Alain Bauer et ses copains sécuritaires ont fait fortune en vendant ce genre de "recettes miracles" aux communes appeurées - flicons, flicons... mais cela n'a pas servi à grand chose, si ce n'est à faire croire qu'on agissait...

Le fiasco de la surveillance vidéo en Grande Bretagne

[France Info - 09/05/2008]

On compte une caméra pour 14 Britanniques. Dans les années 90, la Grande Bretagne a développé cette politique ultra sécuritaire de surveillance pour faire reculer la criminalité et la délinquance. Aujourd’hui, le modèle montre ses limites.

Les responsables de la police britannique parlent d’un véritable fiasco. Ils dénoncent des dépenses trop importantes au regard des résultats : "Des milliards de livres ont été dépensés dans le matériel mais on n’a pas réfléchi à la manière dont la police allait utiliser les images et comment elles seraient présentées au tribunal", explique Mike Neville, responsable du bureau des images de Scotland Yard.

Selon lui, les images provenant des 65 000 caméras londoniennes n’ont permis d’élucider que 3% des vols commis sur la voie publique. Certains rapports estiment même que l’argent dépensé dans la vidéosurveillance aurait sensiblement permis de faire baisser la criminalité s’il avait servi à augmenter l’éclairage public. Et pourtant, dans les années 90, le ministère de l’Intérieur y avait consacré 80% du budget anti-criminalité, environ 630 millions d’euros entre 1994 et 2004.

En France, le modèle britannique et ses 4,2 millions de caméras, sert encore d’exemple au gouvernement. L’année dernière le secrétaire d’Etat à l’emploi, Laurent Wauquiez, (alors porte parole du gouvernement) faisait valoir que "le système de surveillance britannique permettait d’assurer mieux la sécurité du territoire ".

De son côté, la ministre d’Intérieur Michel Alliot-Marie compte tripler le nombre de caméras, pour porter le chiffre à 60.000 avant la fin de l’année 2009. Une politique qu’elle explique par la lutte contre le terrorisme. En 2005, la vidéosurveillance avait contribué à identifier les quatre poseurs de bombes des attentats de Londres, qui avaient fait 56 morts.

http://www.france-info.com/spip.php?article132075&theme=14&sous_theme=14

There is direct evidence that President George W. Bush did not honorably lead this nation, but deliberately misled it into a war he wanted. Bush and his administration knowingly lied to Congress and to the American public — lies that have cost the lives of more than 4,000 young American soldiers and close to $1 trillion.

A Monumental Lie

In his first nationally televised address on the Iraqi crisis on October 7, 2002, six days after receiving the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), a classified CIA report, President Bush told millions of Americans the exact opposite of what the CIA was telling him -a monumental lie to the nation and the world.

On the evening of October 7, 2002, the very latest CIA intelligence was that Hussein was not an imminent threat to the U.S. This same information was delivered to the Bush administration as early as October 1, 2002, in the NIE, including input from the CIA and 15 other U.S. intelligence agencies. In addition, CIA director George Tenet briefed Bush in the Oval Office on the morning of October 7th.

According to the October 1, 2002 NIE, “Baghdad for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or CBW [chemical and biological warfare] against the United States, fearing that exposure of Iraqi involvement would provide Washington a stronger case for making war.” The report concluded that Hussein was not planning to use any weapons of mass destruction; further, Hussein would only use weapons of mass destruction he was believed to have if he were first attacked, that is, he would only use them in self-defense.

Preparing its declassified version of the NIE for Congress, which became known as the White Paper, the Bush administration edited the classified NIE document in ways that significantly changed its inference and meaning, making the threat seem imminent and ominous.

In the original NIE report, members of the U.S. intelligence community vigorously disagreed with the CIA’s bloated and inaccurate conclusions. All such opposing commentary was eliminated from the declassified White Paper prepared for Congress and the American people.

The Manning Memo

On January 31, 2003, Bush met in the Oval Office with British Prime Minister Tony Blair. In a memo summarizing the meeting discussion, Blair’s chief foreign policy advisor David Manning wrote that Bush and Blair expressed their doubts that any chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons would ever be found in Iraq, and that there was tension between Bush and Blair over finding some justification for the war that would be acceptable to other nations. Bush was so worried about the failure of the UN inspectors to find hard evidence against Hussein that he talked about three possible ways, Manning wrote, to “provoke a confrontation” with Hussein. One way, Bush said, was to fly “U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, [falsely] painted in UN colors. If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach” of UN resolutions and that would justify war. Bush was calculating to create a war, not prevent one.

Denying Blix’s Findings

Hans Blix, the United Nation’s chief weapons inspector in Iraq, in his March 7, 2003, address to the UN Security Council, said that as of that date, less than 3 weeks before Bush invaded Iraq, that Iraq had capitulated to all demands for professional, no-notice weapons inspections all over Iraq and agreed to increased aerial surveillance by the U.S. over the “no-fly” zones. Iraq had directed the UN inspectors to sites where illicit weapons had been destroyed and had begun to demolish its Al Samoud 2 missiles, as requested by the UN. Blix added that “no evidence of proscribed activities have so far been found” by his inspectors and “no underground facilities for chemical or biological production or storage were found so far.” He said that for his inspectors to absolutely confirm that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction (WMD) “will not take years, nor weeks, but months.”

Mohamed ElBaradei, the chief UN nuclear inspector in Iraq and director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told the UN Security Council that, “we have to date found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapon program in Iraq.”

The UN inspectors were making substantial progress and Hussein was giving them unlimited access. Why was Bush in such an incredible rush to go to war?

Hussein Disarms, so Bush … Goes to War

When it became clear that the whole purpose of Bush’s prewar campaign — to get Hussein to disarm — was being (or already had been) met, Bush and his people came up with a demand they had never once made before — that Hussein resign and leave Iraq. On March 17, 2003, Bush said in a speech to the nation that, “Saddam Hussein and his sons must leave Iraq within 48 hours. Their refusal to do so will result in military conflict.” Military conflict — the lives of thousands of young Americans on the line — because Bush trumped up a new line in the sand?

The Niger Allegation

One of the most notorious instances of the Bush administration using thoroughly discredited information to frighten the American public was the 16 words in Bush’s January 28, 2003 State of the Union speech: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” The Niger allegation was false, and the Bush administration knew it was false.

Joseph C. Wilson IV, the former ambassador to Iraq, was sent to Niger by the CIA in February 2002 to investigate a supposed memo that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake (a form of lightly processed ore) to Iraq by Niger in the late 1990s. Wilson reported back to the CIA that it was “highly doubtful” such a transaction had ever taken place.

On March 7, 2003, Mohamed ElBaradei told the UN Security Council that “based on thorough analysis” his agency concluded that the “documents which formed the basis for the report of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger are in fact not authentic.” Indeed, author Craig Unger uncovered at least 14 instances prior to the 2003 State of the Union address in which analysts at the CIA, the State Department, or other government agencies that had examined the Niger documents “raised serious doubts about their legitimacy — only to be rebuffed by Bush administration officials who wanted to use them.”

