Reporters without borders publishes 2014 'press Freedom' Index, Turkey ranks 154th out of 180.

Reporters without borders publishes 2014 'press Freedom' Index, Turkey ranks 154th out of 180.HT: ReportersWithoutBorders.

The indicator is a tool for measuring overall performance. The breakdown of the indicator’s scores by region shows a worsening in all continents except Asia, where it was unchanged. Like last year, the European Union and Balkans obtained the best score (17.6), followed by the Americas (30.3), Africa (35.6), Asia-Pacific (42.2), Eastern Europe and Central Asia (45.5) and finally Middle East and North Africa (48.7).

Despite its regional aspirations, Turkey (154th) registered no improvement and continues to be one of the world’s biggest prisons for journalists. The Gezi Park revolt highlighted the repressive methods used by the security forces, the increase in self-censorship and the dangers of the prime minister’s populist discourse. In view of the upcoming elections and the unpredictability of the peace process with the Kurdish separatists, 2014 is likely to be a decisive year for the future of civil liberties in Turkey.

The “war on terror” is also being exploited by governments that are quick to treat journalists as “threats to national security.” Dozens of journalists have been jailed on this pretext in Turkey (154th), especially for covering the Kurdish issue. In Morocco, unchanged in 136th position, the authorities readily confused journalism with terrorism since the case of online newspaper editor Ali Anouzla. In Israel (96th, +17), freedom of information is often sacrificed to purported security requirements.

In Iran (173rd, +2), one of the Middle East’s key countries, there has so far been no implementation of the promises to improve freedom of information that the new president, Hassan Rouhani, made. Coverage of the Syrian tragedy in both the official Iranian press and on the blogosphere is closely watched by the regime, which cracks down on any criticism of its foreign policy.Canada ranks Nr 18.Read the full story here.

Video - Rep. Louie Gohmert: White House Using 'Al Capone' Tactics.

Video - Rep. Louie Gohmert: White House Using 'Al Capone' Tactics.HT: Newsmax.

The Obama administration is guilty of "Chicago thuggery" in its shutting of national monuments, which cost the government more closed than they do open, Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas says.

"We've got inquiries . . . to find out how much did you spend to close down open-air monuments and parks and roads that you don't spend a dime of money on," Gohmert, a Republican, told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.

"But we know he is willing to spend money just to inflict hurt . . . and it has more to do with Chicago thuggery. You know, Al Capone was willing to make people hurt if they didn't go along with the proposals," he said Tuesday.

Does Obama's relationship with Bill Ayers bolster Hitler / Stalin comparisons?

Does Obama's relationship with Bill Ayers bolster Hitler / Stalin comparisons?(BarrackNow).Comparisons of Barack Obama to Hitler and Stalin appear to be going somewhat mainstream in one respect, thanks to Vice President Joe Biden's announcement that 'the president is going to act' on gun control. The implication was clear - the road to confiscation includes Executive Orders, which are unconstitutional, especially when they do not enforce existing laws enacted by Congress. Such orders are beyond unconstitutional when they target the second amendment itself.

After Biden's comments, it wasn't difficult to make the connection to Hitler and Stalin in this regard - both confiscated guns before committing mass murder by the millions.

Fast forward to the 2008 election campaign. One figure from Obama's past whom he attempted to distance himself from was Bill Ayers, founder of the Weather Underground. Despite the successful attempts by Obama to dismiss his relationship with Ayers - coupled with media complicity in suppressing it - the fact remains that these two men had a rather lengthy and cozy relationship. That's not only relevant based on Ayers' terrorist background but it's also relevant based on his plans, conveyed in 1969.

People may be inclined to compare Obama's desire to confiscate guns to that of Hitler and Stalin but they should also be willing to compare Ayers' desire to commit mass murder to the desire of Hitler and Stalin to do the same thing.

Then, for good measure, consider how close the relationship between Obama and Ayers must have been if they shared an office for at least three years.Read the full story here.

The EPA and December 7th - "A date that will live in infamy."

The EPA and December 7th - "A date that will live in infamy."(WUWT).Originally published in The Washington Times.
December 7, 2009 is a date that will live in infamy. Not only in memory of the attack on Pearl Harbor, but the day the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) declared carbon dioxide to be a pollutant under the Clean Air Act.

The 52-page EPA Endangerment Finding can be summarized simply. The agency concluded that carbon dioxide and five other greenhouse gases emitted by US industry and vehicles were causing dangerous global warming. The EPA stated that these gases “…threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations.” The agency relied on studies by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) of the United Nations, the U.S. Global Climate Research Program, and the National Research Council.

That ruling is bizarre. Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. It is an invisible, odorless, harmless gas. It does not cause smoke or smog. The rising visible plumes from the smokestacks of a power plant are not CO2. That’s condensing water vapor. We can’t see carbon dioxide.

