from 24/7 wall st.: The population of the United States has increased steadily by roughly 2.5 million people every year since World War II. Throughout prosperity and hard times, Americans continue to have families. Many of the country’s regions have expanded to accommodate this population increase. Some cities have grown faster than others as the result of being at the center of some important new technology or job market. Others have lost residents because of failing industries and migration. Nevertheless, some of these cities have continued to grow slowly, or at least remain relatively stagnant, buoyed by the rising tide of the national population. There are some cities, however, which have experienced such severe hardship and decline that their populations have actually decreased significantly. New Orleans has lost more than a quarter of its population in the past ten years as the result of Hurricane Katrina. The rest of the cities that have lost major parts of their population have seen their flagship industries which include coal, steel, oil, and auto-related manufacturing fall off or completely collapse.
The somber ceremonies commemorated for occasion started on Saturday and in Louisiana residents staged a symbolic burial of their loved ones. President Obama is scheduled to visit New Orleans. He will deliver a speech at Xavier University which was also flooded during the Hurricane Katrina.
A district where many houses are still vacant will hold a march and a healing ceremony and many of these houses have a circle painted on them to ensure that these houses have been searched for victims.
While President is visiting the area, the doubts about spending of the $20 billion in direct federal relief after Hurricane Katrina are still looming as much of this money is still unspent even after 5 years. The fact is given due consideration by one of the congressmen who wants to spend this money somewhere else.
The New York Times reported on Friday that the files "involve the curious career of George E. Joannides, the case officer who oversaw the dissident Cubans in 1963. In 1978, the agency made Mr. Joannides the liaison to the House Select Committee on Assassinations - but never told the committee of his earlier role."
Joannides was the deputy director for psychological warfare at the CIA's Miami station, JM/WAVE, which was the center of anti-Castro activities in the early 60's and served as a spawning ground for figures who would later be involved in covert operations in Vietnam and in Iran-Contra. In 1963, Joannides worked closely with leaders of the the Directorio Revolucionario Estudantil and exercised a significant degree of control over the group's leaders.
Former Washington Post reporter Jefferson Morley has been engaged since 2001 in a battle to learn move about the dual role placed by Joannides, which has raised suspicions that he was part of a coverup. "I know there's a story here," Morley told the Times. "The confirmation is that the C.I.A. treats these documents as extremely sensitive."
This past July, Morley wrote, "Last week, I did my part to hold the CIA accountable. I filed my sixth (!) declaration in connection with Morley v. CIA, my ongoing lawsuit against the agency seeking records related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy ... The Joannides file, say a diverse group of JFK authors, are part of the assassination story and should be made public. For six years, the CIA has refused, alleging their release would harm 'national security.'"
Morley's quest has gained prominent supporters, including even anti-conspiracy assassination scholar Gerald Posner, who believes that the CIA's secretiveness is feeding into conspiracy theories.
G. Robert Blakey, who served as staff director to the House Select Committee on Assassinations, told the Times, "If I’d known his role in 1963, I would have put Joannides under oath - he would have been a witness, not a facilitator ... How do we know what he didn’t give us?"
from usatoday: Hurricane Katrina, which struck the Gulf Coast four years ago, was an eye-opener for all Americans. The inability of New Orleans to cope was shocking. The levees built to protect the city were failures. The follies of the Federal Emergency Management Agency were maddening. Surely a tragedy of this scale (more than 1,600 deaths in Louisiana and Mississippi), a humiliation of this magnitude, would prompt officials to prepare better for the next major hurricane. With Tropical Storm Danny threatening the Northeast this weekend, and other storms potentially to come this hurricane season, it would be nice to believe that Katrina's lessons have been learned.