On October 5 and 6, 2002, the CIA sent memos to the National Security Council, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, and to the White House Situation Room stating that the Niger information was no good.

On January 24, 2003, four days before the president’s State of the Union address, the CIA’s National Intelligence Council, which oversees all federal agencies that deal with intelligence, sent a memo to the White House stating that “the Niger story is baseless and should be laid to rest.”

The 9/11 Lie

The Bush administration put undue pressure on U.S. intelligence agencies to provide it with conclusions that would help them in their quest for war. Bush’s former counterterrorism chief, Richard Clarke, said that on September 12, 2001, one day after 9/11, “The President in a very intimidating way left us — me and my staff — with the clear indication that he wanted us to come back with the word that there was an Iraqi hand behind 9/11.”

Bush said on October 7, 2002, “We know that Iraq and the Al Qaeda terrorist network share a common enemy — the United States of America. We know that Iraq and Al Qaeda have had high level contacts that go back a decade,” and that “Iraq has trained Al Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gasses.” Of Hussein, he said on November 1, 2002, “We know he’s got ties with Al Qaeda.”

Even after Bush admitted on September 17, 2003, that he had “no evidence” that Saddam Hussein was involved with 9/11, he audaciously continued, in the months and years that followed, to clearly suggest, without stating it outright, that Hussein was involved in 9/11.

On March 20, 2006, Bush said, “I was very careful never to say that Saddam Hussein ordered the attack on America.”

Vincent Bugliosi received his law degree in 1964. In his career at the L.A. County District Attorney’s office, he successfully prosecuted 105 out of 106 felony jury trials, including 21 murder convictions without a single loss. His most famous trial, the Charles Manson case, became the basis of his classic, Helter Skelter, the biggest selling true-crime book in publishing history. The Prosecution of George W. Bush For Murder is available May 27.

For more information visit www.prosecutionofbush.com

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Let's be geopolitically strategic today.

Our writers here make the point that, while we (manifestly!) weren't paying attention, that superpower status we earned by being the last country standing after World War II, and defended so expensively during the ensuing Cold War, has quietly left the building.

From a new addition to our blogroll, Tom Engelhardt's  TomDispatch.com, comes this bracing wake-up call.

Tomgram: Michael Klare, America Out of Gas

TomDispatch.com | posted May 08, 2008 11:01 am

These days, the price of oil seems ever on the rise. A barrel of crude broke another barrier Wednesday -- $123 -- on international markets, and the talk is now of the sort of "superspike" in pricing (only yesterday unimaginable) that might break the $200 a barrel ceiling "within two years." And that would be without a full-scale American air assault on Iran, after which all bets would be off.

Considering that, in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks, oil was still in the $20 a barrel price range, this is no small measure of what the Bush administration years have really accomplished. Today, it's hard even to remember not 9/11, but 11/9 -- November 9, 1989 -- the day that the Berlin Wall fell, signaling that, soon enough, after its seventy-odd year life, that Reaganesque Evil Empire, the Soviet Union, was heading for the door. In 1991, it disappeared from the face of the Earth without a whimper. Until almost the last moment, top officials in Washington assumed it would go on forever; and, when it was gone, most of them couldn't, at first, believe it. Soon enough, however, the event was hailed as the greatest of American triumphs -- "victory" not just in the Cold War, but at a level never before seen. Finally, for the first time in history, there was but a single superpower on the planet....

Almost seven and a half years later, as Michael Klare so vividly indicates below, an observer might be pardoned for wondering whether there hadn't been two super losers in the Cold War. Had the Soviet Union, the weaker of the two great powers of the second half of the last century, simply imploded first, while the U.S., enwreathed in a cloud of self-congratulation, was almost unbeknownst to itself also slowly making its way toward an exit? And, as a final irony, Klare -- author of the not-to-be-missed new book Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet -- points out, energy has refloated Russia, even as it's sinking us. Tom

Portrait of an Oil-Addicted Former Superpower

How Rising Oil Prices Are Obliterating America's Superpower Status
By Michael T. Klare

Nineteen years ago, the fall of the Berlin Wall effectively eliminated the Soviet Union as the world's other superpower. Yes, the USSR as a political entity stumbled on for another two years, but it was clearly an ex-superpower from the moment it lost control over its satellites in Eastern Europe.

Less than a month ago, the United States similarly lost its claim to superpower status when a barrel crude oil roared past $110 on the international market, gasoline prices crossed the $3.50 threshold at American pumps, and diesel fuel topped $4.00. As was true of the USSR following the dismantling of the Berlin Wall, the USA will no doubt continue to stumble on like the superpower it once was; but as the nation's economy continues to be eviscerated to pay for its daily oil fix, it, too, will be seen by increasing numbers of savvy observers as an ex-superpower-in-the-making.

As I read this, a colorful image popped into mind. From a crime novel of John D. MacDonald's pre-Travis McGee days, he wrote a scene of a hired killer going after a middle-aged politician, with a very thin, very sharp implement the style and shape of a knitting needle. The assassin "stumbles," brushes against his target, deftly plunges the slender needle into the hapless victim's heart, withdraws it and quickly melts away. Meanwhile the 55-ish politician, used to the various aches and pains that are part and parcel of encroaching age, pays limited attention to the brief twinge he feels in his chest (what's another twinge?), and keeps walking for a short time, bleeding internally. Essentially already dead.

While the U.S. walked in the sunshine, basking in its status of the globe's only superpower, history brushed against us. According to Michael Klare, we are about to discover that our vaunted status has disappeared.

The Klare piece is quite colorful in its descriptions of exactly what rabbit hole we've thrown ourselves down, including allowing Iraq to charge our military market rates for fuel (which our high-tech military is using at the rate of 27 gallons per soldier per day!) while charging its citizens one-third of that. Not exactly superpower behavior.

[Please click the link below for the complete article -- but then please come on back!]

Tomgram: Michael Klare, America Out of Gas

It's going to require some clear, out of the box reflection to confront the outcome of our new status in the world.

We no longer can depend on our usual, brute force, finesse-free approach to geopolitics to achieve our aims.

Many cogent military writers have noted that World War II, on which our superpower stature was founded, was won not through excellent strategy (the professional officer corps of the Germans was far more competent) or courageous soldiering (the Samurai spirit of the Japanese soldier was unmatched), although there were adequate amounts of both.

Rather, the overwhelming industrial might that put thousands of ships in the water (at one point, one "Liberty ship" oceangoing cargo craft was launched each day!) and aircraft in the air and tanks (not great tanks, but good enough) on the ground, and was simultaneously able to furnish petroleum and materiel to our allies Britain and the Soviet Union in war-winning quantities, was what won the war for the U.S.