The EPA ruling failed to include nature’s largest greenhouse gas, water vapor. Scientists estimate that 75 percent to 90 percent of Earth’s greenhouse effect is due to water vapor and clouds. As any eighth-grade chemistry student learns, burning hydrocarbon fuel produces both carbon dioxide and water vapor. When natural gas (methane) is burned, two water vapor molecules are produced for each carbon dioxide molecule. Since water vapor is a greenhouse gas produced by human industry, the EPA should declare water a pollutant by its own logic.

Rather than being a pollutant, CO2 is green! Carbon dioxide is plant food, a compound essential for plant photosynthesis. Hundreds of peer-reviewed studies show that higher levels of atmospheric CO2 cause plants to grow faster and larger. Wheat, orange trees, pine trees, hardwood trees, prairie grasses, and even poison ivy thrive in higher levels of CO2.

Plants grow larger root systems, produce more seeds and vegetables, and bloom larger flowers with more CO2. Tree wood density increases. Plants grow better in poor soil and drought conditions with higher levels of atmospheric CO2. In fact, if we wanted to put one compound into the atmosphere that would be great for the biosphere, carbon dioxide is that compound. Yet, almost every university and company now tracks the size of its “carbon footprint” and tries to reduce carbon emissions.

But isn’t it true that too much of anything can be bad for the environment? Yes in the case of real pollutants such as carbon monoxide or lead, but carbon dioxide is a harmless compound that is common in nature. The 2007 IPCC Carbon Cycle Model estimated that the atmosphere contained 750 billion tons of carbon in the form of CO2 with an additional 38,000 billion tons of carbon dissolved in the oceans. Mankind adds a comparably small 6 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere each year.

The current atmospheric level of 394 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide is actually somewhat on the low side. Dr. William Happer of Princeton University points out that atmospheric CO2 reached several thousand ppm in past ages. Geological evidence shows that life flourished during those past times of high CO2.

Over 190 nations are currently gathered in Doha, Qatar, attempting to negotiate a global treaty to restrict carbon dioxide emissions. Future generations will regard the early 20th century as an age of climate foolishness.Hmmmm......."You will Obey and drive my electric cars?"

Steve Goreham is Executive Director of the Climate Science Coalition of America and author of the new book The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Climatism: Mankind and Climate Change Mania.

Study: American Households Hit 43-Year Low In Net Worth.

Study: American Households Hit 43-Year Low In Net Worth.(CBS). The median net worth of American households has dropped to a 43-year low as the lower and middle classes appear poorer and less stable than they have been since 1969.
According to a recent study by New York University economics professor Edward N. Wolff, median net worth is at the decades-low figure of $57,000 (in 2010 dollars). And as the numbers in his study reflect, the situation only appears worse when all the statistics are taken as a whole.
According to Wolff, between 1983 and 2010, the percentage of households with less than $10,000 in assets (using constant 1995 dollars) rose from 29.7 percent to 37.1 percent. The “less than $10,000″ figure includes the numerous households that have no assets at all, or “negative assets,” which is otherwise known as “debt.”
Over that same period of time, the wealthiest 1 percent of American households increased their average wealth by 71 percent.
As noted by Daily Finance, from 1983 to 2010 the share of total wealth held by the richest 10 percent of American households increased from 68.2 percent to 76.7 percent. Meanwhile, all the rest of Americans lost financial ground.Hmmm.....Obama: "America remains the one indispensable nation. And the world needs a strong America, and it is stronger now than when I came into office."Read the full story here.

Video - Emeritus law professor from Neurenberg delivers bleak prognosis for the EU, warns of Gold and Account seizures.

HT: TundraTabloids.

Video - 1998 ‘Redistribution’ Speech: Obama Saw Welfare Recipients As ‘Majority Coalition’.

Obama is also heard lamenting Americans’ distrust of “government action”; identifying his political opponents - that is, Republicans - as “the bad guys”; declaring his support for labor unions and community organizers; endorsing the public financing of political campaigns; and staking out liberal positions on gun control, government-run health care and welfare reform. Many of those positions, he conceded, had “no chance of seeing the light of day in Springfield” - the Illinois state capital - “or in Washington.” It’s unclear if NBC News had a complete recorded copy including Obama’s unedited remarks. “I think that what we’re gonna have to do is somehow resuscitate the notion that government action can be effective at all,” he told an audience that reportedly consisted of some 400 people. “There has been a systematic - I don’t think it’s too strong to call it a propaganda campaign - against the possibility of government action and its efficacy,” he said. “And I think some of it has been deserved. The Chicago Housing Authority has not been a model of good policymaking. And neither, necessarily, has been the Chicago public schools.” “What that means, then is that as we try to resuscitate this notion that we’re all in this thing together - ‘leave nobody behind’ - we do have to be innovative in thinking.’What are the delivery systems that are actually effective and meet people where they live?’” he said. It was at this point that Obama launched into his now-famous line about constructing government systems that redistribute wealth. The full recording reveals that Obama saw welfare recipients and the working poor in Chicago as a “majority coalition” who could be leveraged politically. “What I think will re-engage people in politics is if we’re doing significant, serious policy work around what I will label the ‘working poor,’” he said, “although my definition of the working poor is not simply folks making minimum wage, but it’s also families of four who are making $30,000 a year.” “They are struggling. And to the extent that we are doing research figuring out what kinds of government action would successfully make their lives better, we are then putting together a potential majority coalition to move those agendas forward.”Read the full story here.

