What Is ObamaCare?

April 11, 2012

Activist Post

By Paul Craig Roberts

Growing up in the post-war era (after the Second World War), I never expected to live in the strange Kafkaesque world that exists today. The US government can assassinate any US citizen that the executive branch thinks could possibly be a “threat” to the US government, or throw the hapless citizen into a dungeon for the rest of his or her life without presenting any evidence to a court or obtaining a conviction of any crime, or send the “threat” to a puppet foreign state to be tortured until the “threat” confesses to a crime that never occurred or dies at the hands of “freedom and democracy” while professing innocence.

It has never been revealed how a single citizen, or any number thereof, could possibly comprise a threat to a government that has a trillion plus dollars to spend each year on security and weapons, the world’s largest navy and air force, 700 plus military bases across the world, large numbers of nuclear weapons, 16 intelligence agencies plus the intelligence agencies of its NATO puppet states and the intelligence service of Israel.

Nevertheless, air travelers are subjected to porno-scanning and sexual groping. Cars traveling on Interstate highways can expect to be stopped, with traffic backed up for miles, while Homeland Security and the federalized state or local police conduct searches.

I witnessed one such warrantless search on Easter Sunday. The south bound lanes of I-185 heading into Columbus, Georgia, were at a standstill while black SUV and police car lights flashed. US citizens were treated by “security” forces that they finance as if they were “terrorists” or “domestic extremists,” another undefined class of Americans devoid of constitutional protections.

These events are Kafkaesque in themselves, but they are ever more so when one considers that these extraordinary violations of the US Constitution fail to be overturned in the Supreme Court. Apparently, American citizens lack standing to defend their civil liberties.

Yet, ObamaCare is before the US Supreme Court. The conservative majority might now utilize the “judicial activism” for which conservatives have criticized liberals. Hypocrisy should no longer surprise us. However, the fight over ObamaCare is not worth five cents.

It is extraordinary that “liberals,” “progressives,” “Democrats,” whatever they are, are defending a “health program” that uses public monies to pay private insurance companies and that raises the cost of health care.

Americans have been brainwashed that “a single-payer system is unaffordable” because it is “socialized medicine.” Despite this propaganda, accepted by many Americans, European countries manage to afford single-payer systems. Health care is not a stress, a trauma, an unaffordable expense for European populations. Among the Western Civilized Nations, only the richest, the US, has no universal health care.

Click here for the report.

Birther Controversy: Feds Refuse To Release Obama Draft Card

March 29, 2012

Info Wars

By Steve Watson

“Is it time to impeach this president.” –KTRN

A request for original documents by a group investigating the eligibility of president Obama has been turned down by The Selective Service System in a move that is sure to court more controversy.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, leader of the probe into the authenticity of the now notorious Obama birth certificate, announced earlier this month that he had cause to believe that Obama’s Selective Service registration form was also a forgery.

Arpaio asked for a response from the federal agency within 30 days on whether or not it will provide a hard copy of the original document.

The Selective Service System has now replied to the request with a three-sentence letter from the office of Selective Service Director Lawrence G. Romo.

“This Agency has no evidence that President Obama’s 1980 registration is not authentic,” wrote Richard S. Flahavan, associate director of public & intergovernmental affairs.

“However, if you have any credible evidence to the contrary and believe that a Federal crime has been committed, we suggest that it be turned over immediately to the Federal Bureau of Investigation to pursue,” the letter concluded.

Click here for the full report.

US Subjected Manning To Cruel, Inhuman, Degrading Treatment, UN Torture Chief Concludes

March 14, 2012

TruthOut

By Jason Leopold

“Someone should give Bradley Manning a medal of courage. Instead, he gets tortured by the United States.” –KTRN

The United States government subjected Bradley Manning to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment following his arrest in May 2010 in Iraq on suspicion of leaking hundreds of thousands of secret State Department cables and other documents to WikiLeaks, the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Torture concluded in a long-awaited report.

In an addendum to a report presented to the UN General Assembly on the protection of human rights, Juan Méndez wrote that “imposing seriously punitive conditions of detention on someone who has not been found guilty of any crime is a violation of his right to a physical and psychological integrity as well as his presumption of innocence.”

Méndez told The Guardian UK Monday, “If the effects in regards to pain and suffering inflicted on Manning were more severe, they could constitute torture.”

Spokespeople for the State Department and Department of Defense did not return calls seeking comment. Last year, PJ Crowley was forced to resign from his position as a State Department spokesman for publicly condemning Manning’s treatment, which he characterized as “ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid.”

Méndez said during a Firedoglake book salon I hosted last year he became concerned about Manning when he started to hear reports about that the Army intelligence officer was being held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day for nearly a year at the brig at Marine Corps Base Quantico and forced to strip naked.

Méndez, who spent 14 months investigating Manning’s treatment, accused US government officials of using harsh tactics, such as solitary confinement, to punish Manning “in an effort to coerce him into ‘co-operation’ with the authorities for, allegedly for the purpose of persuading [Manning] to implicate others.”

