Puppet MastersS


Take 2

Anti-Muslim filmmaker detained for almost a month...next court date three days after election


The Washington Times
Sat, 20 Oct 2012 00:00 UTC
Nakoula Basseley Nakoula
© Reuters / Bret HartmanNakoula Basseley Nakoula (C) is escorted out of his home by Los Angeles County Sheriff's officers in Cerritos, California September 15, 2012
Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, the 55-year-old filmmaker responsible for the anti-Muslim video that President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice initially and wrongly blamed for inciting the deadly terrorist attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi, is still being held at the Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) without bond.

It has been almost one month since Mr. Nakoula was arrested for allegedly violating the terms of his probation for a 2010 bank-fraud conviction. According to reports, under his probation, Mr. Nakoula was prohibited from using computers and the internet without supervision. According to ABC News:
Nakoula had met with federal probation officers on Sept. 14 about whether his involvement in the film violated the terms of his probation, which barred him from accessing the internet without prior approval and from using any name other than his legal name.
Nakoula told authorities he was involved in the film and asked law enforcement for help in regards to death threats he received since the film surfaced online.

"Nakoula was ordered detained -- held without bond -- by a federal judge, who determined he posed a flight risk," said Thom Mrozek of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California.

Mr. Nakoula's next court date is on November 9, three days after the presidential election. In the meantime, while the Obama administration passes blame around over who dropped the ball with the attack in Benghazi, Mr. Nakoula remains locked up and muzzled in a Los Angeles detention center until after the ballots for president are counted on November 6.
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Book 2

Colombian prostitute Dania Londoño to publish book on Secret Service sex scandal

Manuel Rueda
abc News
Wed, 17 Oct 2012 00:00 UTC
Dania Londono
© Dania Londono/TwitterDania Londoño alerted Colombian officials about a sex party staged by US Secret Service Agents in a Cartagena hotel this spring.
A Colombian prostitute that gave the U.S. Secret Service a headache this spring, is once again making headlines around the world.

Escort Dania Londoño has announced plans to publish a book, called Room Service, in which she talks about the sex scandal that shook the U.S. Secret Service prior to President Obama's visit to Cartagena, Colombia in April of this year.

In Room Service, Londoño reveals the details of a sex party staged by at least 10 agents of the U.S. Secret Service and 8 members of the U.S. military who picked up girls in Cartagena brothels, and took them to their hotel, just two days before President Obama arrived in town for the Summit of the Americas.

Londoño claims that one of the agents offered her $800 for her sexual services that night. But when this agent -- whose name Londoño can't remember -- refused to pay up, the escort girl formed a ruckus at Cartagena's Hotel Caribe, which led local police to look into all the misbehavior that was going on that night.

Several members of the Secret Service resigned following the incident, which sparked a congressional investigation.
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Bad Guys

CIA seeks to expand drone fleet, officials say

Greg Miller
The Washington Post
Thu, 18 Oct 2012 00:00 UTC
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© The Associated Press/Heidi VogtCIA Director David H. Petraeus, shown in Afghanistan when he was the top U.S. military commander there, is urging the White House to expand the CIA’s fleet of armed drones.
The CIA is urging the White House to approve a significant expansion of the agency's fleet of armed drones, a move that would extend the spy service's decade-long transformation into a paramilitary force, U.S. officials said.

The proposal by CIA Director David H. Petraeus would bolster the agency's ability to sustain its campaigns of lethal strikes in Pakistan and Yemen and enable it, if directed, to shift aircraft to emerging al-Qaeda threats in North Africa or other trouble spots, officials said.

If approved, the CIA could add as many as 10 drones, the officials said, to an inventory that has ranged between 30 and 35 over the past few years.

The outcome has broad implications for counterterrorism policy and whether the CIA gradually returns to being an organization focused mainly on gathering intelligence, or remains a central player in the targeted killing of terrorism suspects abroad.

In the past, officials from the Pentagon and other departments have raised concerns about the CIA's expanding arsenal and involvement in lethal operations, but a senior Defense official said that the Pentagon had not opposed the agency's current plan.

Officials from the White House, the CIA and the Pentagon declined to comment on the proposal. Officials who discussed it did so on the condition of anonymity, citing the sensitive nature of the subject.

One U.S. official said the request reflects a concern that political turmoil across the Middle East and North Africa has created new openings for al-Qaeda and its affiliates.