Country wide complaints Mount Against Michelle Obama’s New Lunch Menu.

Country wide complaints Mount Against Michelle Obama’s New Lunch Menu.(TH).In Wisconsin, high school athletes are complaining about not getting enough to eat each day, due to the skimpy new school lunch menu mandated by the United States Department of Agriculture and First Lady Michelle Obama.

The story we published earlier this week on that subject is unfortunately not unique. Students across the country are complaining about the new school lunch regulations.
Perhaps the real motive is to starve students into slimming down. Just ask students in Pierre, South Dakota who, too, are in an all-out revolt.
"I know a lot of my friends who are just drinking a jug of milk for their lunch. And they are not getting a proper meal," middle school student Samantha Gortmaker told Keloland.com.
Despite the fact that the new regulations have increased the cost of a lunch 20 to 25 cents per plate, it’s not pleasing students.
Some are throwing away their vegetables while others are adapting to the rules by becoming industrious. In New Bedford, Massachusetts, students have created a black market - for chocolate syrup. The kiddie capitalists are smuggling in bottles of it and selling it by the squeeze, according to SouthCoastToday.com.
Nancy Carvalho, director of food services for New Bedford Public Schools, was quoted as saying that hummus and black bean salads have been tough sells in elementary cafeterias. That means even smaller children are going through the day fighting hunger pains, which can never be considered a good thing.One government official tried to put the blame on the students.

 "One thing I think we need to keep in mind as kids say they're still hungry is that many children aren't used to eating fruits and vegetables at home, much less at school. So it's a change in what they are eating. If they are still hungry, it's that they are not eating all the food that's being offered," USDA Deputy Undersecretary Janey Thornton was quoted as saying.Hmmm......You heard 'Nanny' Finish Your Plate!Read the full story here.

Nation’s children push back against Michelle Obama-backed school lunch regs.

Nation’s children push back against Michelle Obama-backed school lunch regs.(DC).Children and parents across the country are fed up with the restrictive new school meal regulations implemented by the Department of Agriculture under the “Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010,” which has long been touted by first lady Michelle Obama.

The standards — which cap meal calories at 650 for students in kindergarten through fifth grade, at 700 calories for middle school students and 850 for high school students — also dictate the number of breads, proteins, vegetables and fruits children are allowed per meal.

A spokeswoman for Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King, who earlier this month introduced legislation to roll back the new standards, told The Daily Caller that King’s office has heard more complaints about the issue during the past few weeks than any other.

“This year, we’ll be hungry by 2:00,” one student, Zach Eck, told KAKETV in Kansas. “We would eat our pencils at school if they had nutritional value.”

Iowa mom Robin Wissink told TheDC that she now provides her autistic daughter Molly, a junior in high school, with a bag lunch because her school’s new menu is so unappealing. Students at St. Mark’s in Colwich, Kan. have also been “brown bagging” their meals.

And some student-athletes in Wisconsin are arguing that the calorie caps hit them especially hard, given their intense workouts and scrimmages.

“A lot of us are starting to get hungry even before the practice begins,” Mukwonago High senior Nick Blohm told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “Our metabolisms are all sped up.”

The new lunch standards have led to the removal of some old food favorites, including a particularly popular item at one school in upstate New York: chicken nuggets.

“Now they’re kind of forcing all the students to get the vegetables and fruit with their lunch, and they took out chicken nuggets this year, which I’m not too happy about,” Chris Cimino, a senior at Mohonasen High School in upstate New York, told the Associated Press, which gave the rules a “mixed grade.”

Students in the Plum Borough School District in Pennsylvania are protesting the new federal restrictions on Twitter.

“everyone.. if you agree school lunches are expensive and small, RT this. we can fight the school! tweet #BrownBagginIt,” @TornadoBoyTubbs tweeted, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.Read the full story here.

The ‘No More Solyndras Act’ Charade a.k.a. “The 50 More Solyndras and Then We’ll Stop Wasting Your Money — Really — We Promise Act.”

The ‘No More Solyndras Act’ Charade a.k.a. “The 50 More Solyndras and Then We’ll Stop Wasting Your Money — Really — We Promise Act.”(Cato).By Tad DeHaven.Last week, the House passed the “No More Solyndras Act” on a mostly party-line vote. However, instead of terminating the Department of Energy loan guarantee program that subsidized Solyndra and other boondoggles, the bill allows applicants who filed before the first of this year to still receive handouts.
The DOE will still have $34 billion in remaining lending authority to issue new loan guarantees. And as Taxpayers for Common Sense (TCS) explains, there are going to be plenty of opportunities for taxpayers to get fleeced again:

It was recently revealed that approximately 50 applications sit active in the queue. The projects include an $8.3 billion loan guarantee for nuclear reactor project in Georgia and a nearly $2 billion loan guarantee for a liquid coal facility in Wyoming. There’s a $1.7 billion loan guarantee for a coal gasification plant in Indiana plus more than 15 solar projects in the pipeline!
Some of these applicants are clear losers for taxpayers. This bill would allow a $2 billion loan guarantee for a uranium enrichment project to remain on deck, ready to receive a loan guarantee despite the fact that the company has received a delisting notice from the New York Stock Exchange. Talk about taxpayers striking out, the United States Enrichment Corporation (USEC) is currently in line to receive a loan guarantee for its enrichment facility in Piketon, OH. On the other hand USEC hit a home run with a $100 million giveaway in the continuing resolution.