wmd panel criticizes obama plan to fund swine flu vaccine from washington post: President Obama's contingency plan to help finance production of a swine flu vaccine with funds set aside to develop defenses against biological attacks would weaken the nation's preparedness for terrorism, the leaders of a bipartisan commission on weapons of mass destruction said yesterday. The White House asked Congress on Tuesday for authority to spend up to $9 billion more for an H1N1 flu vaccine and other preparations against the novel flu strain that first appeared in April. Of the total, the administration asked Congress to provide $2 billion in "contingent" funding. Another $3 billion could come from the Project BioShield Special Reserve Fund, created in 2004 to field countermeasures against nuclear, biological or chemical threats; $3.1 billion from stimulus funds appropriated to spur economic recovery; and $800 million from the Department of Health and Human Services. "Using BioShield funds for flu preparedness will severely diminish the nation's efforts to prepare for WMD events and will leave the nation less, not more, prepared," the commission's chairman, former senator Bob Graham (D-Fla.), and vice chairman, former senator James M. Talent (R-Mo.), wrote to Obama in a letter sent yesterday and in another dated Wednesday to his budget director, Peter Orszag.
readying americans for dangerous, mandatory vaccinations from stephen lendman: At least three US federal laws should concern all Americans and suggest what may be coming - mandatory vaccinations for hyped, non-existant threats, like H1N1 (Swine Flu). Vaccines and drugs like Tamiflu endanger human health but are hugely profitable to drug company manufacturers. The Project BioShield Act of 2004 (S. 15) became law on July 21, 2004 "to provide protections and countermeasures against chemical, radiological, or nuclear agents that may be used in a terrorist attack against the United States by giving the National Institutes of Health contracting flexibility, infrastructure improvements, and expediting the scientific peer review process, and streamlining the Food and Drug Administration approval process of countermeasures." In other words, the FDA may now recklessly approve inadequately tested, potentially dangerous vaccines and other drugs if ever the Secretaries of Health and Human Services (HHS) or Defense (DOD) declare a national emergency, whether or not one exists and regardless of whether treatments available are safe and effective. Around $6 billion or more will be spent to develop, produce, and stockpile vaccines and other drugs to counteract claimed bioterror agents.
new orleans mayor nagan quarantined in shanghai from afp: New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, who had been due in Australia for a speaking engagement, instead remained in quarantine in Shanghai on Wednesday over a swine flu scare, his spokesman said. Nagin, who was detained Sunday after a fellow passenger on his flight fell ill with a suspected case of swine flu, has missed several meetings in the Chinese business hub since being quarantined, spokesman James Ross told AFP. “Mayor Nagin, his wife and executive protection staff are all doing very well. They are feeling fine and they have no symptoms of illness... They remain in very good spirits and are simply looking forward to a speedy resolution.”
update: new orleans mayor released from china quarantine from afp: New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin has been released from quarantine in Shanghai following a swine flu scare, his office said Wednesday.
fda considers psychiatric drugs for kids from us news & world report: The FDA will decide today if three antipsychotic drugs that are commonly used to treat adults are also safe for use by children. Drugmakers AstraZeneca and Eli Lilly want approval to market Seroquel and Zyprexa for treatment of adolescents with schizophrenia and manic depressive disorder, the Associated Press reports. And Pfizer's experimental drug Geodon, if approved by the FDA, might treat young bipolar patients. Although studies in kids have shown the drugs to be effective when compared to a placebo, some patient and consumer groups are concerned about the medications' long-term effects. Side effects of the drugs include weight gain and high blood sugar. The AP reports that such side effects could increase the risk of developing diabetes. In a December online issue of the Lancet, researchers reported that Seroquel and Geodon, both known as second-generation or atypical antipsychotics, were no more effective than first-generation drugs, which are often cheaper. Only two antipsychotic drugs are currently approved for use in kids. Bipolar disorder and schizophrenia appear to share common genetic causes, according to a study published in a January issue of the Lancet that involved data on 2 million families.
