Saturday-Sunday, July 30-August 01, 2005                                               The Daily Battle Against Subjectivity
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PODCAST July 30, 2005

Signs of the Times
Commentary

The world as seen from around the kitchen table

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In our latest podcast, (left to right) editors Henry See, Scott Ogrin, and Joe Quinn discuss the latest on the second round of London Bombings with an update on the London Bombings of 7/7.

We also discuss the global implications of the so-called "War on Terror" and the motivations behind the attacks.

Below are some of the articles cited so that you can read the material yourselves.

Next show we'll be interviewing Laura Knight-Jadczyk, author of seven books, including the groundbreaking new book The Secret History of the World and How to Get Out Alive and The Wave.

If you have any questions for Laura or the Signs Team, write us at:

Israel - The Source Of Atrocities
By Ted Lang
7-27-5

It is why they so desperately need "hate crimes" legislation, and an "Anti-Defamation League" to defame anyone who opposes their racist crimes of apartheid and genocidal mass murder. It is why they require and consistently rely on the best intelligence organization in the world, which, when it partners with our own CIA, creates the false flag operations necessary to incite Americans to war, and which has also resulted in the total destruction of our basic human freedoms via the USA PATRIOT Act. The terrorist acts perpetrated against US and the slaughter of over 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001, was just such an operation.

Human lives mean absolutely nothing to these sociopathic, lying, conniving psychopaths. They have bribed and bought the loyalty of virtually every member of Congress, both in the Senate and the House of Representatives. They have annexed Washington, D.C. and rendered it a mere suburb of Tel Aviv. They control the White House. They have taken over and commandeered our own Pentagon, and conspired and arranged to have our own military fight wars selected and deemed necessary by their vicious, cruel and inhumane government. They call themselves "Israel," yet another atrocity, this one an historical and sacrilegious falsehood directed at the Old Testament.

As perceived enemies of the Bush regime draw near to expose the latter's disloyalty, lies, treason and its collaboration in false flag operations to ignite wars orchestrated by Israel, Zionists will smear, whine, deny, flee, bribe, discredit, blackmail and conceivably even kill to avoid both the exposure of their conspiratorial activities as well as the resultant total elimination of their influence. Should Americans ever find out precisely what happened on 9-11, their power will be forever neutralized and they will eventually be totally destroyed. Yet the truth will set US free!

Israel's primary mission here is to protect the criminal regime of President George W. Bush. It is Bush and his support from Congress that is directing our youth to fight and die for Israel, the ploy being that once "our ally" gets total control of the Middle East, oil accessibility will be a "cakewalk." Nonsense! When our troops were running low on ammunition, Israel offered ammunition they acquired free from the American taxpayer - but for a price! Israel is not our ally - Israel is now America's most dangerous enemy!

Israel, and more to the point, Zionism, is indeed the tool of the Illuminati. And we're not talking about Dan Brown's [Angels & Demons - The Da Vinci Code] ancient Illuminati cult - we're talking about the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission, Bilderberg, Skull and Bones, Thule Society, etc. The Rothschild-Rockefeller international bankers plotting the New World Order have acquired untold wealth by orchestrating wars, thereby generating the enormous military spending on the part of the belligerents for whom they provide funding. A World War III would fit quite nicely into their plans for the human race; the United States of what?

So, as Bush enemies approach, Zionism strikes! Congressman John Conyers' inquiry into the Downing Street Memo was crushed by the usual charges of "anti-Semitism" from the usual anti-think/pro-Israel shills, schmucks and schlocks. The domination of our corporate establishment mainstream media by Zionists and dual-loyalty Jews supports the ring of protection the Bush regime needs to conduct its war crimes against humanity. This is why there was little or hardly any mention of the Memo in the MSM. This is why there's no journalistic follow-up on the AIPAC scandal or the White House/Washington pedophile ring.

As acts of conspiracy are uncovered distractions and smears will increase. No sooner had I pointed this out and the London bombings followed. And as I also pointed out afterwards, there was Israel again, smack, dab in the middle of things along with Benjamin Netanyahu. When terrorism strikes, can Israel and its Mossad be far away?

Now we learn that we have a "shoot-to-kill" policy on the part of London police; and where did they learn such brutal, cold-blooded techniques in unjustly and violently terminating human life? From the "experts" of course: Israel!

These are the same "experts" who encouraged US to ignore all international laws and moral standards, precisely as they have, to commit torture and atrocities against both POWs and rounded-up civilians. These are the "experts" who taught US how to use female interrogators to sexually humiliate Muslims so they no longer wished to return to their homes and people. These are the demolition "experts" who have crushed people and homeowners to death while they were still inside their homes using huge D9 Caterpillar bulldozers, and killing old people and those on crutches who were unable to evacuate in a timely fashion.

These are the same world-renowned demolition "experts" who planted explosives in Larry Silverstein's leased buildings: the WTC towers and Building 7. They are the ones who took such pride in their handiwork that they danced in the streets, hooted, and high-fived each other celebrating when the towers collapsed killing 3,000 of our own with our government's help. They laughed while we died. And they are laughing still. They are Israel.

 

Murder of Charles de Menezes - Classic Psychological Operation
SOTT

Trauma - an emotional wound or shock that creates substantial, lasting damage to the psychological development of a person.

A report in today's UK Guardian newspaper tell us:

Brazilian did not wear bulky jacket

Relatives say Met admits that, contrary to reports, electrician did not leap tube station barrier

Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian shot dead in the head, was not wearing a heavy jacket that might have concealed a bomb, and did not jump the ticket barrier when challenged by armed plainclothes police, his cousin said yesterday.

Speaking at a press conference after a meeting with the Metropolitan police, Vivien Figueiredo, 22, said that the first reports of how her 27-year-old cousin had come to be killed in mistake for a suicide bomber on Friday at Stockwell tube station were wrong.

"He used a travel card," she said. "He had no bulky jacket, he was wearing a jeans jacket.

the original reports that de Menezes was wearing a bulky jacket, failed to respond to police instructions and jumped the tube turnstiles all came from the Metropolitan police themselves and now appear to be completely false, or rather, they deliberately lied to cover their collective ass. So what then is the truth of this most disturbing incident? Well, let's look at a case history.

On January 30, 1972, soldiers from the British Army's 1st Parachute Regiment opened fire on unarmed and peaceful civilian demonstrators in the city of Derry, Northern Ireland. The marchers were demanding equal civil rights in terms of housing, jobs and education for the marginalised nationalist (Irish) population of Northern Ireland. The resulting death toll reached 13 with a number of others wounded. Among the dead were a 17 year old boy and a 65 year old man, most of the victims were shot in the back.

In the years since the atrocity, debate has raged about who to blame for the murders. Naturally, the British government initially carried out a whitewashed inquiry which exonerated the paratroopers and their CO and accepted the soldier's claims that they only responded after coming under fire. Since then, these claims have been proven to be false. A rather less biased inquiry was opened on 3 April 1999 in order to assess new information that had since come to light and is ongoing. The best result that can be expected from the inquiry is that it will rule that the British soldiers were to blame and that due to lack of discipline or the tension of the day or unknown variables, the soldiers lost control and simply opened fire indiscriminately. Most people will probably accept this as closure on the event. Such a ruling however, will leave the truth untold.