What’s really disgraceful is that an amendment from Rep. Tom McClintock (R-CA) that would have completely terminated the loan guarantees wasn’t even allowed to be debated and voted on.As Rep. McClintock said on the House floor, the bill should be renamed “The 50 More Solyndras and Then We’ll Stop Wasting Your Money — Really — We Promise Act.”Read the full story here.

UN Small Arms Treaty Passes in silence While Media covers 'Obamarama'.

UN Small Arms Treaty Passes in silence While Media covers 'Obamarama'.(ReadAbility).
The United Nations Small Arms Treaty passed in its second session. The Media was silent over its passage.
According to the UN’s press release,

Concluding its two-week session today, the second United Nations conference to review the 2001 Programme of Action on trafficking in small arms and light weapons adopted a consensus outcome document that highlighted the international community’s renewed commitment to preventing, combating and eradicating the illicit trade.
The document’s adoption represented a major achievement for delegations, who had failed to agree on a final outcome at the first review conference, held in 2006. “We accomplished something great today,” said U. Joy Ogwu ( Nigeria), President of the Conference, formally known as the United Nations Conference to Review Progress Made in the Implementation of the Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects.
According to the text, Member States renewed their pledge to rid the world of the scourge brought upon it by the illicit manufacture, transfer and circulation of small arms and light weapons, and their excessive accumulation and uncontrolled spread in many parts of the world. They also committed to mobilizing the necessary political will and resources to implement the Programme of Action and the International Tracing Instrument, with the aim of achieving clear and tangible results over the next six years, through 2018.
Further by the text, States emphasized that the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons continued to sustain conflicts, exacerbate armed violence, undermine respect for international humanitarian law and international human rights law, aid terrorism and illegal armed groups, and facilitate increasing levels of transnational organized crime, as well as trafficking in humans, drugs and certain natural resources.

Ahhh yes, the cries of terrorism and drugs and boogey men for the passage of the treaty. This comes from member nations who knowingly promote these kinds of things. Even the United States is now in the midst of a scandal involving gunwalking, known as Fast and Furious, and at least one man arrested has come forward and said that Fast and Furious was all about arming drug cartels in Mexico, never about tracking them.
All countries signed the declaration and further documentation can be found here.
According to the program of action:

“8. Reaffirming our respect for and commitment to international law and the purposes and principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, including the sovereign equality of States, territorial integrity, the peaceful resolution of international disputes, non-intervention and non-interference in the internal affairs of States, “. Non-intervention and non-interference? How about Syria? NATO is part of the United Nations.
“9. Reaffirming the inherent right to individual or collective self-defence in accordance with Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations,”. Collective means the state, in-contrary to our Bill of Rights guaranteed by our government, but ultimately granted by our Creator.
“10. Reaffirming also the right of each State to manufacture, import and retain small arms and light weapons for its self-defence and security needs, as well as for its capacity to participate in peacekeeping operations in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations, “. This is just another statement dealing with a ‘collective right’, not an individual right. The ATF, FBI, Homeland Security, along with all the ‘alphabet’ agencies of the federal and state governments are immune and the tyranny they will accomplish when this treaty is fully implemented staggers the mind.
“11. Reaffirming the right of self-determination of all peoples, taking into account the particular situation of peoples under colonial or other forms of alien domination or foreign occupation, and recognizing the right of peoples to take legitimate action in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations to realize their inalienable right of self-determination. This shall not be construed as authorizing or encouraging any action that would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity or political unity of sovereign and independent States conducting themselves in compliance with the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples,” This section was examined previously. It is important to point out that the West Bank and Gaza are not recognized as an ‘sovereign and independent States’, therefore they are up for grabs.

Of course this will be enforced by the UN’s blue helmets, or International Assistance.
Keys To Liberty reported,

It is interesting to note, the “delegations agreed to strengthen the action programme’s implementation at the national, regional and global levels over the period 2012-2018. On follow-up measures, they decided to hold a one-week biennial meeting of States in 2014 and 2016, and a one-week open-ended meeting of governmental experts in 2015 to consider the Programme of Action’s full and effective implementation”. (Underline Emphasis is the author’s) Over the next few years ‘something’ is needed to fully implement this treaty by 2018. Each two years they will meet to see how the treaty has been complied with. This means new statutes in place at the federal level, further restricting the right to keep and bear arms. An assault weapons ban, large capacity magazine ban and stripper clips ban are just around the corner. In the future this will probably begin with more ‘false flag’ operations, stemming, and leading to our own government behind them. More Aurora, Colorado’s, more Sikh Temple type massacres around the country and maybe even a Oklahoma City bombing type event.