from ap: The U.S. Marine Corps is wooing public school districts across the country, expanding a network of military academies that has grown steadily despite criticism that it's a recruiting ploy. The Marines are talking with at least six districts — including in suburban Atlanta, New Orleans and Las Vegas — about opening schools where every student wears a uniform, participates in Junior ROTC and takes military classes, said Bill McHenry, who runs the Junior ROTC program for the Marines. Those schools would be on top of more than a dozen public military academies that have already opened nationwide, a trend that's picking up speed as the U.S. Department of Defense looks for ways to increase the number of units in Junior ROTC, which stands for Reserve Officers Training Corps. "Many kids in our country don't get a fair shake. Many kids live in war zones. Many kids who are bright and have so much potential and so much to offer, all they need to be given is a chance," McHenry said. "If you look at stats, what we're doing now isn't working."
audio: biowarfare & the jfk assassination from brasscheck tv: It's easy to mistakenly assume that everything that can be known about the Kennedy assassination has been uncovered. Here's a shocker. In addition to running around with Cuban exiles, right wing nut jobs, and organized crime figures, Lee Harvey Oswald appears to have had another more sinister another job. He was an errand boy for a black budget bio-warfare project operated out of the Infectious Disease Lab at the US Public Health Service Hospital in New Orleans that went terribly wrong. If the well documented assertions of the author of "Dr. Mary's Monkey" are true, the significance of any involvement Oswald might have had with the Kennedy assassination pales in comparison.
dallas lawyer who represented zapruder in film negotiations dies from dallas morning news: Samuel Morris Passman had one transaction that stood out among the many he handled for a multitude of clients over his nearly 70 years as a Dallas lawyer. Mr. Passman represented Abraham Zapruder during negotiations for rights to the Dallas dressmaker's 8 mm home movie of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Mr. Passman, 96, died Wednesday at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas of complications after a fall at his home... Mr. Zapruder wanted financial security for his family and to avoid the perception he was profiting from the tragedy, according to news accounts of the negotiations. At a Nov. 25, 1963, meeting with Life magazine's Los Angeles bureau chief and Mr. Zapruder in Mr. Passman's office, the lawyer suggested that the first of six annual $25,000 payments be made to the family of J.D. Tippit, the police officer killed shortly after the president. "I remember thinking that whatever fee Zapruder paid the lawyer, Passman had just earned every penny with that inspired suggestion," Richard B. Stolley, the Life executive wrote in 1988. "Zapruder, who earlier had worried aloud to me about the Tippit family's future, agreed without hesitation; and his donation of $25,000 two days later earned the public applauses it both deserved and was meant to elicit."
video: 'i led three lives' from brasscheck tv: Herbert Philbrick, a Boston advertising executive who infiltrated the U.S. Communist Party on behalf of the FBI in the 1940s, wrote a bestselling book on the life of a double agent, "I Led Three Lives: Citizen, 'Communist', Counterspy" (1952). "I Led Three Lives" was an American television show which was syndicated by Ziv Television Programs from 1953 to 1956 and lasted 117 episodes. The part of Philbrick was played by Richard Carlson. According to Judyth Vary Baker, Lee Harvey Oswald's girlfriend in New Orleans, "I Led Three Lives" was Oswald's favorite TV show. This particular film was produced before the Bay of Pigs fiasco which Oswald was believed by some to have participated in with David Ferrie, his instructor in the Lousiana Civil Air Patrol. Conspiracy theorists believe that Oswald was the "lone nut assassin" who killed JFK. To maintain this farce requires ignoring his family's long involvement with organized crime in New Orleans, his personal involvement with New Orleans-based anti-communists, and his strange status as a US Marine who "defected" to the Soviet Union and was permitted back in the US with the financial support of the US State Department. In the midst of all this, Oswald posed dramatically, though unconvincingly, as a Castro sympathizer. "I Led Three Lives" indeed...
video: oswald in new orleans from brasscheck tv: To really understand 20th century American and the trajectory of the US is still on, you need to understand the Kennedy assassination. Until the House Select Committee on Assassinations concluded that Kennedy was killed by "some sort" of conspiracy, Lee Harvey Oswald was loudly declared to be the "lone assassin" in the murder of JFK. Here's what the "news media" and "law enforcement" had to overlook to come to this conclusion.