The British Paratroop regiment is acknowledged as one of the best trained and most disciplined of the British military. For this reason the idea that such a group of trained killers would arbitrarily and en masse disregard specific orders and fire on clearly unarmed civilians is hardly believable. The only reasonable explanation therefore is that the soldiers were acting on specific orders when they gunned down thirteen people that day - orders that, more than likely, originated in the psychological warfare department of the British military. Simply stated, the aim of such brutality towards the civilian population was collective psychological traumatisation, not only of those directly involved in the march, but also the wider nationalist population of N. Ireland who shared the aspirations of the marchers.

To this end, the operation was more or less successful, with the nationalist population of Northern Ireland left reeling from such apparently state-sponsored savagery in response to legitimate and reasonable demands. A possible secondary or parallel objective was to force the resurgent IRA into an organised campaign of paramilitary resistance to the British presence and stranglehold on the Northern Irish statelet, which is in fact what resulted. Lest we forget, from a military-industrial complex point of view, and despite the beliefs of the average citizen, war is desirable and good business practice. Military budgets must be justified after all.

Coming back to the murder of Charles de Menezes by British special forces on a London train last Friday; in the absence of any valid justification for the killing of this innocent man and taking into consideration that the Metropolitan police have now been exposed as having lied about the details of the murder, the only reasonable explanation is that this was a case of pre-meditated state-sponsored murder, designed to send a clear, if subliminal, message to the British public that they really should be afraid, and the "terrorist threat" may well be the least of their worries.

It is in the deliberate emotional traumatisation of the general public that governments find their greatest resource for the shaping of public opinion and the forcing through of policies which, under normal circumstances, would be immediately and intuitively rejected by the public.

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Has anything said by the London police been true?
Xymphora

Yet another (!) cousin of Jean Charles de Menezes has weighed in on his execution, and states that he was not wearing a bulky coat, but just a jean jacket, and did not leap the subway turnstiles (these are issues which could and should be answered by the release of CCTV tapes). If he wasn't wearing a bulky coat, and wasn't identified as one of the terror suspects when he left his flat, British authorities are left with no good reason for treating him as a terrorist, and in particular as somebody who could be subject to summary execution.

Letting him get on a bus if they thought he was a potential suicide bomber makes no sense, and then later deciding he needed to be executed in the Israeli style makes even less sense. All the emphasis on Israeli training seems to be misdirection, as they did not follow any of the logic of the Israeli approach. The Israeli method is supposed to permanently incapacitate the bomber before he can do any damage. It is also supposed to protect the police by using a long-distance shot.

Instead, the London police gave him a great deal of time to set off his bomb (after giving him a whole bus ride on which to do so), forced him into an area where the bomb would do more damage, fired shots at close range where the police would be in danger, fired shots that had the danger of setting off the bomb, and fired too many shots if the intent was simply to kill him. If they were learning from the Israelis, they didn't learn very well. The only fact which reconciles their allowing him on the bus, but later shooting him at such close range, is that they knew he in fact didn't have a bomb. If they knew he didn't have a bomb, what was their motive in executing him?

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No Video of the 3 Bombers Inside the London Subway Cars before they blew up?

by Dick Fojut
July 25, 2005
GlobalResearch.ca

Editor's note

At present, the London underground has an analogue video network and video transmission at 180 stations. Confirmed by new reports, there are close to two thousand video cameras which monitor London's Underground and mainline rail stations.

It is estimated that "the average Briton is caught on various cameras up to 300 times on a normal day." (The Age, 8 July 2005).

The key issue raised in this commentary refers to videocameras inside the underground carriages. In most European metro systems, the trains are equipped with a videowatch installation, with video cameras inside each carriage. The driver of the train is able to see inside each of the carriages, and the digital video files would be available to police investigators.

EVERY London bus and Underground train car has multiple Video Cameras!

The Police claim the bus videos malfunctioned, but made no similar claim about the video cameras in the Underground train cars. The Muslim men are claimed to have ridden from Luton to King's Cross where they split up to take separate trains. I've also read it takes about 25 minutes to ride from Luton station to where the bombs were detonated.

Therefore, there MUST be some 25 minutes continuous video of first four men, riding from Luton, then video of each (supposed) "Muslim" Bomber, seated with his rucksack on each of the 3 separate Underground cars, riding from King's Cross - to where the 3 bombs exploded SIMULTANEOUSLY!

If the London Police CANNOT produce those videos they SHOULD possess, the accused 4 men, 3 supposedly with rucksack bombs, were NOT on the Underground train cars, did NOT detonate bombs! And the Police are LYING.

The 3 young men from Leeds apparently were innocent "patsies" used in a "False Flag" phoney Blair Government instigated "terrorist" attack! They weren't suicide bombers, or deceived dupes. They WEREN'T on the trains!

Instead of 3 falsely accused Muslim "patsies," either unidentified "others" must have carried on and detonated the bombs - OR the bombs were ALREADY concealed under seats, or UNDER the subway cars - and detonated by REMOTE CONTROL!

Comment: On 9/11, the videos from the security cameras were removed. We have yet to see any of them, only an out-of-focus, misdated selection from a security camera in the Pentagon parking lot. Now the missing video game appears to be reoccurring.

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The Myth of the Suicide Bomber
By "impatient"

Why "Suicide Bombing" Must be a Myth and What Purposes it Really Serves 

After reading The Logic of Suicide Terrorism--It’s the Occupation, Not the Fundamentalism by Robert Pape, the main idea that we come away with is that suicide bombers are real, very real indeed. Though we were promised a revelation of the logic, these questions remain: 

  • If the purpose of a suicide-terrorist attack is not to die, but to kill and to inflict the maximum number of casualties on the target society, why do they die? 
  • If the purpose of the suicide bomber is to end the occupation of his country, why is the suicide tactic not as old as war and territorial occupation itself? 
  • If the purpose of the suicide bomber is to end the occupation of his country and to inflict the maximum number of casualties on the target society why are the targets so disparate and scattered, without a clear relation to the occupation? 
  • Why are suicide bombings publicized before any proof is brought by investigation? 

For me these questions underline the illogical nature of suicide bombings. I believe to find logic you have to see the suicide bomber as a fabrication of the Zionists for their own purposes: 

  • To demonize Islam 
  • To make Muslims look stupid, fanatical, and murderous. 
  • To create worldwide terrorism that they can claim has nothing to do with Israel, but everything to do with Islam. 
  • To attack those who think themselves to be allies, but are not, e.g. America, Spain, Britain. 
  • To shift the blame for any bombing Zionists perpetrate onto the Muslims, simply by calling it a suicide bombing. 
  • To control public opinion in favor of Israel as the most grieved victim of terrorism. 
  • To justify apartheid in Israel. 
  • To justify war in the Middle East with the spoils of war accruing to themselves, while the costs are borne by their “allies”. [...] 

Israel Uses the Myth as a Cover to Attack "Allies" 

[Israel uses the suicide bomber myth as a cover] to attack those who think themselves to be allies, but are not, e.g. America, Spain, Britain. 

In 1983 Israel invaded and occupied Lebanon. The US and France had peacekeeping forces in place near the Beirut airport. The US had a naval presence off the coast. Early one Sunday morning, simultaneously, both the French and American Marine barracks were bombed. The story was that a truck had come at high speed through a gate and exploded, killing hundreds of Marines. As the two bombings were simultaneous one wonders why so little is said about the French barracks especially if we are to think there were simultaneous “truck bombs”; it would have been a neat trick. 

Suicide was not mentioned in the original reports, in 1983, but in the twentieth anniversary reports the bombing of the US Marine barracks was said to have been done by a “suicide bomber”, and elsewhere the words “terrorist suicide bombing” were used. So by 2003 a simple bombing had become a suicide bombing. I think that change is significant. 