Comment: Meanwhile...
Your Tax Dollars at Work: CIA chiefs face arrest over horrific evidence of bloody 'video-game' sorties by drone pilots

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Calendar

Israel swaps missile drills for earthquake rehearsal

Dan Williams
Yahoo! Canada News
Sun, 21 Oct 2012 00:00 UTC
Image
© Reuters/Nir EliasIsraeli soldiers from the Home Front Command stand on rubble during an earthquake drill in Holon, near Tel Aviv October 21, 2012.
Israel dropped its annual simulation of a missile attack and held its first major earthquake drill on Sunday instead, but officials insisted the country remained as ready as ever for the possibility of a war with arch-foe Iran.

School children, civil servants and others participating in the "Turning Point 6" exercise were urged to flee outdoors if possible as radio and TV channels broadcast tremor alerts. In previous years, people were told to go to household bomb shelters in order to flee an imaginary missile attack.

"We want people to run into homes during a missile attack, and we want people to run out of homes during an earthquake," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said after he and fellow ministers evacuated their weekly cabinet meeting.

The change in format comes at a time when hostile rhetoric over Tehran's disputed nuclear program has waned, with both Israel and the United States about to hold elections and Western powers pursuing ever-stronger sanctions against Iran.

But Israeli officials denied the drill signaled an easing of their stance on Iran.

Defence Minister Ehud Barak said the exercise readied Israel for more than "something that happens once in 5,000 years", but for what he called "the very real scenarios" of missile strikes.

Other officials emphasized the risk of an earthquake given the abutting Syria-Africa rift along Israel's eastern frontier.

Comment: Also see:
Israel plans 'huge earthquake drill' next week that assumes mass casualties of 7,000 dead, 70,000 wounded

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Airplane

Your Tax Dollars at Work: CIA chiefs face arrest over horrific evidence of bloody 'video-game' sorties by drone pilots

David Rose
Daily Mail
Sun, 21 Oct 2012 11:30 UTC
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The Mail on Sunday today reveals shocking new evidence of the full horrific impact of US drone attacks in Pakistan.

A damning dossier assembled from exhaustive research into the strikes' targets sets out in heartbreaking detail the deaths of teachers, students and Pakistani policemen. It also describes how bereaved relatives are forced to gather their loved ones' dismembered body parts in the aftermath of strikes.

The dossier has been assembled by human rights lawyer Shahzad Akbar, who works for Pakistan's Foundation for Fundamental Rights and the British human rights charity Reprieve.

Filed in two separate court cases, it is set to trigger a formal murder investigation by police into the roles of two US officials said to have ordered the strikes. They are Jonathan Banks, former head of the Central Intelligence Agency's Islamabad station, and John A. Rizzo, the CIA's former chief lawyer. Mr Akbar and his staff have already gathered further testimony which has yet to be filed.

'We have statements from a further 82 victims' families relating to more than 30 drone strikes,' he said. 'This is their only hope of justice.'

In the first case, which has already been heard by a court in Islamabad, judgment is expected imminently. If the judge grants Mr Akbar's petition, an international arrest warrant will be issued via Interpol against the two Americans.
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Black Magic

Romney-Ryan ticket to return a more militarized version of Bush era

Wayne Madsen
Press TV
Sat, 20 Oct 2012 03:26 UTC
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Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney introduces Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as his vice presidential running mate on August 11, 2012 in Norfolk, Virginia.
A Mitt Romney-Paul Ryan administration would bring back to American foreign and domestic policy all the worst elements of the Bush administration, along with a greater degree of militarism, home-grown fascism, and a greater likelihood of war with such countries as Iran, Syria, Venezuela, North Korea, China, and Russia.

In fact, the most alarming aspect of a Romney administration would be the appointment of members of the Mormon Latter Day Saints Church, a sect that is not considered Christian by most traditional Christian denominations, to senior government positions.

Mormons believe in the imminent apocalypse and would have no problem pushing the world to the edge of nuclear annihilation as a fulfillment of their prophecies of a band of 19th-century con-men who convinced their followers that Jesus ministered in North America and that the Garden of Eden was located in what is now the state of Missouri.

