is falling apart. Buchanan is worried that the American melting pot has stopped assimilating immigrants the way it once did. Is America dying? Are you a racist if you think America is breaking apart?
Brother Nathanael | The End Of White America (05/20/12) [3:25]
Other Videos
Depression & Suicide Explained, Chemical Imbalance or Human Needs? Psychology & Self Esteem [21:04]

08.23.2013. 13:18

Thursday August 22, 2013
News Articles

*5 Companies That Make Money By Keeping Americans Terrified of Terror Attacks
AlterNet | Alex Kane | 08/16/13

Michael Hayden, the former director of the National Security Agency, has invaded America's television sets in recent weeks to warn about Edward Snowden's leaks and the continuing terrorist threat to America.

But what often goes unmentioned, as the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald pointed out, is that Hayden has a financial stake in keeping Americans scared and on a permanent war footing against Islamist militants. And the private firm he works for, called the Chertoff Group, is not the only one making money by scaring Americans.

70 percent of the national intelligence budget is now spent on private contractors, as author Tim Shorrock reported. The private intelligence contractors have profited to the tune of at least $6 billion a year. In 2010, the Washington Post revealed that there are 1,931 private firms across the country dedicated to fighting terrorism. ... Read more

1. The Chertoff Group
On August 11, former NSA head Michael Hayden, the man at the center of the Bush administration's 2005 surveillance scandal, was defending his former agency on CBS News in the wake of the latest NSA spying scandal.

2. Booz Allen Hamilton
This private intelligence contractor has become a household name in the wake of the NSA scandal. Edward Snowden, the man responsible for leaking secret documents that exposed the breadth of NSA surveillance, was working for Booz Allen when he downloaded the documents he handed off to media outlets.

3. Science Applications International Corporation
Sometimes referred to as "NSA West" because so many former NSA employees go on to work for the formerly California-based Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), this firm makes a ton of cash off government contracts. And they do so by hawking their expertise in combatting the terrorist threat.

4. Center for Counterintelligence and Security Studies
U.S. intelligence agencies aren't the only sectors of government where the private sector has cashed in on the fear of terrorism. The post-9/11 world has seen the blossoming of a cottage industry of self-styled "experts" on Islam from private companies that market their supposedly ironclad analysis of the threat from Islamists to other federal agencies and state and local law enforcement. These companies have profited from law enforcement taking part in the "war on terror."

5. Security Solutions International
Security Solutions International is yet another private firm hawking anti-Muslim training to law enforcement. This Miami-based company founded in 2004 uses its Israeli security connections to boost its standing in the market. They use Israeli security trainers in their courses.
*War Profiteers? | War Criminals?
Click to zoom
The US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq will cost taxpayers up to $6 trillion, "the most expensive wars in US history," a new report has revealed, adding that these campaigns will dominate future federal budgets "for decades to come."
A 2011 report from the commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan estimated that defence contractors had wasted or lost to fraud as much as $60bn -- or $12m a day -- since 2001.

Raped and Impregnated at 14, Girl Must Now Share Parental Rights with Her Attacker
AlterNet | Iulia Filip | 08/21/13

BOSTON (CN) - A rape victim sued Massachusetts to stop it from subjecting her to "a court-ordered 16-year unwanted relationship with her attacker" by giving him paternity rights over the child born from the rape.

"The plaintiff, a rape victim in a state criminal matter, became pregnant in 2009 at age 14 as a result of the crime and gave birth to her attacker's child," the lawsuit states.   "The defendant in the state criminal proceeding, age 20 at the time of the impregnation, was convicted of rape in 2011 and was sentenced to 16 years probation. ... Read more

Naked Breastfeeding Yoga Mom Says That Photo Was Not Staged

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Thursday, August 22 [10:33]
*DN | Bradley Manning: "Sometimes You Have to Pay a Heavy Price to Live in a Free Society" (08/22/13) [5:16], Part 2 [4:37]
Bradley Manning I want to live as a woman "I am Chelsea Manning. I am female," (08/22/13) [5:27]
Interesting Movies
Elysium director Neill Blomkamp: 'It's about the third world trying to get into the first' (08/22/13) [3:46]
Elysium trailer (2013) [3:33]
HBO | Dirty Bomb Attack on London (11/05/12) [1:30:08]
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm New Details On The Scope Of NSA Surveillance (08/22/13) [1hr]
Jason Matthews: "Red Sparrow", a first-time author out with a debut spy novel (08/22/13) [1hr]
TRNN News
TRNN | David Swanson: Private Manning becomes latest victim of President Obama's war on whistleblowers and efforts should be made to remember him as a hero not a traitor (08/21/13) [6:00]
*TRNN | Bill Black: Instead of prosecuting banks for mortgage fraud, the Department of Justice is working with them. (08/21/13) [8:27]
*Larry Wilkerson: The Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex (10/26/09 older but good) [10:21], Part 2 [12:47], Part 3 [14:29]
Quote of the Day: We need good leadership, consistent, sustained good leadership. Can't just be President Obama; it has to be the next 2 or 3 presidents in a row. It has to be about 20 to 25 years of good leadership. Where are we going to find that with our political process? Think about 2000. Think about 2000. I sat there as a member of the Republican Party, and I thought to myself, my God, 300 million people in this country and all we can come up with is Al Gore and George W. Bush.
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
*Chris Hayes | Possible chemical weapons massacre in Syria (08/21/13) [10:54]
Chris Hayes | Bradley Manning sentenced to 35years, longer than other soldiers who committed murder (08/21/13) [1:03]
*Chris Hayes | What would it take for Republicans to support Obama's health care law? (08/21/13) [7:22]
Chris Hayes | The NRA's secret gun registry? (08/21/13) [5:49]
I like Chris Hayes, because he asks great questions, waits for his guest answers, and usually doesn't talk over his guest.

I wish the same process would be used in our government. Both sides of an issue present their concrete solutions to the problem. Each side then supports their solutions with arguements that can be boiled down to easily understood bullet points. The issue than can be published for all to see and possibly through the Internet able to respond to (by section).
*Chris Hayes | More social-economic classes? (08/21/13) [7:26]
Chris Hayes | Could unemployment reduce your chance of getting a kidney transplant? (08/21/13) [5:40]
MSNBC Rachel Maddow
Rachel Maddow | Graphic video suggests chemical attacks in Syria (08/21/13) [17:11]
Part 2 [3:56]
Rachel Maddow | NSA bungling has implecation beyond security (08/21/13) [10:29]
Rachel Maddow | Fukushima is more dangerous as time progresses (08/21/13) [4:41]
Humor News
Stephen Cobert | Must-see morning clip: Kevin Spacey defends "House of Cards'" Emmy nominations on "Colbert Report" (08/15/13) [5:41]

08.22.2013. 15:14

Wednesday August 21, 2013
News Articles

NSA Can Reach 75 Percent Of U.S. Internet Traffic
HP | Ashley Alman | 08/20/13

The National Security Agency has developed surveillance programs that reach more Internet communications of Americans than have publicly been disclosed, according to current and formal officials cited in a Wall Street Journal article posted online Tuesday night.

The NSA has developed a surveillance network that can reach about 75 percent of all Internet traffic in the U.S., officials told the Journal. While the spy agency's filtering programs were designed to mine communications either originating from or ending abroad, the system is likely to gather purely domestic communications as well, the Journal reported. ... Read more

Fukushima Nuclear Crisis Escalates To Worst Level In 2 Years
Reuters & HP | Kiyoshi Takenaka | 08/21/13

Japan's nuclear crisis escalated to its worst level in two years on Wednesday, with its nuclear watchdog saying it feared more tanks were leaking contaminated water and China expressing its shock over the disaster.   Japan's nuclear regulator also said it feared the disaster exceeded the ability of the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co, to cope "in some respects".

... Upgrading the warning to level 3 will mark the first time Japan has issued a warning on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES) since three reactor meltdowns at the plant after a massive earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.   A maximum INES level 7 was declared at the battered plant after explosions led to a loss of power and cooling two years ago, confirming Fukushima as the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl a quarter of a century earlier. ... Read more

I just did a search for Fukushima on the IAEA website. Got a lot of articles for 2012. Seems like they are a little bit behind the times. It seems like the world should be a little bit more concerned with the Train Wreck called Fukushima.
IAEA - International Atomic Energy Agency

While Hedge Funds Underperformed The S&P By 80% In 2013, They Piled Into These Three Stocks
ZeroHedge | author | 08/21/13

Well, with Chief Market Risk Manager Bernanke at the helm making sure there is no risk, ever again, only lunatics will short right? Well, yes: until Ben pulls the rug from underneath everyone. Then the last will be first.   And the first will be last.

Also, remember a lot of people think the big banks are nothing but hedge funds! Read more
- Click to zoom

*Rising Seas Could Cause $1 Trillion Damage A Year By 2050
ZeroHedge | author | 08/21/13

A new study carried out by the economists at the World Bank has examined the risks that coastal cities around the world face due to global warming's effect on extreme weather events, and rising sea levels.

The study claimed that the potential losses caused by flooding was at around $6 billion a year in 2005, but predicts that as not enough is being done to cut emissions and halt global warming, by 2050 the cost could exceed $1 trillion a year. Over 40% of those costs will likely occur in just four global cities; New Orleans, Miami, and New York in the US, and then Guangzhou in China. ... Read more

*5 Companies That Make Money By Keeping Americans Terrified of Terror Attacks
AlterNet | Alex Kane | 08/16/13

Michael Hayden, the former director of the National Security Agency, has invaded America's television sets in recent weeks to warn about Edward Snowden's leaks and the continuing terrorist threat to America.

But what often goes unmentioned, as the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald pointed out, is that Hayden has a financial stake in keeping Americans scared and on a permanent war footing against Islamist militants. And the private firm he works for, called the Chertoff Group, is not the only one making money by scaring Americans.

70 percent of the national intelligence budget is now spent on private contractors, as author Tim Shorrock reported. The private intelligence contractors have profited to the tune of at least $6 billion a year. In 2010, the Washington Post revealed that there are 1,931 private firms across the country dedicated to fighting terrorism. ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Wednesday, August 21 [13:43]
*DN | 50 Years Later, the Untold History of the March on Washington & MLK's Most Famous Speech (08/21/13) [13:15], Part 2 [17:16], Part 3 [12:22]
TRNN News
*TRNN | Larry Wilkerson: Decline of US armed forces inevitable if systemic problems remain unaddressed (08/19/13) [6:39]
Glenn Greenwald: Journalism is not a crime and it's not terrorism (08/20/13) [21:09]
*Christian Zionist
Note: Brother Nathan is a character, but all of his short videos are interesting and full of facts. He condenses in 4.5 minutes what it takes the other videos an hour-and-half.
More Brother Nathanael Kapner Videos
Exposing Zionist Christians (04/08/13) [4:23]
Christian Zionism and Islamophobia (02/02/13) [1:44:27]
The Roots of Christian Zionism: How Scofield Sowed Seeds of Apostasy (11/18/11) [1:00:48]
Christian Zionism BRAINWASHING (07/23/12) [15:26]
How the bible got changed. Misquoting Jesus Speech at Stanford by Bart Ehrman. (10/29/11) [1:35:20]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Debate Over U.S. Policy Toward Egypt (08/21/13) [1hr]
*Fukushima News
Japan Debates Issuing Gravest Fukushima Nuclear Warning (08/21/13) [1:21]
Remember when a small puddle of liquid on the floor would be a major concern for the IAEA?
More pictures of Fukushima
Fukushima has become a Tank Farm. What is a Tank Farm you say? Over a thousand Tanks with the most toxic liquid on the planet... minus all the toxic water that has already flowed into the ocean. And then there are all the solid material that needs to be disposed of.
Comedy
Stephen Cobert | NSA Press Conference on Domestic Spying [4:56]
Stephen Cobert | Golden Age of Fracking [2:00]
Jon Stewart | Oliver: One Crazy Summary - Carlos Danger. (08/15/13) [2:00]
Jon Stewart | Oliver: One Crazy Summary - Bob Filner. (08/15/13) [1:58]
Stanford NYU Living Under Drones
Living Under Drones website
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.21.2013. 13:13

Tuesday August 20, 2013
News Articles

The People vs. the Profiteers
Vanity Fair | David Rose | 11/2007 older but good

Over the past 16 years, Grayson has litigated dozens of cases of contractor fraud. In many of these, he has found the Justice Department to be an ally in exposing wrongdoing. But in cases that involve the Iraq war, the D.O.J. has taken extraordinary steps to stand in his way. Behind its machinations, he believes, is a scandal of epic proportions--one that may come to haunt the legacy of the Bush administration long after it is gone.