That's not military or diplomatic finesse. That's brute force. And today's hollowed out industrial engine couldn't duplicate such an effort.

We're in hock up to our eyebrows, dependent on smiling sheikhs for our ability to commute to work, possessing a bunch of fair weather friends who may disappear when the holey state of our umbrella is discerned.

Seems like some new thinking may be required of this country's leaders.

One of the current three candidates for president seems to be capable of eschewing business as usual (Barack Obama's refusal to jump on the let them eat cake pandering of McCain's and Clinton's gas tax holiday proposal is a promising signal).

Rather makes irrelevant the color of his skin, doesn't it?

It’s it for now. Thanks,

--MUDGE

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by Prof. David Ray Griffin
Global Research, May 9, 2008
The Canadian

At the core of the official story about 9/11 is the claim that the four airliners that crashed that day had been taken over by a band of al-Qaeda hijackers led by Mohamed Atta. No proof was ever provided for this claim. But various kinds of evidence have been offered, the most important of which was reportedly found in Atta’s luggage after the attacks. The materials in this luggage were said to confirm the suspicion that the planes had been hijacked by Atta and fellow Muslims. As Joel Achenbach wrote in a Washington Post story on September 16, 2001:

Atta is thought to have piloted American Airlines Flight 11, the first to slam into the World Trade Center. A letter written by Atta, left in his luggage at Boston's Logan Airport, said he planned to kill himself so he could go to heaven as a martyr. It also contained a Saudi passport, an international driver's license, instructional videos for flying Boeing airliners and an Islamic prayer schedule. (“’You Never Imagine’ A Hijacker Next Door.”)

This discovery was clearly very helpful in making the case against Atta and al-Qaeda.

But why was Atta’s luggage there to be discovered? Achenbach said: “Officials believe that Atta and [Abdul] Alomari rented a car in Boston, drove to Portland, Maine, and took a room Monday night at the Comfort Inn . . . . They then flew on a short flight Tuesday morning from Portland to Boston, changing to Flight 11.”

But why did Atta’s luggage not make it on to Flight 11? A 9/11 staff statement suggested that it was a tight connection, saying: “The Portland detour almost prevented Atta and Omari from making Flight 11 out of Boston. In fact, the luggage they checked in Portland failed to make it onto the plane” (Staff Statement No. 16, June 16, 2004). When The 9/11 Commission Report appeared the following month, however, this suggestion was missing. Indeed, the Commission, after saying that “Atta and Omari arrived in Boston at 6:45,” added that “American Airlines Flight 11 [was] scheduled to depart at 7:45” (9/11 Commission Report [henceforth 9/11CR], 1-2).

If there was almost an hour for the luggage to be transferred, why was it left behind? We might suppose that the ground crew was careless. American Airlines reported, however, that “Atta was the only passenger among the 81 aboard American Flight 11 whose luggage didn't make the flight” (Paul Sperry, WorldNetDaily.com, September 11, 2002).

There was, moreover, even a bigger mystery: Why did Atta, if he was already in Boston on September 10, take the trip to Portland and stay overnight, thereby necessitating the early morning commuter flight? If the commuter flight had been delayed by an hour, Atta and al-Omari would have missed the connection. There would have been only three hijackers to take control of Flight 11. Atta, moreover, was reportedly the designated pilot for this flight and also the ringleader of the whole operation, which, after years of planning, he might have had to call off.

Why he would have made such a risky trip has never been explained. A year after the attacks, FBI Director Robert Mueller, testifying to the Congressional Joint Inquiry into 9/11, said:

[T]he day before the attacks, Mohamed Atta . . . picked up Abdul Aziz . . . and drove to Portland, Maine. They checked into the Comfort Inn in South Portland. . . . [T]heir reason for going there, to date, remains unclear. (“Statement for the Record,” Joint Intelligence Committee Inquiry, Sept. 26, 2002)

Two years later, the 9/11 Commission wrote: “No physical, documentary, or analytical evidence provides a convincing explanation of why Atta and Omari drove to Portland, Maine, from Boston on the morning of September 10, only to return to Logan on Flight 5930 on the morning of September 11” (9/11CR 451n1).

We have, therefore, two mysteries. Why would Atta have risked the trip to Portland? And why did his luggage fail to get loaded onto Flight 11? My book, 9/11 Contradictions, is about contradictions, not mysteries. Clues to these mysteries, however, can be found by exploring a full-fledged contradiction: the fact that the Atta-to-Portland story contradicts stories that appeared in the press in the first days after 9/11.

The Original Story: Boston and the Bukharis

According to the official account, as we have seen, Atta drove to Portland in a blue Nissan Altima, then flew on the morning of September 11 from Portland to the Boston airport, where the incriminating materials were found in his luggage later that day. In the first few days after 9/11, however, the story was very different.

On September 12, a CNN report distinguished between Atta and the men who flew from Portland to Boston.

Law enforcement sources say that two of the suspected hijackers . . . are brothers that lived [in Vero Beach, Florida]. . . . One of them is Adnan Bukhari. We have a photograph of him. . . . Also living in Vero Beach, Bukhari's brother, Ameer. . . . Law enforcement sources . . . tell CNN that the Bukhari brothers were believed to have been on one of the two flights out of Boston . . . . Also we can report to you that a car impounded in Portland, Maine, according to law enforcement authorities, was rented at Boston Logan Airport and driven to Portland, Maine. Now the Maine state police confirm that two of the suspected hijackers were on a U.S. Air flight out of [the Portland airport.]. . . The FBI is also looking at two more suspected hijackers . . . , Mohammad Atta and Marwan Yusef Alshehhi.” (“America Under Attack: How Could It Happen?” Although the reporter, Susan Candiotti, said “Logan Airport,” the information she received had to have referred to the Portland airport, from which the U.S. Airways flight originated, and about which the Maine state police would have had information.)

Another CNN report that same day stated that the incriminating materials were found in a car at the Boston airport and, while discussing the Nissan found at the Portland airport, did not connect it to Atta:

Law enforcement officials confirmed that a car was seized at Boston's Logan International Airport and that suspicious materials were found. The Boston Herald said there were Arabic language flight training manuals in the car. . . . Meanwhile, in Portland, Maine, police said that two individuals who traveled by plane from that city to Boston were under investigation. . . . Maine authorities said a car---a rented silver Nissan Altima with Massachusetts plates---was seized from the Portland airport Tuesday evening. (“US Says It Has Identified Hijackers”)

On the next day, September 13, CNN named the Bukharis as the renters of the Nissan and said that the car found at Boston, now identified as a Mitsubishi, was rented by Atta:

"Two of the men were brothers, . . . Adnan Bukhari and Ameer Abbas Bukhari. . . . The two rented a car, a silver-blue Nissan Altima, from an Alamo car rental at Boston's Logan Airport and drove to an airport in Portland, Maine, where they got on US Airways Flight 5930 at 6 AM Tuesday headed back to Boston. . . . A Mitsubishi sedan impounded at Logan Airport was rented by [Mohamed] Atta, sources said. The car contained materials, including flight manuals, written in Arabic that law enforcement sources called “helpful” to the investigation." (“Two Brothers among Hijackers”)

Another CNN report that same day said that law enforcement authorities were led to the Bukhari brothers by documents connected to the Nissan (“Hijack Suspect Detained, Cooperating with FBI”).

