The service in those cities is scheduled to start late this year as a prelude to nationwide service next year, perhaps as early as April. To receive the alerts, users must have mobile phones with a special chip, which is currently included in some higher-end smartphones like the latest iPhones. The service will also require a software upgrade.
After a dinner in New York on Dec. 14, Steven Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, pulled aside David Axelrod, President Obama’s closest adviser, to convey an urgent plea: move the 9/11 trial out of Manhattan.
More recently, in a series of presentations to business leaders, local elected officials and community representatives of Chinatown, Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly laid out his plan for securing the trial: blanketing a swath of Lower Manhattan with police checkpoints, vehicle searches, rooftop snipers and canine patrols.
republicans unite to halt trials of alleged 9/11 plotters from afp: US lawmakers Tuesday unveiled plans to block public funding for US-based trials involving Guantanamo detainees who are accused of plotting the September 11, 2001 attacks. Republican lawmakers Frank Wolf and Lindsey Graham joined forces to introduce legislation which "would explicitly block this dangerous and wasteful trial from any domestic civilian court," Wolf said. They also won support from Democrats Jim Webb and Blanche Lincoln, as well as independent senator Joe Lieberman. If approved, the legislation would stop the Justice Department from using public funds to try the alleged mastermind of the 2001 attacks, Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, and his four co-accused, in domestic US courts.
dc air natl guard on 9/11 & the many deaths of osama: updates to the complete 9/11 timeline from history commons: After a hiatus of a couple of weeks, dozens of new entries have been published in the 9/11 Timeline over the last few days. The largest chunk of them covers events at the DC Air National Guard, based at Andrews Air Force Base, on the day of the attacks. Initially, officers assumed that the first crash into the WTC was an accident. However, after the second crash, Andrews learned the Secret Service wanted fighters launched. Although the Secret Service then said it didn’t on the phone, pilots started overwriting recent exercise data on their flight disks... There are also several new entries about Osama bin Laden, for whom al-Qaeda offered to arrange a TV interview in October 2001. After the interview had been done, western intelligence naturally managed to come into possession of it before it was broadcast by Al Jazeera. We also have some more about bin Laden’s health. He died of lung problems in December 2001, was buried in an earthquake in 2005, and expired in Iran in 2006, all of which makes his near-death condition in 2007 remarkable.
video: abc news reports on secret meeting of the rich from wsj: Last week’s meeting of the Great and the Good (or the Richest and Richer) was bound to draw criticism. The New York meeting of billionaires Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, David Rockefeller, Eli Broad, George Soros, Ted Turner, Oprah, Michael Bloomberg and others was described by the Chronicle of Philanthropy as an informal gathering aimed at encouraging philanthropy. Just a few billionaires getting together for drinks and dinner and a friendly chat about how to promote charitable giving. There was no agenda, we were told. And no plan for a follow-up meeting.
But in an age of fallen wealth idols, it was inevitable that a meeting of billionaire minds would draw scrutiny. Surely all that money and power in one room had to spell trouble for the rest of us. An article in the Times of London, headlined “Billionaire Club in Bid to Curb World Population,” said the issues discussed in the top-secret meeting included health care, education and – by far the most controversial – slowing the global population growth.
“Taking their cue from Gates they agreed that overpopulation was a priority,” the article said, adding that “this could result in a challenge to some Third World politicians who believe contraception and female education weaken traditional values.” Such a stand wouldn’t be surprising. Mssrs. Gates, Buffett and Turner have been quietly worrying about Malthusian population problems for years. Mr. Gates in February outlined a plan to try to cap the world’s population at 8.3 billion people, rather than the projected 9.3 billion at which the population is expected to peak.