... His obvious adversaries are the contracting corporations themselves -- especially Halliburton, the giant oil-services conglomerate where Vice President Dick Cheney spent the latter half of the 1990s as C.E.O., and its former subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root, now known simply as KBR. But he says his efforts to take on those organizations have earned him another enemy: the United States Department of Justice. ... Read more

*Ripping Off Young America: The College-Loan Scandal
Rolling Stone | Matt Taibbi | 08/15/13

Tuition costs at public and private colleges were, are and have been rising faster than just about anything in American society -- health care, energy, even housing. Between 1950 and 1970, sending a kid to a public university cost about four percent of an American family's annual income. Forty years later, in 2010, it accounted for 11 percent. Moody's released statistics showing tuition and fees rising 300 percent versus the Consumer Price Index between 1990 and 2011. ... Read more

Philippines capital Manila hit by heavy flooding
TheGuardian | author | 08/19/13

Residents of Manila, capital of the Philippines, wade through waist-high water after a monsoon storm hits the city. Many civilians have been evacuated from their homes and some are taking refuge in makeshift shelters set up in schools. Read more

David Miranda: 'They said I would be put in jail if I didn't co-operate'
TheGuardian | Jonathan Watts | 08/19/13

Partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald gives his first interview on nine-hour interrogation at Heathrow airport

In his first interview since returning to his home in Rio de Janeiro early on Monday, Miranda said the authorities in the UK had pandered to the US in trying to intimidate him and force him to reveal the passwords to his computer and mobile phone.   "They were threatening me all the time and saying I would be put in jail if I didn't co-operate," said Miranda. "They treated me like I was a criminal or someone about to attack the UK … It was exhausting and frustrating, but I knew I wasn't doing anything wrong." ... Read more

Guardian Editor: U.K. 'Security Experts' Entered Offices And Destroyed Hard Drives
HP | Adam Goldberg | 08/19/13

... During one meeting, Rusbridger explained to an official that if the British government were to take legal steps in order to roadblock the paper's reporting, the work could simply be done outside of the country. That's when things took a disturbing turn:

The man was unmoved. And so one of the more bizarre moments in the Guardian's long history occurred -- with two GCHQ security experts overseeing the destruction of hard drives in the Guardian's basement just to make sure there was nothing in the mangled bits of metal which could possibly be of any interest to passing Chinese agents. "We can call off the black helicopters," joked one as we swept up the remains of a MacBook Pro. ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Tuesday, August 20 [15:38]
*DN | Matt Taibbi: U.S. Student Loan Bubble Saddles a Generation With Debt and Threatens the Economy (08/20/13) [6:59], Part 2 [9:19]
Quote of the Day: "About Anthony Weiner. I think most people can forgive adultry, but not this creepy Internet thing".
CIA
END of the PETRO DOLLAR? (03/02/12) [17:44]
*Operation Ajax: Iran and the CIA Coup in 1953 [8:39], Part 2 [8:39]
Overthrowing Governments 101, CIA Coups [26:31]
DN | Stephen Kinzer on the History of BP/British Petroleum and Its Role in the 1953 Iran Coup [7:00], Part 2 [28:00]
CIA Covert Action in Iran, Vietnam, Laos, the Congo, Cuba, and Guatemala (1965) [51:47]
Fukushima
Tepco reports massive radioactive leak from tank (08/20/13) [1:44]
Fukushima: Japan's Apocalypse Now! (08/19/13) [2:16]
TYT News
MSNBC Chris Hayes - Al In
*Chris Hayes | CIA reveals it's role in 1953 Iranian coup (08/19/13) [7:01]
Chris Hayes | GOP crusade against Obamacare continues (08/19/13) [7:30], Part 2 [4:46]
Climate Change
Flooding in China

08.20.2013. 15:08

Monday August 19, 2013
News Articles

The CIA wants to spy on you through your TV: Agency director says it will 'transform' surveillance

So what has Edward Snowden said that hasn't already been said by "once" CIA director David Petraeus?

Daily Mail | Rob Waugh |03/16/12

When people download a film from Netflix to a flatscreen, or turn on web radio, they could be alerting unwanted watchers to exactly what they are doing and where they are.   Spies will no longer have to plant bugs in your home - the rise of 'connected' gadgets controlled by apps will mean that people 'bug' their own homes, says CIA director David Petraeus.   The CIA claims it will be able to 'read' these devices via the internet - and perhaps even via radio waves from outside the home.

Everything from remote controls to clock radios can now be controlled via apps - and chip company ARM recently unveiled low-powered, cheaper chips which will be used in everything from fridges and ovens to doorbells.   The resultant chorus of 'connected' gadgets will be able to be read like a book - and even remote-controlled, according to CIA CIA Director David Petraeus, according to a recent report by Wired's 'Danger Room' blog. ... Read more

NSA Broke Privacy Rules Thousands of Times, Contrary to Official Claims
Wired Magazine | Kim Zetter | 08/16/13

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee has called for more hearings to examine the government's surveillance tactics following new revelations that the National Security Agency has violated privacy rules thousands of times in its surveillance of U.S. citizens and foreigners.

... The audit, from May 2012, tallied 2,776 incidents in the preceding 12 months. The documents also reveal efforts by NSA staffers to withhold information from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which is supposed to provide oversight of NSA surveillance, and to whitewash reports submitted to the Justice Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence by removing details about NSA activity, including removing mention of unintended surveillance of Americans. ... Read more

The PowerPoint rant that got a colonel fired
ArmyTimes | author | 09/02/10

...I have been assigned as a staff officer to a headquarters in Afghanistan for about two months. During that time, I have not done anything productive. Fortunately, little of substance is really done here, but that is a task we do well.

We are part of the operational arm of the International Security Assistance Force commanded by Army Gen. David Petraeus. It is composed of military representatives from all the NATO countries, several of which I cannot pronounce. ... Read more
- Click to zoom

Atlantic Basin Primed for an Above-Normal Hurricane Season
Climate.gov | author | 08/14/13

Andrea, Barry, Chantal, Dorian, Erin*... who's next? Probably plenty more, according to NOAA's updated Atlantic hurricane season outlook. With five named storms already in the books this summer, the 2013 hurricane season is shaping up to be above normal, and there is a possibility that it could be very active during the peak of the season from mid-August through October. An additional 9-15 named storms are likely, of which 6-9 are predicted to become hurricanes, with 3-5 reaching major hurricane status.

Among the climate factors behind the heightened activity? Heat. These maps show the tropical cyclone heat potential of the tropical Atlantic Ocean ramping up between May 24 (bottom) and August 4 (top). This "hurricane heat potential" depends not just on the surface temperature, but on the depth of the warm water. ... Read more
NOAA | State of the Climate in 2012 website
State of the Climate in 2012 Report.pdf

8 Reasons Charles Koch is the Scariest Man in America
AlterNet | Paul Buchheit | 08?18/13

Scary because he claims "We don't have the power to coerce anybody" while providing massive funding to organizations that attack public education, social programs, worker salaries, business regulations, and the environment.

Scary because he refers to himself with words like 'integrity' and 'principles' while saying "I want my fair share - and that's all of it."

Scary because he declares, "I want my legacy to be...a better way of life for...all Americans." Here is some of the legacy of Charles Koch: ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Monday, August 19 [12:21]
DN | Sharif Abdel Kouddous: In Modern Egypt's Bloodiest Period, "New Horrors Are Brought Every Day" (08/19/13) [13:34], Part 2 [24:06]
DN | Editor of the Progressive Arrested Covering Solidarity Singers' Protest of Wisconsin Gov. Walker (08/19/13) [7:01]
TRNN News
TRNN | Lynn Parramore: Why Has NY Planned Parenthood & NOW Denounced Spitzer for NYC Comptroller? (08/19/13) [8:32]
TRNN | Oliver Stone: Snowden Is a Hero; Obama Is a Snake (08/12/13) [5:16]
Interesting Video
100 Years in 10 Minutes (1911 - 2011 in 10 Minutes) [10:39]
Halliburton & KBR & Dick Cheney
Hurricane Season
NOAA | Atlantic Hurricane Season Outlook (05/23/13) [3:58]
Fukushima
RT | Fukushima hero died of cancer (07/11/13) [6:43]
BeyondNuclear.org website
Dateline | Fukushima Now (03/05/13) [18:56]
Afghanistan Ghost Base
RT | Ghost military base in Afghanistan cost tax payers $34 million (07/10/13) [2:04]
Rachel Maddow | Shocking $32,000,000.00 military waste test Americas' patience with Afghanistan (07/10/13) [15:39]
TYT News
TYT | Wikileaks Stratfor Emails Devastating (02/28/12) [9:50]
Lunchroom memo from Fred Barton, Stratfor's vice-president of intelligence, in which he states that he has an unofficial rule: "Admit nothing, deny everything and make counter-accusations."
Guardian | WikiLeaks' Stratfor dump lifts lid on intelligence-industrial complex (02/28/12) (article)
Washington Post | Top Secret America (articles)
Wikileaks
BBC Newsnight | Wikileaks files reveal Arctic 'carve up' (05/13/11) [8:48]
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm The Aftermath Of Oil Spills In Michigan And Arkansas (08/19/13) [1hr]
Aljazeera News
Comedy
Stephen Cobert | NSA Press Conference on Domestic Spying [4:56]
Stephen Cobert | Golden Age of Fracking [2:00]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.
The arrogance of being thick as a brick [11:03]
CIA
END of the PETRO DOLLAR? (03/02/12) [17:44]
Operation Ajax: Iran and the CIA Coup in 1953 [8:39], Part 2 [8:39]
Overthrowing Governments 101, CIA Coups [26:31]
The United States government has a long history of coup making around the world. With our guest, author and former New York Times Bureau Chief Stephen Kinzer, we take a detailed look at the American overthrow of governments in Iran 1953, Guatemala 1954 and Chile 1973. In examining these coups, we learn the tried and true techniques employed by governments to destabilize and bring down foreign governments. We, also, examine the corporate interests which typically provide the impetus for coups.

Mr. Kinzer is the author of "Overthrow", a history of 14 American coups ranging from Hawaii in 1893 to Iraq in 2003. He is, also, the author of "All the Shah's Men, An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror" and co-author of "Bitter Fruit: The Untold Story of the American Coup in Guatemala."
DN | Stephen Kinzer on the History of BP/British Petroleum and Its Role in the 1953 Iran Coup [7:00], Part 2 [28:00]
CIA Covert Action in Iran, Vietnam, Laos, the Congo, Cuba, and Guatemala (1965) [51:47]
CIA Overview (propaganda) (08/12/13) [9:07]

Osama Bin Laden
Official Story
ABC20/20 | KILL SHOT: The story Behind Bin Laden's Death (08/11/12) [15:01], Part 2 [15:01], Part 3 [10:47]
NatGeo | The Last Days Of Osama Bin Laden, Worlds Most Wanted Terrorist (03/20/12) [44:51]
BBC | The Death of Bin Laden () [29:06]
Osama Bin Laden died years ago
CIA Agent: "Osama Bin Laden died of natural causes" 5 Years Before Seal-Team-6 Raid (05/29/12) [0:53]
BBC | David Frost interview with Benazir Bhutto: Osama Bin Laden Dead Since 2001 (2007) [3:19]
BBC | Obama did NOT kill Osama Bin Laden (05/15/11) [2:22]
Seal Team Six
Esquire.com | Navy SEAL That Killed Osama bin Laden abandoned by the Government. (02/11/13) [5:55]
MoxNews | Who Really Killed Osama Bin Laden? (03/26/13) [14:13]
SEAL Team 6 Assassinated () [11:34]
Obama's SEAL Team 6 Coverup (05/30/13) [12:57]
Stratfor | George Friedman
TYT | Wikileaks Stratfor Emails Devastating (02/28/12) [9:50]
Guardian | WikiLeaks' Stratfor dump lifts lid on intelligence-industrial complex (02/28/12) (article)
The most striking revelation from the latest disclosure is not simply the military-industrial complex that conspires to spy on citizens, activists and trouble-causers, but the extremely low quality of the information available to the highest bidder. Clients of the company include Dow Chemical, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Raytheon, as well as US government agencies like the Department of Homeland Security, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the Marines.
Stratfor has recruited a "global network of informants who are paid via Swiss banks accounts and pre-paid credit cards -- which includes government employees, embassy staff and journalists around the world." This, he says, "is corrupt or corrupting because Stratfor is a private intelligence organisation that services governments and private clients."
Stratfor is also seeking to profit directly from this information by partnering in an apparent hedge-fund venture with Shea Morenz, a former Goldman Sachs managing director. He points to an August 2011 document, marked "DO NOT SHARE OR DISCUSS", from Stratfor CEO George Friedman, which says:

"What StratCap will do is use our Stratfor's intelligence and analysis to trade in a range of geopolitical instruments, particularly government bonds, currencies and the like."