A Problem Emerges

However, that same day (September 13), CNN issued a correction (“Feds Think They’ve Identified Some Hijackers”), pointing out that neither of the Bukharis had died on 9/11: Ameer had died the year before and Adnan was still alive. CNN apologized for the “misinformation,” which had been “[b]ased on information from multiple law enforcement sources.”

However, this discovery did not immediately lead to a complete change of story. For example, the next day (September 14), CNN said: “A Mitsubishi sedan [Atta] rented was found at Boston's Logan Airport. Arabic language materials were found in the car” (Mike Fish, “Fla. Flight Schools May Have Trained Hijackers”).

The Emergence of the Final Story

That same day, however, the story began to change more drastically. An Associated Press report, referring to “two suspects in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center,” said:

One of the two suspects who boarded a flight in Portland was Mohamed Atta, 33. . . . The 2001 Nissan Altima used by the men came from the same Boston rental location as another car used by additional suspects that contained incriminating materials when it was seized at Boston's Logan Airport.

Once in Maine, the suspects spent the night at the Comfort Inn in South Portland before boarding the plane the next morning. (“Portland Police Eye Local Ties”)

Suddenly, the Nissan Altima had been driven to Portland by Atta and his companion, who had then flown back to Boston the next morning. But the transition to what would become the accepted narrative was not yet complete. The incriminating materials were still found in a rental car left at Logan---although this car was now said to have been rented by unnamed “additional suspects,” not by Atta.

The complete transition was made on September 16, in the aforementioned Washington Post article by Joel Achenbach, which had the incriminating evidence found in Atta’s luggage.

This new story was soon fleshed out with various details, including physical evidence that Atta and al-Omari had been in Portland the night before the attacks. One article said:

The FBI released a detailed chronology Thursday [October 4] showing that two of the suspected hijackers in the Sept. 11 attack on the World Trade Center spent their final hours in Greater Portland. . . . After checking in at the motel, Atta and Alomari were seen . . . [b]etween 8 and 9 PM . . . at Pizza Hut; at 8:31 PM, they were videotaped by a KeyBank automatic teller machine, and videotaped again at 8:41 PM at a Fast Green ATM next to Pizzeria Uno. . . . At . . . 9:22 PM, Atta was caught on videotape in the Wal-Mart in Scarborough. (“The Night Before Terror,” Portland Press Herald, October 5, 2001)

The Mysteries and the Contradiction

This new story solved a problem created by the discovery that the Bukharis had not died on 9/11---how to explain why a rental car left at the Portland airport could have led authorities to two of the hijackers. This solution, however, created the mystery of why Atta would have taken this trip plus the problem of explaining the well-reported fact that incriminating materials had been found at Logan Airport. This latter problem was solved by saying that they were found in Atta’s luggage, which did not make it onto Flight 11. But this solution created, in turn, the mystery as to why Atta’s luggage failed to make the flight. The main problem facing the new story, however, is simply the fact that it is a new story, which radically contradicts what the authorities had said the first few days.

The 9/11 Commission dealt with this contradiction by simply ignoring it. It did not mention the early reports that the Nissan left at the Portland airport had documents leading the FBI to Adnan and Ameer Bukhari, that the Bukharis had taken the early morning flight from Portland to Boston, that the FBI was led to Atta (along with Marwan al-Shehhi) by information found in a Mitsubishi left at Boston’s Logan Airport, or that this Mitsubishi was where the treasure trove of information was found. It instead simply told the new story as if it had been the story all along.

Congress and the press need to ask why this contradiction exists and why the 9/11 Commission ignored it. This essay is an abbreviated version of Chapter 16 of Dr. Griffin's 9/11 Contradictions: An Open Letter to Congress and the Press (Northampton: Olive Branch, March, 2008).

The CRG grants permission to cross-post original Global Research articles on community internet sites as long as the text & title are not modified. The source and the author's copyright must be displayed. For publication of Global Research articles in print or other forms including commercial internet sites, contact: crgeditor@yahoo.com

www.globalresearch.ca contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to our readers under the provisions of "fair use" in an effort to advance a better understanding of political, economic and social issues. The material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving it for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material for purposes other than "fair use" you must request permission from the copyright owner.

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© Copyright David Ray Griffin, The Canadian, 2008
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see

David Ray Griffin on the Global Research News Hour

9/11 Contradictions: When Did Cheney Enter the Underground Bunker?

Let Us Call It by Its Proper Name: Torture

Let us not forget that on Saturday, March 8, 2008, President Bush announced that he had vetoed legislation that would have banned the CIA from using harsh interrogation methods, such as waterboarding, to break suspected terrorists because it would end practices that he said have prevented attacks. The bill that he rejected would have provided guidelines for intelligence activities and has the interrogation requirement as one provision. The bill would have limited CIA interrogators to the 19 techniques that are allowed for use by military questioners. In 2006, the Army Field Manual banned the use of methods such as waterboarding or sensory deprivation on uncooperative prisoners.

Therefore, at this moment in history, let us not forget what is still being executed by our government. Rather than simply describing it as an "advanced" or "enhanced" interrogation technique, let us call it by its proper name: Torture.

[wpvideo xiNKslGq w=450]

Let Us Call It by Its Proper Name: Torture

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And, no, my question right now is not: why is John Edwards such a pussy that the most he can contribute this late in the game is to say that for Hillary it's tough to make the math work, but yet he's still unable to pony up and endorse?  My question is also not: why the hell is everybody so silent about McCain's endorsements by wackos like John Hagee, people that claim that disasters like 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina are caused by our acceptance of gays, while in the meantime we spend countless hours on Wright?  My question is not even: what the f' is Hillary Clinton still doing in the primary race??

My question is to the state of West Virginia.  Polls  show Hillary to be ahead by 43 points.  43 POINTS.  That's huge.  And my question?

Let me set it up...

My wife once wrote a letter to Germany.  Yes, the entire country.  It opened: "Dear Germany..."  She was upset because she thought she was given a ticket on the train unfairly.  She refused to pay the ticket until "Germany" responded to her hand-written letter to the country at large.  Of course, Mr. Germany never responded and now I believe there's a warrant out for her arrest.

I made fun of her.  But, now here I am, essentially about to do the same thing.  Because my question is this:

Dear West Virginia: What the hell are you thinking voting for Hillary?

Your vote for Hillary will not move her any closer to the White House.  Unless Obama steps in front of a bus, her chances are zero.  So, why do it? 