Using Professor Pape’s logic of suicide terrorism applied to the situation in Lebanon we should wonder why the occupying Israeli force was not targeted rather than the French and Americans who were on the periphery as peacekeepers. Just because a target is handy does not make it strategically worthwhile. If the planning was so tight that simultaneous truck bombs could hit these two marginal targets, why not use that expertise and tonnage to hit the one perfect target? 

The Israelis had prior knowledge of a truck being outfitted to carry a very large bomb but did not warn the Americans.(déjà vu) This was reported by Mossad operative, Victor Ostrovsky in his book By Way of Deception. The odd thing about this story is not that the Israelis neglected to warn the Americans, but that they could even imagine that the Americans would be the target rather than themselves. Why would they think that? The Israelis use the deception of admitting some knowledge as a way of deflecting suspicion away from themselves as perpetrators. In this case the admission of prior knowledge reveals more than disregard, it reveals an inconsistency that makes me believe they were the bombers. 

Israel's Suicide Bomber Myth is an Organic Process With Three Components: Reality, Fantasy and Purpose 

[KingKangaroo:] If Israel did invent the suicide bomb, why did they wait so long to use the tactic at home? 

The invention of a myth does not happen in a meeting of the Knesset, nor does it come out of the imagination of one person or a think tank. It is an organic process that is a mix of reality, fantasy, and purpose

A good example of this organic process is the example I gave earlier of the bombings in 1983 of the US and French military barracks at the Beirut airport. I believe it was Israel that carried out the attacks. The Israelis did not want the US and France to intermeddle in Israel’s attack on the Palestinians who had fled to Lebanon. The US and France were their allies, so an attack could not be seen to come from the Israelis. The bombing was done under the pretense that two truck bombs were detonated simultaneously as they ran into the barracks. Of course the trucks, if there were any, were demolished, and the drivers, if there were any, were blown up. The story of who did the bombing was in the hands of the Israelis who fabricated the whole thing to cover themselves. 

So the Israelis had the purpose to make their meddlesome allies leave. The reality was the bombing, and the fantasy was the fabrication that hid the truth. Today this would be called a “suicide bombing”; in 1983 it was not. You can see that it is only the characterization that has changed, not the action. 

I do not know the event that marks the beginning of the suicide bomber myth. Bombings can be made suicidal retroactively, making it even more difficult to pinpoint its beginnings. One thing I can say with confidence is that it was not an actual suicide that prompted the new formula, but almost serendipitously the Israelis found the suicide twist to their terrorism myth to be very useful.. 

The primary use of the suicide bomber myth is to demonize the Palestinians. Israel had fought three successful wars against the inhabitants of Palestine in 1948, 1967, and 1973. The Palestinians had been disarmed, dispossessed, and forced into refugee camps in Gaza, Jordan, and the West Bank. After 1973 what the Israelis had on their hands was akin to Indian Reservations in the US, but with millions of people in the small territory. This did not satisfy the Israelis who wanted the whole lot to move into neighboring countries leaving Israel to the Israelis. 

The injustice and inequality of this situation was too obvious for the Israelis to pursue their goals without condemnation by the world. It was pathetic to listen to Israelis whine about being threatened by the awful Palestinians who wanted to “push Jews into the sea”. It was necessary to make these rag-tag Palestinians look menacing, dangerous, and fanatical to justify Israel’s continued expansion and relentless punishment of these defeated people. 

Blaming the Palestinians for terrorist actions, like the murder of the Israeli Olympic athletes at Munich, was Israel’s original ploy, but ambitious actions like that were costly and difficult. Gradually the elaborate terrorism of Abu Nidal gave way to the modest but equally effective suicide bomber. The purpose of making the Palestinians look wantonly murderous, unpredictable and fanatical is realized by this myth, justifying all manner of retribution and Israel’s continued expansion. This ogranic process goes on. As we speak, the myth of the Palestinian suicide bomber is taking on its new form in London; as it has in Madrid, Kenya, Tanzania, New York and other farflung places -wherever the [Israelis/Zionists] find it useful. 

The Fairy Tale Blocks Serious Questions 

The moment people stop believing in the suicide bomber fairy tale, the sooner they'll start to ask some serious questions. 

Remember how we all used to believe the holocaust tales? There are all those pictures, all that testimony, all those books written, all those memorials built. It is in textbooks and encyclopedias. It is taught in school. 

Can't we handle the possiblity that the "Islamic fundamentalist, suicide bomber" may also be a lie? We should look at everything with the same skepticism we developed in dealing with the holocaust myth, especially those things that come from the same source. [...]

Treason and the Myth 

[Mariner:] Since the U.S. Intel people know this - IF the Israelis masterminded the bombing of the Marine Barracks - they know it and are engaged in Treason by not making it known. 

A fine example of such treason is the case of the USS Liberty. Knowledge went beyond Intelligence all the way to LBJ who gave the order for the rescuers to turn back. 

The Intifada is Real and Justified, Not to Confuse with the Suicide Bomber Fable 

Of course the Palestinian resistance is real and thoroughly justified. It is the fabricated "suicide bomber" that I seek to discredit. The myth is used to make the Palestinians and Muslims look stupid and effete. It is also the method by which they are set up as patsies for every act of terrorism Israel chooses. The forty foot high security wall replete with guard towers was justified by the myth of the “suicide bomber”. Don’t confuse this cheap fable with the true courage of real people. 

It is Very Hard and Rare to Overcome Survival Instinct and Commit Suicide 

[MrSpock:] The suicide bomber as a fabrication of the Zionists? How? Who dies? 

Muslims, and sacrificial others. Part of what makes the "suicide bomber" preposterous is that no important Jewish target has ever been hit. 

Suicide is absolutely unnatural; it is an aberration in creatures whose instinct is to survive. It is not easy to override that instinct. It is so contrary to instinct that stories of suicide for a cause are few and always make us marvel: the samurai who falls on his sword as penance for a loss in battle, the kamikaze pilot who knows he goes to certain death, the Roman who prefers death by his own hand to the humiliation of being killed by his enemies. There have been Christian and Buddhist martyrs who use suicide as a demonstration of belief and/or protest. All these are distinct from the unwilling martyrdom of dying in conflict. 

The fact that suicide for a cause is so exceptional in our history is one thing that makes me question the burgeoning phenomenon of the “Muslim suicide bomber”. The Japanese Kamikaze pilot is understandable as a cultural phenomenon with roots in the concept of the samurai, but again, this is so exceptional that we look in awe on those whose sense of duty is so strong. Can we find a similar antecedent for this peculiar type of martyrdom among Muslims in these last fourteen centuries, keeping in mind the difference between dying in battle and an intentional suicide? I don't think so. 

Are there any other instances of intentional martyrdom in all our history that have been met with such cruel derision and mockery as the “Muslim suicide bomber” of our time? Doesn’t such a reaction by itself make this case extraordinary? 

That suicide for a cause is anti-instinctual, exceedingly rare, and when found, traceable to its cultural antecedents, makes me very skeptical that hundreds, perhaps thousands, of such cases would spring forth quite suddenly in a people, no matter what the provocation. 

Professor Pape tries to avoid the question of religion in his article because he wants us to think that the occupation of territory in the Middle East is sufficient to cause this phenomenon. It cannot be. And Gabor would like to make the case for Islam as the sufficient cause of suicide bombing, and that cannot be either, for many of those purported to be suicides are not religious. 