kiss' peter criss in new jfk murder film from antimusic: KISS drummer Peter Criss will be making an acting appearance in the upcoming film Frame Of Mind, set to be released on DVD February 24, 2009. The film is a detective drama and centers around a new twist in the President John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories. When Detective David Secca discovers a piece of film showing a man concealing a rifle on the grassy knoll in Dallas, it becomes clear this is an important clue in uncovering the truth behind history. Criss plays the character Mike, a New Jersey Detective. A clip of Peter's performance can be seen here. [but not anymore...]
bombs & choppers during military exercises startle residents from wwltv: Residents in and around New Orleans have been hearing the sounds of low-flying helicopters and what sounds like bomb blasts over the past few nights, but the sounds are part of a training exercise for some of America's elite military troops... according to military officials, it’s a training exercise that brought about 150 U.S. troops from the U.S. Special Operations Command to train in New Orleans for urban warfare... The forces are using simulated ammunitions, almost like paintball pellets, to conduct the training... The NOPD did put a press release out about the training, and WWL-TV aired a story about it; however, that was a week ago. Since U.S. Special Operations Command hasn't done a similar training here since 2000, it has caught many people by surprise.
US troops in black helicopters invade new orleans from paul joseph watson: The New Orleans Police Department, along with 150 active duty U.S. troops, are currently engaging in what they describe as “military training” as black helicopters whizz around the city dropping bombs in the latest example of Americans being incrementally conditioned to accept a state of de facto martial law. The training has been ongoing since January 27 and involves “the use of military helicopters flying after dark throughout the city,” according to an Associated Press report.
Residents were warned “not to panic” if they witnessed the training and were assured that the activities had “been carefully planned and are safe”. However, initial reports before the exercises began claimed that the training would only involve police, when in fact 150 U.S. troops from the U.S. Special Operations Command are also involved as part of urban warfare training. Residents described hearing low flying helicopters and even bombs during the course of last night. “I heard a bunch of explosions starting at about 10 p.m. They were about ten seconds apart, and then they’d stop, and we thought it was over, but then they started again,” said Gigi Burk. The exercises are scheduled to end on February 8.
The militarization of law enforcement has rapidly advanced since 9/11 as part of a general program to prepare Americans for outright martial law following a mass casualty event. A new bill introduced in Congress authorizes the Department of Homeland Security to set up a network of FEMA camp facilities to be used to house U.S. citizens in the event of a national emergency.
The National Emergency Centers Act or HR 645 mandates the establishment of “national emergency centers” to be located on military installations for the purpose of to providing “temporary housing, medical, and humanitarian assistance to individuals and families dislocated due to an emergency or major disaster,” according to the bill. With active duty military personnel already being stationed inside the U.S. under Northcom, partly for purposes of “crowd control,” fears that Americans could be incarcerated in detainment camps are all too real. A resident filmed the helicopters at night around the University of New Orleans Lakefront Campus on February 3. Watch the clip below. (part2 & part3)
US/mexico border fence almost complete from ap: The fence along the U.S.-Mexico border is mostly finished. Customs and Border Protection spokesman Lloyd Easterling says that 601 miles of the project had been completed as of a week ago. Easterling says 69 miles of the fence still must be built to meet the goal set during the Bush administration. In December, then President-elect Barack Obama said he wanted to evaluate border security operations before he considers whether to finish building the fence under his administration. Easterling said the Obama White House has not told Homeland Security to stop building the fence.
military pushing the biometrics agenda from ap: On the front lines in Iraq, U.S. troops can scan someone's eye or finger to try to determine if he is a potential enemy or has been connected to a terror attack. At military bases on U.S. soil, it's not that easy. The use of biometrics _ ranging from simple fingerprints to more advanced retinal and facial scans _ has thrived in Iraq, where soldiers carry handheld devices that enable them to link to databases filled with hundreds of thousands of identities. But in Colorado, military bases just 20 miles or so apart have different identification requirements and access procedures for personnel or contractors trying to get onto the property. The gaps raise security concerns and worries of another attempted massacre scheme, like the one foiled at Fort Dix in New Jersey in 2007. "Interestingly, we are probably further forward in using biometrics outside our country in some of the combat environments than we are inside our country," Air Force Gen. Gene Renuart, commander of U.S. Northern Command, said Tuesday. "We've got to find a way to fix that." Speaking at a biometrics conference, Renuart said the military services and law enforcement agencies around the country all carry different ID badges, and many are embedded with different information. And in some cases those agencies, he said, also have different computer databases that don't communicate well.
