corbett report: episode175 - the rand corporation exposed

from corbett report: What is a think tank and how can a mere research institution actually shape the society it claims to be studying? Join us this week on The Corbett Report as we head down into the nuclear bunker with the boys from RAND to unearth the secrets of the research institution that has molded our world for the past 60 years.

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the latest corbett report videos:
sunday update - feb13: everything is related
the last word on overpopulation

the latest corbett report interviews:
#286 – aaron james & #287 – alex abella

previous: episode173/174 - inside rand/patriot mythology

corbett report: episode173/174 - inside rand/patriot mythology

corbett report: episode173 - inside the rand corporation
from corbett report: This week on Documentaries That Matter, we feature a recent PrisonPlanet.tv interview with Alex Abella, a Cuban-born journalist and author who was granted access to the archives of the RAND Corporation. The information he uncovered shows how RAND has been manipulating the shadow government for decades and how it has helped shape the New World Order.
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check out the redesigned website of corbettreport.com!

corbett report: episode174 - patriot mythology
from corbett report: Just because the MSM is wrong doesn’t mean the alternative media is right. From spurious quotations to the JFK myth to the “fat Bin Laden” video, join us this week on The Corbett Report as we do a fact check on common misconceptions in the alternative media.
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the latest corbett report videos:
sunday update - feb6: diet, injections & injunctions
film, literature & the new world order: franz kafka's 'the trial'

the latest corbett report interviews:
#283 – bob chapman, #284 – dr. james beck & #285 – maher osseiran

previous: episode171/172 - professional perspectives on water fluoridation/meet rahm emanuel

biowars/envirohealth: vaccines, quakes & secret chemicals

bill gates: 'we must make this the decade of vaccines'*
swine flu stirred profits, but fewer deaths than predicted*
video: sanofi pasteur hired rand to determine how to vaccinate school children*
canadians contract guillain-barre syndrome after swine flu shot from same doctor*

vaccine study retracted as causes of autism remain elusive*
"finish it off so it doesn't suffer":
russian journalist calls for euthanasia of disabled newborns*
dod prepares for climate change as security issue*
simulated volcanic eruptions to block sun*
massive yellowstone eruption days away?*
100s of mostly tiny quakes are rattling yellowstone park*
detectives question climate change scientist over email leaks*
nearly 17,000 chemicals remain corporate secrets –
even the epa doesn't know what they are*
mid-atlantic braces for 'monster blizzard'*

7/30 newspurge: enviro, geo, history, memes, mayhem & police state

envirohealth:
global warming is the new religion of 1st world urban elites*
india widens climate rift with west*
should we geoengineer the climate?*
former belgian mayor crusades against chemtrails*
video: history channel doc validates chemtrails & weatherwars*


geopolitiks:
iran wows to hit israel's atomic sites if attacked*
ehud barak warns iran of possible israeli strike on nuclear facilities*
video: israel indicates a military strike on iran is possible*


history/mystery:
oliver stone: jfk & the unspeakable*
russian navy declassifies cold war close encounters*
govt not even trying to prove ivins guilty for anthrax murders*
fresno-area lawyer not shy about taking on the cia*
the 1st cia assassination: cbs reporter george polk*
illuminati 'vampires', but who's the real sucker?*
can you help support a new 5-part video series on the jfk assassination?*
the corporate roots of auschwitz*
family security matters praises nazi spy reinhard gehlen*
apollo 11 anniversary: "there could have been no man on the moon, russian or american, without nazi know-how"*
how stanley kubrick faked the apollo moon landings: or how i learned to stop worrying & love the lies*
vietnam vets again press veterans admin on agent orange*

media/memes:
matchbox & the 'young warriors': a creepy ad campaign*
aphrodite jones's "michael jackson conspiracy" is a whitewash*
will john travolta renounce scientology?*
dan rather slams the corporate media*

murder/mayhem:
8 killed when van driving wrong way sets off 3-car crash in ny*
iranian plane crashes on runway, 17 dead*
texas mother says devil made her stab & decapitate her baby*
faa probes pilot who strayed into jfk path*
cia code expert found dead on palm springs trail*

police state int'l:
report: bush mulled sending troops into buffalo*
dhs coordinates nle to prevent terrorist attacks with federal, state, local tribal, private sector & international partners*
cuba, US hold joint army drills*
north carolina terrorist ring broken up, seven arrested*
nyc to have cctv in subway by the end of the year*
obama stimulus buys $8m in airport spy cameras*
uk's national id card unveiled*
uk snitches get £500 to spy on neighbours*
US military spy was in wash. antiwar groups, ran their email list*
video: pentagon caught subverting protest group*
video: napolitano reports to cfr on stasi snoop network*