As for the Palestinian family whose son or daughter is said to have been a suicide bomber, are they not very much like families everywhere whose children die in battle? They desperately want to see that the death meant something, had some good in it. That is not hard to understand. Also familiar to all are the leaders who praise the dead, speaking of their heroism. It keeps up morale. 

Neither of us has access to evidence for or against suicide bombings and cannot hope to prove anything one way or the other. What I have tried to do is look at it historically, psychologically, and rationally. I stand by my assertion that the “Muslim suicide bomber” is a myth. As you said about the Muslims, “They don't deny the suicide bombers, they are trying to explain it.” I am trying to explain it too, it needs a lot of explaining. 

The Vulgar 72 Virgin Myth [Has No Basis in Islam] 

[Judson:]...[the parents] desperately want to see that the death meant something, had some good in it. That is not hard to understand 

How many times have you heard an American bring up the idea that suicide bombers are motivated by the thought of 72 virgins waiting for them in heaven? What audacious and gratutitous cruelty, how heartless, how vulgar. Is that what they would like to say to the parents of a son or daughter who has been killed in the struggle against the Zionists? And how much more horrible is it to think that they were not suicides but homicides? Americans should keep their smutty fantasies to themselves. 

The Suicide Bomber Never Really Hurts the Enemy 

[grizzle:] No important Jewish target has ever been hit. Kind of like the IRA isn't gunning for the queen and family. 

Not quite. Take the example that is in this morning’s news: 

A suicide bomber blew himself up among a group of teens near a shopping mall in the seaside city of Netanya on Tuesday, killing himself and two others in the second such attack since a truce was declared five months ago. ...The blast went off shortly before 7 p.m. near the Sharon Mall in Netanya. Police said a preliminary investigation indicated the bomber blew himself up among a group of teenagers crossing a busy intersection. 

Unidentified teenagers crossing a street is not an important Jewish target. But this is typical for bombings in Israel. The victims are often not even Israelis, let alone important Israelis. Reports of victims and damage are deliberately vague, merely giving an impression, not facts or pictures. Asian and South American workers, other Palestinians, and what seems to be a favorite target - Russian immigrants are the usual victims. 

After thinking carefully about suicide as a tactic and putting yourself in the place of a person contemplating this ultimate sacrifice – how would you choose a target to make your death worthwhile - useful to force an end to the occupation of your country? Would you blow yourself up in a shopping mall toy store, the entrance to a super market, a bus stop, near a hitchhiking post, in a restaurant frequented by foreigners, outside a shopping mall? It may not be possible to get through the security to hit the Knesset while in session, but surely you could come up with something better than a mall toy store. 

The pathetic nature of the targets reinforces the idea that Muslims are stupid. But for me it reinforces the doubt that Muslims are suicide bombers. 

The Suicide Hijacker--Similar Myth 

[grizzle:] Palestinian vs Israeli is not 9/11 or 7/7. I doubt Muslims were involved in the latter two, unless they were the non-religious CIA shill type. 

I do not believe that Muslims were involved in 9/11, but wasn't the notion of the suicide bomber the direct antecedent of the suicide hijacker? I believe there were no hijackers involved in 9/11. But for all those who buy the hijacker scenario the preparation they have been given to believe that Muslims have no qualms about suicide leads directly to the conclusion that Muslims must be the culprits. 

Palestinian vs. Israeli is not 9/11, 7/7, 3/11, USS Cole, Nairobi, Kenya and Tanzania embassy bombings, the shoebomber, Beslan school, suicide bombings in Iraq, etc. If they are not Palestinian vs. Israeli, perhaps the Israeli part of the equation is what should be examined. The Israelis invented and perpetuate this myth, complete with the bombed-out bus tour of Europe and the US. It is not hard for them to come up with these tales, just think for a moment about the absolutely Byzantine concoctions provided by very ordinary Jews as they manufacture their holocaust tales. 

Muslims Did Not Use Suicide as a Method in Previous Wars 

[MrSpock:] So the person believes that he won't really die, only go "to another place". Isn't that what all religion is all about? Of course it is. Muslims just happened to "activate" this belief in a larger than average percentage. 

Islam has been around for 1400 years. Is suicide a religio-cultural tradition? Looking only at history in the last 150 years can you point to suicide as a method of fighting the enemy? The French experience with Muslim terrorists in Algeria had its bombers, but no suicide bombers. The English experience in fighting the Arabs in 1918 in Iraq was fierce, but no suicide bombers. Israel has been fighting the Palestinians since 1948, where are the Muslim suicide bombers in those years between 1948 and 1985? If it were a religious predilection it would not have made a sudden appearance in Israel within the last twenty years. Islam is a worldwide religion, fighting battles in places far from the Palestinian conflict – before 1985 where were the Muslim suicide bombers outside of Israel? 

In addition, it is the case that many of the so-called suicide terrorists are not religious. How can a religion induce a person to commit suicide with the promise of honor in heaven if that person is not a believer? 

You agreed with my statement “Suicide is absolutely unnatural; it is an aberration in creatures whose instinct is to survive. It is not easy to override that instinct.. But just to add another dimension to our survival instinct, think of what you know about mothers. Is it not the case that protection of her young is primary? It is not difficult for us to imagine a mother who sacrifices herself for her child, we can understand that. But can we imagine a mother of two small children ready to commit suicide for a cause? A mother would not have the inducement of “72 virgins waiting on the other side” as Muslim haters mockingly cite. 

Getting involved in a case by case dispute over hundreds, possibly thousands of these reports is not possible for us. I am just not willing to accept at face value the reports of suicide bombers coming out of the Middle East for all the reasons I have discussed. I do not have to present an alternative explanation for every death that has been attributed to a suicide bomber to cast doubt on the stories. It would be akin to disputing the six million figure for the holocaust by examining each of the six million. The story can be undercut in other ways. I have tried to do that. 

Embarrassing Reality Check



Robert Pape
Ph.D., Chicago, 1988
Major Areas of Interest:
Selected Publications:
- The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism" in APSR (2003);
- Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War;
- "Explaining Costly International Moral Action: Britain's Sixty-Year Campaign against the Atlantic Slave Trade" (with Chaim Kaufmann) in International Organization (1999).

Robert A. Pape is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago specializing in international security affairs. His publications include
Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (Cornell 1996), "Why Economic Sanctions Do Not Work," International Security (1997), "The Determinants of International Moral Action," International Organization (1999). His commentary on international security policy has appeared in The New York Times, New Republic, Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, as well as on Nightline, ABC News with Peter Jennings, and National Public Radio. Before coming to Chicago in 1999, he taught international relations at Dartmouth College for five years and air power strategy for the USAF's School of Advanced Airpower Studies for three years. He received his Ph. D. from the University of Chicago in 1988 and graduated summa cum laude and Phi Betta Kappa from the University of Pittsburgh in 1982. His current work focuses on the effect of technological change on conflict and cooperation among major powers and the theory and practice of suicide terrorism.

Impatient says: When suicide terrorism is exposed as a hoax won't all these accolades be a little embarrassing? I mean, really - The Theory and Practice of Suicide Terrorism? I''m afraid it is worse than being an expert in Gender Issues and is right up there with Holocaust Studies. Passé doesn't quite describe how it will look when the truth is known.

Epilogue by Cyte

The Koran states that the punishment for murder is execution unless the survivors waive it. The punishment for suicide is eternal Hell and there is no way out.