The claim that Stratfor buys information from insiders, while seeking to profit from their analysis, could attract the attention of regulators like the Securities and Exchange Commission, which polices Wall Street.

Next 100 Years - STRATFOR - George Friedman (2009) [8:10] Part 2 [6:41]
STRATFOR | George Friedman on America's Domination in the 21st Centruy (2009) [25:39]
STRATFOR | Rethinking Iran (2009) [6:38]
STRATFOR | George Friedman Predicts WorldWarIII Between Turkey and Poland (2010) [5:32]
STRATFOR | Agenda: With George Friedman: Global Warming (2009) [5:51]
North America
STRATFOR | Canada's Geographic Challenge (2013) [2:12]
SouthAmerica
STRATFOR | Mexico's Geographic Challenge (2012) [1:54]
STRATFOR |Argentina's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:00]
Europe
STRATFOR | Germany's Geographic Challenge (2013) [2:13]
STRATFOR | Spain's Geographic Challenge (2013) [2:06]
STRATFOR | France's Geographic Challenge (2013) [1:49]
STRATFOR | Italy's Geographic Challenge (2013) [2:10]
STRATFOR | Greece's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:12]
STRATFOR | Croatia's Geographic Challenge (2012) [1:52]
Middle East
STRATFOR | Turkey's Geographic Challenge (2013) [2:17]
STRATFOR | Saudi Arabia's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:04]
STRATFOR | Syria's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:04]
STRATFOR | Egypt's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:04]
Africa
STRATFOR | Ethiopia's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:13]
Euroashia
STRATFOR | Russia's Geographic Challenge (2012) [1:32]
STRATFOR | Mongolia's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:02]
STRATFOR | Nepal's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:08]
STRATFOR | Japan's Geographic Challenge (2013) [2:01]
STRATFOR | Indonesia's Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:02]
STRATFOR | The Philippines' Geographic Challenge (2012) [2:06]

The Living Dead | Adam Curtis
Out of the carnage in Europe 50 years ago, the Allies selected certain memories. They used them to build the official version of the good war. This film is about how that happened. It tells why certain memories have to be buried and forgotten because they contradicted the optimism of the big historical picture. The Living Dead (subtitled Three Films About the Power of the Past) was the second major documentary made by the film-maker Adam Curtis.

On the Desperate Edge of Now
This episode examined how the various national memories of the Second World War were effectively rewritten and manipulated in the Cold War period. For Germany, this began at the Nuremberg Trials, where attempts were made to prevent the Nazis in the dock--principally Hermann Göring--from offering any rational argument for what they had done. Subsequently, however, bringing lower-ranking Nazis to justice was effectively forgotten about in the interests of maintaining West Germany as an ally in the Cold War. For the Allied countries, faced with a new enemy in the Soviet Union, there was a need to portray WW2 as a crusade of pure good against pure evil, even if this meant denying the memories of the Allied soldiers who had actually done the fighting, and knew it to have been far more complex. A number of American veterans told how years later they found themselves plagued with the previously-suppressed memories of the brutal things they had seen and done. The title comes from a veteran's description of what the uncertainty of survival in combat is like.
Adam Curtis | The Living Dead: On the Despirate Edge of Now E1 [58:07]

You Have Used Me as a Fish Long Enough
In this episode, the history of brainwashing and mind control was examined. The angle pursued by Curtis was the way in which psychiatry pursued tabula rasa theories of the mind, initially in order to set people free from traumatic memories and then later as a potential instrument of social control. The work of Ewen Cameron was surveyed, with particular reference to Cold War theories of communist brainwashing and the search for hypnoprogammed assassins. The programme's thesis was that the search for control over the past via medical intervention had had to be abandoned and that in modern times control over the past is more effectively exercised by the manipulation of history. Some film from this episode, an interview with one of Cameron's victims, was later re-used by Curtis in his The Century of the Self. The title of this episode comes from a paranoid schizophrenic seen in archive film in the programme, who believed her neighbours were using her as a source of amusement by denying her any privacy, like a pet goldfish.
Adam Curtis | The Living Dead: You Have Used Me as a Fish Long Enough E2 [58:34]

The Attic
In this episode, the Imperial aspirations of Margaret Thatcher were examined. The way in which Mrs Thatcher used public relations in an attempt to emulate Winston Churchill in harking back to Britain's "glorious past" to fulfil a political or national end. The title is a reference to the attic flat at the top of 10 Downing Street, which was created during Thatcher's period refurbishment of the house, which did away with the Prime Minister's previous living quarters on lower floors. Scenes from The Innocents (film) the adaptation of The Turn of the Screw by Henry James are intercut with Thatcher's reign.
Adam Curtis | The Living Dead: The Attic E3 [58:55]

The Trap, E1-E3
Adam Curtis | The Trap: E1 [58:34]
Adam Curtis | The Trap: The Lonly Robot E2 [58:34]
Adam Curtis | The Trap: We Will Force U 2 B Free E3 [58:18]
Mayfair Set, E1-E4
Adam Curtis | The Mayfair Set: Who pays to Win E1 [44:21]
Adam Curtis | The Mayfair Set: Entrepreneur Spelt E2 [58:55]
Adam Curtis | The Mayfair Set: Destroy the Technostructure E3 [59:19]
Adam Curtis | The Mayfair Set: Twilight of the Dogs E4 [59:00]
Pandora's Box, E1-E6
Pandora's Box, subtitled A Fable From the Age of Science, is a six part 1992 BBC documentary television series written and produced by Adam Curtis, which examines the consequences of political and technocratic rationalism.
Adam Curtis | Pandora's Box: The Engineers E1 [45:00]
Adam Curtis | Pandora's Box: The the Brink of Eternity E2 [45:00]
Adam Curtis | Pandora's Box: The League of Gentlemen E3 [45:00]
Adam Curtis | Pandora's Box: Goodbye Mrs. Ant E4 [45:07]
Adam Curtis | Pandora's Box: Black Powder E5 [45:00]
Adam Curtis | Pandora's Box: A is for Atom E6 [45:52]

08.19.2013. 12:25

Friday August 16, 2013
News Articles

DAY OF RAGE or Egypt Protests: Islamists Call For 'Friday Of Anger'
HP | Aya Batrawy | 08/16/13

Heavy gunfire rang out in the heart of Cairo as tens of thousands of Muslim Brotherhood supporters took to the streets Friday across Egypt in defiance of a military-imposed state of emergency following the country's bloodshed earlier this week. At least 17 people were killed in the fighting, including police officers.

... Protesters and residents of the neighborhoods they marched by exchanged gunfire and birdshot as tanks blocked key roads and key junctures. The Brotherhood urged its supporters in Cairo to head to Ramses Square, near the capital's train station in the heart of the capital. ... Read more
TYT | Muslim Brotherhood Protester Killed By Police In Egypt (08/14/13) [7:33]

Bradley Manning says sorry for leaks that 'hurt the United States'
TheGuardian | Paul Lewis | 08/14/13

Manning, 25, speaks at sentencing phase of his trial and says 'I believed I was going to help people, not hurt people'

... However on Wednesday, after three days in which his legal team called witnesses they hoped would lead to a lower sentence, Manning took to the stand for an unsworn statement -- meaning he could speak to the judge but not be cross-examined.   Looking nervous, he turned to Colonel Denise Lind, who is presiding over his court martial, and said: "First, your honour, I want to start off with an apology. I am sorry that my actions hurt people. I am sorry that I hurt the United States." ... Read more
TYT | Bradley Manning's Heartbreaking Apology (08/14/13) [5:49]

NSA often breaks privacy rules
Washington Post | Barton Gellman | 08/16/13

The National Security Agency has broken privacy rules or overstepped its legal authority thousands of times each year since Congress granted the agency broad new powers in 2008, according to an internal audit and other top-secret documents. ... Read more, and here.
- Click to zoom
- Click to zoom

NSA News | Nationial Security State
Enemy Of The State (1998) (full movie) [2:12:12]
1.8 gigapixel ARGUS-IS. World's highest resolution video surveillance platform by DARPA [4:41]
DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Friday, August 16 [10:34]
*DN | NSA Violated Surveillance Rules Thousands of Times, Intercepted All 202 Area Code Calls By Accident (08/16/13) [8:32]
According to an NSA audit from May 2012 leaked by Edward Snowden, there were 2,776 incidents in the preceding 12 months of unauthorized collection, storage, access to or distribution of legally protected communications. In one case, the NSA intercepted a "large number" of calls placed from Washington when a programming error confused the U.S. area code 202 for 20, the international dialing code for Egypt. The audit only counted violations committed at the NSA's Fort Meade headquarters and other facilities in the Washington area. We speak to Alex Abdo of the American Civil Liberties Union.
*DN | Day of Rage in Cairo: Anti-Coup Groups Hold Massive Protest Marches to Condemn Deadly Crackdown (08/16/13) [8:48]
Part 2 | Ex-State Department Spokesperson P.J. Crowley: The U.S. Should Describe Morsi Ouster As A Coup (08/16/13) [15:26]
Part 3 | Did an 8-Year-Old Spy for America? U.S. Drone Killed Yemeni Man After Boy Planted Tracking Chip (08/16/13) [10:38]
Banks
PBS NewsHour | JP Morgan Inquiry Stays Open After Ex-Traders Are Charged (08/15/13) [9:04]
Fukushima
*Thom Hartmann | Fukushima: Is the "China Syndrome" Happening? (08/12/13) [7:54]
RT | 'Fukushima media cover-up - PR success, public health disaster' (08/12/13) [5:35]
PBS NewsHour | Fukushima Reinforces Worst Fears for Japanese (08/08/13) [7:32], Part 2 [2:20]
The last 20% of the following video is religious and I don't indores it one-way-or-the-other. You can end the video anytime you want.
Special Report: Fukushima Unparalleled Catastrophe, What are they not saying? (08/11/13) [18:49]
TYT News
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Domestic News - Friday (08/16/13) [1hr]
International News - Friday (08/16/13) [1hr]
Environmental News
PBS NewsHour | Tempers May Flare as Climate Change Heats Up, Study Finds (08/07/13) [6:36]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Chris Hayes | World reacts to shocking Egyptian crackdown (08/15/13) [13:35]
*Chris Hayes | Right wing wages a war on Food Stamps (08/15/13) [7:40]
- Click to zoom
Chris Hayes | Politics of Power, documentary on energy rush (08/15/13) [4:05], Part 2 [6:50]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.16.2013. 14:33

Thursday August 15, 2013
News Articles

Death Toll Tops 500
HP | Hamza Hendawi | 08/15/13

Egyptian authorities on Thursday significantly raised the death toll from clashes the previous day between police and supporters of the ousted Islamist president, saying more than 500 people died and laying bare the extent of the violence that swept much of the country and prompted the government to declare a nationwide state of emergency and a nighttime curfew. ... Read more

Foreigners Sell More US Securities Than After Lehman Bankruptcy
ZeroHedge | author | 08/15/13

While Americans were blissfully BTFD in June, and enjoying the media propaganda that "all is well" and the beard has their back (he does, but not in the conventionally accepted way) foreigners were selling. Did we say selling? Pardon, we meant dumping with a vengeance, throwing out the boatload with the bathwater, with both hands and feet and getting to da choppa.

As the just released TIC data report indicates, in June foreigners, both private and official, were hitting every bid they could find. Literally. For the first month ever, every single security class was sold off: Corporate stocks: sold - $26.8 billion; Corporate Bonds - sold $5.0 billion; Agencies: - sold $5.2 billion, and, perhaps the culprit of it all, Treasuries, saw the biggest dump ever, as foreigners sold an epic $40.8 billion! Adding across the various asset classes, the consolidated foreign sale in June 2013 was worse than Lehman and the month after it. ... Read more
- Click to zoom

9 Actual Quotes About Climate Change From The People Who Represent You In Washington
BuzzFeed | author | 08/13/13

Even though 97% of scientists and NASA agree on the science of climate change, some members of Congress still deny that it is happening. Here's a nice sampling of quotes from actual members of Congress.