Here are some theories:

1.) West Virginia is in denial.  They are zombies in the cult of Hillary and actually believe her when she says she's staying in the race to take it all the way to the White House.  I imagine they also believe her when she says a gas holiday is a fantastic idea.

2.) West Virginia is voting out of spite.  They're angry that Hillary isn't going to win, so they're just going to vote for her anyway to prove a point.  Not really sure what that point is.  Perhaps it's that a massive amount of people can put the entire nation at risk and into the hands of Bush's 3rd term merely because of a bruised ego. 

3.) West Virginia is dumb.  I'm not a fan of this theory.  It's a little harsh.  However, we've all read the exit polls showing that Hillary garners more support from the uneducated than Obama does.  I'm just sayin'...

4.) West Virginia wants to further divide and crush the Democratic Party.  They want McCain, that's why they'll vote for Hillary.  They are soldiers in Rush Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos."  (Side question: is it just me or is Rush's head getting larger by the second?  Literally.  Like Violet in "Willy Wonka in the Chocolate Factory," only it's not his whole body, just his head.  Crazy.)

5.) West Virginia has been secretly abducted by an alien race involved in a game show where the player wins a million alien dollars everytime someone on Earth utters the word "Hillary," so they want her to be in the public eye as long as possible.  Hillary.  Hillary.  Hillary.  That's 3 mil' right there alone.  You're welcome.

I have no answers today.  Only questions.  I imagine all of the theories are correct to some degree.  Okay, maybe not the fifth one.  I'll give you that.

But, I will tell you this: none of these theories bode well for the integrity of the people of West Virginia.  All of the theories are based on toxic thinking and intentions.  So, I don't really want to believe any of them.  I have more faith in the people of America.  I have more faith in West Virginia... mountain momma... take me home... country roads...

C'mon, West Virginia.  Take us all home.  Please. 

Sincerely,

America

I’ve just completed a month in the most happening place (Accident and Emergency) in a hospital and moved on to the one place (Paediatrics) I wasn’t particularly looking forward to throughout the year. And along with me I carry a memory here and a memory there. I did so many ‘cool’ things during this previous posting which I only used to dream about (yes, med students can end up dreaming about the hospital itself).

For instance, there was the day when I got to administer CPR on a dying lady who managed to live, and on the baby which unfortunately didn’t.

Ok, ok…I’ll switch to the lighter moments such as where I made an utter fool of myself in front of a patient by describing to them an x-ray thinking it belonged to someone else. *takes a mental note: -never see the x-ray of a patient without getting a history and a physical first* also was the moment where I cut myself trying to break open a vial in a fancy way, and the several injections I poked into others without a care in the world lol. I finally got some proper practice to fine tune my ability to suture people up and even better practice on how to avoid my ears getting blown away when some of the patients scream at the top of their lungs. There’s a rumour that goes around in my hospital which claims Bangladeshis and Egyptians are the most pain-sensitive of all humans- A & E does make that rumour hold true. Oh and these were the days when my white coats would regularly end up being stained with blood while assisting emergency amputations.

Overall though, it’s been one place where my heart has really been satisfied with. The one department in the hospital which I can honestly say I left unwillingly. It’s the one field that’s got me really attracted towards for a life-long career and yet I ponder now whether the stress and pay will be worth the toll or whether it was just something I enjoyed because it was temporary and had cool working hours.

Before I conclude, here’s a take-home message for you all: We have all seen on tv (specially in indian movies) that famous celebrity lying in the ER with a monitor attached to him that suddenly shows a flat line for the ECG and you hear the nurse scream "Help! He's dying!!!". Then out of nowhere these amazing doctors come up and shock him magically back in to life. Well next time that happens, remember that’s just bull. You don’t shock a flat line, unless you want to make sure he remains dead.

- Christine Todd Whitman

nydailynews.com / Jon Gold's Blog: 360 Post-9/11 Workers Have Died, Including 80 Of Cancer, Says State

More than 360 workers who dealt with the aftermath of the World Trade Center disaster have died, state health officials said Wednesday.

Officials have determined the cause of death of 154 of the responders and volunteers who toiled at Ground Zero, the blocks nearby and at the Fresh Kills landfill, where debris from the site was taken.

Of those, 80 died of cancer.

"It's the tip of the iceberg," said David Worby, who is representing 10,000 workers - 600 with cancer - who say they got sick after working on rescue and recovery efforts. . . .

31. Mai 2008

bundesweit

Gleich 2 Aktionen kündigt der Arbeitskreis: Stoppt die Vorratsdatenspeicherung! an.

Die eine Aktion ist eine bundesweite Demo gegen die Vorratsdatenspeicherung und soll am 31. Mai 2008 stattfinden.

Zu dieser Aktion sind schon 77 Städte gelistet, allerdings sind es noch recht wenig.

Wer sich an dieser Aktion beteiligen respektive mitarbeiten möchte, kann Weiteres auf der wiki - Seite von AK Vorrat in Erfahrung bringen.

Die 2. Aktion soll dann eine europaweite Demonstration in den Hauptstädten Europas im September sein.

europaweit

September 2008

Politfactor meint: es brennt in Deutschland - beteiligt euch zahlreich an den Aktionen!

No other commentary is required, this article says it all!

Published on Friday, May 9, 2008 by CommonDreams.org

The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder

by Vincent Bugliosi

There is direct evidence that President George W. Bush did not honorably lead this nation, but deliberately misled it into a war he wanted. Bush and his administration knowingly lied to Congress and to the American public — lies that have cost the lives of more than 4,000 young American soldiers and close to $1 trillion.

A Monumental Lie

In his first nationally televised address on the Iraqi crisis on October 7, 2002, six days after receiving the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), a classified CIA report, President Bush told millions of Americans the exact opposite of what the CIA was telling him -a monumental lie to the nation and the world.

On the evening of October 7, 2002, the very latest CIA intelligence was that Hussein was not an imminent threat to the U.S. This same information was delivered to the Bush administration as early as October 1, 2002, in the NIE, including input from the CIA and 15 other U.S. intelligence agencies. In addition, CIA director George Tenet briefed Bush in the Oval Office on the morning of October 7th.

According to the October 1, 2002 NIE, “Baghdad for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or CBW [chemical and biological warfare] against the United States, fearing that exposure of Iraqi involvement would provide Washington a stronger case for making war.” The report concluded that Hussein was not planning to use any weapons of mass destruction; further, Hussein would only use weapons of mass destruction he was believed to have if he were first attacked, that is, he would only use them in self-defense.

Preparing its declassified version of the NIE for Congress, which became known as the White Paper, the Bush administration edited the classified NIE document in ways that significantly changed its inference and meaning, making the threat seem imminent and ominous.

In the original NIE report, members of the U.S. intelligence community vigorously disagreed with the CIA’s bloated and inaccurate conclusions. All such opposing commentary was eliminated from the declassified White Paper prepared for Congress and the American people.