Right about now you are probably thinking, so what? As long as the Senate doesn’t ratify all if well. Ask yourself if you are familiar with the United Nation’s Agenda 21. The Senate didn’t ratify that. Instead Bill Clinton basically passed it by executive order. Mike Opelka, at the Blaze writes:

Agenda 21 is a two-decade old, grand plan for global ’Sustainable Development,’ brought to you from the United Nations. George H.W. Bush (and 177 other world leaders) agreed to it back in 1992, and in 1995, Bill Clinton signed Executive Order #12858, creating a Presidential Council on ‘Sustainable Development.’ This effectively pushed the UN plan into America’s large, churning government machine without the need for any review or discussion by Congress or the American people.

So it is perfectly feasible that this will be implemented over a period of years, but very short years.
From The Trenches reports on legislation that is currently before Congress to put the squeeze on those of us wishing to maintain our Second Amendment rights.Hmmmm........"Dictatorship naturally arises out of democracy, and the most aggravated form of tyranny and slavery out of the most extreme liberty". ~ Plato.Read the full story here.

Video - Obama calls for 'democracy with a small d'.

"Food stamp presidency" - Food Stamp Participation Doubled Among Able-Bodied Adults After Obama Suspended Work Requirement.

"Food stamp presidency" - Food Stamp Participation Doubled Among Able-Bodied Adults After Obama Suspended Work Requirement.(Heritage).By Rachel Sheffield.A new report from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) confirms that food stamp participation doubled among able-bodied adults after the Obama Administration suspended the program’s work requirements.
As Heritage’s Kiki Bradley notes:

The welfare reform of 1996 requires that after three months on food stamps, recipients be engaged in some kind of work activity for at least 20 hours a week. Tucked away in the mammoth 2009 so-called “stimulus” spending bill was the suspension of this requirement for able-bodied adults with no children.

The result has been that between 2008 and 2010, the number of these able-bodied adults on food stamps doubled—from 1.9 million to 3.9 million, according to CRS. (Total participation is now at roughly 47 million, or one in seven Americans.)
This work requirement suspension expired September 30, 2010. But Obama’s “next two budgets then requested that the suspension be extended each year,” explains Bradley. “However, he did not wait for Congress to act on these requests; instead his Department of Agriculture issued waivers to 44 states and the District of Columbia freeing them from implementing the food stamp work requirement.”
Although the weak economic situation would have likely resulted in increased food stamp participation, the Washington Examiner notes that the “doubling of the use of food stamps by the able-bodied population without dependents exceeded the 43 percent increase in food stamp usage among the broader population over the same 2008 to 2010 time frame.”
The CRS reports comes in the midst of the Obama Administration’s latest attempt to waive work requirements from the largest cash assistance welfare program: Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), created under the 1996 welfare reform law. The reform successfully helped move welfare recipients off of the rolls and into jobs and cut the welfare caseload by half within five years. Now, the Obama Administration is trying to gut the heart of this program by claiming that it can waive the work requirement.
The Obama Administration is lengthening its track record of policies that promote government dependence. As a result, taxpayers will be on the line to fund more government assistance for able-bodied adults.
Today, the federal government spends nearly $1 trillion a year on approximately 80 different federal welfare programs. If President Obama has his way, spending will only continue to increase despite welfare already being the fastest-growing part of government spending.
Instead of pushing for more Americans onto the government dole, welfare programs should be founded on the principles of personal responsibility and work. Work requirements in food stamps and TANF should be restored and strengthened and should be expanded to other government welfare programs.
Requiring able-bodied recipients to work or prepare for work not only is fair to taxpayers but also ensures that those receiving aid are being assisted to achieve self-reliance and independence.Hmmmm.......Creating his depending Voter Base....like a 'dealer'.......Chicago politics.Read the full story here.

Obama appointed appeals Judge grants Obama Admin right to indefinitely detain Americans under NDAA.