general wants to scan more US irises & fingerprints from danger room: Air Force Gen. Victor Renuart, the Pentagon's homeland security commander, thinks one of the tools the military uses to combat insurgents in Iraq - the collection of biometric data - is needed here at home. The Associated Press has this alarming intriguing quote from Renuart, who spoke Tuesday at a defense industry conference in northern Virginia: "Interestingly, we are probably further forward in using biometrics outside our country in some of the combat environments than we are inside our country," said the general. "We’ve got to find a way to fix that." Tuesday's conference was devoted to discussion of implementation of HSPD-24, a homeland security directive signed by President George W. Bush in 2008. The directive is supposed to harmonize the way federal agencies and the military collect, store, analyze - and share - biometric data. As it stands, the directive instructs the Attorney General to work with the Secretaries of State, Defense, and Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of the Office of Science and Technology to create an action plan for implementing HSPD-24 by this June. The new administration may be reviewing a number of Bush directives, but now might be a really good time to read up on the military's use of biometric technology. Noah reported extensively on the use of biometrics to deny freedom of movement to insurgents in Anbar province; he also noted the privacy and human-rights implications. For good measure, go read this fascinating transcript of this bloggers' roundtable from 2007 with Lt. Col. John Velliquette, then the chief of biometrics collection in Iraq. In the conference Tuesday, Renuart seemed to be talking largely about security badges for military bases. But as anyone who's been on the receiving end of the U.S. military's biometric identification process knows, it's an intrusive process. More importantly, deciding who has access to the databases - and how that info will be shared - will continue to be a major concern for the government and for privacy advocates.
scotus says passenger can be frisked from ap: The Supreme Court ruled Monday that police officers have leeway to frisk a passenger in a car stopped for a traffic violation even if nothing indicates the passenger has committed a crime or is about to do so. The court on Monday unanimously overruled an Arizona appeals court that threw out evidence found during such an encounter. The case involved a 2002 pat-down search of an Eloy, Ariz., man by an Oro Valley police officer, who found a gun and marijuana. The justices accepted Arizona's argument that traffic stops are inherently dangerous for police and that pat-downs are permissible when an officer has a reasonable suspicion that the passenger may be armed and dangerous. The pat-down is allowed if the police "harbor reasonable suspicion that a person subjected to the frisk is armed, and therefore dangerous to the safety of the police and public," Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said. The case is Arizona v. Johnson, 07-1122.
'behavior detection' experts to boost stuper bowl security from tampa tribune: If an officer asks if you need help on Super Bowl Sunday, he might be more than just gracious. For the first time, the Transportation Security Administration's "Behavior Detection Officers" are enhancing security at the championship event by watching people for combinations of suspicious behavior. "They're trained to do exactly that – pick people out of a crowd," Gary Milano, federal security director for the TSA's Tampa office, said today. These officers don't have the power to arrest but are uniformed behavioral experts, Milano said. The TSA and the U.S. Secret Service trained about 70 Tampa police officers and Hillsborough County sheriff's deputies working the event in their techniques. Milano described them as "telltale signs of people about to engage in wrongdoing" based on the Israeli security system. Each behavior, such as profuse sweating, could be innocent on its own but raises eyebrows when coupled with other behaviors, Milano said. He declined to elaborate.