The Manning Memo

On January 31, 2003, Bush met in the Oval Office with British Prime Minister Tony Blair. In a memo summarizing the meeting discussion, Blair’s chief foreign policy advisor David Manning wrote that Bush and Blair expressed their doubts that any chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons would ever be found in Iraq, and that there was tension between Bush and Blair over finding some justification for the war that would be acceptable to other nations. Bush was so worried about the failure of the UN inspectors to find hard evidence against Hussein that he talked about three possible ways, Manning wrote, to “provoke a confrontation” with Hussein. One way, Bush said, was to fly “U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, [falsely] painted in UN colors. If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach” of UN resolutions and that would justify war. Bush was calculating to create a war, not prevent one.

~snip~

Vincent Bugliosi received his law degree in 1964. In his career at the L.A. County District Attorney’s office, he successfully prosecuted 105 out of 106 felony jury trials, including 21 murder convictions without a single loss. His most famous trial, the Charles Manson case, became the basis of his classic, Helter Skelter, the biggest selling true-crime book in publishing history. The Prosecution of George W. Bush For Murder is available May 27.

For more information visit www.prosecutionofbush.com

Read the FULL STORY here.

 (Be warned: her new CD called "Sunday in New York"  hits the streets on May 13).

Yeah, I'm talkin' Christine Ebersole.

Check this out. Please, baby, please. It's her " 911 Awakening."

 http://www.prisonplanet.tv/articles/september2007/180907report.html

How about her peronal, chatty blog revealing how very, very crowded the voices in Ms. Ebersole's head must be:

   www.christineebersol.com/blog/

I know, I know. We thought she was a lover but she's nothin but another crazy hater....

Entre las revelaciones que aparecen en el libro se encuentra la afirmación de que Canadá participó en los preparativos del ataque anglosajón contra Afganistán antes de los atentados del 11 de septiembre de 2001.

Pero el libro no saldrá a la venta. El autor fue arrestado y encarcelado ayer por solicitación sexual de menores a través de Internet. Mientras tanto, la casa editora JCL recibió una carta del ministerio de Defensa de Canadá en la que se le comunica que la publicación de la obra puede poner en peligro la seguridad nacional. Ante la presión, la editora JCL retiró inmediatamente el libro de su catálogo.

Fuente : VoltaireNet

Then I looked at my shirt.  It was covered with blood.  My arm was covered with blood, my neck, my chest.  I started to panic.  I checked E's mouth, no blood.  I checked E's head, no blood.  I looked at myself again, there was more blood on me.  Finally, I noticed that it was E's hand.   Then I noticed how quickly it was coming out.  Then I really started to panic  (I know, I know, not the thing to do).  I called A and asked what to do-he said to bandage him up and take him to the hospital.   Sounded good in theory, but I just couldn't bandage E up.  He wouldn't sit still for me to look at his hand, I didn't want to hurt him even more by trying to wrap him up.   Being the great wife I am, I started to get angry with A and hung up, saying I needed to take care of things...yea.

A few minutes had passed and the bleeding was still pretty heavy.  F@*k this I thought.  I'm calling 911.  So I did.  And actually calmed down.  The funny thing being that E, once I calmed him down for falling and hitting his head, wasn't upset at all.  If anything,  he was just bothered by my holding his hand wrapped in a paper towel.  A couple of minutes after I called, a police officer showed up.

"What happened?"

"My son cut himself, I'm not sure on what, and a chunk of his finger came off."

"Do you have it?" the police officer asked.

"Um...no, no, it's not a piece of his finger, just the skin."

Ok, now I was feeling pretty badly.  A paramedic and firemen showed up...totaling at least 6 people.  Two of them looked at E's finger.  They couldn't figure out where it was cut, but said it wasn't too bad, and that he wasn't in dire need of medical attention.  The wrapped it up, suggested I get him a tetanus shot (at that point I had NO idea what he had had for his shot) and seek medical attention if I wanted to (um...YEA!).  Then they all left.

Yea, maybe I over reacted a bit, but I was covered in blood, COVERED.  It looked so much worse than it was.  So, I packed up a few things in E's diaper bag, grabbed a hoodie to cover my bloody self, loaded the car up, and off we were to the dr.'s.

A met us there, thank goodness, and was surprised at how Emerson was...normal.  We brought him into the doctor, the doctor looked at E's finger and told us this

He has a superficial cut on the tip of his finger.  The cut that he has on the middle part of his finger isn't too bad.  Luckily the skin is still there, so it will heal better.  Babies heal very quickly.  Stitches are not needed.  Just make sure change the band aid when it gets nasty looking, and keep it clean.  The only thing we're looking for is infection.  Keep it covered until Monday.  Call me tomorrow and let me know if it's still bleeding and how he's doing.

Ok...phew.  Even though I called 911, over reacting a bit, my baby was going to be ok.  In a way, I'm glad that it happened like it did.  I'll be better prepared for the future when things are worse...because of course they will be.

And I was feeling like a negligent mother, my perfect baby injured at only 9 months.  But, things happen.  And how he got cut?  The pair of tongs that I had in my hand when I went to comfort him-my guess is he grabbed them and cut himself.  As A puts it, you went over to make him feel better, that's not a bad thing.

Lesson learned-don't have anything in hands when comforting baby...

Anyhow, that's not the subject of this blog. I wanted to pay tribute to something that caught me completely off guard. In 2001, there were two skyscrapers known collectively, along with a few other lesser buildings, as the World Trade Center in NYC. They have also been referred to as the "Twin Towers". On September 11, 2001, Religion destroyed those two towers. A well known fact to New Yorkers, but not to the world abroad, is that there was a doomed piece of artwork planted dead center of the esplanade between the two leviathan buildings; the Sphere (as shown above).

During my recent trip back to New York, I ventured, sadly, for the first time to Battery Park to oggle the hapless tourists in their constant and evol pilgrimage to Ellis/Liberty Island(s). Having never ventured that far Downtown, I was surprised by the twisted, and yet nearly untouched, sculpture that greeted me.

The sphere, having been between the two towers at the time of the "War of Religion against the Rest of the World", was a saddening and somber reminder of what happened back so long ago. I must have stood there for about 20 minutes staring at this reminder of my own goal of vindication and retribution.

Imagine a world where hatred wasn't based on fiction; imagine NO religion.

Where was I when the towers were hit? I was in high school, Junior year. I was in the middle of class, Boston, circa 2001, Lincold-Sudbury Regional. Me and my closest friends, John, Brandon, and Chris, watched LIVE as the second tower was persecuted upon. It took a day to drive, but we made the trek to Manhattan to volunteer for anything we could think of. We dared not go further than the East Village, we found a local restaurant that was feeding service people and offered our services. It was a great time of unity that will forever scar my young life.

The memory will live on. New York will always be a sad place to me. I Love New York, for different reasons.