  1. "It could just be a shift on the axis." -- Congressman Bill Cassidy (R-LA)
  2. "[Climate Change] led to the Vikings dominating Europe for several hundred years." -- Congressman Morgan Griffith (R-VA)
  3. "Every cow in the world, you know, when they do what they do, you've got more carbon dioxide." -- Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH)
  4. "The ice caps are melting, which we see over and over again. Yeah, they're melting on Mars, too!" -- Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA)
  5. "The new fad thing that's going through America and around the world. It's called global warming." -- Congressman Steve Stockman (R-TX)
  6. "The government can't change the weather." --Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL)
  7. "It is not proven, it's not science. It's more of a religion than a science." -- Congressman Steve King (R-IA)
  8. "...The idea that manmade gases, CO2, are causing catastrophic global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people." -- Senator James Inhofe (R-OK)
  9. "All voodoo, nonsense, hokum, a hoax." -- Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN)
Read more

NSA News | Nationial Security State
Enemy Of The State (1998) (full movie) [2:12:12]
1.8 gigapixel ARGUS-IS. World's highest resolution video surveillance platform by DARPA [4:41]
DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Thursday, August 15 [12:18]
*DN | Massacre in Cairo: Egypt on Brink After Worst Violence Since 2011 Revolution (08/15/13) [15:53], Part 2 [21:39]
Health
Dana's Story, Story About Lyme Disease (08/05/13) [2:48]
Top 25 Raw Vegan Smoothie Recipes
Because we are committed to make you healthier, happier and fitter, we are giving you our Top Raw Vegan Smoothie Recipes. This green and healthy smoothies from fresh fruits and vegetables gives you healthy beginnings. Why? It's so healthy that you can drink vitamins, minerals, proteins, fats and enzymes in just one sitting.
TRNN News
Although the U.S has the world's largest military industrial complex, Israel has the largest ratio of its economy dedicated to the military and security industry (07/8/13) [7:00]
*Signed into law in 1935, the Social Security Act launched an integral social safety net program, but is it still sustainable? (08/14/13) [8:12]
*TRNN | Antonia Juhasz: Texas Towns Frack Their Way To Drought Conditions (08/15/13) [6:32]
TRNN | Noha Radwan: Egyptian Military Creating Conditions for Dictatorship (08/15/13) [17:45]
TYT News
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Update On Egypt's State Of Emergency (08/15/13) [1hr]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Other Videos
"NCIS" Cast Talks Cote de Pablo's Exit (07/31/13) [2:54]
Toronto's Smallest House On The Ellen Show (2008) [5:09]
Comedy News
*Colbert Takes On Mayor Johnny Cummings In Amazing 'People Who Are Destroying America' (08/15/13) [7:44]

08.15.2013. 11:30

Wednesday August 14, 2013
News Articles

As Head Of NSA Review Group Obama Appoints Same Person Who "Apologized" For Lying To Congress
ZeroHedge | author | 08/12/13

It is almost as if the Obama administration is intent on making every possible PR (and of course governance, but it's really the Fed that is in charge of the US so that part is irrelevant) mistake, and then some more.   Recall that on Friday, to much fanfare, the president took credit for the revelations presented by Edward Snowden (because, you see, he would have publicly addressed all the top secret NSA issues regardless, ignoring for a minute that without Snowden all speculation about pervasive NSA domestic surveillance would still be dismissed as simply more conspiracy theory), and announced that he would conduct a review of the policies and espionage procedures in place at the NSA.

Also recall that in a Senate hearing this March, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told Senator Ron Wyden that the NSA did not collect phone records of millions of Americans. This was just three months before the revelations of an NSA leaker made it clear that Clapper was not telling the truth. ... Read more
TYT | Obama NSA Conference Breakdown (08/12/13) [9:31]

*We Are Legion: Anonymous' Presence In The U.S. Military
ZeroHedge | author | 08/12/13

Are we going to see more leaks?   Yes. A lot [of Anonymous members] are mid- to high-rank NCOs. They are well-respected, have connections, and overly large security clearances. A lot of people who are part of the [Anonymous] culture are just dying at this point for something to come across their table that isn't already out there. It is so easy to leak information that if you want to, you can do it. ... Read more

*Anonymous' Secret Presence In The U.S. Army
BuzzFeed | author | 08/09/13

An active-duty Army captain and member of Anonymous describes how the organization operates, his own involvement in the Arab Spring, how the crackdown on Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden has affected soldiers, and how more leaks are on the way. He has agreed to speak with BuzzFeed on the condition of anonymity. ... Read more

How Anonymous Picks Targets, Launches Attacks, and Takes Powerful Organizations Down
Wired Magazine | Quinn Norton | 07/03/12 older

No one but Hector Xavier Monsegur can know why or when he became Sabu, joining the strange and chaotic Internet collective known as Anonymous. But we know the moment he gave Sabu up. On June 7, 2011, federal agents came to his apartment on New York's Lower East Side and threatened the 28-year-old with an array of charges that could add up to 124 years in prison. So Hector Monsegur, who as Sabu had become a mentor and icon to fellow members of Anonymous, surrendered his online identity to a new, equally faceless and secretive master: the FBI.

For the next eight months, Sabu continued to rage across the Internet as a core member of AntiSec, a blackhat hacking group within Anonymous. He helped to deface government and corporate websites and even helped bring down the private intelligence firm Stratfor--all, apparently, with the FBI's blessing as it quietly gathered logs on Monsegur's fellow "anons." Law enforcement officials later told Fox News that Monsegur was working out of the FBI offices "almost daily" in the weeks after he pleaded guilty in August and then from his own home thereafter, with an agent watching his activity 24 hours a day. ... Read more

North Carolina enacts voter ID law, setting stage for fight
Bostom Globe | author | 08/13/13

Governor Pat McCrory of North Carolina signed into law Monday one of the nation's most wide-ranging voter-identification laws, just a few weeks after the Supreme Court opened the door for such changes by striking down a key portion of the Voting Rights Act.

The move by the Republican is expected to touch off a major court battle over voting rights, and the Justice Department is weighing a challenge to the new law.   The measure requires voters to present government-issued photo identification at the polls and shortens the early-voting period from 17 days to 10. It also ends preregistration for 16- and 17-year-old voters who will be 18 on Election Day and eliminates same-day registration. ... Read more
TYT | Governor Pat McCrory of North Carolina signed Strict Voter ID Bill Signed Into Law (08/13/13) [6:32]

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Wednesday, August 14 [6:50]
DN | Dozens Dead as Egyptian Forces Commit 3rd Mass Killing of Pro-Morsi Demonstrators (08/14/13) [3:25]
DN | Questlove on Police Racial Profiling, Stop & Frisk, the Message He Took From Trayvon Martin Verdict (08/14/13) [15:04], Part 2 [20:03]
Story of Anonymous
*We Are Legion The Story of the Hacktivists (full movie) (03/24/13) [1:36:41]
TRNN News
*TRNN | Bill Black: The Government is Finally Arresting Wall Street Bankers...For Losing Wall Street's Money (08/14/13) [7:59]
Ring of Fire
New Wall Street Scam (08/14/13) [12:21]
Wall Street bankers have a new scam, where they drive up the price of consumer goods, and rake in billions in additional profits for greedy bankers. Investigative journalist David Dayen joins Ring of Fire host Mike Papantonio to explain how this scam works, and why nobody is doing anything to stop it.
PBS Frontline: The Warning, The Financial Collapse - Brooksley Born [56:17]
TYT News
Fukushima
*PBS Newshour | Fukushima Reinforces Worst Fears for Japanese (08/08/13) [7:32]
Wealth Inequality
Trickle Down? Rich Hoarding Cash at Record Pace [3:07]
*Wealth Inequality in America [6:25]
Food
Spice Up Romen - Click to zoom
Homemade KFC Fried Chicken
Homemade KFC Fried Chicken Recipe [3:23]
Homemade KFC Fried Chicken Recipe [3:23]

    Secret ingredient:
  1. 1 TEASPOON ground Oregano
  2. 1 tablespoon ground Basil
  3. 1 TEASPOON ground Tarragon
  4. 1 tablespoon ground Marjoram
  5. 1 tablespoon ground Sage
  6. 1 tablespoon ground Black pepper
  7. 1 tablespoon ground White pepper
  8. 1 TEASPOON ground Chili
  9. 1 tablespoon ground Paprika
  10. 3 tablespoon ground Salt
  11. 1 tablespoon Onion Powder
  12. 3 tablespoon granulated garlic
  13. 3 Cup All-purpose Flour (375 grams)
  14. Batter process:
  15. 2 eggs
  16. Cup milk
  17. Frying process:
  18. 1 Gallon of Corn Oil (first 8 to 10 minutes at 320 Fahrenheit, maximum temperature for 1-3 minutes)
Comedy News
NSA Spying Keeps Fear Fresh (08/14/13) [2:07]
United States of Surveillance (07/22/13) [2:30]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.14.2013. 12:07

Tuesday August 13, 2013
News Articles

'Citizen Koch' Rescued By Small Donors As Documentary Outraises Funds Pulled By PBS
HP | Nick Wing | 08/09/13

"Citizen Koch," a highly regarded documentary about the billionaire Koch brothers and the growing influence of money in politics after the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, suffered a major setback earlier this year when PBS pulled the film and the $150,000 in funding that had been promised. Scrambling to find a way to distribute their film, Academy Award-nominated filmmakers Carl Deal and Tia Lessin turned to Kickstarter in a highly successful move that recently surpassed the funds they had previously expected to receive from public television. Read more

For Freshmen in the House, Seats of Plenty
NYTimes | Eric Lipton | 08/10/13

WASHINGTON -- Representative Andy Barr, a Republican from Kentucky with little experience in the intricacies of Wall Street, was among the lucky House freshmen to secure a seat on the powerful Financial Services Committee.

Now, half a year into his first term, he has emerged as a telling example of why the panel is sometimes called "the cash committee" -- a place, critics say, where there are big incentives for freshmen to do special favors for the industry. ... Read more
*TYT | How Freshmen Congressmen Are Bought (08/12/13) [9:21]

Michael Hayden, Bob Schieffer and the media's reverence of national security officials
TheGuardian | Glenn Greenwald | 08/12/13

In 2006, the New York Times won the Pulitzer Prize for having revealed that the NSA was eavesdropping on Americans without warrants. The reason that was a scandal was because it was illegal under a 30-year-old law that made it a felony, punishable by up to 5 years in prison for each offense, to eavesdrop on Americans without those warrants. Although both the Bush and Obama DOJs ultimately prevented final adjudication by raising claims of secrecy and standing, and the "Look Forward, Not Backward (for powerful elites)" Obama DOJ refused to prosecute the responsible officials, all three federal judges to rule on the substance found that domestic spying to be unconstitutional and in violation of the statute.

The person who secretly implemented that illegal domestic spying program was retired Gen. Michael Hayden, then Bush's NSA director. That's the very same Michael Hayden who is now frequently presented by US television outlets as the authority and expert on the current NSA controversy - all without ever mentioning the central role he played in overseeing that illegal warrantless eavesdropping program. ... Read more
*TYT | NSA Spying - Hayden Smears Snowden (08/12/13) [9:33]

Obama's NSA Conference Could Be Subtitled 'The Guardian Gets Results'
HP | Jack Mirkinson | 08/10/13

President Obama's press conference on Friday was full of headline-making news about new proposals to reform the American surveillance system. But another headline could also be appropriate: "Journalism gets results."

The press conference came after weeks of steady reports about the scale and scope of the National Security Agency's surveillance capabilities, all stemming from a mountain of leaks from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. The vast majority of the reports appeared in the Guardian. ... Read more
*TYT | Obama NSA Conference Breakdown (08/12/13) [9:31]

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Tuesday, August 13 [12:42]
*DN | Owner of Snowden's Email Service on Why He Closed Lavabit Rather Than Comply With Gov't (08/13/13) [15:37], Part 2 [10:42]
TRNN News
TRNN | Robert Pollin: The US Has Lowest Minimum Wage and Most Young People Without Jobs Among Wealthiest Countries (08/13/13) [9:39]
NSA News
Bob Schieffer Roasted For Unbalanced NSA Panel (08/11/13) [9:34]
GMO News
God, I wish I was so precocious when I was younger. Here is a 14 year old who speaks better than most Legislators and counter her debaters arguments straight on and with good rebuttles.
14-year-old debates GMOs with condescending TV host (08/13/13) [13:17]
Rachel Parent, 14, slams Kevin O'Leary, scoring GMO debate (07/25/13) [1:32]
Fukushima News
Euronews | Beaches near Fukushima plant still open despite contamination (08/12/13) [1:12]
Euronews | New German wind farm faces delay over WWII ammunition find (08/11/13) [1:04]
*TYT News
Koch Brothers
*Robert Greenwald's "Koch Brothers Exposed" (2012) [1:00:52]
Citizen Koch (Trailer) (2013) [3:02]
Education
1912, 8th Grade Graduation Test - Click to zoom
Answers
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Renewed Debate Over Assisted Suicide (08/13/13) [1hr]
The Future Of Television (08/13/13) [1hr]
Environment

Waves of Trash in Indonesia
HP | Gabriela Aoun | 08/12/13

Read more


08.13.2013. 12:26

Monday August 12, 2013
News Articles

money for nothing: iraqi mps get us $23 million -- for retiring
niqash.org/ | Mustafa Habib | 07/08/13

Baghdad activists are planning a major demonstration at the end of August protesting the huge sums Iraqi MPs get, even if they serve less than four years in parliament. Over 300 MPs get around US$72,000 a year in a country where the average wage was around US$6,000 in 2012.