Méndez stressed in his report that “solitary confinement is a harsh measure which may cause serious psychological and physiological adverse effects on individuals regardless of their specific conditions.”

“To the Special Rapporteur’s request for information on the authority to impose and the purpose of the isolation regime, the [US] government responded that the prison rules authorized the brig commander to impose it on account of the seriousness of the offense for which [Manning] would eventually be charged,” Méndez’s report says.

Click here for the full report.

12 Facts About Super PACs That Will Blow Your Mind

February 24, 2012

The American Dream

By TAD

“Another clear example at Super Pac nonsense can be seen with what Steven Colbert and John Stewart have done. The Super Pac rules are a joke.” –KTRN

In American politics, it takes an enormous amount of money to win campaigns, and the rise of the “Super PACs” is allowing the wealthy to exert even more influence over the political process than they did before.  When you examine the results of federal elections over the past several decades, you quickly discover that the candidate that raises the most money almost always wins.  Wealthy individuals are limited by law as to how much money they can give directly to a political campaign, but there are no limits on how much money they can give to Super PACs.  During the 2012 election season, some of these Super PACs actually have more money than the campaigns of the candidates that they support do.  Buying the vote is not illegal in America, and these Super PACs are buying huge amounts of advertising in key states.  Unfortunately, most Americans have never learned to think for themselves.  Instead, they let the television do much of their thinking for them.  If their trusted friend, the television, tells them to vote a certain way, then that is what they are likely to do.  Super PACs are much more likely to run negative ads than the actual candidates are, and we have already seen very negative ads dramatically move the poll numbers in some of the states.  Sadly, as long as very negative ads keep working people are going to keep using them.

Super PACs are supposed to be completely and totally “independent” of the campaigns that they support, but the reality is that many of these Super PACs are run and staffed by former top aides of the candidates.

Some of the candidates are relying on the Super PACs to be the “attack dogs” while they sit back and try to maintain a more “positive” image.  If a Super PAC goes too far, a candidate can simply claim that he does not have any control over that Super PAC.

If money did not influence elections, then people would stop giving so much of it to the campaigns and to the Super PACs.  The truth is that money does influence elections, and when wealthy individuals and big corporations are allowed to pour millions upon millions of dollars into these Super PACs it gives them a much, much larger say in the outcome of our elections than you and I have.

Click here for the full report.

15 Ways Politics Steals Our Energy

February 23, 2012

Activist Post

By Dylan Charles

“This is an interesting article – especially after we just had the fifth millionth GOP debate.  Talk about a waste of energy.”  –KTRN

From grade school on we are taught to appreciate the American government and its civic processes as the cornerstone of freedom in the world, the ‘shining beacon on the hill.’ We are taught how to pledge allegiance to and revere a flag. We are told that goodness will prevail if we all just participate heartily and enthusiastically, playing by the rules.

We grow up believing that a basic responsibility of being born a human on planet earth is to participate in all of this political activity, and likewise, we are taught that non-participation is irresponsible, lazy, deplorable even. And so as good citizens do, many of us participate.

So, perhaps you’ve donated money to a political campaign or ran for public office. Maybe you’ve staffed for a political party or organized at the grass roots level. Maybe you’ve even joined the electoral process as a delegate, gone to your County or State convention, or just showed up with signs at the polls. Perhaps you’ve written your Congressman once or twice.

But is all this frenzy of well-intentioned activity doing our society any good or providing hope for a better future for our posterity?

Is it possible that our electoral system is cleverly designed to exhaust our positive, community-minded energies and to pacify our violent human will to live the prosperous and peaceful lives we deserve?

Could it be that the resources and energy we have applied to this social mechanism have been squandered in one of the greatest opportunity costs of all time?

Actually, when looking at politics as a drain on society, it becomes rather easy to conclude that we may be indeed wasting our greatest potential for societal progress in this endless game of ego satiation and public parade. Furthermore, it appears that the hidden costs of our political efforts have been quite vast, and have had many detrimental effects to our collective psyche and identity.

Consider this:

Politics devours time, energy and resources that could be spent elsewhere.

Politics creates widespread division amongst the populace by providing us with few choices and then positioning those choices as mutually exclusive enemies.

Politics nullifies the value of society’s potentially most effective members by forcing passionate, community-oriented individuals into a rigid arena that demands conformity and ultimately defers to entrenched power cliques.

Politics falsely empowers the thoughtless by providing an arena for people to believe they are positively impacting the world by simply pressing a button or checking a box when told to do so.

Click here for the full report.

Hey Rick Santorum, What’s The 4th Amendment?

February 23, 2012

We Are Change

After reminding Rick Santorum that he said he doesn’t agree that the Patriot Act violates the 4th Amendment, Luke Rudkowski of We Are Change asks Rick Santorum to tell us what exactly the 4th Amendment is.