Mizzle

Palfrey told former NSA official that call girls had picked up information concerning foreknowledge of attacks

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet
Monday, May 5, 2008

Former NSA analyst and Navy intelligence officer Wayne Madsen tells the The Alex Jones Show that one of the key motives behind the DC Madams murder may have been the information her call girls picked up from Washingtons top brass concerning foreknowledge and government complicity in the 9/11 attacks.';

Former NSA analyst and Navy intelligence officer Wayne Madsen tells the The Alex Jones Show that one of the key motives behind the DC Madam's murder may have been the information her call girls picked up from Washington's top brass concerning foreknowledge and government complicity in the 9/11 attacks. Madsen also connected another suspicious death - that of former CIA agent Roland Carnaby who was gunned down by Houston police last week - to another individual who was involved in both the 9/11 cover-up and the D.C. Madam scandal, disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Noting that Palfrey and her defense team had tried to invoke the Classified Information Procedures Act in the U.S. District Court in Washington, which is only used when classified information or the names of people who are intelligence officers needs to be discussed, Madsen said Palfrey, "Had information which could have a bearing on the 9/11 attacks that some of her employees may have picked up information beforehand that would have been very useful to the 9/11 investigation."

Madsen added that most of Palfrey's call girls had been active around the area of McLean Virginia, which is where the CIA and other intelligence agencies are based and where Dick Cheney lived at the time. Host Alex Jones recalled that during interviews Palfrey had told him that her escort service was in fact being used as an intelligence operation to gather intelligence on individuals who used the service, particularly those connected to the military. Madsen, who spoke personally to Palfrey on numerous occasions, recalls one conversation at dinner about a month a go with Palfrey and her asset forfeiture lawyer where Palfrey told him, 'I have information that would have been of great interest to the 9/11 Commission - there's information that they have (her call girls) that would have been very important for the 9/11 Commission to know having to do with intelligence they picked up about 9/11 before it happened'. The former NSA official noted that some of Palfrey's call girls were being chauffeured by Sherlington Limousines to poker parties attended by former CIA director and co-chair of the Joint 9/11 Intelligence Inquiry Porter Goss. One of the reasons cited for Goss' abrupt resignation in May 2006 was his alleged involvement in a prostitution scandal where lobbyists were holding parties for GOP lawmakers that featured hookers and gambling at the Watergate Hotel in D.C. On the morning of 9/11, Goss was having breakfast with the head of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) General Mahmoud Ahmad, the man who ordered a wire transfer of $100,000 to alleged lead hijacker Mohammed Atta.
Deborah Jeane Palfrey.

In addition, Madsen pointed out that Jack Abramoff, who was also connected to the DC Madam scandal, allowed at least two of the 9/11 hijackers to use one of his casino boats in the days before 9/11, and this is what Palfrey was probably referring to when she spoke about her call girls picking up information about 9/11 before it happened. "There's the link, when you've got Abramoff and you had two of those hijackers on his casino boat a few days before 9/11 - I just wonder if that's what Jeane was talking about," said Madsen, "Because now I'm looking at this crazy incident in Houston with Roland Carnaby, a retired CIA guy who was still contracted to the CIA, being gunned down in broad daylight by the Houston police department - now I've been told by Agency sources in Houston that one of the people he was looking at was Abramhoff and the casino boats - so here you've got two people in the same week, looks like they were both assassinated in broad daylight," he concluded. Many readers will recall that Newsweek reported that military brass in Washington received a warning the night before the 9/11 attacks which led to a September 11 flight being cancelled. "NEWSWEEK has learned that while U.S. intelligence received no specific warning, the state of alert had been high during the past two weeks, and a particularly urgent warning may have been received the night before the attacks, causing some top Pentagon brass to cancel a trip. Why that same information was not available to the 266 people who died aboard the four hijacked commercial aircraft may become a hot topic on the Hill," according to the September 13 2001 issue. The connection to 9/11 is tantalizing and provides a key motive for why numerous power brokers would have wanted Palfrey to be shut up for good before she had the opportunity to release information in court that her call girls picked up about 9/11 pointing to foreknowledge and government complicity
in the attacks.

------------------------------

Excerpts from WorldNetDaily:

With virtually no fanfare, President Bush signed into law a plan ordering the government to take no more than six months to set up a "national contingency plan" to screen newborns' DNA in case of a "Public Health emergency."

The new law requires that the results of the program – including "information … research, and data on newborn screening" – shall be assembled by a "central clearinghouse" and made available on the Internet.

According to congressional records, S.1858, sponsored by Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., was approved in the Senate Dec. 13, in the House April 8 and signed by Bush April 24.

The bill, she said, strips "citizens of genetic privacy rights and DNA property rights. It bill also violates research ethics and the Nuremberg Code.

"The public is clueless. S. 1858 imposes a federal agenda of DNA databanking and population-wide genetic research," Brase continued. "It does not require consent and there are no requirements to fully inform parents about the warehousing of their child's DNA for the purpose of genetic research.

>>Maybe one day in the not so distant future people will not only judge each other by class, sex and color, but also what deficiency you may have in your genetic sequence. How great will that be. I can't wait for those days to arrive.

I can see it now, "Hey babe how you doing, you looking righteous today...uhm any chance you've got your DNA scan tron on your person, I wouldn't mind comparing stats. You seem like a match, but you can't be to careful this days...They just discovered a new cancer gene in the lower helix...".

It took eight years for your individual freedoms to be removed right from under you without anyone even noticing. And this last salvo by this administration (to include the House and the Senate) may have been the real dozy'.

*laughs to keep from crying*

1989 San Francisco earthquake kills 68

1998 Northeastern US Ice Storm kills 35, many people without power for weeks

2001 9/11, simultaneous terrorist attacks on DC and NYC kill 2993

2005 New Orleans Hurricane Katrina kills 1836

In the past 20 years in Southeast Asia:

1989 Bangladesh, massive tornado kills 1,300

1991 Bangladesh, flooding kills 139,000

1993 India, Earthquake kills 22,000

1998 Papua New Guinea, tsunami kills 2,000

1999 India, 'Super Cyclone' kills 9,885

2001 India, Earthquake kills 20,000

2004 Throughout Southeast Asia, tsunami kills 229,866

2007 Bangladesh, Cyclone Sidr kills 3,500

2008 Burma, Cyclone Nargis kills at least 100,000 (numbers still coming in)

These numbers are incomprehensible. To anyone, I would think. I can comprehend 35 dead. That's a tragedy, a human, terrifying tragedy. But 100 times that? 3,000 times that? The numbers lose their meaning. On Monday, there were 100,000 more people alive on the planet than there are today. How can this be?