According to a document obtained from Parliament, each of the 325 MPs in Iraq gets a salary after he leaves office, of at least US$72,000 a year. And that's even if the MP doesn't complete a full term in office. Adding all of the salaries together equals around US$23 million a year in MPs' salaries. Iraqi MPs get these payments as long as they live and the number getting these pensions obviously rises with each new batch of parliamentarians. ... Read more

Forget Apology: Eric Holder Owes The American People A Resignation
ZeroHedge | author | 08/12/13

Bloomberg's Jon Weil, who has compiled the following stunning array of lies regarding the DOJ's enforcement activity disclosed by none other than its head, Eric Holder, is far too kind when he says that the "fast and furious" Holder owes the American people an apology. What we really owes is at least a resignation (and frankly much more, but it is too early on Monday to become too politically incorrect). And considering that the DOJ in its now former employee Lanny Brauer's words refused to prosecute those banks which were deemed "too big to prosecute", the lying here has now became a meta phenomenon, as the DOJ is effectively caught lying about lying. How many more meta levels of higher up fraud "inception" can Holder take this, before the American people finally demand his head, metaphorically-speaking of course? ... Read more

Michigan Safety Net for Boomers Frays on Bankrupt Detroit
Bloomberg | author | 08/12/13

There's a made-in-Michigan quality to Art Reyes, a third-generation autoworker with a pension, retiree health benefits and income that enabled him to send three of his four children to college.   He's a product of the old Michigan, which gave birth to organized labor, worker protections and wages that propelled the middle class. That Michigan is almost gone. Now overseeing the nation's largest municipal bankruptcy in Detroit, the state is at the forefront again, this time playing host to the unraveling of the homemade fabric that cloaked and comforted working families for generations. Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Monday, August 12 [14:53]
*DN | Senate Insider Speaks Out: Ex-Wyden Staffer on Secret Laws, Domestic Spying and Obama's NSA Reforms (08/12/13) [20:30]
As President Obama proposed a series of changes to reform the government's surveillance policies and programs, we speak to Jennifer Hoelzer, the former deputy chief of staff for Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, a longtime critic of the Obama administration for using a secret interpretation of the USA PATRIOT Act to allow the NSA to conduct domestic surveillance. "Unfortunately Edward Snowden was the only means by which we have been able to have this debate," Hoelzer says.
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm *Mounting Tensions Between The U.S. And Russia (08/12/13) [1hr]
In a press conference Friday, President Barack Obama defended his decision to hit pause on the U.S.-Russian relationship. Over the last several months, differences have emerged over Syria and human rights. The president said NSA leaker Edward Snowden was not the only reason for cancelling a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Putin's return to power has brought an increase in Cold War-type anti-America rhetoric. Also on Friday, the U.S. Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense met with their Russian counterparts over areas where interests overlap and conflicts divide. A panel joins Diane to discuss tensions between the U.S. and Russia and possibilities for future collaboration.
Monsanto Hired BlackWater Mercenaries to Spy on Americans
TRNN News
TRNN | Yves Engler: With Keystone XL Delayed, Trans-Canada Sets Eyes on "Energy East" (08/12/13) [10:25]
*TRNN | Patrick Bond: Scientists Warn Arctic Methane Release Would Cost $60 Trillion (08/12/13) [8:15]
Bloomberg | Where In the World Is This $60 Trillion Time Bomb? (08/01/13) [2:15]
Newsy | Melting Arctic Ice Could Cost $60 Trillion (08/01/13) [2:02]
Newsy | Permafrost Methane Time Bomb NBC News (10/09/12) [6:48]
Income Inequality
*Wealth Inequality in America [6:25]
Bush, Cheney and Halliburton & KBR
The Halliburton Agenda: The Politics of Oil and Money () []
Bush's Legacy: New Iraq Oil Law To Open Iraq's Oil Reserves to Western Companies () [29:04]
Climate Change
DC | Global Warming, What You Need To Know, with Tom Brokaw (2012) [1:27:32]
GeoEngineering
Chemtrails [10:27]
*DN | Geoengineering: Can We Save the Planet By Messing With Nature? (05/20/13)[26:01]
"What in the World Are They Spraying?" [1:37:45]
"Why in the World are They Spraying?" [1:12:56]
Fukushima
NASA
This Week @NASA (08/09/13) [5:24]
A Year of Curiosity on Mars (08/06/13) [1:10:46]
NASA | ScienceCasts: The Sun's Magnetic Field is About to Flip (08/05/13) [4:04]
Jeremy Scahill - Dirty Wars
Jeremy Scahill: DIRTY WARS - Official Theatrical Trailer [2:21]
Glenn Greenwald
Naomi Klein
BookTV | The Free Market Economy, Disaster Capitalism and Blackwater: Naomi Klein & Jeremy Scahill (2008) [1:28:42]
Naomi Klein | The Shock Doctrine 2009 [1:18:38]
Klein's third book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, was published on September 4, 2007, becoming an international and New York Times bestseller translated into 28 languages. The book argues that the free market policies of Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics have risen to prominence in countries such as Chile, under Pinochet, Poland, Russia, under Yeltsin, and the United States (for example, the privatization of the New Orleans Public Schools after Hurricane Katrina). The book also argues that policy initiatives (for instance, the privatization of Iraq's economy under the Coalition Provisional Authority) were rushed through while the citizens of these countries were in shock from disasters, upheavals, or invasion.
PBS Frontline
PBS Frontline: The Warning, The Financial Collapse - Brooksley Born [56:17]
MSNBC Rachel Maddow
Maddow | NSA Spying Data Being Used By LOCAL Police To Bust US Citizens For "Regular Old Crime" (08/06/13) [13:07]
Comedy News
Scary Kentucky Fried Chicken Commercial (1967) [1:01]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.12.2013. 14:06

Friday August 09, 2013
News Articles

Former NSA Chief Aggressively Attacks The Entire Hacking Community
ZeroHedge | author | 08/08/13

There's an interesting trend happening in America today. A trend characterized by old, authoritarian, formerly "highly respected" figures in society becoming so confused and concerned that the zeitgeist of the nation is moving away from them, that they are overcome by dementia and publicly lash out like spoiled children in increasingly irrational manner.

Former CIA and NSA head Michael Hayden. Amongst other things, here is what he said about Snowden supporters: Nihilists, anarchists, activists, Lulzsec, Anonymous, twenty-somethings who haven't talked to the opposite sex in five or six years. Read more
Former NSA chief warns of cyber-terror attacks if Snowden apprehended (08/06/13 Guardian)

Your Government Spies on You and Lies About It: Now What?
AlterNet | Steven Rosenfeld | 08/08/13

Now that Americans know the federal government domestically spies and lies about it--thanks to a litany of "misstatements" by top officials that have been debunked following disclosures by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden--very big questions emerge about what kind of country we are going to be.

Americans keep hearing more news reports about the national security state's growing reach. Reuters just broke the story of more police efforts to use data collected in the NSA's domestic digital dragnet for FBI drug investigations. Meanwhile, the New York Times reports that other federal agencies are clamoring for the NSA's data and are engaged in turf battles over it. ... Read more

An Exposed ALEC Faces Mass Protests and Calls for Scrutiny
Bill Moyers | John Nichols | 08/09/13

... ALEC has been decried by labor, environmental and clean government groups in state capitols across the country. National political figures, such as Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, are launching inquiries into how the group promotes its legislative agenda. And this week, as ALEC gathers its corporate and legislative "members" in the city of its founding to celebrate four decades of service to special interests and ambitious politicians, demonstrations against the group have drawn thousands of union members, civil rights activists and social justice campaigners into the streets of Chicago.

An organization that once held its annual meetings virtually unnoticed is now met with mass protests so large that streets around its hotel were closed Thursday as activists staged "die-ins" recalling ALEC's role in the passage of so-called "Stand Your Ground" laws and headlines screamed: "ALEC convention protests: Labor vs. lobbyists." ... Read more

93% of the Public Wants GMO Labeling--Monsanto and the Big Agribusiness Giants Plan to Spend Millions in Propaganda to Change Our Minds
AlterNet | Katherine Paul | 08/01/13

Monsanto and Big Food are taking the battle for consumers' hearts and minds to the next level. And it's no coincidence that they're pulling out the big guns just as the Washington State I-522 campaign to label genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in food products is gaining steam. ... Read more

5 Foods You May Not Know Are Genetically Modified
AlterNet | Maggie Caldwell | 08/07/13

Am I eating GMOs? Probably. Since several common ingredients like corn starch and soy protein are predominantly derived from genetically modified crops, it's pretty hard to avoid GM foods altogether. In fact, GMOs are present in 60 to 70 percent of foods on US supermarket shelves.

  1. Papayas
  2. Milk: RGBH, or recombinant bovine growth hormone.
  3. Corn: 90%.
  4. Soy: 93%
  5. Squash and zucchini: approx. 25,000 acres of crookneck, straightneck.

Are there any foods I've heard might be genetically modified -- but actually aren't?

  1. Potatoes
  2. Seedless watermelon
  3. Salmon: Currently no meat, fish, or egg products are genetically engineered
  4. Soy milk
  5. Rice
Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Friday, August 09 [12:42]
DN | Son of Victim in Sikh Temple Attack Unites With Former White Supremacist to Fight Violence and Hate (08/09/13) [14:41]
DN | Onondaga Leader Oren Lyons, Pete Seeger On International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples (08/09/13) [21:14]
RT News - NSA 'routinely lies' to Congress
RT | Snowden leaks show NSA 'routinely lies' to Congress (06/10/13) [8:03]
Bill Moyers
*Bill Moyers | Richard Wolff: Taming Capitalism Run Wild (08/09/13) [56:54]
TRNN News
*TRNN | Australia Has $16 Minimum Wage and is the Only Rich Country to Dodge the Global Recession (08/09/13) [8:38]
*TRNN | Bradley Manning, the Nuremberg Charter and Refusing to Collaborate with War Crimes (08/09/13) [14:03]
TYT News
*TYT | NSA Director Tries To Smack Down Hackers and Privacy Advocates (08/06/13) [4:24]
*TYT | Congressman Alan Grayson discussing 9/11: Bush let us down not Obama. (old, but good) (08/19/10) [4:16]
The Ed Show: 19 August 2010 Cenk Uygur (host of The Young Turks) filling in for Ed Schultz on MSNBC talks to Congressman Alan Grayson (D-FL) on why 18% of Americans believe president Obama is a Muslim and 70% of Americans have an issue with a proposed Islamic cultural center near ground zero.
*Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Domestic News - Friday(08/09/13) [1hr]
International News - Friday(08/09/13) [1hr]
They are saying on the Diane Rehm Show, that the closures of our embassies was based on a conference call between Al-Qaeta leaders. WHAT! We are spending trillions of dollars to collect every phone call in the world, and Al-Qaeta is using conference calls???
Aljazeera News
Inside Story : The rise and rise of al-Qaeda (08/08/13) [25:01]
*Aljazeera | Inside Story : How real is the threat posed by al-Qaeda? (08/05/13) [25:01]
Wall Street in Crisis - Click to zoom
Wall Street in Crisis: A Perfect Storm Looming (Survey.pdf)

08.09.2013. 15:41

Thursday August 08, 2013
News Articles

Broad U.S. terror alert mystifies experts; 'It's crazy pants,' one says
McClatchy | Hannah Allam | 08/06/13

But how, then, does it make sense for the State Department to close embassies as far afield as Mauritius or Madagascar, where there's been no visible jihadist activity? And why is it that countries that weathered numerous terrorist attacks -- Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq, for example -- were excluded or allowed to reopen quickly? ...

... "It's crazy pants -- you can quote me," said Will McCants, a former State Department adviser on counterterrorism who this month joins the Brookings Saban Center as the director of its project on U.S. relations with the Islamic world.   "We just showed our hand, so now they're obviously going to change their position on when and where" to attack, said Nada Bakos, a former CIA analyst who was part of the team that hunted Osama bin Laden for years. ... Read more

Fed Belongs to Everybody as Public Says It's Our Money in Crisis. RIGHT!
Bloomberg | Caroline Salas Gage | 6:45

The unprecedented frenzy surrounding Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke's potential successor shows that Americans won't let the central bank go back to its opaque and secretive ways.