warwhores:
microwave weapon will rain pain from the sky*
pentagon pain ray’s new target: killer geese*
casualties of war, part1: the hell of war comes home*
cia's phoenix program flies again:
rand says bring back afghan assassinations*
'by his own rules: ambitions, successes & ultimate failures of donald rumsfeld ' by bradley graham*
US command considering private security on afghan front lines*
US military to stop releasing militant death tolls in afghanistan*
the washington post's aversion to the word 'torture'*
US military to set up in colombia*

north korea’s nukes: paid for by the US govt

from paul joseph watson: Amidst the cacophony of condemnation from all sides following North Korea’s second nuclear bomb test, there has been no mention whatsoever of how the secretive Stalinist state got its weapons in the first place - they were paid for by the U.S. government. Both the Clinton and Bush administrations played a key role in helping Kim Jong-Il develop North Korea’s nuclear prowess from the mid 1990’s onwards. The hypocrisy being spewed forth from all sides in reaction to today’s news that North Korea tested an underground nuclear device equivalent to 10 times the power of their first test in October 2006 is akin to when the U.S. cited Iraq’s possession of chemical and biological weapons as a reason to invade in 2003, having first checked the receipt of course, since it was Donald Rumsfeld who brokered the deal to supply Saddam with those weapons in the first place. Rumsfeld was also the man who presided over a $200 million dollar contract to deliver equipment and services to build two light water reactor stations in North Korea in January 2000 when he was an executive director of ABB (Asea Brown Boveri). Wolfram Eberhardt, a spokesman for ABB confirmed that Rumsfeld was at nearly all the board meetings during his involvement with the company.

north korea informed US of nuclear test: official*
north korea 'fires more missiles'*
world powerless to stop north korea*
ruling party official: japan should attack north korea*
nuke test only the beginning for north korea, US spooks say*

update1: inside america’s (mock) attack on north korea
from danger room: Even the hawks say there’s not much America can do, in response to North Korea’s nuclear test. But that doesn’t mean the U.S. military isn’t prepping for a war with the Kim Jong-Il regime, just in case. In March, American and South Korean forces teamed up for the “Key Resolve/Foal Eagle” war game. 13,100 troops from outside Korea — and tens of thousands more, already stationed in the country — participated in the massive exercise, which focused on “deploying troops and equipment to Korea in the event of an attack,” according to a military press release. Some U.S. and South Korean commandos made airborne jumps together from a helium blimp; others, from helicopters hovering above the Korea Strait. A third group ran a mock “operation to secure a suspected chemical weapons lab.” Unconventional weapons experts drilled in responding to a simulated strike involving “hundreds of WMD.” Navy helicopter pilots swept for mines, while Marine fighter pilots flew with their South Korean counterparts to “wipe out” simulated enemy aircraft. The Americans and their allies kicked all kinds of butt in the exercise, of course. Other war games, testing out the North Korean scenario, didn’t end quite as cleanly. One ran by The Atlantic in 2005 forecast 100,000 or more dead civilians in the first few days. And that was if the U.S. could assemble the half-million to million troops needed for such an assault; none of the participants thought such a staggering number of troops could be gathered together, given all of America’s military commitments around the world.

update2: state of war between two koreas after armistice ended
from paul joseph watson: A state of war officially exists again between North and South Korea for the first time since the end of hostilities in 1953 following North Korea’s announcement that they would henceforth refuse to abide by the terms of the peace armistice. “The Korean People’s Army will not be bound to the Armistice Agreement any longer,” the official Korean Central News Agency said in a statement today. Any attempt to inspect North Korean vessels will be countered with “prompt and strong military strikes.” South Korea’s military said it will “deal sternly with any provocation” from the North, reports Bloomberg. As we have highlighted, any North Korean attack on South Korea will be countered by the United States, which is allied with South Korea. North Korea is allied with China, and Chinese military forces will support North Korea in any conflict just as they did in the 1950’s before the armistice was signed. North Korea’s renouncement of the peace armistice follows yesterday’s threat by a Japanese ruling party minister that Japan should change the terms of its pacifist constitution in order to conduct cruise missile strikes on North Korea. Meanwhile, Russia has warned that the conflict could go nuclear and has made preparations to safeguard its far eastern regions. An interesting back story to this crisis is the fact that, as we reported in October last year, the RAND corporation has been intensely lobbying the Pentagon to become embroiled in a new war. Although North Korea was ruled out as a target because RAND demanded a bigger conflict, the eventual consequences of a war between the Koreas could lead to a global military confrontation involving Russia and China.