I once met a suicide-promoting cleric in an Arab country and listened to him for a while. He was not an Arab, but he wanted to look like one. He spoke like one. He coordinated with local intelligence and the Mossad. And nobody touched him. He talked to young men about suicide. He was a suicide talk trainer. The boys talked about suicide and were all incarcerated, but the Israeli myth of the suicide bomber was born.

I don't think that there are suicide trainers, but suicide-talk trainers. I believe that videos declaring intent to go on a suicide mission are staged under drugs or under torture.

===============
Liberty Forum poster "impatient" presented compelling arguments on this thread that the suicide bomber is a myth and cannot exist in reality. "Impatient" refuted professor Robert Pape's research on the subject. I have only weaved his comments together and added section headings, an epilogue and a few comments between square brackets.
Cyte

Comment: We repeat once again a citation from a report written by elite US army officers at the Army School of Advanced Military Studies that gave the following description for Mossad:

"Wildcard. Ruthless and cunning. Has capability to target US forces and make it look like a Palestinian/Arab act." [Washington Times, September 10, 2001]

Notice the date. We have no doubt that there are many elements in important posts within the US government and military that are horrified by what the neocons are doing. Where many commentators are hoping these Patriotic elements will soon do something about the Bush Reich, we think the history of US intelligence activities doesn't amke that much of a democratic alternative. There have been many countries overthrwn, their leaders assassinated, and their people put into poverty by these so-called Patriotic elements before the neocons tooks over the reins of power.

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The "Magic Bomb" Theory
by Mark Faulk

This is a story about disappearing terrorists, nonexistent bags, and botched investigations, but most of all, this is a story about magic bombs.

It's Crime Scene Investigation 101. It's the basic law of physics. It's so elementary, my dear Watson, that even a dancer who was dazed from the shock of being seated directly over the spot where one of the bombs was planted in the London tube carriage two weeks ago could figure it out.

In a seemingly innocuous article in the British newspaper Cambridge Evening News, 32 year-old dance instructor Bruce Lait, in an interview from his hospital bed, said that "The policeman said 'mind that hole, that's where the bomb was'. The metal was pushed upwards as if the bomb was underneath the train. They seem to think the bomb was left in a bag, but I don't remember anybody being where the bomb was, or any bag."

Read that last part again, very slowly, and let it sink in. "The metal was pushed upwards as if the bomb was underneath the train." "They seem to think the bomb was left in a bag, but I don't remember anybody being where the bomb was, or any bag."

And the British authorities on the crime scene missed that, and just assumed that it was a carry-on bomb? C'mon, how many times have you seen that bad TV show where the eccentric detective figures out that the crime was an "inside job" because the glass was outside the broken window, not inside where it should have been. I repeat: Crime Scene Investigation 101. Basic physics.

While describing the scene, Lait said about he and his dance partner Crystal Main, "Out of that whole carriage, I think Crystal and I were the only ones who were not seriously injured, and I think we were nearest the bomb."

He went on to describe those sitting closest to him and Main when the bomb went off. "I remember an Asian guy, there was a white guy with tracksuit trousers and a baseball cap, and there were two old ladies sitting opposite me." He described the woman whose body was lying on top of him when he regained consciousness as a "middle-aged woman who had blonde curly hair, was dressed in black, and could have been a businesswoman."

Again, play close attention here. "We were nearest the bomb." An Asian guy, a white guy, two old ladies, and a blond businesswoman......and two dancers.

So.....if the bomb was in a bag carried on by the terrorist, how could two dancers be "nearest the bomb"? And why didn't the person who was the closest eyewitness see the bomber, or even ANYONE, sitting where the bomb went off? Why was the metal pushed upwards if the bomb was inside of the train carriage?

Let's put this in perspective, piece by piece:

"The metal was pushed upwards as if the bomb was underneath the train."

"I don't remember anybody being where the bomb was, or any bag."

"We were nearest the bomb."

An Asian guy, a white guy, two old ladies, and a blond businesswoman......and two dancers.

Here we go again. Another terrorist event with more questions than answers, questions that the major media (yet again) aren't even asking.

Hell, I'll even take a stab at answering them:

The metal was pushed upwards because THE BOMB WAS UNDERNEATH THE TRAIN.

Lait didn't remember seeing anyone, or a bag that could be holding a bomb, near the point of detonation because there was no bomber sitting there, there was no bag. THE BOMB WAS UNDERNEATH THE TRAIN.

An Asian guy, a white guy, two old ladies, and a blond businesswoman......and two dancers. There was no Islamic radical, no Mideastern terrorist sitting in that carriage. THE BOMB WAS UNDERNEATH THE TRAIN.

Dance partners Bruce Lait and Crystal Main were nearest the bomb.....again, no Islamic radical, no Mideastern terrorist sitting in that carriage. THE BOMB WAS UNDERNEATH THE TRAIN.

We were praised by some, and criticized by others, for posting an article by Jeff Buckley (entitled "London Calling") the day after the first London bombings two weeks ago that questioned the motives behind the bombings, and that asked readers to view the inevitable "official government response" with a healthy grain of skepticism.

Here's how Jeff so aptly put it:

"So, when you see the headlines dominated by this story and the mounting evidence of lies, deception, and treason being forever pushed to the back burner, be sure to ask yourself, 'Who benefits from this?' Before you throw your support behind administrations that only have doublespeak, deceit, and death to show for their efforts, be sure to ask yourself, 'Who benefits from this?' And, before you allow yourself to be steamrolled and swept away by the inevitable surge of jingoistic retaliatory euphoria, be sure to ask yourself, 'Who benefits from this?'"

"Who benefits from this?"

So here we are, barely two weeks (and another "symbolic" bombing episode) later, and the voices of the Far Right are busy spinning this as yet another excuse for the war in Iraq.....even though the suspected terrorists are Pakistanis. (Sound familiar? The 9/11 terrorists were mostly from Saudi Arabia, so...."Let's bomb Iraq!")

"Who benefits from this?"

Here we are barely two weeks later, and the disciples of doublespeak are busy blaming a group of suicide bombers with carry-on bags, even though those who died are the most unlikely group of "suicide bombers" ever to commit an act of terrorism.

"Who benefits from this?"

Here we are barely two weeks later, and Bush and Company is using the London bombings to.....successfully.....push through the renewal of the Patriot Act. "Screw the Constitution, they're bombing us!"

The official spinmeisters are either ignoring the signs that something is just not right here, or dismissing those of us who are questioning the official response as the usual bunch of fringe conspiracy theorists.

Well guess what? If we don't keep asking the hard questions, and demanding honest, straightforward answers to those questions, then no one will. They've deceived us a million times before, and if honest Americans....and Englanders....don't continue to hold our public officials accountable for their actions and demand the truth, then they will continue to spoon feed us lie after lie after lie....until we eventually all suffocate under the weight of mass deception. And THAT'S the Faulking Truth.

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British boy wrongly labelled as London bomber

Dawn Monitor

AN INTERVIEW of a British teenager broadcast on a Pakistani television network has thrown into doubt investigators’ claims that all the three London bombers of Pakistani descent visited Pakistan last year. According to the investigators, the three bombers had died in the July 7 attacks.

But 16-year-old Hasib Hussain, a namesake of one of the putative bombers and of Pakistani descent, said in the interview that a photograph of a passport purporting to show bomber Hasib Hussain, 19, was his, and not that of the ‘bomber’.

The photo, together with documents showing that Hasib and two other bombers visited Pakistan last year, was published in newspapers on Monday.