Obama appointed appeals Judge grants Obama Admin right to indefinitely detain Americans under NDAA.(RT).A lone appeals judge bowed down to the Obama administration late Monday and reauthorized the White House’s ability to indefinitely detain American citizens without charge or due process. Last week, a federal judge ruled that an temporary injunction on section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 must be made permanent, essentially barring the White House from ever enforcing a clause in the NDAA that can let them put any US citizen behind bars indefinitely over mere allegations of terrorist associations. On Monday, the US Justice Department asked for an emergency stay on that order, and hours later US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit Judge Raymond Lohier agreed to intervene and place a hold on the injunction. The stay will remain in effect until at least September 28, when a three-judge appeals court panel is expected to begin addressing the issue.
On December 31, 2011, US President Barack Obama signed the NDAA into law, even though he insisted on accompanying that authorization with a statement explaining his hesitance to essentially eliminate habeas corpus for the American people. “The fact that I support this bill as a whole does not mean I agree with everything in it,” President Obama wrote. “In particular, I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of suspected terrorists.”
A lawsuit against the administration was filed shortly thereafter on behalf of Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges and others, and Judge Forrest agreed with them in district court last week after months of debate. With the stay issued on Monday night, however, that justice’s decision has been destroyed.
With only Judge Lohier’s single ruling on Monday, the federal government has been once again granted the go ahead to imprison any person "who was part of or substantially supported al-Qaeda, the Taliban or associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners" until a poorly defined deadline described as merely “the end of the hostilities.”
The ruling comes despite Judge Forrest's earlier decision that the NDAA fails to “pass constitutional muster” and that the legislation contained elements that had a "chilling impact on First Amendment rights” Because alleged terrorists are so broadly defined as to include anyone with simple associations with enemy forces, some members of the press have feared that simply speaking with adversaries of the state can land them behind bars. "First Amendment rights are guaranteed by the Constitution and cannot be legislated away," Judge Forrest wrote last week. "This Court rejects the Government's suggestion that American citizens can be placed in military detention indefinitely, for acts they could not predict might subject them to detention."
Bruce Afran, a co-counsel representing the plaintiffs in the case Hedges v Obama, said Monday that he suspects the White House has been relentless in this case because they are already employing the NDAA to imprison Americans, or plan to shortly. “A Department of Homeland Security bulletin was issued Friday claiming that the riots [in the Middle East] are likely to come to the US and saying that DHS is looking for the Islamic leaders of these likely riots,”
Afran told Hedges for a blogpost published this week. “It is my view that this is why the government wants to reopen the NDAA — so it has a tool to round up would-be Islamic protesters before they can launch any protest, violent or otherwise. Right now there are no legal tools to arrest would-be protesters. The NDAA would give the government such power. Since the request to vacate the injunction only comes about on the day of the riots, and following the DHS bulletin, it seems to me that the two are connected. The government wants to reopen the NDAA injunction so that they can use it to block protests.” Within only hours of Afran’s statement being made public, demonstrators in New York City waged a day of protests in order to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement. Although it is not believed that the NDAA was used to justify any arrests, more than 180 political protesters were detained by the NYPD over the course of the day’s actions. One week earlier, the results of a Freedom of Information Act request filed by the American Civil Liberties Union confirmed that the FBI has been monitoring Occupy protests in at least one instance, but the bureau would not give further details, citing that decision is "in the interest of national defense or foreign policy." Josh Gerstein, a reporter with Politico, reported on the stay late Monday and acknowledged that both Forrest and Lohier were appointed to the court by President Obama.Hmmmm......."L'etat c'est Moi"?Read the full story here.

Obama Admin Warns Ruling Impedes Its Detention Powers.

Obama Admin Warns Ruling Impedes Its Detention Powers.(NYT).WASHINGTON — The Obama administration warned Monday that a judge’s ruling last week blocking a statute authorizing the indefinite detention of terrorism suspects has jeopardized its ability to continue detaining certain prisoners captured during the war in Afghanistan.

Judge Forrest’s order “threatens irreparable harm to national security and the public interest by injecting added burdens and dangerous confusion into the conduct of military operations abroad during an active armed conflict,” the government wrote in a 38-page filing with the federal appeals court in New York.

The motion focused on language used by Judge Forrest that rejected interpreting the original use-of-force authorization as including the ability to detain “substantial supporters” of Al Qaeda and the Taliban, as opposed to people who are actually part of those groups. The judge also called into question the idea that the United States could detain members or supporters of “associated forces” that had no involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks.

“If, following issuance of this permanent injunctive relief, the government detains individuals under theories of ‘substantially or directly supporting’ associated forces, as set forth in” the National Defense Authorization Act, “and a contempt action is brought before this court, the government will bear a heavy burden indeed,” she wrote.

The United States is holding about 50 non-Afghan prisoners, most of them Pakistani, at the Parwan detention facility at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, as well several hundred Afghans. The legal imbroglio comes during a diplomatic tussle with the government of President Hamid Karzai over control of the Afghan prisoners.

The indefinite detention provision in the version of the annual National Defense Authorization Act enacted last year was contentious because lawmakers did not make clear whether American citizens could also be held without trial as wartime prisoners, and they did not specify what kinds of conduct constituted the “support” that could make someone detainable, nor which “associated forces” were off-limits.

Judge Forrest had previously issued a preliminary injunction against enforcing the statute. While the government had appealed, it did not seek a stay of her preliminary order, which lacked the more expansive language.

But after she made the injunction permanent last week, the Obama administration immediately asked her for an emergency stay, arguing that she was making an “unprecedented” judicial intrusion into wartime matters. When she declined, the government signaled it would go straight to the appeals court.

Robert Chesney, a professor at University of Texas, Austin, who specializes in the laws of war, said that if the Second Circuit appeals court upholds the injunction — even if by narrowing its scope — rather than overturning it on standing grounds, it could potentially set up a split on detention authority with the more conservative District of Columbia appeals court. 

In an e-mail, Bruce Afran, one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs, argued that the government’s “concern is unfounded” because Judge Forrest’s actual injunction “does not touch” the government’s separate powers under the authorization to use military force.