update3: US raises military alert levels in korea as north says 'we are ready for war' in nuclear stand-off
from dailymail: The U.S. and South Korea have raised the military alert levels on the Korean peninsula after North Korea raised the stakes in its nuclear stand-off with the world yesterday. The joint command for the 28,500 U.S. troops that support South Korea's 670,000 soldiers has raised its alert a notch to signify a serious threat from North Korea, the South's Joint Chiefs of Staff said. It is the highest threat level since the North's only other nuclear test in October 2006.

update4: korea at defcon1?

coordinated carnage in mumbai; 145 dead

from danger room: Something horrible is happening in Mumbai. 80 people are dead and 250 injured in a coordinated series of attacks on luxury hotels, train stations, and tourist attractions in India's financial capital. At least seven sites were struck, the Times of India reports. And the death toll could easily climb much higher. 60 lifeless bodies and over 200 injured people were brought to a single hospital, according to DNA Mumbai.

"A little-known group, the Deccan Mujahideen, has claimed responsibility," the AP reports. The strikes "come after a series of blasts attributed to Islamist terrorists over the summer and autumn in other cities around India," the Wall Street Journal notes.

Terrorists "armed with AK-47 rifles and grenades" stormed the "passenger hall" of Mumbai's Chhatrapathi Shivaji Terminus (CST) train station. They "and opened fire and threw grenades," according to Mumbai General Railway Police Commissioner A. K. Sharma. 30 people were injured.

"Firing was also reported at Cama Hospital in south Mumbai, police said, adding that a blast was reported in a taxi under a flyover in suburban Vile Parle," the paper says. "Three persons were killed in a bomb explosion in a taxi on Mazegaon dockyard road and an equal number were gunned down at [the] Taj Hotel."

"Bellboys could be seen rushing the injured out on luggage trolleys," according to DNA Mumbai. The victims "included three senior police officers, including the head of [the state's] anti-terror squad," the Wall Street Journal reports.

More bloodshed could come from the Taj attack. The gun-toting terrorists who hit the landmark hotel also took 15 people, half of them foreigners, hostage on the roof of the luxury Taj Hotel, an escaped hostage tells the Times of India. The attackers, men in their early 20's, honed in on "anyone with British or American passports," an eyewitness said.

Survivors of the attack on the Oberoi hotel told a similar story. A British restaurant-goer tells Sky News television that "the attackers were singling out Britons and Americans."

update1: mumbai attacks to be blamed on pakistan?
from paul joseph watson: Coordinated attacks across Mumbai, India’s financial capital, which have killed up to a hundred people and injured hundreds more, are likely to be blamed on a terrorist organization linked to the Pakistani ISI, providing further justification for controversial U.S. bombings inside Pakistani territory and heightened rhetoric against Pakistan on behalf of President elect Barack Obama...

Journalist Stephen Schwartz notes that several terrorist and criminal groups are “backed by senior officers in the Pakistani army, the country’s ISI intelligence establishment and other armed bodies of the state.” Author Daniel Byman states, “Pakistan is probably today’s most active sponsor of terrorism.”

Indeed,Indian police claimed that the Pakistani ISI directed the July 2006 train bombing in Mumbai which killed 186 people, which was blamed on the Islamist militant group Lashkar-e-Toiba, an organization based in Pakistan. Look for the same organization or an affiliated group to be blamed for today’s attacks.

As Bloomberg reports today, “The government has previously blamed terrorist attacks on organizations linked to foreign powers, without offering evidence or making arrests. Local media often blame the attacks on groups backed by Pakistan or Bangladesh, without identifying the security officials who provided the information.”

With shrill corporate media outfits begging for a scapegoat to be used as war on terror propaganda, it won’t be long before an Al-Qaeda-Pakistan link is claimed. Indeed, early reports already state that the attacks are "thought to be linked to Al-Qaeda," offering no evidence and in spite of the fact that an unknown group, Deccan Mujahideen, has clamed responsibility for the massacre. The Deccan Plateau is a large plateau in India, suggesting this is where the terrorist group was based.

