Today Sott editors came across a short entry on Boingboing.net featuring a photograph of Dick Cheney posted on the "Outdoors" section of the official US government Whitehouse.gov website.

The photograph is captioned "Vice President Dick Cheney spends an afternoon fly-fishing on the Snake River in Idaho."

See for yourself:

©WhiteHouse.gov

And a close up:

©Whitehouse.gov

The poster on Boingboing.net suggested that the reflection in Cheney's glasses bears a resemblance to a naked human being, which brings to mind that story of Cheney shooting his "friend" in the face. The explanation that Cheney shot Whittington "by accident" being something of a joke. It is clear to the careful observer that the reflection really is just Cheney's hand, however, since the topic has been raised, we simply could not, in all conscience, turn down the opportunity to point out Dave McGowan's article from The Center for an Informed America, where he muses on the idea that perhaps Cheney really does enjoy playing "The Most Dangerous Game" from time to time.

©Red Pill Press

"The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which blissfully and unawaredly enslave themselves." - Dresden James

In part one, I promised I would get pure and simple with the truth about the war on terror. I posited that if the average person were to be furnished with real facts about the war on terror, conditions necessary for a radical change in the status quo on this planet could be created. What form such a change would take is not readily determinable, although a decent amount of chaos could be expected.

I understand that many people have trouble believing that the average person can ever wake up to the reality of the world around them. Nourished almost since birth on a diet of lies and disinformation, not to mention chemical-laden food and drink, we could be forgiven for concluding that their destiny as cannon fodder for the pathocrats is all but assured. The problem with this theory however is that there is no way to prove it.

Original Title: "Pinguino delle Meraviglie Parla e Scompare"
Gazzettino dell'Avicolo
21st March 2008 - Genoa, Italy.

©Sott

An Italian male was found in a state of shock by one of our correspondents who received a call at home requesting investigative and moral support. The story he was about to recount was kind of odd but backed by an impressive amount of corroborating evidence. Mr. Piero V. allegedly saw a penguin materializing into his house, an Emperor Penguin of sort considering its size, and told the reporter that the bird was communicating with him using telepathy. Although nearly incomprehensible at first, the bird, after a series of buzzy signals casted into Mr. Piero's brain, succeeded by making its intentions clear.

The nearly alienated Genoan then rushed on a specific place by following the directions given by the penguin, who was apparently in the need to share its findings, only to pop away in the blink of an eye, behind a tree. Mr. Piero said that after the initial shock he now feels energized and it's like he's living a new life. After having recapitulated all what happened in that weekend that ultimately looked like a lifelong time adventure, he now thanks wholeheartedly the mysterious bird.

P.V. said that the penguin started 'talking' to him only after having stopped near a tree with a red mark on it. He was already 300 miles away from home, in the nice town of Pontremoli (Tuscany).

Here's the transcription of the words given by the penguin. He named himself as "Pen Guinn", P.V. later told the reporter.

Michael Hayden - loves a good conspiracy

For years "conspiracy theorists" have suffered the ignominy of exile on the fringe of political debate, not to mention social acceptance. "Conspiracy" was not necessarily a 'dirty word', but form the phrase "conspiracy theory" and you could almost hear the shutters coming down on already closed minds. Stories of the lies and secret machinations of the political military and corporate elite were ridiculed as fantasy and a virtual impossibility. Indeed, the very existence of a political, military and corporate elite was widely disavowed. Changes are afoot however - big changes. The lies and abuses of the directors of the American empire project and their associates in collective Western government over the past few years have become so egregious, so flagrant, that it is now virtually impossible for the average citizen to accept the official version of reality and still lay claim to their own sanity.

©William Kentridge

"[...] the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn't there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. How did this happen? Who's to blame? Well certainly there are those more responsible than others, and they will be held accountable, but again truth be told, if you're looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror. I know why you did it. I know you were afraid. Who wouldn't be? War, terror, disease. There were a myriad of problems which conspired to corrupt your reason and rob you of your common sense. Fear got the best of you [...]" Character V, from V for Vendetta

Yes, V is right. There is something terribly wrong with this country - and this could be referring to almost any country on the globe, since Pathocracy has taken global control. It actually makes sense for psychopaths to act as they do as such is their nature. But what about the rest of us? How is it that "fear got the best of us", and why is it that a paralyzing fear descends upon us when we consider resisting? Why is it that thoughts of "them" coming for us and locking us away, overshadow our truest human desires for Freedom, Love, Truth?