The founder of Mormonism, Joseph Smith, believed that one day the United States would become a theocratic nation run by the Mormon Church. Romney, a former Mormon missionary and bishop of the sect, has referred to Smith's prophecy as "not official church doctrine," but he has refused to condemn it outright.
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MIB

America's brownshirts - Homeland Security graduates first Corps of Homeland Youth


Whiteout Press
Sun, 07 Oct 2012 00:00 UTC
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© DHS.govOn September 13, 2012, the Dept of Homeland Security graduated its first class of FEMA Corps youth, aka the Homeland Youth.
Vicksburg. The federal government calls them FEMA Corps. But they conjure up memories of the Hitler Youth of 1930's Germany. Regardless of their name, the Dept of Homeland Security has just graduated its first class of 231 Homeland Youth. Kids, aged 18-24 and recruited from the President's AmeriCorp volunteers, they represent the first wave of DHS's youth corps, designed specifically to create a full time, paid, standing army of FEMA Youth across the country.

On September 13, 2012, the Dept of Homeland Security graduated its first class of FEMA Corps youth, aka the Homeland Youth. Image courtesy of DHS.gov.

On September 13, 2012, the Department of Homeland Security graduated its first class of FEMA Corps first-responders. While the idea of having a volunteer force of tens of thousands of volunteers scattered across the country to aid in times of natural disasters sounds great, the details and timing of this new government army is somewhat curious, if not disturbing.

Comment: If this isn't reminiscent of Hitler Youth, what is?

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Airplane

US loses eight jets at Camp Bastion in worst one day air loss since Vietnam war


RT.com
Wed, 17 Oct 2012 20:36 UTC
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© AFP Photo / Leila GorchevHarrier jet

After Taliban gunmen destroyed eight Harrier jets at a US camp in Helmand Province, the US military has suffered its worst air loss in one day since the Vietnam War.

The Taliban attacked Camp Bastion, the main strategic base in southwestern Afghanistan, on Sept. 14, causing $200 million in damage in the single most destructive strike on a Western base during the war, according to military officials.

Two Marines were killed, nine coalition personnel were wounded and six jets costing between $23 million and $30 million were completely destroyed.

The approximately 15 insurgents, dressed in US Army uniforms, had penetrated the base Friday night and instantly began shooting and setting fire to parked Navy-AV-8B Harrier jets when they were inside. Three refueling stations were severely damaged during the attack.
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Star of David

Twelve-year-old arrested and abused multiple times by Israel and he is one among many

Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
The Electronic Intifada
Fri, 19 Oct 2012 00:00 UTC
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© Amer Aruri / B’TselemMuslim Odeh

In an unwavering voice, Muslim Odeh recounted how Israeli riot police took him from his bed earlier this week, blindfolded him, subjected him to hours of intense interrogation and held him overnight in a Jerusalem prison compound.

Odeh vomited after Israeli police punched him four times in the stomach on his way to his prison cell. Odeh's calm demeanor, only days after his ordeal, was evidence of how this was his tenth arrest in three years.

More shocking, however, is the fact that this resident of Silwan in East Jerusalem is only 12-years-old. "I miss my house," Odeh told The Electronic Intifada, as he stared longingly from the balcony of his uncle's home - where he is under house arrest until next Wednesday, 24 October - onto his family's house below.

"I don't feel comfortable. I miss my friends, my grandmother, my mother," he said. "I don't know if they will arrest me again."
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Pirates

5 ways America is being hollowed out by unfettered corporate greed

Paul Buchheit
Alternet
Sun, 14 Oct 2012 16:04 UTC
money bags
© unknown
There's no free market -- just businesses doing whatever they please with virtually zero accountability

Conservatives believe that enriching individuals will eventually enrich society, and that government should not get in the way of the process. This is what happens as a result:

The tax loss from one scheming businessman could have paid the salaries of 30,000 nurses

The lack of regulation in the financial industry allowed hedge fund manager John Paulson to conspire with Goldman Sachs in a plan to create packages of risky subprime mortgages and then short-sell (bet against) the sure-to-fail financial instruments. The ploy paid him $3.7 billion. Deregulation in the tax code allowed him to call his income "carried interest," which is taxed at a 15% rate. More deregulation allowed him to defer his profits indefinitely.

The lost taxes of $1.3 billion (35% of $3.7 billion) could have paid the salaries of 30,000 LPNs, 10 nurses for every county in the United States. Instead, one clever businessman took it all.
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