update2: experts doubt al-qaeda link in mumbai attacks
from iht: Global terrorism experts said Thursday they had never heard of the group. And based on its tactics, they said, it was probably not a cell or group linked to Al Qaeda. "It's even unclear whether it's a real group or not," said Bruce Hoffman, a professor at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University and the author of the book "Inside Terrorism." "It could be a cover name for another group, or a name adopted just for this particular incident." Christine Fair, senior political scientist and a South Asia expert at the RAND Corporation, was careful to say that the identity of the terrorists could not yet be known. But she insisted the style of the attacks and the targets in Mumbai suggested that the militants were likely to be Indian Muslims - and not linked to Al Qaeda or the violent South Asian terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba. "There's absolutely nothing Al Qaeda-like about it," she said of the attack. "Did you see any suicide bombers? And there are no fingerprints of Lashkar. They don't do hostage taking, and they don't do grenades." Hoffman agreed that the assault was "not exactly Al Qaeda's modus operandi, which is suicide attacks."

update3: attacks blamed on al-qaeda as pretext for response
from paul joseph watson: The majority of the corporate media has gleefully seized upon the terror attacks in Mumbai to claim that they are the work of “Al-Qaeda,” despite clear and contradictory evidence suggesting otherwise, as a pretext to increase bombing campaigns in Pakistan and beef support for the ailing war on terror in Afghanistan. The swiftness with which the media blamed “Al-Qaeda” was staggering, especially considering the fact that the attacks had not even concluded before the boogeyman was whipped out of the closet once more to act as a poster child for the war on terror and allow the TV networks to show lots of blood, panic and authority figures pointing guns at people. The only claim of responsibility for the attacks came from the “Deccan Mujahideen,” the Deccan Plateau being an area in southern India, but the press, usually breathless to take the first obscure claim of culpability and set it in stone, are now belittling this explanation as a likely hoax in an attempt to pin the blame on the all-mighty mythical Al-Qaeda. “Earlier eyewitness reports from the hotels suggested the attackers were singling out British and American passport holders,” reports the BBC. “If the reports are true, our security correspondent Frank Gardner says it implies an Islamist motive - attacks inspired or co-ordinated by al-Qaeda.” Really? Perhaps the BBC’s “security correspondent” should be worried about his job security, because the facts directly contradict previous alleged “Al-Qaeda” attacks. Since when do Al-Qaeda take hostages? Since when do they hang around to be caught? Since when do Al-Qaeda use grenades rather than bombs or suicide bombs? And if the attacks were targeted against British and American citizens then tell me why, out of at least 101 killed, was there only one British victim?

father & daughter from virginia among the 145 people killed in mumbai
media forced to backtrack on al-qaeda link to mumbai attacks

update: mumbai attack updates: false flag, uk intel ops & questions

police state usa: talking cameras, preemptive war & domestic troops

north hollywood installs 'talking cameras'

from infowars: North Hollywood is going the way of Baltimore, Martin County, and Middlesbrough, England. It has installed “talking cameras,” ostensibly to ward off taggers and people who dump trash. “Los Angeles police are using motion-activated cameras to warn vandals that they’re being watched,” reports WOAI for NBC News. “The motion triggers a recorded voice that states, ‘This is the Los Angeles Police Department. It is illegal to spray graffiti or dump trash here.’ The voice warns vandals that they are being recorded and will be prosecuted. The camera provides a high-resolution image of the tagger and the vehicle. It can capture an image of a license plate from 250 feet.”

gates expands preemptive war doctrine to include nuclear strikes
from wsws: In a remarkable speech on nuclear policy delivered October 28 at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (CEIP), US Defense Secretary Robert Gates painted a dire portrait of international affairs and argued that Washington should expand the doctrine of pre-emptive war formulated by the Bush administration to include possible nuclear strikes. It is widely rumored that, in the likely event that Democrat Barack Obama wins next week's US presidential election, Obama will keep Gates as defense secretary. Gates' speech, given in the waning days of the Bush presidency, has the character of a policy declaration of the next US administration.

the new technology of repression
from consortium news: In its final months, the Bush administration is pressing ahead with a new generation of spy technology designed to strengthen the U.S. military’s ability to detect and eliminate suspected insurgents in Iraq and elsewhere based on computer analyses of their movements and activities. The Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has begun granting contracts to software firms to create algorithms (632kb PDF) that can be applied to the real-time video feeds from drone aircraft so the data can be sorted and stored on a wide range of human activities, from digging a ditch to climbing into a car to kissing someone.

'reorganizing US domestic intel': new report from rand
from homestation: The question of whether the United States needs a new domestic intelligence service that is independent of law enforcement is examined by Greg Treverton of the RAND Corporation in a new report for Congress entitled "Reorganizing U.S. Domestic Intelligence." (1mb PDF)
"One of the questions in the fight against terrorism is whether the United States needs a dedicated domestic intelligence agency separate from law enforcement, on the model of many comparable democracies. To examine this issue, Congress directed that the Department of Homeland Security perform an independent study on the feasibility of creating a counterterrorism intelligence agency and the department turned to the RAND Corporation for this analysis but asked it specifically not to make a recommendation."