“I first saw my photograph on Channel 4 [British TV network) and I was terrified,” Hasib Hussain, the teenager said in the interview with the ARY network on Thursday.

“I didn’t want people looking at me saying ‘hey, you are supposed to be dead’,” he said, “or someone saying that there goes the London bomber.”

On Monday, Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) said Hasib Hussain, carrying a British passport, had arrived in Karachi from Riyadh on July 15 last year.

The father of Hasib (the interviewee) said that the family had indeed visited Karachi last year.

He urged the British and Pakistani authorities to clear up the confusion.

An FIA official told the BBC: “We have nothing to say on the matter at this stage.” —BBC

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British Cops trained in Israel
Michel Chossudovsky | July 25 2005

"Operation Kratos": London Met Police Special Operations Unit "Shoot to Kill"

The cold blooded murder of Jean Charles de Menezes, in the Stockwell underground was no accident. London Metropolitan Police had approved a policy of "shoot to kill":

"a controversial tactic deployed only in the most extreme circumstances but one police have been preparing to use for the last two weeks.".

The shoot to kill policy was undertaken under the auspices of "Operation Kratos", named after the mythical Spartan hero. It was carried out by the London Metropolitan's elite SO19 firearms unit often referred to as the Blue Berets. The latter are described as the equivalent to the US SWAT teams, yet in this particular case, they were not wearing uniforms.


The training of the S019 marksmen was patterned on that of Israel. They had been briefed "by officers who had been to Israel to meet their counterparts there and pick up tips gleaned from the experience of dealing with Hamas bombers".

"During the Kratos briefings, the Met team were told that, contrary to their normal arms training, they should fire at the head rather than the chest. Although the chest is easier to hit, it is not as reliable in causing instant death, giving a bomber a chance to detonate his device.... "(The Scottish Daily Record, 23 July, 2005).

The "Israeli counterparts" refers to Israel's National Police (INP), Shin Bet (the Israel Security Agency) and Israel's Ministry of Internal Security. But the police antiterrorist operations conducted by the INP against Hamas and Islamic Jihad are carried out in close coordination with the Military (Israeli Defense Force) and Mossad. Israel has also collaborated in the training of members of the FBI and the LAPD. Top law enforcement officers of the FBI were trained in Israel under a program sponsored by the The Jewish Institute for National Security.

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Met chief warns more could be shot
Rosie Cowan, Vikram Dodd and Richard Norton-Taylor
Monday July 25, 2005
The Guardian

Britain's most senior policeman remained defiant last night over the new "shoot-to-kill" policy for dealing with suspected suicide bombers, despite the killing last week of an innocent man by armed officers.

Sir Ian Blair, the Scotland Yard commissioner, apologised to the family of Jean Charles de Menezes, the 27-year-old Brazilian who died after being shot five times in the head at close range by police on board a tube train at Stockwell, south London, on Friday.

But he admitted more people could die at the hands of police marksmen in the escalating battle against terrorism. Openly discussing the shift in police tactics for the first time, Sir Ian defended the policy of "shoot to kill in order to protect", saying it was necessary to shoot suspects in the head if it was feared they might trigger devices on their body.

"The Metropolitan police accepts full responsibility for this," he said. "To the family I can only express my deep regrets. What we have got to recognise is that people are taking incredibly fast-moving decisions in life threatening situations. There is no point in shooting in someone's chest because that is where the bomb is likely to be. There is no point in shooting anywhere else if they fall down and detonate it. The only way to deal with this is to shoot to the head."

The block of flats in Tulse Hill, south London, where Mr Mr De Menezes lived, was under surveillance following the discovery of its address in a rucksack containing one of four bombs which failed to explode in the capital last Thursday.

He was followed for several miles by undercover officers. According to eyewitnesses, he bolted after being confronted by armed officers at the tube station, resulting in a chase and him being shot on the train. Mr De Menezes' family branded the police "stupid and incompetent", insisting they had no reason to suspect him.

Alex Pereira, his cousin, said: "He was 100% good guy who never did anything wrong and had no reason to run. What the police have shown is that they are incapable and stupid." [...]


Wakey Wakey!
SOTT

An important note to humanity:

Drop the remote for a minute and listen up. Over the past few years, we have gone to significant lenghts to highlight the fact that for most people on the planet, living what has come to be known as 'a normal life' will soon be untenable. Quite apart from the fact that, since Bush came to power, terror attacks, war, death and suffering, the passing of new draconian legislation and a general aura of fear have all descended like a black pall over most of the world, the past few years has been witness to a seriously sharp rise in the number of reported meteorite sightings and impacts.

What might be the cause of such a spike? Well, we could be forgiven for thinking that it is just that; an innocuous spike that will soon settle down. However, if we factor in historical, geological and paleontological evidence which suggests that our planet has in the past undergone regular cyclical catastrophes that have metoerite impacts (among other natural cataclysms) as their defining aspect, AND that we seem to be overdue for another one, the recent spate of space rocks visiting our planet's skies and surface paints a rather different picture.

It seems more than a concidence also that this rise in near earth comets, bollides and meteorites appears to be occuring in concert with a definite increase in the 'heat' in both political and climatological terms.

The conclusion we draw from this is that events on earth may well be mirrored in the cosmos/solar system, or, as it has been said, "Disasters involve cycles in the human experiential cycle [...] The human cycle mirrors cycle of catastrophe. Earth benefits in form of periodic cleansing. Time to start paying attention to the signs. They are escalating. They can even be 'felt' by you and others, if you pay attention." So if we do NOT want a major bombardment of heavenly bodies, we might all think about waking up to the truth of what is really happening on our planet and the deliberate machinations of the power elite who are aware of such events and are doing everything in their power to prevent you and I from figuring it out.

Meteor seen in Siskiyou skies Tuesday

Wednesday, July 20, 2005
Siskiyou Daily

YREKA - At 2:20 Tuesday afternoon, callers began alerting Yreka police and the Siskiyou County Sheriff's Department to a "fire ball" that had come from the sky and believed to have landed near the city's corporation yard.

A golfer at the Rogue Valley Country Club in Medford, Ore. was getting ready to make a shot off the second tee, when he reported seeing a flaming object with "blue and red flames coming off of it," fall from the sky. That observer thought that the object had fallen somewhere near Shady Cove, Ore.

Callers also contacted the National Weather Service offices in Medford and Roseburg, Ore. to report the sighting.

Fireball Streaks Across Oregon Skies Tuesday

7/19/2005
Koin.com

PORTLAND -- According to the Cascade Meteorite Lab at Portland State University, a fireball streaked across the sky at 2:17 p.m.

The fireball was seen in Portland, Medford and most likely most places in between.

A fireball is a meteorite that has entered our atmosphere and is burning up. Most times it burns up totally before hitting the ground but once in a while we get a meteorite that lands on earth.

If you saw the fireball, the lab would like to hear from you. You can call them at (503) 287-6733.

Meteorite hits tractor

Wed, July 27, 2005
Edmonton, Canada

FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. -- An unusual rock that fell out of the sky, through a shed and into a tractor earlier this month appears to be a meteorite, says a director with the Geological Survey of Canada. [...]

An afternoon picking strawberries took a bizarre twist for Adeline Kelly on July 17 when a chunk of rock plummeted from the sky, penetrating the tin roof of a shed and piercing the manifold of a tractor on her and her husband's Montney ranch, just north of Fort St. John. The stone bounced several times after landing. Adeline searched for the object and eventually found a small, rough-surfaced black and grey stone with specks of diamond-like material embedded in it. Part of the stone had shattered, but much of it was still intact.