I'm so close!!!!!!! I just need to do worse in Science. But here's one thing that's pretty ironic. My Dad is actually an 8th Grade Science Teacher, at the school I go to. I won't have him for science next year, they won't put me in his class, I'll have the other 8th grade science teacher. And yet, I'm terrible at science. We're researching ways for alternative energy (Yes, I actually know what that is 8) And my suggestion was somehow get like 1000 hamsters and a lot of hamster wheels. Too bad we're doing Solar Power instead. :(

But with 18 days of school left, maybe its not the best idea. But I don't have to keep it for a long time, just like one day, and then get them back to passing again :D

A funny thing happened in Math a while ago. Me and some of my friends were having a "Team-Pencil-Fight" against some other guy. His response I don't understand at all. Not to be racist, but he's African-American, and if you see how those people sometimes act, it might make more sense. So he picks up the classroom phone. You know, the one where the receiver is on the wall, with the numbers, and the actual phone is on a cord. So anyway, he picks the phone up, turns around, and my friend tries to dial 911 into the phone. He only got the "9" and the 1st "1", lucky for the guy on the phone. Maybe that's what you could call a "Prank Call"...

Scott777

I've been battling with "time" for many years, and am just now "getting" the fact that I need to let go and let "time" just do it's own thing. You can substitute the word "time" with "God" or "fate" or "karma" I suppose. I prefer "God" or simply "our Creator." (Someone's in charge of all this mess... I just am thankful it's not me!)

The point is that I've been trying to be in control of time, and everything that goes with it, for so long.  I have been officially labeled a "control freak",  for good reason too. But for the past several months I've been practicing letting go of that perceived control...and things have been going smoother.

So the question is, are things really going smoother, or is it just that it is smoother on my psyche when I relinquish control?

I've been increasenly (is that word?) frustrated with how my studies have been going: which is, to say in one word, slow. In two words: agonizingly slow. There are many legit reasons for it going so slow, but lately I've been feeling like a failure: failing my family (who have been supporting me) and failing myself (I should be a lot farther in my goals than I am right now).

Over the past months I've started giving myself permission for being not being where I think I should be at this point in my life, and I feel better for it. I've come to realize that there's nothing I could have done differently over the past 2 years to make things go faster, and the things I allowed to delay me were either honorable and loving actions (like taking care of my parents) or simply things out of my control that required immediate attending to (like moving). I dont think I could go back and change things too much, even if I ever had that opportunity. So I have decided to quit beating myself up over it, and just let the studying and my future career flow the ways it's supposed to. Oddly enough, when I let go, the more productive my days seem to be. I just have to keep practicing letting go of the notion that things are totally in my hands, I guess. I am finding that being a control freak is a lot like being an alcoholic (which I also am): Beating it is easier said than done, and one has to take one step at a time as we surrender our will to a higher power.  

Have you ever read the Tao? I am beginning to and this is one of my absolute favorite passages, that has a lot to do with what I'm talking about today:

(part of the 29th verse of the Tao written by Lao-tzu in China, 500 years before Christ)

Allow your life to unfold naturally.
Know that it too is a vessel of perfection.
Just as you breathe in and breath out,
there is a time for being ahead
and a time for being behind;
a time for being in motion
and a time for being at rest;
a time for being vigorous
and a time for being exhausted;
a time for beign safe
and a time for being in danger.

I like the concept of "time for being exhausted." It gives me comfort and heals some guilt and shame by enabling me to allow myself permission (and time) to be exhausted both mentally and physically. I'm learning that it's okay to take time to rest and recover.  

Interestingly enough there is a simular passage written by an unknown scholar around the time of King Soloman in the 10th century before Christ, in the book of Ecclesiastes (old Testament of Bible). But I like the Tao one better: it's a little gentler, more peaceful and embracing - plus I do not believe there is a ever a permissable time for hate and war, which Eccl 3:1 speaks of, but I suppose the context of those verses could be debated a little.

Eccl 3:1
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
a time to search and atime to give up,
a time to keep and atime to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

According to her claims, 9/11 is an exemple of design inference. When you saw the first airplane hit the tower, you probably thought that it was an accident. Just when the second airplane hit the second tower, you ceased considering this option, and realized it was terrorism. That, people, is design inference explained by Denyse O'leary.

For a short moment, I said to myself "Maybe she's right, and this is a design inference". It actually is. But it is not — in any way — transposable to natural evolution. 

Why? It's all about statistics - or maybe probabilities. According to Denyse O'Leary, and many other 'design inference' enthusiats, species can not emerge by chance. Juste like two airplanes just can't hit two adjacent towers by chance, and it was later proved that they didn't : the crashes were designed. 

The flaw in the logic here is that airplane crashes in 9/11 where not independent. It was only two manifestations of a single decision. Even if two planes hit two towers, it is nothing but a single event. In evolution, events are more likely to be independent. Since two populations are unable to exchange genes — i.e. to maintain gene flow — they stop to be dependent (unless being involved in an ecological interaction, but this is a particular case). 

I think there is a deeper flaw in Denyses' logic. We now know for sure that there was a designer behind 9/11. We were able to connect the pattern (plane hitting tower) with the process (someone taking the decision to attack New-York). In this case, we know both the conclusions, and the premices. 

But it is dangerous to apply the same logic to evolution : of course, if we consider that our premice is 'there is a designer', every single attempt to infer design will lead us to the conclusion that 'there is a designer'. Any serious evolutionnist will start by investigating the premices (even if in certain cases, it is usefull to investigate patterns in order to determine processes, which is close to indudtivism).

That is the main problem with "intelligent" design : they try to conclude to the existence of a designer, knowikng that the existence of this designer is their only hypothesis. Where the heck is intelligence in this?

Also, see this tremendously good post of Riley Firth, at The War on Bullshit.

The Great Sadness began for me on 9/11/01. I was across the street from the Pentagon when it was struck by terrorists. Working as a journalist, I covered the event from various angles, including a trip to New York a couple of weeks after the attack. It was a busy, chaotic time. We journalists didn't have time to grieve, worry, fear, or think about what had just happened or what we saw in the process of telling the rest of the world about it. And when the dust settled, no one wanted to talk about it. So, I didn't.

I left Washington, DC and came to Indianapolis to escape the town with a Bulls Eye on it. I wanted out of news but I knew I wanted to continue to write. So my journalism career turned from TV to print; from news to sports.

Many of the details will get filled in through this blog but I ultimately met and married my husband nearly four years ago. Not long after our marriage began, I was diagnosed with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder after a suicide attempt. The Great Sadness had not become clear to me yet; I didn't understand what it was. I just knew it was there.

After reading the book, "The Shack," I began to recognize that I still carried The Great Sadness, as one of the characters in the book describes. The book also left me longing to have the type of intimate relationship this character had with Papa, our Lord and Savior. I can't even begin to describe the hunger and thirst I have for Him after reading this book. I wish I had an opportunity to hole up in a shack and meet Him face to face too.

Until then, I know I have to continue the healing process. Right now, there is such tremendous grief. It is impossible to describe or explain. But it is as strong as if it had just happened. And so, I do what I do best: Write.

Perhaps healing will come. Perhaps the Great Sadness will lift. Perhaps others will find hope and healing from their Great Sadness.

Until next time...