“The general thrust of their argument seems to be that the president and the Congress are immune from judicial review,” he said.Hmmmm........."L'État, c'est moi" .Read the full story here.

       

Video - Obama Care: "The Little Print" 101.

"ObamaNomics" - US austerity targets would include $129 million for embassy protection

"ObamaNomics" - US austerity targets would include $129 million for embassy protection.(RT).The White House budget office announced Friday that 2013's automatic spending cuts will slash $109 billion from federal spending – including $129 million annually that goes to embassy protection. Unless Congress implements a plan to reduce the deficit by $1.2 trillion in the next ten years, automatic spending cuts will slash federal government funds on January 2 – affecting US affairs abroad and at home. The details of the slash in funds for embassy protection comes after US Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens was killed in an attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi on Tuesday night. Three other Americans also died in the attack on the diplomatic mission.
As protesters in the Muslim world angrily target additional US embassies after the release of an American-made anti-Islamic video sparked worldwide outrage, embassy protection is vital to prevent further attacks. But it's just one area that will suffer if Congress remains undecided. The new budget will also take away $54.7 billion from defense spending, which includes $21.5 billion from operations and maintenance for the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, reserves and National Guard.

“The report leaves no question that the sequestration would be deeply destructive to national security, domestic investments and core government functions,” the White House budget office wrote in the report. 

Military aid to Afghanistan would be reduced by $1.4 billion. The National Institutes of Health, which do research to find cures to deadly diseases, would see $2.5 billion of their funding evaporate. Border and fencing technology would take a $33 million hit. Medicare would be cut by $11.1 billion. The American Cancer Society would also lose money, resulting in 50,000 fewer low-income, underinsured women from being screened for cancer in 2013. Education will also suffer.
Class sizes will go up, after school programs will be reduced and “children with disabilities would suffer,” the report notes. Washington DC’s Howard University, one of the nation's Historically Black Colleges, would lose $19 million in funding. “The Administration does not support these cuts, but unless Congress acts responsibly, there will be no choice but to implement them,” the report says. A Defense Department spokesperson told Reuters that the cuts to funding “would have devastating effects on important defense and non-defense programs.” “If sequestration is triggered, the Department would be forced to cut $55 billion in 2013 in an across-the-board, senseless manner and it’s clear that allowing these indiscriminate cuts would be irresponsible,” acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, George Little, told Reuters. At a time when embassies are under attack overseas and more than half of Americans depend on government subsidies, domestic and overseas spending reductions would make an already-bad picture even worse.Read the full story here.

US Totalitarianism Loses Major Battle As Judge Permanently Blocks NDAA's Military Detention Provision.

US Totalitarianism Loses Major Battle As Judge Permanently Blocks NDAA's Military Detention Provision.(ZH).Back in January, Pulitzer winning journalist Chris Hedges sued President Obama and the recently passed National Defense Authorization Act, specifically challenging the legality of the Authorization for Use of Military Force or, the provision that authorizes military detention for people deemed to have "substantially supported" al Qaeda, the Taliban or "associated forces." Hedges called the president's action allowing indefinite detention, which was signed into law with little opposition from either party "unforgivable, unconstitutional and exceedingly dangerous." He attacked point blank the civil rights farce that is the neverending "war on terror" conducted by both parties, targetting whom exactly is unclear, but certainly attaining ever more intense retaliation from foreigners such as the furious attacks against the US consulates in Egypt and Libya. He asked "why do U.S. citizens now need to be specifically singled out for military detention and denial of due process when under the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force the president can apparently find the legal cover to serve as judge, jury and executioner to assassinate U.S. citizens." A few months later, in May, U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest ruled in favor of a temporary injunction blocking the enforcement of the authorization for military detention.

Today, the war againt the true totalitarian terror won a decisive battle, when in a 112-opinion, Judge Forrest turned the temporary injunction, following an appeal by the totalitarian government from August 6, into a permanent one.

From Reuters: The permanent injunction prevents the U.S. government from enforcing a portion of Section 1021 of the National Defense Authorization Act's "Homeland Battlefield" provisions. The opinion stems from a January lawsuit filed by former New York Times war correspondent and Pulitzer Prize winner Chris Hedges and others. The plaintiffs said they had no assurance that their writing and advocacy activities would not fall under the scope of the provision. Government attorneys argued that the executive branch is entitled to latitude when it comes to cases of national security and that the law is neither too broad nor overly vague. "This court does not disagree with the principle that the president has primacy in foreign affairs," the judge said, but that she was not convinced by government arguments. "The government has not stated that such conduct - which, by analogy, covers any writing, journalistic and associational activities that involve al Qaeda, the Taliban or whomever is deemed "associated forces" - does not fall within § 1021(b)(2)." What is ironic, is that in the ongoing absolute farce that is the theatrical presidential debate, there hasn't been one word uttered discussing precisely the kind of creeping totalitarian control, and Orwellian loss of constitutional rights, that the biparty-supported NDAA would have demanded out of the US republic. 
Why? Chris Hedges said it best: The oddest part of this legislation is that the FBI, the CIA, the director of national intelligence, the Pentagon and the attorney general didn’t support it. FBI Director Robert Mueller said he feared the bill would actually impede the bureau’s ability to investigate terrorism because it would be harder to win cooperation from suspects held by the military. “The possibility looms that we will lose opportunities to obtain cooperation from the persons in the past that we’ve been fairly successful in gaining,” he told Congress. But it passed anyway. And I suspect it passed because the corporations, seeing the unrest in the streets, knowing that things are about to get much worse, worrying that the Occupy movement will expand, do not trust the police to protect them. They want to be able to call in the Army. And now they can. He is 100% correct, and today, if it weren't for his lawsuit, the saying that someone, somewhere in the world might possibly "hate America for its liberties" would have been the biggest lie conceivable. Also, the total fascist takeover of America would now have been a fact.Read the full story here.