new orleans terror drills from jan27 to feb8 from katc: The New Orleans Police Department is warning residents not to panic if they see helicopters flying around the city after dark. The department will be hosting military training in and around the city between Jan. 27 and Feb. 8. The training includes the use of military helicopters flying after dark throughout the city. Police say they want residents of New Orleans and outlying areas to know it's a training event. The activities, authorities say, have been carefully planned and are safe.
fema: gustav to be category 5 from ap: The government's disaster relief chief says Hurricane Gustav is growing into a monster Category 5 storm. The storm that hit Cuba Saturday could reach landfall along the Gulf Coast by early Tuesday. Federal Emergency Management Agency chief David Paulison told reporters several times at a briefing Saturday that the storm was strengthening into a Category 5 hurricane.
global hawk may be called for storm duty from sun herald: Something that's being manufactured in part right here on the Coast could forever change the face of hurricane predictions, hurricane monitoring and even hurricane relief. But whether it's detecting land mines in a faraway country or monitoring contraflow in a hurricane evacuation, it's all the same equipment, officials with Northrop Grumman said Wednesday. And if Gustav becomes enough of a threat, the Global Hawk's capabilities might get a hurricane test run.
mandatory evacuations to begin sunday morning in new orleans from cnn: New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin ordered a mandatory evacuation of the city beginning 8 a.m. Sunday but urged residents to consider escaping "the mother of all storms" before then. "You need to be scared," Nagin said of the Category 4 hurricane tearing along Cuba's western coast. "You need to be concerned, and you need to get your butts moving out of New Orleans right now. This is the storm of the century." The city's west bank is to evacuate at 8 a.m.
2. Far from performing incompetently, the Bush administration and reactionary forces in local government were extremely effective in attaining their aims.
Specifically:
1. The Bush administration did an extremely effective job of withholding vital "life and death" information that levees had not only topped, they had also catastrophically collapsed.
2. FEMA did an extremely effective job of discouraging qualified relief workers from coming to the area, going so far as to turn many back at gunpoint. They also turned away much needed supplies like water and fuel and sabotaged local communications lines.
3. Thousands of flood victims were very effectively herded and held in concentration-like conditions within the city for many days after the flooding.
4. Though it claimed to be unable to bring food, water, medicine or transportation into the flood zone, Homeland Security did an extremely effective job of quickly hiring and deploying highly paid gun thugs to the region who were employed by companies that had made massive contributions to the Bush campaign.
5. The Bush administration and their friends in the news media did an extremely effective job of painting the victims of the flooding as dangerous and not worthy of being helped.
6. The Bush administration did an extremely effective job of erasing a carefully researched and thought out evacuation plan developed over many years by LSU and replacing it with NOTHING.
7. Post-flood law enforcement did an extremely effective job of illegally seizing fire arms from hundreds of law abiding citizens while allowing criminals to run amok.
Incompetence? Poor planning? You've got to be kidding....
from ap: Despite more than $22 million in repairs, a levee that broke with catastrophic effectduring Hurricane Katrina is leaking again because of the mushy ground on which New Orleans was built, raising serious questions about the reliability of the city's flood defenses. Outside engineering experts who have studied the project told The AP that the type of seepage spotted at the 17th Street Canal in the Lakeview neighborhood afflicts other New Orleans levees, too, and could cause some of them to collapse during a storm.
from bloomberg: President George W. Bush and the leaders of Canada and Mexico are using a summit meeting today in New Orleans to defend free trade and $930 billion in cross-border commerce against a political backlash. It won't be easy. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon have each made lowering trade barriers, cutting regulation and supporting the North American Free Trade Agreement a hallmark of their administrations and will make the case with Bush for those policies.