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Australia admits secret climate pact talks with US
AFP
Wednesday July 27, 5:03 PM

Australia and the United States have been secretly negotiating a new international pact on greenhouse gas emissions to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which they refused to sign, a minister said Wednesday.

The negotiations have also involved China, India and South Korea, according to a report in The Australian newspaper.

Environment Minister Ian Campbell said details of the deal and the countries involved would be announced soon.

Greenhouse gases trapping heat in the atmosphere are blamed for global warming, seen as one of the world's greatest environmental dangers, and the refusal by the United States and Australia to ratify the Kyoto Protocol was widely condemned.

"The countries that are involved in any future proposal will be announced when we announce the details of the proposal," Campbell told reporters, adding that this would be "in the very near future".

"Australia is, and I reassure the Australian people, working on something that is more effective post-Kyoto," Campbell said. [...]

One of the US arguments against the present Kyoto format is that it does not require big developing countries such as China and India to make targeted emissions cuts -- an absence that Bush says is unfair and illogical.

But developing countries say historical responsibility for global warming lies with nations that industrialised first, and primarily with the United States, which by itself accounts for a quarter of all global greenhouse-gas pollution.

The new alliance will bring together nations that account for more than 40 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, The Australian said. [...]

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Heat Wave Prompts Summer School 'Snow Day'
By KATHY MATHESON
The Associated Press
Tuesday, July 26, 2005; 9:52 PM

PHILADELPHIA -- A blistering heat wave gave Philadelphia summer school students the equivalent of a snow day Tuesday as temperatures climbed into the upper 90s and so many homeowners cranked up their air conditioners that their power grid set a record.

As a large swath of the United States suffered through another miserably hot day, several western states and parts of the Midwest began to feel the relief of a cold front pushing out what had been days of triple-digit temperatures.

But for the East, the cooler temperatures weren't expect to arrive until Thursday.

That likely means another early dismissal Wednesday for Philadelphia students stuck in summer school classrooms, many without air conditioning, officials said.

The demand for cooling was evident at PJM Interconnection LLC, which coordinates the movement of electricity between 13 states ranging from Illinois to North Carolina. The power grid reported setting a record Tuesday with a peak load of 135,000 megawatts - enough to power 108 million homes under normal conditions.

"It was 120 (degrees) in the direct sunlight," said Walt Arrison, a surveyor at the construction site who kept a small key chain thermometer in his pocket.

Already the heat has been blamed for deaths across the country, including 28 in the Phoenix area alone, most of them homeless people.

At least four deaths have been blamed on the heat in Missouri, including a woman found Sunday in a home without air conditioning. Two young children left in hot cars died in Oklahoma. A 29-year-old hiker died Monday in Kentucky. And a 48-year-old woman was found dead Tuesday in her non-air-conditioned apartment in Cincinnati. [...]

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Floods kill dozens in India as Bombay under water
Reuters
Wednesday July 27, 1:24 PM

BOMBAY - Landslides and floods killed at least 30 people in India's western state of Maharashtra, leaving dozens more missing, and crippled normal life in the nation's financial hub, Bombay, a state official said on Wednesday.

Most fatalities in the industrial powerhouse state were in the coastal districts of Raigad and Ratnagiri, where several villages were cut off after heavy monsoon rains.

Maharashtra's relief secretary, Krishna Vatsa, said the government had called in the army, navy and air force to assist thousands of people who were stranded and to pull out possible survivors of landslides.

"We have not been able to reach some villages where more than several dozen people may be missing in landslides," Vatsa told Reuters, confirming at least 30 deaths in Raigad and Ratnagiri and adding that electricity, telephone links and transport connections had been cut off to those districts.

Press Trust of India reported 54 fatalities in Raigad district alone due to floods and landslides. In coastal Maharashtra, officials and media reported more than 1,700 people had been rescued since Tuesday.

Trading on Bombay's bond and currency markets was cancelled and Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deskmukh declared a state holiday saying conditions were very bad. The government asked people to stay at home as further heavy rains were forecast.

"The situation is so grave (that despite) these human efforts, we are not in a position to reach out to the people who are in the districts," Deskmukh told NDTV television.

Late on Tuesday, another official said that in the village of Juigao, about 150 km (95 miles) south of Bombay, 150 villagers were feared buried after a landslide.

BOMBAY FLOODED

In Bombay -- home to the Bollywood movie industry -- and its suburbs, thousands of office workers had to stay overnight in hotels, and schools were shut on Wednesday as rain continued overnight, flooding roads and stalling hundreds of cars. [...]

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Signs of the Times - 2004-02-22

For quite some time now we have been sounding the warning bells that all is not well on the big blue marble, yet billions have carried on with "normal life", ignoring the growing signs that "normal life" seems set to get very "abnormal" indeed. Until now, those immersed in illusion could dismiss the evidence that changes of a global nature were afoot, telling themselves that their governments, in their benevolence, would surely warn the people if this were true. Well the government has issued just such a warning, although we are pretty sure that benevolence has little to do with it. Information of this nature is not done for the good of the people but rather as part of the plan to tighten control.

Little pieces of the truth are being let out to gradually acclimatise the population. We have seen this at work since the events of September 11, 2001. The USA is unrecognisable compared to the pre-9/11 era, yet the majority of the population has accepted that more and more of their rights must be sacrificed in order to engage the "War on terror." We often compare this to boiling a frog. Rather than plopping the frog in boiling water, the heat is raised one degree at a time, allowing the frog to become accustomed to the change. In this way, there is no fight, no shock of awareness that alerts the frog to his danger.

This is happening on a planet-wide scale. There are more and more reports of unusual phenomenon: UFOs, water pipes bursting into flame, meteors lighting up the skies, and now a report on the climatic catastrophe awaiting us before 2020.

Now that some measure of "disclosure" of the truth has arrived, the choice confronting humanity has been made very stark indeed. Confirmation of the truth that our Earth is due for some major upheavals, threatening the lives of millions, or billions, will surely play directly into the hands of the proponents of religious fundamentalism the world over, swelling the ranks of those begging to be "saved". Others will embrace even further the continued lies and deceit of their elected (or unelected) officials, hoping against hope that salvation will come from that quarter, forgetting the words of H.L. Mencken when he said:

"The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it."

We wonder when people are going to realise that humanity has no allies, there are no "saviors", no one is going to come and take us away from it all.

Why would we even want a savior? What a complete waste of time our lives would be if we are born simply to sit back and wait for someone else to take responsibility for us. Life is futile until we learn to be useful to creation, until we learn to create something that is uniquely from and of ourselves.

Do we not aspire to BE? To contribute something real to existence by learning to DO something REAL, to create something REAL? Life is an opportunity for us to learn, to choose and to develop, not to run from. To BE we must learn how to DO; we may be able to DO by developing WILL, and WILL is developed by gathering KNOWLEDGE and then applying that knowledge.

We all give to existence through the knowledge we carry, how much of the truth of reality we perceive, and, then, how we are able to apply this knowledge. With this in mind, we might ask ourselves: what is the nature of that which I am giving? Am I gathering objective knowledge and pursuing individual creativeness in the faith that I can possibly Be and Do? Am I asserting my existence, or am I immersing myself further into illusion and lies and negating my very right to existence by sending out a mental call for someone else to come and "save" me in some way?