But some right-leaning blogs have started attacking the billionaires as forming a kind of secret sterilization society or giant ATM to fund abortions. It fed into time-honored fears of the rich using their wealth to reshape mankind in its preferred image. Some are raising the specter of eugenics.
new york 'terror plot' another govt provocateured set-up from paul joseph watson: The corporate media and the authorities are having a field day lavishing saturation coverage on the so-called New York “terror plot” in which four men, three of them U.S. citizens, supposedly planned to blow up a Jewish temple and shoot down military planes, feverishly citing it as another example of why we should accept police state measures in major cities and the targeting of American citizens as “domestic terrorists”. The only problem with this premise, mirroring just about every other major terror plot and terror bust that we have ever studied, is that the men were radicalized and provocateured by an FBI informant, who provided the group with the fake weapons that led to their arrest. Just as in every other case, the men will likely turn out to be semi-retarded dropouts who eagerly followed the fed’s lead in the pursuit of a promise of massive cash gifts and a way out of their miserable poverty-stricken lives. However, this won’t be reported with one iota of the gusto that the corporate media are pushing this story today.
update: manhattan fly-over & the national security state from kurt nimmo: CBS in New York reports that the Pentagon knew its photo-op flyover above Manhattan would raise “public concern” and frighten New Yorkers but pulled off the stunt anyway. “Federal officials knew that sending two fighter jets and Air Force One to buzz ground zero and Lady Liberty might set off nightmarish fears of a 9/11 replay, but they still ordered the photo-op kept secret from the public,” reports Marcia Kramer WCBS TV.
video: congress ends 9/11 workers’ health care bill from ny1: Congress has abandoned legislation to provide billions of dollars in health care for September 11th recovery workers. The program would have provided long term care for workers who were at the World Trade Center on or shortly after September 11, 2001 at an estimated cost of at least $5 billion. Mayor Michael Bloomberg strongly objected to a part of the bill that would have forced the city to pay for 10 percent of the program, saying it would place an undue burden on city taxpayers. In addition, the legislation would have reopened the federal September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, adding around $6 billion to the plan.
and speaking of bloomberg...
bloomberg plans to seek re-election by rewriting term limit law from thinkprogress: On Thursday, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg reportedly plans to announce that he will be seeking a third term, arguing that “the financial crisis unfolding in New York City demands his steady hand and proven business acumen.” The New York Times reports: "The move represents an about-face for Mr. Bloomberg, who has repeatedly said he supports term limits and once called an effort to revise the law 'disgusting.' He will apparently try to do so through legislation in the City Council, rather than the ballot box. Mr. Bloomberg’s gambit carries significant political risk. The city’s term limits law was passed twice by voters, in 1993 and 1996, and several polls show widespread popular support for keeping it in place. Under the plan Mr. Bloomberg has outlined to associates, those voters will have no say in the matter, raising the possibility of a backlash." After 9/11, Rudy Giuliani also considered running for a third term, citing national security concerns. The Albany Project has more.
schwarzenegger vetoes bill honoring harvey milk from thinkprogress: Yesterday, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that “would have made the birthday of gay political icon Harvey Milk a statewide ‘day of significance.’” Schwarzenegger, who opposes efforts to ban same-sex marriage in the state, explained his veto by saying that he believes Milk should “be recognized at the local level.” But the AP notes that conservative groups had lobbied the governor to oppose the measure: "In his veto message issued Tuesday, the governor said that while he respected the measure’s intent, he thinks Milk’s “contributions should continue to be recognized at the local level. Conservative groups had lobbied Schwarzenegger not to sign the legislation, sponsored by Assemblyman Mark Leno of San Francisco." Milk, who was the first openly gay man to hold a prominent political office in America, was assassinated in 1978. Watch the trailerof Gus Van Sant’s upcoming biopic of Milk.
and speaking of california corruption...
pelosi paid husband with pac funds from washington times: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has directed nearly $100,000 from her political action committee to her husband's real estate and investment firm over the past decade, a practice of paying a spouse with political donations that she supported banning last year. Financial Leasing Services Inc. (FLS), owned by Paul F. Pelosi, has received $99,000 in rent, utilities and accounting fees from the speaker's "PAC to the Future" over the PAC's nine-year history. The payments have quadrupled since Mr. Pelosi took over as treasurer of his wife's committee in 2007, Federal Election Commission records show. FLS is on track to take in $48,000 in payments this year alone - eight times as much as it received annually from 2000 to 2005, when the committee was run by another treasurer. Lawmakers' frequent use of campaign donations to pay relatives emerged as an issue in the 2006 election campaigns, when the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal gave Democrats fodder to criticize Republicans such as former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas and Rep. John T. Doolittle of California for putting their wives on their campaign and PAC payrolls for fundraising work.