The central bank's decision to adopt unconventional policies has "heightened consequences of what the Fed does and who leads it," Binder said. Such action "has so much impact on the economy and people's lives."

Fed Vice Chairman Janet Yellen and Lawrence Summers, President Barack Obama's former top economic adviser, have been the focus of an intensifying public contest for Bernanke's job. House and Senate Democrats have penned letters to the White House voicing support for Yellen, 66, and Obama defended Summers, 58, to his party's lawmakers on July 31 against a barrage of criticism. ... Read more
Fed Belongs to Everybody as Public Says It's Our Money in Crisis (08/08/13) [6:45]

New Bank Investigations: Real Action, or More of the Same?
RollingStone | Matt Taibbi |08/08/13

A lot of interesting things happening on the white-collar enforcement front. Evil hedge fund SAC Capital and its villainous ruler Stevie Cohen were run through the gauntlet, Goldman Sachs patsy Fabulous Fab took a beating in civil court (I love the detail that emerged, that Goldman executives now call him "the poor kid"), and now, apparently, a pair of high-profile investigations have been launched against Bank of America and J.P. Morgan Chase for subprime mortgage fraud. The latter investigations seem to be designed to answer criticisms that nobody is going after the real doers of evil systemic crimes. ... Read more

Tsunami of Public Outrage Builds in Colorado as Fracking Invades Cities
AlterNet | Phillip Doe | 07/17/13

Many people used to think serving on city council wasn't worth a bucket of warm piss, as Roosevelt's first vice president, John Garner, famously described his job.   Sewers, gutters, zoning, budgets, and taxation used to be the principal domain of city councils, with a little larceny thrown in now and then as reward -- maybe a new driveway or remodeled bathroom from a favor-seeking contractor. ... Read more



DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Thursday, August 08 [16:13]
DN | Activists Accuse Washington, D.C. Police Officer of Infiltrating Bangladesh Sweatshop Protests (08/08/13) [8:03]
TRNN News
*TRNN | Bill Black: Bank of America facing civil charges but BOA and other major financial fraudsters off the hook from criminal charges (08/08/13) [11:37]
*TRNN | Protesters Condemn ALEC's Push to Privatize Public Education (08/08/13) [16:28]
TYT News
TYT | Single Mother Caught Shoplifting Gets Kind Surprise from Cops (08/08/13) [3:28]
TYT | Who Do Republicans Prefer? Paula Deen or Martin Luther King Jr.? (08/08/13) [4:52]
*TYT | Disagree with U.S. Policy? You May be a 'High Threat' to the Pentagon (08/08/13) [4:06]
*TYT | Closing U.S. Embassies is, Quote, 'Crazy Pants' (08/07/13) [5:29]
TYT | How Exactly is Obama 'Starting a Race War'... Glen Beck? (08/07/13) [8:42]
Fukushima News
*TRNN | Japan government in Fukushima clean-up (08/08/13) [2:05]
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm *The Latest In The Debate Over Mandatory Minimum Sentencing (08/08/13) [1hr]
Mandatory minimum sentencing has existed throughout U.S. history, at one time used to punish mostly treason and murder. But in the 1980s, Congress saw mandatory minimums as a way to tackle a different kind of crime: drug offenses. As part of the "war on drugs," there was bipartisan support for tough sentences, rather than rehabilitation. Today, the pendulum might be swinging in the other direction. With a prison population soaring and budgets tightening, lawmakers from both parties are supporting ways to reform these sentences, and Attorney General Eric Holder is weighing in. Diane and her guests discuss the debate over mandatory minimum sentencing.
Comedy News
Stephen Colbert | Stripper Bears, Global Extremism & Mini Muslims The Colbert Report (08/03/13) [4:48]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.08.2013. 12:11

Wednesday August 07, 2013
News Articles

Fukushima Radioactive Water May Overflow Into Sea
HP | Mari Yamaguchi | 08/06/13

The operator of Japan's wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant said Tuesday it is struggling to stop contaminated underground water from leaking into the sea.   Tokyo Electric Power Co. said some of the water is seeping over or around an underground barrier it created by injecting chemicals into the soil that solidified into a wall.

The latest problem involves underground water which has built up over the last month since the company began creating the chemical walls to stop leaks after it detected radiation spikes in water samples in May. ... Read more
More scary pictures of Fukushima

Abe Sanctions Government Funding To "Freeze" Fukushima With Giant Ice Wall
ZeroHedge | author | 08/07/13

Now that TEPCO has been shown to be inept, Abe and his government have sanctioned the funding of a 1.4km wall of ice to surround the building that holds Reactors 1 to 4. ... Read more

Watching Fox News makes people distrust science
Salon | Lindsay Abrams | 08/06/13

Now that science has more or less agreed that human-caused climate change is happening, some are devoting their efforts to figuring out how it's possible that people can remain skeptics. Plenty has been written about the corrupting influence of conservative media, but a new study from researchers at the University of Arizona, George Mason, American University and Yale looks more closely at exactly how such programs manage to fuel their audiences' denial.

Predictably, they found that the more exposed Americans are to conservative media, the less certain they become that climate change is happening. The problem, they discovered, isn't just that programs like Fox News are sowing the seeds of doubt about climate change, it's that they're decreasing people's trust in the scientists who say it's happening. That's 97 percent of them, for the record. ... Read more

Sydney Leathers, Weiner Sexting Partner, Makes Porn Video Because Of Course
HP | author | 08/05/13

Here is a good example of a politician creating jobs for his constituent! (includes Video) Read more

Sun's Magnetic Field To Flip In Complete Reversal That Will Have 'Ripple Effects'
HP | Sara Gates | 08/06/13

Get ready, Earth. The sun's magnetic field is about to do a 180 when the celestial body's electromagnetism flips and changes polarity.   According to NASA-supported observations, the complete reversal is expected to take place in the coming months.

"It looks like we're no more than three to four months away from a complete field reversal," Todd Hoeksema, a solar physicist and director of Stanford University's Wilcox Solar Observatory, said in a statement released by the agency. "This change will have ripple effects throughout the solar system." ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Wednesday, August 07 [13:25]
DN | How The Washington Post's New Owner Aided the CIA, Blocked WikiLeaks & Decimated Book Industry (08/07/13) [11:40], Part 2 [20:32]
DN | "I Was a Warehouse Wage Slave": Reporter Mac McClelland on Life Inside the Online Shipping Machines (08/07/13) [9:54]
Fukushima
*"Experts Say It's NOW Clear TEPCO Can NOT Handle The Clean Up Of Fukushima & Govt Must Take Over (08/06/13) [5:54]
TRNN News
TRNN | Robert Naiman: US & UK Pull Out Yemen Embassy Staff After Series of Drone Strikes (08/07/13) [12:30]

Drone Strikes 2004-2013 - Click to zoom

Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm *Assessing New Threats From Al-Qaida (08/07/13) [1hr]
The U.S. warns American citizens to leave Yemen, closes diplomatic posts in the Middle East and Africa, and issues a worldwide travel alert. Assessing new threats from al-Qaida.
The Changing Suburbs (08/07/13) [1hr]
Fifty years ago, the suburbs were seen as an ideal community for families looking for good schools and safe neighborhoods. But today's suburbia is a very different place. The suburbs are now home to the largest and fastest-growing poor population in the country. The spread of suburban poverty has many causes, including the subprime mortgage crisis and decline in manufacturing jobs.
TYT News
Do Fox News Viewers Understand Basic Science At All? (08/07/13) [3:25]
*TYT | Terror Threat Shows NSA Spying on U.S. Citizens is Pointless (08/07/13) [6:23]
TYT | Fast Food Restaurant Proves Fair Wages Are Possible (08/07/13) [3:20]
*TYT | NSA Director Tries To Smack Down Hackers and Privacy Advocates (08/07/13) [4:24]
*TYT | Cenk Interviews Reza Aslan (08/06/13) [4:40]
Sun
NASA | ScienceCasts: The Sun's Magnetic Field is About to Flip (08/05/13) [4:04]
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.07.2013. 11:38

Tuesday August 06, 2013
News Articles

Uncollected Greek Taxes Rise To Record €60 Billion, One Third Of Greek GDP
ZeroHedge | author | 08/05/13

While Europe, and especially Germany has been understandably "displeased" with having to provide billions in bailout upon bailout funding to Greece every year starting in 2010, all the more so following recent news that Greece has already spent some 75% of its bank bailout cash with no discernible improvement in its economy to show for it, Europes' taxpayers will unlikely be any more pleased to learn that as of the end of June, a whopping €60 billion in past due taxes (an all time record) was owed by Greek businesses and individuals to the state. This is an amount that is 20% greater than the entire external cash handed over by the Troika to keep Greek banks afloat, and represents nearly 30% of imploding Greek GDP. ... Read more

*40% Of US Workers Now Earn Less Than 1968 Minimum Wage
ZeroHedge | author | 08/05/13

Are American workers paid enough? That is a topic that is endlessly debated all across this great land of ours. Unfortunately, what pretty much everyone can agree on is that American workers are not making as much as they used to after you account for inflation. Back in 1968, the minimum wage in the United States was $1.60 an hour. That sounds very small, but after you account for inflation a very different picture emerges. Using the inflation calculator that the Bureau of Labor Statistics provides, $1.60 in 1968 is equivalent to $10.74 today.

And of course the official government inflation numbers have been heavily manipulated to make inflation look much lower than it actually is, so the number for today should actually be substantially higher than $10.74, but for purposes of this article we will use $10.74. If you were to work a full-time job at $10.74 an hour for a full year (with two weeks off for vacation), you would make about $21,480 for the year. ... Read more

Larry Summers' Enron Connection Is Yet Another Reason Not To Make Him Fed Chairman
HP | Mark Gongloff | 08/05/13

Here's something else to add to the long list of reasons Larry Summers would make a terrible Federal Reserve chairman: He reportedly told California to suck it up when it complained that Enron was manipulating its power market.

According to Kurt Eichenwald's 2005 book about the Enron scandal, "Conspiracy of Fools," then-California Gov. Gray Davis (D) reached out in late 2000 to Summers, who was then the Treasury secretary under President Clinton, for help with the state's little problem of power outages and skyrocketing electricity prices. Davis suspected, rightly, that Enron was toying with the state's electricity supply for fun and profit. ... Read more

McDonald's Franchisees Go Rogue With Meetings
Bloomberg | Leslie Patton | 08/06/13

McDonald's Corp. (MCD), already struggling to sell burgers in the U.S., now must contend with a brewing franchisee revolt.   Store operators say the company, looking to improve its bottom line, is increasingly charging them too much to operate their restaurants -- including rent, remodeling and fees for training and software. The rising costs are making franchisees, who operate almost 90 percent of the chain's more than 14,100 U.S. locations, less likely to open new restaurants and refurbish them, potentially constraining sales. ... Read more

The Mystery of Bee Colony Collapse
Mother Jones | Tom Philpott | 07/31/13

What's tipping honeybee populations into huge annual die-offs? For years, a growing body of evidence has pointed to a group of insecticides called neonicotinoids, widely used on corn, soy, and other US crops, as a possible cause of what has become known as colony collapse disorder (CCD).

Rather than kill bees directly like, say, Raid kills cockroaches, these pesticides are suspected of having what scientists call "sub-lethal effects" -- that is, they make bees more vulnerable to other stressors, like poor nutrition and pathogens. ... Read more

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Tuesday, August 06 [13:59]
*DN | A Domestic Surveillance Scandal at the DEA? Agents Urged to Cover Up Use of NSA Intel in Drug Probes (08/06/13) [16:15]
DN | California City Threatens to Use Eminent Domain to Stop Bank Foreclosures (08/06/13) [4:14]
Fukushima
"Experts Say It's NOW Clear TEPCO Can NOT Handle The Clean Up Of Fukushima & Govt Must Take Over (08/06/13) [5:54]
Fukushima disaster is "beyond our control" says TEPCO as radioactive waste leaks into the sea (08/06/13) [1:56]
TRNN News
*TRNN | Brendan Fisher: After forty years, corporate-funded ALEC remains an organization filled with secrecy (08/06/13) [11:58]
TRNN | Vijay Prashad talks about growing up in India and coming to the realization that liberalism could never eliminate poverty (08/06/13) [19:25]
TYT News
TYT | Fox News Praises Bush & Slams Obama For Doing the Same Thing (08/05/13) [2:51]
*TYT | The Boston Bomber Was A White Supremacist?! (08/05/13) [5:58]
*TYT | The NSA Is Handing Your Data to the DEA and Covering It Up (08/05/13) [6:19]
TYT | Weiner's Sexting Partner ALREADY in Porn (08/05/13) [2:39]
*TYT | Terror Threats Close Embassies, But Why Now? (08/05/13) [9:21]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Chris Hayes | Worst Congress Ever! (08/02/13) [13:00]
Chris Hayes | The future of Electric Cars (08/02/13) [7:54], Part 2 [6:27]
Comedy News
Jon Stewart | Oliver: Halliburton's role in the cover-up following the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (08/01/13) [4:46]
Stephen Cobert | Mayor Bob Filner isn't taking a few sexual harassment charges lying down -- or pinned against the office supply room door. (08/01/13) [4:05]
More Video News
*TRNN | Why are the bees dying? With a third of food production dependent on bees, a new study finds out the reason behind the sharp decline in their population (08/04/13) [8:13]
FED QE 3 - Click to zoom
National Debt - Click to zoom

FED - Quantitative Easing 1-3 - Click to zoom
FED: We Own A Significant Slice Of Critical Markets
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.06.2013. 14:32

Monday August 05, 2013
News Articles

DEA Special Operations Division Covers Up Surveillance Used To Investigate Americans
Reuters | John Shiffman | 08/05/13

A secretive U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration unit is funneling information from intelligence intercepts, wiretaps, informants and a massive database of telephone records to authorities across the nation to help them launch criminal investigations of Americans.