"Government Motors" - Pentagon Buying Chevy Volts to ‘Green Up’ Military.

"Government Motors" - Pentagon Buying Chevy Volts to ‘ Screw Green Up’ Military.(FB). BY: Bill McMorris. The Pentagon is buying Chevrolet Volts to help “green up” the military—while propping up sales of the bailed-out automaker’s most politicized car. The Department of Defense began purchasing the struggling luxury electric car, which retails at $40,000, this summer as part of its goal to purchase 1,500 such green vehicles.
The Marine Corps Air Station in Miramar, Calif. purchased its first two Volts in July, and 18 more vehicles will come shortly to Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, where Air Force One is based, according to military magazine Stars and Stripes.
The Obama administration championed the production of the Volt. Along with the president’s pledge this year to “buy one and drive it myself … five years from now when I’m not president anymore,” the government offers a $7,500 tax break to encourage sales. Such perks, however, have failed to drive consumers to GM car lots. The vehicle has been forced to suspend production twice this year after the Volt failed to gain a foothold in the marketplace. GM is now offering the vehicle for as low as $169 per month, a financing deal that is generally reserved for $15,000 cars—a price so low that GM is reportedly losing nearly $50,000 per vehicle. The struggling automaker will again suspend production later this month after only 2,500 Volts drove off the lots last month.Hmmmm......"You Will Obey and Drive Electric Cars"........Why does the name Stalin come to my mind?Read the full story here.

"ObamaNomics" - GM is still losing as much as $49,000 on each Volt it builds.

"ObamaNomics" - GM is still losing as much as $49,000 on each Volt it builds.(Reuters).

“Nearly two years after the introduction of the path-breaking plug-in hybrid, GM is still losing as much as $49,000 on each Volt it builds, according to estimates provided to Reuters by industry analysts and manufacturing experts.” 

Cheap Volt lease offers meant to drive more customers to Chevy showrooms this summer may have pushed that loss even higher. There are some Americans paying just $5,050 to drive around for two years in a vehicle that cost as much as $89,000 to produce.
And while the loss per vehicle will shrink as more are built and sold, GM is still years away from making money on the Volt, which will soon face new competitors from Ford, Honda and others. GM's basic problem is that "the Volt is over-engineered and over-priced," said Dennis Virag, president of the Michigan-based Automotive Consulting Group. GM's quandary is how to increase sales volume so that it can spread its estimated $1.2-billion investment in the Volt over more vehicles while reducing manufacturing and component costs - which will be difficult to bring down until sales increase. But the Volt's steep $39,995 base price and its complex technology — the car uses expensive lithium-polymer batteries, sophisticated electronics and an electric motor combined with a gasoline engine — have kept many prospective buyers away from Chevy showrooms.
GM acknowledges the Volt continues to lose money, and suggests it might not reach break even until the next-generation model is launched in about three years. "It's true, we're not making money yet" on the Volt, said Doug Parks, GM's vice president of global product programs and the former Volt development chief, in an interview. The car "eventually will make money. As the volume comes up and we get into the Gen 2 car, we're going to turn (the losses) around," Parks said. "I don't see how General Motors will ever get its money back on that vehicle," countered Sandy Munro, president of Michigan-based Munro & Associates, which performs detailed tear-down analyses of vehicles and components for global manufacturers and the U.S. government. It currently costs GM "at least" $75,000 to build the Volt, including development costs, Munro said. That's nearly twice the base price of the Volt before a $7,500 federal tax credit provided as part of President Barack Obama's green energy policy. Other estimates range from $76,000 to $88,000, according to four industry consultants contacted by Reuters. The consultants' companies all have performed work for GM and are familiar with the Volt's development and production. They requested anonymity because of the sensitive nature of their auto industry ties. The independent cost estimates obtained by Reuters factor in GM's initial investment in development of the Volt and its key components, as well as new tooling for battery, stamping, assembly and supplier plants — a price tag that totals "a little over" $1 billion, Parks said. Independent estimates put it at $1.2 billion, a figure that does not include sales, marketing and related corporate costs. Hmmm......Obama: "All the Choices We've Made Have Been the Right Ones" Read the full story here.