mccain: 'i always aspire to be a dictator'
from paul joseph watson: During an interview with the Des Moines Register editorial board yesterday, John McCain - presumably making an attempt at humor - said with a completely straight face that he aspired to be a dictator, while decrying the Congressional rejection of the bailout bill. “I just want to make a comment about the obvious issue and that is the failure of Congress to act yesterday. Its just not acceptable,” said McCain. “This is just a not acceptable situation. I’m not saying this is the perfect answer. If I were dictator, which I always aspire to be, I would write it a little bit differently.” McCain has urged the Bush administration to bypass the will of Congress and invoke executive orders to pass the bailout bill, along with a further $1 trillion dollar spend on buying up bad mortgage debt.
fbi prevents agents from telling 'truth' about 9/11 on pbs from cq politics: The FBI has blocked two of its veteran counterterrorism agents from going public with accusations that the CIA deliberately withheld crucial intelligence before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. FBI Special Agents Mark Rossini and Douglas Miller have asked for permission to appear in an upcoming public television documentary, scheduled to air in January, on pre-9/11 rivalries between the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency. The program is a spin-off from The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America, by acclaimed investigative reporter James Bamford, due out in a matter of days. The FBI denied Rossini and Miller permission to participate in the book or the PBS "NOVA" documentary, which is also being written and produced by Bamford, on grounds that the FBI "doesn't want to stir up old conflicts with the CIA," according to multiple reliable sources. Bamford, contacted by phone, said he could not comment because his publisher has embargoed his new book for release around Oct. 10.
survivors of attack find consolation in march to pentagon from washington post: Each year for the past four, Aline Tyler registered to participate in the annual America Supports You Freedom Walk to commemorate the lives lost on Sept. 11, 2001, and to honor the country's veterans. But when the day came, the 50-year-old Army secretary couldn't bear to lace up her sneakers and go... Tyler was among the Pentagon survivors taking part in the mile-long march from the Women in Military Service for America Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery to the Pentagon crash site. The event, sponsored by the Department of Defense, is one of several to mark this year's anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. On Thursday, the nation will mark the opening of the country's first major Sept.11 memorial with an evening ceremony at the Pentagon, where 184 people died, not including the five men who hijacked American Airlines Flight 77. "Everyone here is a distinguished person today," Gordon England, deputy secretary of defense, said before yesterday's walk... The day's events included a moment of silence for the Sept. 11 victims and a performance by the Oak Ridge Boys. The walk was the largest of about 300 taking place across the country, organizers said.
as pentagon tribute opens, others years away from usa today: In between the Pentagon and the [Arlington National] cemetery is the first permanent memorial at one of the three sites defined by the 9/11 terrorist attacks... In lower Manhattan, where construction on at least seven major projects is underway at Ground Zero, a lasting tribute to the 2,750 who died there has been hindered by disagreements and competing priorities among government agencies, family groups and Wall Street interests. In Pennsylvania, the National Park Service is still buying land for a 2,200-acre memorial to the 40 crewmembers and passengers of United Flight 93 who tried to overpower four hijackers before their jet crashed.
nyc plans remembrances for 7th anniversary of 9/11 from dpa: Seven years after the September 11 terrorist strikes, New Yorkers on Thursday will remember the attacks that killed more than 2,700 people with the destruction of the World Trade Center's twin towers. The city will observe the anniversary with renewed calls for vigilance against the constant threats of new terrorist attacks. Names of the dead will be read yet again... The emphasis on the seventh anniversary has shifted to educating new generations about terrorist threats and the way families of victims survive the loss of loved ones. The National September 11 Memorial & Museum this week unveiled programmes for classroom remembrances, distributed to selected schools across the United States. The outreach scheme will identify teachers to work in partnership with the memorial foundation to teach in classrooms about the attacks on September 11, 2001.
bloomberg: no more excuses in rebuilding at wtc site
design for 9/11 museum evokes wtc from ap: The latest design for the Sept. 11 memorial entrance pavilion has a facade that evokes the World Trade Center's twin towers, and builders still hope the memorial will open by the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks. The three-story, asymmetrical glass and steel building is the last piece of the 8-acre memorial plaza at ground zero, a redesign of a building first introduced as a much larger museum space three years ago. Craig Dykers, architect for the Norwegian architectural firm Snohetta, said the reflective steel facade was inspired by the World Trade Center towers. He said natural light will hit the building at different points of the day and change its appearance. "At times, you'll see yourself in the building," Dykers said Tuesday at the design unveiling.