Although these cases rarely involve national security issues, documents reviewed by Reuters show that law enforcement agents have been directed to conceal how such investigations truly begin - not only from defense lawyers but also sometimes from prosecutors and judges. ... Read more

Comment: My question is not why are they are using drones in the United States, it seems like there would/could be legitimate uses, i.e. like spotting forest firest, finding lost people in remote areas, spotting potential oil spillls, but why do they feel like they have to keep it so secret!

FBI Fesses Up: We've Used Domestic Drones 10 Times
Slate | Ryan Gallagher | 07/26/13

Last month, the FBI admitted it had used surveillance drones in domestic airspace but refused to disclose specific details. Now, after pressure from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., the bureau has been forced to come clean.

In a recent letter to Paul, published on the senator's website Thursday, the FBI acknowledges that it has used drones domestically in 10 cases in response to a "specific, operational need." The bureau says that, since late 2006, it has used unmanned planes for surveillance to support missions related to kidnappings, search and rescue operations, drug interdictions, and fugitive investigations. On eight occasions the drones were used as part of criminal cases, and two in national security-related operations. ... Read more

An Unknown Diner Will Taste The World's First Lab-Grown Burger
Yahoo | Sam Ro | 07/30/13

The world's first test-tube hamburger, made from lab-grown meat, will be served in London next Monday, August 5.

The 5-ounce burger, created by Mark Post from Maastrict University in the Netherlands, will be fed to an unknown diner whose reaction will be seen in front an invitation-only crowd.

The Process Starts With Stem Cells. 1) First, muscle stem cells are harvested from the cow through a biopsy. 2) From there, it's raised like any other living creature. Scientists feed it a steady diet of sugars, fats, amino acids, and minerals. 3) The one-inch strand of muscle is also exercised. According to the scientist, the muscle is stretched between two anchor points. "Its innate tendency to contract causes it to put on bulk, growing into small chunks of meat," they write. 4) "Three thousand of these small chunks of meat are then fused together to create one normal-sized hamburger. ... Read more

Bureau Investigation Finds Fresh Evidence of CIA Drone Strikes on Rescuers
Common Dreams | Chris Woods | 08/01/13

A field investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism in Pakistan's tribal areas appears to confirm that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) last year briefly revived the controversial tactic of deliberately targeting rescuers at the scene of a previous drone strike. The tactic has previously been labelled a possible war crime by two UN investigators.

The Bureau's field researcher found five double-tap strikes took place in mid-2012, one of which also struck a mosque
Read more

FED: "We Own A Significant Slice Of Critical Markets. This Is Something Of A Gordian Knot"
ZeroHedge | author | 08/05/13

... Quantitative easing, or QE, by the public and as large-scale asset purchases, or LSAPs, internally at the Fed. As a result of LSAPs conducted over three stages of QE, the Fed’s System Open Market Account now holds $2 trillion of Treasury securities and $1.3 trillion of agency and mortgage-backed securities (MBS). Since last fall, when we initiated the third stage of QE, we have regularly been purchasing $45 billion a month of Treasuries and $40 billion a month in MBS, meanwhile reinvesting the proceeds from the paydowns of our mortgage-based investments. The result is that our balance sheet has ballooned to more than $3.5 trillion. That’s $3.5 trillion, or $11,300 for every man, woman and child residing in the United States. ... Read more
- Click to zoom

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Friday, August 05 [16:09]
*DN | Greenwald: Snowden "Doing Very Well" in Russia After Sparking "Extraordinary Debate" on NSA, Spying (08/05/13) [12:07]
DN | Greenwald: Is U.S. Exaggerating Threat to Embassies to Silence Critics of NSA Domestic Surveillance? (08/05/13) [23:15]
TRNN News
*TRNN | Why are the bees dying? With a third of food production dependent on bees, a new study finds out the reason behind the sharp decline in their population (08/04/13) [8:13]
TRNN | Why The Real News can call a war crime a war crime [2:12]
More Videos
The following video "The Revelation of the Pyramids" was facinating. Apparently there were two versions of the documentary made. The first documentary was done but the author
*The Revelation of the Pyramids (second version) [1:41:46]
*Bush Family Fortunes: The Best Democracy Money Can Buy [1:01:10]
*CORPORATE FASCISM: The Destruction of America's Middle Class [1:41:52]
**TYT News
TYT | Obama Hints At Shift On Keystone Pipeline (08/03/13) [2:44]
TYT | What Secret Message Is Hiding In The Wendy's Logo? (08/03/13) [3:40]
TYT | Drones Inside United States Not Armed... Yet (08/03/13) [2:35]
TYT | Limbaugh Blames Republican Failures On... Too Much Compromise? (08/02/13) [6:30]
TYT | Would You Eat A Burger Grown In A Lab? (08/02/13) [4:09]
TYT | EVERYTHING You Do Online Is Recorded In XKeyscore (08/02/13) [6:56]
TYT | 'Double Tap' Drone Strikes On First Responders Still In Use Overseas (08/02/13) [8:32]
TYT | Obama Hasn't Learned ANYTHING About the Banks (08/02/13) [7:39]
TYT | Reublican Says Snowden Got People Killed, Has No Evidence (08/02/13) [5:06]
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Smoking In America Today (08/05/13) [1hr]
Comedy News
The Colbert Report | American Hero (07/31/13) [4:13]
The Colbert Report | Weiner Sexting Pics (07/25/13) [8:46]
The Colbert Report | Fast Food Wage - McDonald's (07/22/13) [7:23]
John Oliver | Egypt Morsi - Everybody Coups (07/20/13) [10:28]
National Debt - Click to zoom
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.
Interesting videos
The Revelation of the Pyramids [1:41:46]
*The Revelation of the Pyramids (second version) [1:41:46]
NatGeo | Inside Of The Great Pyramid Of Giza [52:38]
UFOTV: The Cheops Pyramid Mystery [52:27]
The Mystery Of The Sphinx by John Anthony West [1:34:33]
C2CAM | Giza Pyramids & Sphynx Theories [1:24:41]
Graham Hancock
Lecture | Graham Hancock Alternative History & Secrets to Our Past [1:03:12]
C2CAM | Graham Hancock on the Origins of Humankind and Wisdom [1:18:09]
Graham Hancock Supernatural and Consciousness [1:18:09]
Aleister Crowley "The Wickedest Man in the World."
In Search Of The Great Beast 666 [2:06:23]
From "In Search of the Great Beast" [3:10]
Bush Family
*Bush Family Fortunes: The Best Democracy Money Can Buy [1:01:10]
The Carlyle Group, the Bush family and 9/11 [25:43]
Bilderberg Group: The Secret Rulers of the World [25:13]
Ralph Nader on Smedley Butler [2:13]
Smedley Butler excerpt from the movie "The Corporation" [2:17]
Major General Smedley D. Butler Expose Fascist Coup in US. (1934) [9:09]
Corporation
*CORPORATE FASCISM: The Destruction of America's Middle Class [1:41:52]
*AMERICA -- From Freedom To Fascism by Aaron Russo [1:49:29]
Former Illuminati, John Todd explains the Illuminati. [1:11:30]
Other Videos
Monsters and Mysteries in Alaska [43:02]
The Signs [1:55:26]
C2CAM | Giza Pyramids & Sphynx Theories [1:24:41] (above)
Engineer & Egyptologist Robert Bauval discussed his research into the alignment of the Giza pyramids, and his theories about the Sphinx. Studying aerial photos of the Giza Plateau he saw that the three pyramids were lined up on a diagonal, with the smallest one offset to the left. An Egyptian dynasty text referred to a King that wanted to travel to the star Sirius. Bauval later connected the stars in Orion's belt (near Sirius) to the positioning of the three pyramids.

His further research showed that shafts inside the Great Pyramid's chambers were pointed at stars in Orion, coinciding with where they would have been in the sky around 10,500 BC, suggesting the structures at Giza are much older than most Egyptologists believe. Interestingly, 10,500 BC was also the date Edgar Cayce mentioned that a Hall of Records was buried inside the Sphinx. These records may reveal a message or artifact that shows civilization is far older than previously thought, and we are not what we think we are, Bauval suggested.

Most recently, he's been investigating part of the Sahara that had a large ancient civilization back when the area was fertile. In his visits to the little-known area, he saw "mini-Stonehenges" and huge lost sculptures.

08.05.2013. 13:48

Friday August 02, 2013
News Articles

XKeyscore: NSA tool collects 'nearly everything a user does on the internet'
TheGuardian | Glenn Greenwald | 08/01/13

A top secret National Security Agency program allows analysts to search with no prior authorization through vast databases containing emails, online chats and the browsing histories of millions of individuals, according to documents provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The NSA boasts in training materials that the program, called XKeyscore, is its "widest-reaching" system for developing intelligence from the internet.   The latest revelations will add to the intense public and congressional debate around the extent of NSA surveillance programs. They come as senior intelligence officials testify to the Senate judiciary committee on Wednesday, releasing classified documents in response to the Guardian's earlier stories on bulk collection of phone records and Fisa surveillance court oversight. ... Read more

Climate Change And Violence Linked, Breakthrough Study Finds
HP | Robin Wilkey | 08/02/13

Shifts in climate change are strongly linked to human violence around the world, according to a comprehensive new study released Thursday by the University of California, Berkeley and Princeton University.

The research, which was published in Science, examined 60 previous studies from all major regions of the globe. The results suggest that changes such as drought, flood and high temperatures strongly correlate with spikes in conflict. ... Read more

F.B.I. Said to Find It Could Not Have Averted Boston Attack
NYTimes | Michael S. Schmidt | 08/01/13

The F.B.I. has concluded that there was little its agents could have done to prevent the Boston Marathon bombings, according to law enforcement officials, rejecting criticism that it could have better monitored one of the suspects before the attack.