With reality poised to intrude on all of our personal subjective lives, billions will probably flee further into lies and illusion provided by their "leaders". The question we need to answer is: do we truly want to add to their number?

Now the Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us

· Secret report warns of rioting and nuclear war
· Britain will be 'Siberian' in less than 20 years
· Threat to the world is greater than terrorism

Mark Townsend and Paul Harris in New York
Sunday February 22, 2004
The Observer

Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters..

A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.

The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy as countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food, water and energy supplies. The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say the few experts privy to its contents.

'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes the Pentagon analysis. 'Once again, warfare would define human life.'

The findings will prove humiliating to the Bush administration, which has repeatedly denied that climate change even exists. Experts said that they will also make unsettling reading for a President who has insisted national defence is a priority.

The report was commissioned by influential Pentagon defence adviser Andrew Marshall, who has held considerable sway on US military thinking over the past three decades. He was the man behind a sweeping recent review aimed at transforming the American military under Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

Climate change 'should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a US national security concern', say the authors, Peter Schwartz, CIA consultant and former head of planning at Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and Doug Randall of the California-based Global Business Network.

An imminent scenario of catastrophic climate change is 'plausible and would challenge United States national security in ways that should be considered immediately', they conclude. As early as next year widespread flooding by a rise in sea levels will create major upheaval for millions.

Last week the Bush administration came under heavy fire from a large body of respected scientists who claimed that it cherry-picked science to suit its policy agenda and suppressed studies that it did not like. Jeremy Symons, a former whistleblower at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), said that suppression of the report for four months was a further example of the White House trying to bury the threat of climate change.

Senior climatologists, however, believe that their verdicts could prove the catalyst in forcing Bush to accept climate change as a real and happening phenomenon. They also hope it will convince the United States to sign up to global treaties to reduce the rate of climatic change.

A group of eminent UK scientists recently visited the White House to voice their fears over global warming, part of an intensifying drive to get the US to treat the issue seriously. Sources have told The Observer that American officials appeared extremely sensitive about the issue when faced with complaints that America's public stance appeared increasingly out of touch.

One even alleged that the White House had written to complain about some of the comments attributed to Professor Sir David King, Tony Blair's chief scientific adviser, after he branded the President's position on the issue as indefensible.

Among those scientists present at the White House talks were Professor John Schellnhuber, former chief environmental adviser to the German government and head of the UK's leading group of climate scientists at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research. He said that the Pentagon's internal fears should prove the 'tipping point' in persuading Bush to accept climatic change.

Sir John Houghton, former chief executive of the Meteorological Office - and the first senior figure to liken the threat of climate change to that of terrorism - said: 'If the Pentagon is sending out that sort of message, then this is an important document indeed.'

Bob Watson, chief scientist for the World Bank and former chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, added that the Pentagon's dire warnings could no longer be ignored.

'Can Bush ignore the Pentagon? It's going be hard to blow off this sort of document. Its hugely embarrassing. After all, Bush's single highest priority is national defence. The Pentagon is no wacko, liberal group, generally speaking it is conservative. If climate change is a threat to national security and the economy, then he has to act. There are two groups the Bush Administration tend to listen to, the oil lobby and the Pentagon,' added Watson.

'You've got a President who says global warming is a hoax, and across the Potomac river you've got a Pentagon preparing for climate wars. It's pretty scary when Bush starts to ignore his own government on this issue,' said Rob Gueterbock of Greenpeace.

Already, according to Randall and Schwartz, the planet is carrying a higher population than it can sustain. By 2020 'catastrophic' shortages of water and energy supply will become increasingly harder to overcome, plunging the planet into war. They warn that 8,200 years ago climatic conditions brought widespread crop failure, famine, disease and mass migration of populations that could soon be repeated.

Randall told The Observer that the potential ramifications of rapid climate change would create global chaos. 'This is depressing stuff,' he said. 'It is a national security threat that is unique because there is no enemy to point your guns at and we have no control over the threat.'

Randall added that it was already possibly too late to prevent a disaster happening. 'We don't know exactly where we are in the process. It could start tomorrow and we would not know for another five years,' he said.

'The consequences for some nations of the climate change are unbelievable. It seems obvious that cutting the use of fossil fuels would be worthwhile.'

So dramatic are the report's scenarios, Watson said, that they may prove vital in the US elections. Democratic frontrunner John Kerry is known to accept climate change as a real problem. Scientists disillusioned with Bush's stance are threatening to make sure Kerry uses the Pentagon report in his campaign.

The fact that Marshall is behind its scathing findings will aid Kerry's cause. Marshall, 82, is a Pentagon legend who heads a secretive think-tank dedicated to weighing risks to national security called the Office of Net Assessment. Dubbed 'Yoda' by Pentagon insiders who respect his vast experience, he is credited with being behind the Department of Defence's push on ballistic-missile defence.

Symons, who left the EPA in protest at political interference, said that the suppression of the report was a further instance of the White House trying to bury evidence of climate change. 'It is yet another example of why this government should stop burying its head in the sand on this issue.'

Symons said the Bush administration's close links to high-powered energy and oil companies was vital in understanding why climate change was received sceptically in the Oval Office. 'This administration is ignoring the evidence in order to placate a handful of large energy and oil companies,' he added.

Comment: We do not doubt that this information has been known by a select few for many years. The Bush administration, as the above article states, has deliberately buried and ridiculed any evidence that serious earth changes were on the cards. The question then is, why now? And more importantly, what will be their "rescue plan" for their citizens...

Key findings of the Pentagon

Sunday February 22, 2004
The Observer

· Future wars will be fought over the issue of survival rather than religion, ideology or national honour.

· By 2007 violent storms smash coastal barriers rendering large parts of the Netherlands uninhabitable. Cities like The Hague are abandoned. In California the delta island levees in the Sacramento river area are breached, disrupting the aqueduct system transporting water from north to south.

· Between 2010 and 2020 Europe is hardest hit by climatic change with an average annual temperature drop of 6F. Climate in Britain becomes colder and drier as weather patterns begin to resemble Siberia.

· Deaths from war and famine run into the millions until the planet's population is reduced by such an extent the Earth can cope.

· Riots and internal conflict tear apart India, South Africa and Indonesia.

· Access to water becomes a major battleground. The Nile, Danube and Amazon are all mentioned as being high risk.

· A 'significant drop' in the planet's ability to sustain its present population will become apparent over the next 20 years.

· Rich areas like the US and Europe would become 'virtual fortresses' to prevent millions of migrants from entering after being forced from land drowned by sea-level rise or no longer able to grow crops. Waves of boatpeople pose significant problems.

· Nuclear arms proliferation is inevitable. Japan, South Korea, and Germany develop nuclear-weapons capabilities, as do Iran, Egypt and North Korea. Israel, China, India and Pakistan also are poised to use the bomb.

· By 2010 the US and Europe will experience a third more days with peak temperatures above 90F. Climate becomes an 'economic nuisance' as storms, droughts and hot spells create havoc for farmers.

· More than 400m people in subtropical regions at grave risk.

· Europe will face huge internal struggles as it copes with massive numbers of migrants washing up on its shores. Immigrants from Scandinavia seek warmer climes to the south. Southern Europe is beleaguered by refugees from hard-hit countries in Africa.

· Mega-droughts affect the world's major breadbaskets, including America's Midwest, where strong winds bring soil loss.

· China's huge population and food demand make it particularly vulnerable. Bangladesh becomes nearly uninhabitable because of a rising sea level, which contaminates the inland water supplies.


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