pentagon 9/11 memorial revives painful memories
from reuters: On the morning of September 11, 2001, Patrick Smith was walking toward a television set in a Pentagon office to get news of the attacks on New York's World Trade Center when he heard a loud boom. "The wall in front of me kind of buckled inward," he recalled. "The ceiling tiles and wires all started coming down, then it went black and then ... a giant fireball just came over the wall." Such scenes will pass through the minds of many survivors on Thursday, when the first major permanent U.S. memorial to commemorate the September 11 attacks will be dedicated to the 184 victims of the assault on the Pentagon. The ceremony at the fortress-like headquarters of the U.S. military, attended by President George W. Bush, will take place exactly seven years after al Qaeda militants hijacked four airliners and killed almost 3,000 people.
rumsfeld returns to the scene of the crime from dpa: Former US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who helped carry victims of the 2001 terrorist attack on the Pentagon out of the destroyed building, Thursday said the 184 people who died were among the first to fall in the war against terrorism. "Make no mistake, it was because they were Americans that they were killed here in this place," he said.
smallest memories preserve 9/11 legacy: exploring the hangar full of preserved artifacts of the attacks
from cbs: Every day, 2,000 people visit the Tribute Center across from Ground Zero to witness the horror of 9/11: A piece of a plane. A firefighter's jacket. The faces of victims. "You're looking at steel that was bent, most likely, from the force of the collapse," said Alice Greenwald, director of the World Trade Center Museum. But 15 miles away, hidden inside an 80,000-square-foot hangar at New York's JFK Airport, is the largest collection of precious pieces from that fateful day, CBS News correspondent Michelle Miller reports.
7yrs later, new yorkers pause to remember from washington post: At Engine Company No. 10 on Liberty Street, next to the World Trade Center site, tourists and local residents left flowers, posed for pictures with the firefighters and lined up to buy T-shirts with the station house logo "10 House Still Standing." In Battery Park, at the southern tip of Manhattan, large U.S. flags displayed the names of those who died on Sept. 11, 2001, while the victims' family members and tourists signed and wrote messages on a steel beam to be used in the construction of a memorial and museum. And at a downtown hotel, workers were busy photographing and archiving the victims' personal items -- shoes, wallets, business cards -- while family members lined up in front of scanners with envelopes stuffed with photographs, to be included as part of an online record.
Seven years have passed since the terrorist attacks on New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, but the memory of that day remains seared into the city's collective psyche. And with the memorials, tributes, wreaths and events -- organized and impromptu -- there is a concerted effort to ensure the memory is preserved.
"It's something we've got to think about every year -- or even every day," said Gloria Harris, a cafeteria worker from Barbados, who lost a close friend in the World Trade Center's restaurant. She came with her husband, Grantley Harris, to sign the 37-foot-long two-ton beam. "You have to study it every day," she said. "You're going to remember it until you're gone yourself. At least we're going to remember it."
reporter held in contempt in anthrax case from nytimes: A federal judge found a former reporter for USA Today in contempt of court on Tuesday for refusing to name her confidential sources who had discussed a former Army scientist’s possible role in the 2001 anthrax attacks... Dr. Steven J. Hatfill, a onetime bioterrorism expert for the Army, is suing the federal government, saying his reputation was ruined by leaks to the news media from law enforcement officials linking him to the attacks. In 2002, the F.B.I. and John Ashcroft, then the attorney general, described Dr. Hatfill as a “person of interest” in the investigation into the attacks, which killed five people and remain unsolved... “I’m concerned about the ramifications of this order for all journalists, beyond just me,” said Ms. Locy, who now teaches journalism at West Virginia University.
mi6 denies killing princess diana from ap: The former head of MI6 denied Wednesday that the British intelligence agency was responsible for the car accident that killed Princess Diana and her boyfriend, Dodi al Fayed, in 1997. Sir Richard Dearlove, who was director of special operations for the agency at the time of Diana's Paris accident, testified at the inquest into the pair's death that he also believes an operation by rogue agents would have been impossible. Fayed's father, Mohamed Al Fayed, has accused MI6 of engineering the death of his son and the princess at the behest of Prince Philip, Queen Elizabeth II's husband.