That conclusion is based on several internal reviews that examined how the bureau handled a request from a Russian intelligence agency in 2011 to investigate whether one of the suspects, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, had been radicalized during his time in the United States. ... Read more

U.S. Issues Worldwide Travel Alert
HP | Bradley Klapper | 08/02/13/span>

The United States has issued a global travel alert because of an al-Qaida terrorist threat. The State Department says the potential for terrorism is particularly strong in the Middle East and North Africa. It says an attack could occur or come from the Arabian Peninsula

The department says in a statement that al-Qaida and its affiliated organizations "continue to plan terrorist attacks both in the region and beyond." ... Read more

Banksters - Click to zoom
DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Friday, August 02 [15:39]
*DN | We Are Slowly Dying": Fast Food Workers Launch Strike For Living Wage and Right to Unionize (08/02/13) [12:45]
*DN | Reps. Conyers & Massie on Bipartisan Campaign Against NSA Spying; Call For Clapper to Resign (08/02/13) [12:50], Part 2 []
Diane Rehms Show
Diane Rehm Domestic News - Friday(08/02/13) [1hr]
International News - Friday(08/02/13) [1hr]
TYT News
TYT | Fox News Takes Insane, LOW Blow to Anthony Weiner's Wife (07/29/13) [3:18]
TYT | Will Obama Side With The Banks Or The People? (07/27/13) [4:18]
TYT | Why Americans Hate Their Congress (07/27/13) [4:32]
TYT | Guns In Playgrounds Now Legal In North Carolina (07/27/13) [2:25]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
Chris Hayes | Mind of a Monster: Ariel Castro (08/01/13) [12:08]
Chris Hayes | Does being in Russia undercut Snowden's claims? (08/01/13) [8:27]
Part 2 [4:17]
Aljazeera Views
Aljazeera | Viewfinder - Asia: Stranded in Kabul (07/30/13) [25:01]
As foreign troops prepare to withdraw from Afghanistan, one young Afghan secretly devises his own escape.
Comedy News
John Oliver | Encourages Fast Food Workers To Give Fox News Pundits The 'Special Sauce' (08/02/13) [4:10], Part 2 [2:42]
Daily Show | Immigration Reform with Mexicans in the Middle (07/31/13) [3:48]
National Debt - Click to zoom
NSA Terrorist State - Click to zoom
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.02.2013. 18:07

Thursday August 01, 2013
News Articles

Bureau Investigation Finds Fresh Evidence Of CIA Drone Strikes On Rescuers
HP | thebureauinvestigates.com | 08/01/13

A field investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism in Pakistan's tribal areas appears to confirm that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) last year briefly revived the controversial tactic of deliberately targeting rescuers at the scene of a previous drone strike. The tactic has previously been labelled a possible war crime by two UN investigators. ... Read more, Read more

CIA Drone Strikes in Pakistan 2004--2013
Total US strikes: 371
Obama strikes: 320
Total reported killed: 2,514-3,584
Civilians reported killed: 410-928
Children reported killed: 164-195
Total reported injured: 1,112-1,493

US Covert Action in Yemen 2002--2013
Confirmed US drone strikes: 47-57
Total reported killed: 243-358
Civilians reported killed: 15-52
Children reported killed: 2
Reported injured: 62-144

Possible extra US drone strikes: 82-101
Total reported killed: 290-464
Civilians reported killed: 23-48
Children reported killed: 6-9
Reported injured: 81-106

All other US covert operations: 12-77
Total reported killed: 148-377
Civilians reported killed: 60-88
Children reported killed: 25-26
Reported injured: 22-111

US Covert Action in Somalia 2007--2013
US drone strikes: 3-9
Total reported killed: 7-27
Civilians reported killed: 0-15
Children reported killed: 0
Reported injured: 2-24

All other US covert operations: 7-14
Total reported killed: 47-143
Civilians reported killed: 7-42
Children reported killed: 1-3
Reported injured: 12-20

Drone Strikes 2004-2013 - Click to zoom

Crouded, Cloud-Seeding, Chinese Heat-Wave
ZeroHedge | author | 08/01/13

Record-breaking temperatures have been searing large swaths of China, resulting in dozens of heat-related deaths and prompting authorities to issue a national alert. As CNN reports, people are packing into swimming pools or taking refuge in caves in their attempts to escape the fierce temperatures. Local governments are resorting to cloud-seeding technology to try to bring rain to millions of acres of parched farmland. The worst of the smoldering heat wave has been concentrated in the south and east of the country, with Shanghai experiencing its hottest July in at least 140 years. In Shanghai, the heat was being blamed for mounting numbers of dead fish in ponds and rivers and is likely to continue into the middle of August. ... Read more
- Click to zoom

DemocracyNow Daily News
Democracy Now! U.S. and World News Headlines for Thursday, August 01 [16:38]
*DN | As Edward Snowden Wins 1-Year Asylum in Russia, NSA Program Tracking Real-Time Internet Use Exposed (08/01/13) [9:02], Part 2 [11:14], Part 3 [11:14]
National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden has been given one year temporary political asylum in Russia. Snowden has reportedly already left the Moscow airport where he has been holed up for over a month. On Wednesday, The Guardian newspaper revealed details about another secret NSA program based on leaked documents provided by Snowden. The program, XKeyscore, allows analysts to search with no prior authorization through vast databases containing emails, online chats and the browsing histories of millions of individuals giving NSA analysts real-time access to "nearly everything a typical user does on the internet." To discuss these latest developments, we're joined by Spencer Ackerman, national security editor at The Guardian.
TRNN News
*TRNN | Lawmakers Who Upheld NSA Phone Spying Share Close Financial Ties to Defense Industry (08/01/13) [7:04]
MSNBC Chris Hayes - All In
*Chris Hayes | Congress moves to reign in the secret state (07/31/13) [14:33]
Chris Hayes | LAPD talking openly about racial profiling (07/31/13) [7:27]
Chris Hayes | Right-wing gubernatorial candidate waged war on science (07/31/13) [5:38]
Chris Hayes | Clashs in the GOP (07/31/13) [7:30], Part 2 [4:31]
TYT News
Comedy News
Jon Stewart | Oliver: Anthony Weiner invokes 9/11 in new campaign video (08/01/13) [6:06]
*Major Causes of Death - Click to zoom
Other Videos and Documentaries I Ran Across
Note: I don't endorse any of the videos in this section.
As I construct My News Pages I constantly run across a lot of NEW videos, and since I find YouTube frustrating trying to re-find videos, I save the links in this section so I can find them again at a later time.

08.01.2013. 16:59



Special Interest Important stuff
GOOD Shorts Videos

Note: To view a video, click on code at left of the title

I'm still working on this

GOOD Short Videos
Newer Documentaries You Might Not Have Seen

Note: To view a video, click on code at left of the title

I'm still working on this

Newer Documentaries
Documentaries You've Never Seen

Note: To view a video, click on code at left of the title
Documentaries (small | pop-up)
Documentaries (big | full screen)
Good YouTube Documentaries

Note: To view a video, click on its name/title
Great YouTube Docs. (small | pop-up)
Good YouTube Docs. (big | full screen)

Lindsey Graham Mashups
Lindsey Graham

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said the quiet part aloud on why he’s still so close to former President Donald Trump: because we can use him for our goals. "President Trump has gotten people who wouldn't give me or Romney or anybody else the time of day. They believe he is on their side," the senator told the America First Agenda Summit crowd on Tuesday in Washington, D.C.

Or click here for a tablet or a small screen device
Environment & Climate Change
Environment

The term "climate change" is often used to refer specifically to anthropogenic climate change (also known as global warming). Anthropogenic climate change is caused by human activity, as opposed to changes in climate that may have resulted as part of Earth's natural processes.

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AI - Artificial Intelligence | Machine Learning | Deep Learning
AI - Artificial Intelligence

AIArtificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence demonstrated by machines, as opposed to the natural intelligence displayed by animals including humans. AI research has been defined as the field of study of intelligent agents, which refers to any system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its chance of achieving its goals.

The term "artificial intelligence" had previously been used to describe machines that mimic and display "human" cognitive skills that are associated with the human mind, such as "learning" and "problem-solving". This definition has since been rejected by major AI researchers who now describe AI in terms of rationality and acting rationally, which does not limit how intelligence can be articulated.
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Quantum mechanics | AI - Artificial Intelligence
Quantum mechanics

Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles.  It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, quantum field theory, quantum technology, and quantum information science.
Classical physics, the collection of theories that existed before the advent of quantum mechanics, describes many aspects of nature at an ordinary (macroscopic) scale, but is not sufficient for describing them at small (atomic and subatomic) scales. Most theories in classical physics can be derived from quantum mechanics as an approximation valid at large (macroscopic) scale.
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Economy, Wall Street and Banksters

Wall Street and Banksters

Wall Street is an eight-block-long street running roughly northwest to southeast from Broadway to South Street, at the East River, in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. Over time, the term has become a metonym for the financial markets of the United States as a whole, the American financial services industry (even if financial firms are not physically located there), or New York-based financial interests.

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Intelligence Agencies/Deep State?

Intelligence Agencies/Deep State?

An intelligence agency is a government agency responsible for the collection, analysis, and exploitation of information in support of law enforcement, national security, military, and foreign policy objectives. Means of information gathering are both overt and covert and may include espionage, communication interception, cryptanalysis,.

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Daniel Ellsberg | Pentagon Papers
Daniel Ellsberg

Daniel Ellsberg and Paul Jay explore Ellsberg's latest book, The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner. In the introduction to the book, Ellsberg writes: "No policies in human history have more deserved to be recognized as immoral or insane. The story of how this calamitous predicament came about and how and why it has persisted over a half a century is a chronicle of human madness".

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Nukes
Nukes

Nuclear weapons have come a long way and come in all types of different sizes. Some are relatively small while others are enormous, so big they boggle the mind at what they can be capable of, i.e. the Soviet 'Tsar Bomba' is/was 3,000 times greater than the Hiroshima bomb.

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Rana Foroohar and Fall of American Business
Rana Foroohar

Ms. Foroohar says financialization delivers stagnant wages, inequality and economic crisis; the Financial Times columnist and author of "Makers and Takers" says the financial sector represents only 7 percent of the U.S. economy, but takes around 25 percent of all corporate profit while creating only 4 percent of all jobs.

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The Untold History of the United States by Oliver Stone & Petere Kuznick

The Untold History of the United States by Oliver Stone & Petere Kuznick | 2014 | 10 Episodes

Oliver Stone and American University historian Peter J. Kuznick began working on the project in 2008. Stone, Kuznick and British screenwriter Matt Graham cowrote the script. It covers "the reasons behind the Cold War with the Soviet Union, U.S. President Harry Truman's decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan, and changes in America's global role since the fall of Communism." Stone is the director and narrator of all ten episodes.

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Kuznick Interviews

Kuznick Interviews

Historian Peter Kuznick says Eisenhower called for decreased militarization, then Dulles reversed the policy; the Soviets tried to end the cold war after the death of Stalin; crazy schemes involving nuclear weapons and the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba put the world of the eve of destruction - with host Paul Jay

The Untold History of the United States by Kuznick, Peter.mobi | Book | 6.99 MB

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China Valley of Tunnels

China Valley of Tunnels

A report written by a Georgetown University team led by Phillip Karber conducted a three-year study to map out China’s complex tunnel system, which stretches 5,000 km (3,000 miles). The report determined that the stated Chinese nuclear arsenal is understated and as many as 3,000 nuclear warheads may be stored in the underground tunnel network.

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911
911

On September 11, 2001, 19 terrorists attacked the Unites States. They hijacked four airplanes in mid-flight. The terrorists flew two of the planes into two skyscrapers at the World Trade Center in New York City. The impact caused the buildings to catch fire and collapse. Another plane destroyed part of the Pentagon (the U.S. military headquarters) in Arlington, Virginia. The fourth plane crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Officials believe that the terrorists on that plane intended to destroy either the White House or the U.S. Capitol. Passengers on the plane fought the terrorists and prevented them from reaching their goal. In all, nearly 3,000 people were killed in the 9/11 attacks.

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The Vietnam War

The Vietnam War

Ken Burns and Lynn Novick's ten-part, 18-hour documentary series, THE VIETNAM WAR, tells the epic story of one of the most consequential, divisive, and controversial events in American history as it has never before been told on film. Visceral and immersive, the series explores the human dimensions of the war through revelatory testimony of nearly 80 witnesses from all sides--Americans who fought in the war and others who opposed it, as well as combatants and civilians from North and South Vietnam. Ten years in the making, the series includes rarely seen and digitally re-mastered archival footage from sources around the globe, photographs taken by some of the most celebrated photojournalists of the 20th Century, historic television broadcasts, evocative home movies, and secret audio recordings from inside the Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon administrations.

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Trump's Mashups
Trump's Mashups

Donald Trump talks a lot, but what is he actually saying? VICE News' "Trump Talk" mashup series tries to answer that. And, we're happy to say, it was just nominated for two Webby Awards. Now you can watch all the nominated videos.

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Trump's Sexcapades
Trump's Sexcapades.

Jessica Leeds (1980s)
Kristin Anderson (1990s)
E. Jean Carroll (1995 or 1996)
Lisa Boyne (1996)
Cathy Heller (1997)
Temple Taggart McDowell (1997)
Karena Virginia (1998)
Mindy McGillivray (2003)
Jennifer Murphy (2005)
Rachel Crooks (2005)
Natasha Stoynoff (2005)
Juliet Huddy (2005 or 2006)
Jessica Drake (2006)
Ninni Laaksonen (2006)
Cassandra Searles (2013)
Allegations of pageant dressing room visits(1997)
Mariah Billado,
Victoria Hughes,
and three other Miss Teen USA contestants
Bridget Sullivan (2000)
Tasha Dixon (2001)
Unnamed contestants (2001)
Samantha Holvey (2006)

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Trump's Speeches | Rallys |Interviews
Trump's Speeches | Rallys

Donald Trump talks a lot, but what is he actually saying? Watch Trump at some of his rallys and see what you think.

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Donation


I am one of those "once" middle class, over 60, over educated, under-employed, semi retired, soon to be poor workers, that everyone is talking about. 
But I have a modest standard of living so I plan to give all extra donation, beyond my immediate needs, to several of my favorite charities.

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