2 more combat units assigned to homeland brigade
from paul joseph watson: Northcom has announced that two more U.S. military units will be assigned for domestic homeland security missions, bringing the total number of combat ready service members operating inside the U.S. to around 4,700, as fears grow about the increasing militarization of law enforcement. The announcement follows the controversy surrounding a September 8 Army Times report (revised on September 30), which revealed that the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team, fresh from combat duties in Iraq, would be operating inside America for tasks including “civil unrest and crowd control,” a detail that was later denied by Northcom despite the concession that forces would be armed with both non-lethal and lethal weapons as well as having access to tanks. “In the next three years the military plans to activate and train an estimated 4,700 service members for specialized domestic operations, according to Air Force Gen. Gene Renuart, commander of U.S. Northern Command, which was created in 2002 for homeland defense missions,” reports the Colorado Independent.

US border police arrest mexican troops
from reuters: U.S. border police arrested seven Mexican soldiers after they accidentally strayed over the international boundary into Arizona, authorities said. The U.S. Border Patrol said agents encountered the troops in a Humvee a short distance north of the border near Yuma, in far west Arizona, early on Friday. "The Border Patrol agents on scene established a dialogue with the subjects, who identified themselves as members of the Mexican military," the Border Patrol said in a news release. "The ... agents informed them of their presence within the United States. Upon notification, the subjects were peaceably taken into custody," it added.

at&t to try limiting subscribers' data use, too
from latimes: AT&T Inc. customers who obsessively play World of Warcraft while downloading dozens of movies: Your days of online impunity may be numbered. AT&T has joined the ranks of telecommunications companies that are exploring the idea of limiting the amount of bandwidth that subscribers can use each month. The company began this month to apply such limits, testing the policy first in Reno. Subscribers to AT&T's slowest Internet service there will be limited to downloading 20 gigabytes of data per month. Those who subscribe to the fastest plan will be able to download as much as 150 gigabytes per month. Anyone who goes over the limit will pay $1 per extra gigabyte of data downloaded.

US military urged to revise tarnished 'brand'

from reuters: Like the maker of an out-of-favor car or sneaker, the U.S. military needs a new "branding" campaign to earn civilian support in Iraq, Afghanistan and other hot spots, a report for the Pentagon said on Tuesday.

"We will help you" could be the pitch, said the 211-page survey by RAND, a nonprofit research group that carries out many studies for the DoD.

It said the U.S. military "brand" had been tarnished by, among other things, images of Abu Ghraib prison; the U.S. military detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; and post-invasion gaps in getting Iraqi civilians electricity and clean water.

U.S. forces should heed product "positioning" and branding lessons from such consumer-savvy powerhouses as Lexus, Ritz-Carlton hotels and Nike, said the report.

The study was ordered by the U.S. Joint Forces Command, which helps steer military modernization.

"It's not just a matter of putting the right 'spin' on U.S. military actions," said Todd Helmus, a behavioral scientist and the report's lead author. "It's synchronizing what we say with what we do."

Since before World War II, the military has developed a mystique based on brute force, said the study, titled "Enlisting Madison Avenue: The Marketing Approach to Earning Popular Support in Theaters of Operation." (1.4mb PDF)

"Like commercial firms that must update unattractive brand identities, so too should the United States consider updating its military's brand identity to suit current and future operational environments," the report said.

The use of "brute force has hindered operational success in both Iraq and Afghanistan," it said.

In Afghanistan, NATO and U.S.-led coalition forces have been criticized for a surge in civilian casualties and Afghan President Hamid Karzai has warned that patience with foreign troops is wearing thin.

The report's research is based on interviews with current and former practitioners from military public affairs, civil affairs, information operations and psychological operations, as well as with 25 marketing professionals in business and academia.

Its recommendations could apply to peacekeeping-style operations as well as wars.

The "we will help you" line is the brainchild of Keith Reinhard, chairman emeritus of DDB Worldwide, a leading global advertising agency, the report said.

"It is a promise that can be kept," the authors said. "And because it positions the United States as a partner of indigenous populations, it does not usurp their authority, dignity or responsibility."

Helmus said in a telephone interview that "We will help you" was just an example of a potential branding concept rather than a RAND Corp. recommendation.

The Norfolk, Virginia-based Joint Forces Command will use the study to explore possible responses to "current urban challenges," said Duane Schattle, director of the command's Joint Urban Operations Office.