How can anybody be sure of anything in this day and time when the world seems to have gone mad and we find ourselves collectively in the position of the hero/heroine of the horror movie who hears a noise. Indeed, the audience can see that the monster is lurking in the bushes (no pun intended) just outside the door, the soundtrack is heavy with ominous portent, and with innocent naïveté and a handy flashlight, the star of the movie puts his or her hand on the doorknob. The audience groans with the agony of knowing and collectively shouts "DON'T OPEN THE DOOR!" But, unfortunately, the movie world is not connected to the world of the audience, and no warning can cross that divide.

In the old days, movie heroes and heroines generally always survived such mistakes by dint of clever scripting. In more recent years, you can never be sure anymore: the hero or heroine is likely to die - reflecting real life - because of their stupidity.

©unknown

Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition

I happened to catch the hilarious Monty Python sketch from the 1970s and its famous catch-phrase got me thinking. With all that's happening in the West today, is nobody expecting another Spanish Inquisition, or something like it?

©Doug Mills/The New York Times

Reading the news lately, there certainly appears to be an unusual amount of activity in many different spheres of power and influence. The Principle players seem to be moving in unison and orchestrating events in rapid succession, as if following a schedule.

They may think they're doing it slowly enough that no one will notice (knowing the lead time they have) - and they're almost correct - most people don't notice - but then there are those who do notice... those keeping the sott.net lighthouse lit.

So, it seems that, at this present moment, it has become necessary to try to block the lighthouse beam with internet search engine suppression and myriad other tricks such as silly lawsuits - good thing that light is rather like water in that it will always find a way out of enclosed places - the smallest hairline crack is all that's needed; and once it's out, you can't get it back in.

Let's see what light filters through the cracks once we begin to connect some interesting recent dots...

In response to my last article, Letters From The Edge, which included a recent missive from Victor Clube, author of The Cosmic Serpent and The Cosmic Winter, I stated:

We aren't talking about a giant asteroid here that is going to create a global wave of firestorm destruction like the movies depict! It's not Planet X or Nibiru! It's NOT the End of the World (at least not for everybody, but certainly for those who aren't prepared and happen to be in the line of fire!) But yeah, it might be somewhat like the Black Death with the loss of half the population of one or more continents, or the great Chicago Fire or Tunguska or even all of these rolled into one; but all of those events were survivable had the victims been informed and prepared. Yes, there are those who, even had they been informed and prepared would not have survived in any case, but we choose the optimistic path: Knowledge Protects. And we are trying our hardest to give you that knowledge.

One reader commented on the article as follows:

What I've picked up so far is that the formation of true community where people share perspective, information, knowledge and material resources such as pooled labor and the fruits of such (cash) is one of the main ways that persons can create the situation where they can survive such a cosmic disaster. Knowledge of what's really happening being another--which among other potential benefits, prevents paralyzing fear and panic--enabling persons to Think in real time as some thing happens. Therefore, sharing and spreading knowledge of what's really happening to encourage greater awareness and the formation of such community groups being another.

Would you please write an article/articles where you share other ideas/suggestions on how to survive such a possible/probable cosmic event as described?

Needless to say, we all need to help SOTT stay online for such an article to come out.

I'm trying to get there.

Today I'm going to write a letter; a letter to all our readers. I'm also going to include a transcript of a very interesting letter SOTT.net has received from Prof. Victor Clube. I hope that these letters will change your life, your future, and mine as well.

Here at SOTT.net, we have been pretty busy working on our legal defense, as if you couldn't guess! I'm sure that everyone notices that we are nowhere near our goal for having enough funds to cover this expense. All of you just remember, if 1,000 people can donate $100.00 each, we are in the clear. If 2,000 people donate $50 each, we are in the clear. And certainly, with over 10,000 of you reading this site every day, we ought to be able to do that!

Just keep in mind what you would be missing if we were gone! Who else would spend days, weeks, months and even years digging down to the deepest levels of our reality to bring you reports and analyses of what is really going on? After all, it is not just a matter of the political chaos out there; there are cosmic reasons for that chaos and historical cycles demonstrate clearly that times such as these generally manifest other symptoms that we all need to be aware of. For example...