mumia abu-jamal loses bid for hearing from ap: Pennsylvania's highest appeals court has rejected a request by convicted killerMumia Abu-Jamal for a hearing into his claims that witnesses in his case perjured themselves. The state Supreme Court on Tuesday issued a unanimous ruling saying the former Black Panther and radio reporter waited too long to file a post-conviction appeal in the matter. Abu-Jamal was convicted of shooting to death Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner in 1981. A federal judge in 2001 overturned Abu-Jamal's death sentence but upheld his conviction.
bloomberg: new york count 'fraud' from press tv: Mayor Michael Bloomberg says the results for the New York Democratic presidential primary suggest that 'fraud' has been committed. The New York mayor was pointing to unofficial results in which Senator Barack Obama reportedly received no votes in nearly 80 New York State districts. "If you want to call it significant undercounting, I guess that's a euphemism for fraud," said Bloomberg.
12 steps to financial disaster: US economy risks mother of all meltdowns from financialtimes: Recently, Professor Roubini’s scenarios have been dire enough to make the flesh creep. But his thinking deserves to be taken seriously. He firstpredicted a US recession in July 2006*. At that time, his view was extremely controversial. It is so no longer. Now he states that there is “a rising probability of a ‘catastrophic’ financial and economic outcome”**. The characteristics of this scenario are, he argues: “A vicious circle where a deep recession makes the financial losses more severe and where, in turn, large and growing financial losses and a financial meltdown make the recession even more severe.” Prof Roubini is even fonder of lists than I am. Here are his 12 – yes,12 – steps to financial disaster.
from ap: The city has closed a facility where debris was sifted for Sept. 11 victims' remains, but the search won't end until after the World Trade Center site is rebuilt, a city official said Tuesday.
Ongoing construction around ground zero — including the dismantling of a toxic skyscraper that caught fire in August — could put off a complete search of areas believed to contain human remains for years, according to a memo by Deputy Mayor Ed Skyler.
"At no point in the near future would it be prudent to declare this search 'over,'" Skyler wrote to Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
The discovery of more than 80 bones in a manhole at ground zero in October 2006 prompted an expanded search of nearby rooftops, manholes and sewer lines for bone fragments of victims of the terrorist attacks. Hundreds of bones were found beginning in 2005 at the former Deutsche Bank tower across from the trade center site.
The city has found 1,772 bones and fragments so far. Seven victims have been identified from bones found in a service road at ground zero and on the roof of the bank building, Skyler said. More than 1,100 of the trade center victims have not been identified from the thousands of remains found after the attack.
The medical examiner's office finished work Monday at a facility opened last year to hand-sift debris from around ground zero, but it will use a tractor-trailer and other equipment to continue sifting remains, Skyler said.
fair use notice: this site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. we are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, & social justice issues, etc. we believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US copyright law. In accordance with title 17 usc section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
from cbsnews: With the tenth anniversary of the September 11 approaching, memories of the attacks on that day are surfacing as well as concerns about an attack on that day next month. In an interview with CNN, President Obama said that he was more worried about a deranged individual perpetrating an attack on 9/11 in retribution for killing Osama Bin Laden than a large scale, coordinated Al Qaeda attack. "As President of the United States I worry about all of it, but the most likely scenario ends up being a lone wolf operations rather than a large well coordinated attack," he told CNN's Wolf Blitzer. He gave the example of the massacre by Anders Behring Breivik in Norway as an example of the lone wolf. "One person deranged or driven by hateful ideology can do a lot more damage... We are vigilant and constantly monitoring the potential risks of terrorist attacks... We are not letting our guard down." A joint FBI/Department of Homeland Security memo (PDF) echoes Mr. Obama's statements: "Small-arms operations could be employed through a range of tactics from a lone offender--as illustrated by the recent 22 July 2011 lone shooter attack that took place in Norway--to a coordinated small-unit attack involving several operatives. Recent lone offender attacks and plots in the United States and abroad illustrate the effectiveness of the small-arms tactic and the need for continued vigilance and awareness of this tactic. Attacks by lone offenders--which by definition lack co-conspirators, and therefore provide fewer opportunities for detection--may be more difficult for law enforcement and homeland security authorities to disrupt."