The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution:
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The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

US Government Program Secretly Injected Citizens with Plutonium, Uranium

February 22, 2012

Activist Post

By Anthony Gucciardi

“When people say the government cares about the people, they are obviously misinformed.” –KTRN

In a secret program that is now admitted to be true, the United States government injected unknowing human ‘participants’ with highly toxic plutonium.

It sounds like a bizarre torture scenario that you’d expect to see blamed on illegal terror organizations, but the individuals behind this crime are actually doctors working for the United States government. Disregarding the health of innocent citizens, the government testers were eager to see how unknowing participants suffered as a result of secret plutonium injection.

It began in 1945, when an employee at the Oak Ridge Nuclear Facility was in a car accident. Ebb Cade survived, but was taken in as a human participant in a disturbing study he did not consent to.

It is important to note that this man was a fifty-three-year-old African American, as previous government trials have singled out African Americans and other minorities. The racist sterilization programs occurred between 1929 to 1974 under an admitted eugenics programs that officials claimed were ‘creating a better society’. Most victims were poor, black women who were ‘deemed unfit to be parents’. Individuals as young as 10 were sterilized simply for not getting along with schoolmates or being promiscuous, and many parents were misled into sterilizing their children.

Ebb Cade was taken and bound to a bed with a broken arm and leg, where doctors interviewed him regarding his current state of health. After determining he was in a state of proper health, doctors secretly injected him with 4.7 micrograms of plutonium on April 10th. It is still unknown who exactly ordered the program within the U.S. government, as they have managed to disassociate themselves with the entire nefarious program.

At the time of the injection, scientists were perfectly aware of the negative effects associated with radiation. With cancers and radiation sickness on the rise, these scientists knew exactly what they were doing — examining the effects of plutonium isotopes on living beings.

Prior to the tests on Cade, the scientists injected animals with plutonium and noted the severe adverse effects. In some cases, animals were even fed radioactive waste. In fact, one scientist received a face full of gas and required his stomach to be pumped along with a full face scrub in an attempt to eliminate the threat. The scientists made sure that they were given the full treatment after the exposure. Meanwhile, they were injecting individuals with plutonium.

Click here for the full report.

Obama Fights To Keep Unconstitutional Warrantless Wiretapping Powers

February 21, 2012

Activist Post

By Madison Ruppert

“Didn’t Obama run on a platform of change? Apparently not.” –KTRN

So much for change. The Obama administration is continuing their efforts to go back on every single campaign promise, and beyond all odds make themselves look even worse than the administration of George W. Bush.

Personally, I didn’t think such a thing was possible, but with the extrajudicial killing of Americans, refusal to explain why they think they can engage in such activities (multiple times, no less), the passing the radically un-American National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 (NDAA), and so much more, Obama is doing a great job at proving me wrong.

Now to continue this trend, Barack Obama has instructed the Justice Department to defend the warrantless wiretapping policy first introduced under George W. Bush.

In response, just last week the Department of Justice filed papers with the Supreme Court seeking to overturn a decision from an appeals court which allowed a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to continue.

This suit challenged the constitutionality of a law passed in 2008 which gave the American government what had previously been an unprecedented amount of power to snoop on American citizens without any semblance of probable cause.

Click here for the full report.

The Only Thing Governments Have Done Song

February 20, 2012

UTOPIA or BUST

A US Government Program Secretly Injected People With Plutonium

February 15, 2012

Io9

By Esther Inglis-Arkell

“Yes, this program was conducted in the 1940s.  But, if they did something this sinister back then, who’s to say they aren’t financing similar or worse programs now?”  — KTRN

The horrors of the nuclear age, in terms of exploding reactors and nuclear bombs, are well known. Behind the well-publicized threat of mass death lies a secret history of nuclear projects being used to destroy individuals. In the late 1940s, United States citizens were injected with plutonium without their knowledge.

In early 1945, Ebb Cade, a worker at the Oak Ridge Nuclear Facility, got into a car wreck. He survived, but was bed bound with a broken arm and a broken leg. When doctors interviewed him, they ascertained that the fifty-three-year-old African American man was otherwise perfectly healthy, eating well, drinking well, and had no history of serious illness. And so, having obtained a healthy subject, on April 10th his doctors secretly injected him with 4.7 micrograms of plutonium. Who exactly ordered the injection, and who exactly administered it, has never been determined, with the most likely candidates all contradicting each other.

What is certain is that no one administered the dose for the man’s health. Although radium was still being touted by unscrupulous companies to the masses as a health tonic, enough people had gotten cancer and radiation sickness that any scientists knew that radiation was bad news. Since the beginning of the Manhattan Project, tests had been done to see how plutonium isotopes affected living beings. Animals had been fed and injected with the element, and their subsequent health problems were noted. When a scientist working on separating isotopes of plutonium had gotten a face full of gas, his stomach was pumped, to get out any plutonium he had swallowed, and his face was thoroughly scrubbed.

Click here for the full report.

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