"All three governments want to push back on the perception that Nafta is a disaster," said Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Council of the Americas, a business-backed group that will meet with the leaders tomorrow. "The overriding political imperative is the support of Nafta." Bush and Calderon reopened the Mexican consulate in New Orleans today, a move they heralded as a sign of both the recovery following Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and of the close economic ties between the two countries." Mexico and the United States are working together to build a future of prosperity and opportunity for people on both sides of the border," Bush said.
fema covered up cancer risks to katrina victims from salon: Last summer, the Federal Emergency Management Agency was publicly shamed when lawmakers revealed the agency, to avoid lawsuits, put off testing trailers used to house Hurricane Katrina victims for formaldehyde, a toxic chemical. Now, documents obtained by Salon show that FEMA also pressured scientists to water down a report on the health risks of formaldehyde. FEMA officials instructed the scientists to omit any references to cancer or other long-term health risks from exposure to formaldehyde in FEMA trailers.
hawaii lawmaker calls for aspartame ban
from khon2: Many popular foods and drinks would be pulled from store shelves under a bill in the state Legislature to ban the sweetener aspartame. While the Food and Drug Administration and many doctors say it's safe, a growing contingent of consumers thinks the additive is dangerous if not deadly. One lawmaker is bringing the debate to the Capitol.
tennessee news report about fight against fluoride
cdc: adults skipping protective vaccinations from ap: Vaccines aren't just for kids, but far too few grown-ups are rolling up their sleeves, disappointed federal health officials reported Wednesday. The numbers of newly vaccinated are surprisingly low, considering how much public attention a trio of new shots - which protect against shingles, whooping cough and cervical cancer - received in recent years.
coal producer pays $20m pollution fine from ap: The country's fourth-largest coal producer, Massey Energy Co., will pay a $20 million fine as part of a settlement with the government over allegations it routinely polluted hundreds of streams and waterways in West Virginia and Kentucky with sediment-filled waste water and coal slurry.
from press tv: Democrat John Edwards gives up his bid to become the next US president, after coming in third in all the nominating contests so far. Edwards is expected to make his formal announcement in New Orleans later today.
An advisor in Edwards' campaign, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the former North Carolina senator will not immediately endorse either of his rivals, Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama, the Associated Press reported. Edwards waged a spirited top-tier campaign as a champion for the middle class in the Democratic nomination race, which is now a two-person competition.
The AP says police have used stun guns and chemical spray to repel protesters, and that "a scuffle" occurred in the City Council chambers. The New Orleans Times-Picayune is live-blogging developments and has published a photo gallery.
The vote is a key moment in a long fight between local activists and preservationists who want the housing renovated, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which seeks demolition. USA TODAY published a feature on the dispute Dec. 13.
video: police taze & chem spray protesters from raw story: Violence broke out in New Orleans on Thursday after police shut the gates of City Hall against protesters who were attempting to enter a City Council meeting that was expected to approve the demolition of 4500 units of public housing. When about 100 protesters broke through, police began using pepper spray and tasers and even engaging in fistfights with the demonstrators.
from propaganda matrix: One year after Hurricane Katrina and the lessons remain painfully clear - the event paved the way for the standard government response to a crisis - sabotage the rescue efforts, dominate and enslave the victims, then reap the windfall from the tragedy.
Katrina was a trial balloon for widespread gun confiscation under the pretext of a crisis. Following the police chief's announcement that nobody would be "allowed" to be armed - re-writing the 2nd amendment in one sentence - police, national guard and private security thugs began confiscating firearms from owners whose homes were completely undamaged and unaffected by the hurricane in the high and dry areas of the city of New Orleans.
The New York Times reported that the only people allowed to keep their guns were the security squads that had been hired by wealthier residents of New Orleans, which was totally misleading because 99% of these thugs were hired by the federal government. A few billionaires with mansions were able to afford the security but the middle class were not. This report gave the impression that the middle class were not being targeted for gun confiscation and so those readers were put back to sleep.
Katrina was another example of what FEMA does best - deliberately sabotages a crisis and leaves people for dead. Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard's memorable emotional plea on Meet the Press went right to the heart of what FEMA were doing.
"We had Wal-Mart deliver three trucks of water, trailer trucks of water. FEMA turned them back. They said we didn't need them. This was a week ago. FEMA--we had 1,000 gallons of diesel fuel on a Coast Guard vessel docked in my parish. The Coast Guard said, "Come get the fuel right away." When we got there with our trucks, they got a word. "FEMA says don't give you the fuel." Yesterday--yesterday--FEMA comes in and cuts all of our emergency communication lines. They cut them without notice. Our sheriff, Harry Lee, goes back in, he reconnects the line. He posts armed guards on our line and says, "No one is getting near these lines."
Why would FEMA make an already terrible situation worse? Because after every purposefully botched rescue effort that is whitewashed as a lack of resources, FEMA get more funding and more power.
The agenda in New Orleans was about privatizing the police state. Although abuses regularly occur, law enforcement are at least supposed to operate within the realms of the constitution, a definition that can be shifted when private mercenaries are hired to dominate the population - as happened in New Orleans where we saw Blackwater security and even Israeli troops pointing guns at American citizens.
In addition to the Israelis, armed Mexican soldiers entered the US for the first time since 1846 to supposedly provide aid. Conditioning Americans to the perception that foreign troops on US soil policing US citizens in times of emergency is normal was one of the outcomes of this alarming precedent.
The Army Times reported that hurricane survivors who wouldn't leave New Orleans were to be treated as insurgents and that combat operations to eliminate them were undertaken. This is where the so-called 'relief' effort was directed towards - treating American citizens like terrorists and hunting them down simply for wanting to stay in their own homes. And once they were caught, FEMA treated evacuees as internees, registering them and giving them ID cards, preventing them from leaving the internment camps.
The deliberate misappropriation of funds for the emergency was evident from the start when the first three organizations on the government recommended donation list were the American Red Cross, Pat Robertson and Bnai Brith. What a choice! The American Red Cross seize on any disaster as a cash cow the first chance they get as we have previously documented.
The US government already has developed technology enabling control and reduction of hurricanes but rather than seeking to use it to help people they are only interested in using it as a weapon. Former Naval physicist Ben Livingston briefed President Lyndon B. Johnson on hurricane control technology 40 years ago.
As Bush fiddled with a guitar in a staged photo-op and his wife called the hurricane 'Corrina' in interviews, the rest of his Neo-Con cheerleading gaggle crawled out of the woodwork to attack the victims of the tragedy.
The statements sent spewing from the frothing mouths of the Neo-Cons again betrayed the fact that they were completely devoid of any rational human feelings or grip on reality.
Barbara Bush said the victims were better off after the hurricane than they were before it.
Tom Delay said being forcibly detained in prison camp facilities was kind of fun.
Glenn Beck, the talk show host, said that hurricane victims were scumbags and saying he hated the 9/11 families.
Immediately after 9/11 when we questioned the official version of events these were the same people who were called us crass, insensitive, and an insult to the family members. Now they were the ones calling the same family members scumbags.
Dick Cheney said the hurricane victims were thankful for what the federal government had done to them.
The bottom line on Katrina is that whether you believe it was all incompetence or part incompetence and part malevolence, the lasting pretext is the same. When a disaster takes place, you have no rights and the federal government can arrest you if you don’t follow their every order.
In creating a permanent state of emergency as the Bush administration has attempted to do, this mandates a pervasive and permanent state of martial law where constitutionally guaranteed rights are suspended and rule by force applies.
The horrific suffering of the residents of New Orleans which continues to this day underlines a basic truth - government can't protect you, won't protect you and has no intention of protecting you.
Katrina was the calling card of the New World Order - misery, suffering, death, authoritarianism, police state and finally the elitists cashing their chips in on the devastation.
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 ap: The Mississippi River rose Monday to levels not seen in Memphis since the 1930s, swamping homes in low-lying neighborhoods and driving hundreds of people from their homes. But officials were confident the levees would protect the city's world-famous musical landmarks, including Graceland and Beale Street, and that no new areas would see any serious flooding. As residents in the Home of the Blues waited for the river to crest as early as Monday night at a projected mark just inches short of the record set in 1937, officials downstream in Louisiana began evacuating prisoners from the state's toughest penitentiary and opened floodgates to relieve pressure on levees outside of New Orleans.
