Volta: Toyota's 32-Miles-Per-Gallon, Hybrid Supercar :.

Holy !*&#^!&@^)!:

This second generation Hybrid Synergy Drive system uses the 3.3-liter V6 common to a variety of Toyota/Lexus products, plus two powerful electric motors to produce a phenomenal 408 horsepower (300 kW). Needless to say the lightweight sports car is quick, shooting forward from standstill to 100 km/h (62 mph) in a sizzling 4.03 seconds before reaching a terminal velocity of 250 km/h (155 mph).

Now, what's the most interesting aspect of this story? Read the second to last sentence carefully:

Ironic, but the one company that would have no financial challenges building a car this daring, probably won't.

So it goes...

Related: Toyota Unveils Highlander Hybrid SUV :.

After further research, I found out that Toyota IS releasing the Highlander SUV as a hybrid. Let's not kid ourselves, folks, hybrid SUVs are way too little, way too late. BUT... The hybrid platform could allow us to actually eliminate the use of gasoline---RIGHT NOW!

If you don't know anything about Aquafuel, none of what follows will make any sense to you, so, start with Blaze Labs and J.L. Naudin. Then return to this story.

I don't think hybrids are a big deal, on their own, since they still require petroleum based gasoline. The hybrid platform, though, is very close to being something revolutionary! The power recovery system that's integrated into the braking system is the big deal. We just need to eliminate the requirement of having to burn petroleum based gas in the damn thing!!!

Until the multiple issues with fuel cells are sorted out, the thing to do would be to build an Aquafuel generator into these hybrids. Integrate something like three 185watt solar panels into the top facing surfaces of this SUV and guess what! THE VEHICLE COULD BE MAKING IT'S OWN FUEL THE ENTIRE TIME IT'S SITTING IN THE SUN.


Obviously, any integrated solar power system isn't, on its own, going to make enough Aquafuel to accommodate most drivers' needs. (In sunny areas, where the vehicle isn't used everyday, it might.) Therefore, when larger amounts of Aquafuel are required, say, to fill up the vehicle for a long trip, high current electricity from clean or dirty sources may be utilized to top off the vehicle's Aquafuel tank. At that point, you just need to make sure the Aquafuel generator has a sufficient water supply.

In the early stages, this idea could be implemented as a duel fuel system. Aquafuel runs fine in unmodified, internal combustion engines that call for 87 octane, unleaded gasoline. In the event that high current electricity isn't available to produce Aquafuel in large quantities, the internal combustion engine could burn regular gasoline.

Now, if only the companies would make hybrids with diesel engines... Well, you would be done right there. Can you imagine? Being able to drive for about 600 miles on one tank of biodiesel, straight vegetable oil (SVO), or petroleum based diesel? The biodiesel and SVO freaks would snap up every last diesel hybrid vehicle.

Question/Answer

Q: Can Aquafuel systems be added to existing vehicles as well?

A: As long as they burn 87 octane, unleaded gasoline.

Q: Where can I buy an Aquafuel system?

A: Uh, you can't.

Q: Why not?

A: I don't know, exactly. Ask the good people at Santilli Magnegas. They say the U.S. government has hindered the development of this technology. They also own all the patents on this. You can see a Ferrari running on Aquafuel and some other vehicles converted to use it on this site as well.

These ideas are merely stopgap measures that would buy us some time. These are not solutions. The agricultural sector's dependence on petroleum products is far more frightening than automobile related consumption. I would say to get the gas out of our cars first, because that is actually possible. Getting the gas out of our food, on the other hand, will require much more time and effort. The nightmare scenario is that humanity will find itself in a situation where petroleum supplies have dwindled to the point where alternative solutions can't be bootstrapped into operation because the energy isn't available.

Hint: Nothing is being done about any of this (to any degree that matters) and our so-called leaders are allowing the energy situation to go off the rails, one can only assume, on purpose. I suppose it's possible that greed and criminal incompetence are involved, but in the final analysis, it doesn't matter. So, what's the moral of the story? Learn how to grow and raise your own food before you get hungry.

And dream about the world we could have had if untold trillions of dollars worth of our tax money hadn't been used for purely evil purposes.

Related: Alternative Energy Magazine Editor, Cold Fusion Author Murdered

Related: Wind, Solar, Hydro, Ethanol, Biodiesel, Aquafuel and Fuel Cell Technologies
posted by Kevin at 4:58 PM

Snooping Robot Going to Iraq :.

These primitive remote controlled units will soon be replaced by much more autonomous versions. The rise of the machines is virtually unstoppable:

A robot designed for urban warfare will soon be on its way to assist U.S. Marines in Iraq, where the scrappy machine can peer around corners and snoop in areas too dangerous or inaccessible for human soldiers.

Called Dragon Runner, the four-wheeled device is small and light enough to be carried in a soldier's backpack and rugged enough to be tossed over fences and up or down stairwells.

"We've thrown it out of second- and third-story windows," said Capt. Dave Moreau, project officer for Dragon Runner at the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory in Quantico, Va. "We've thrown it off the back of a moving vehicle at 45 miles an hour."

If Dragon Runner performs well, the Pentagon conceivably would be interested in buying hundreds of the robots. Hagen Schempf, a senior systems scientist at the Robotics Institute who was principal investigator for Dragon Runner, said he thinks applications in civilian law enforcement and firefighting might eventually outnumber those in the military.

"We might soon face a different problem here ---- how fast can we make how many?" said Schempf, who is co-founder and chairman of Automatika, which has licensed the Dragon Runner technology from CMU.
posted by Kevin at 4:22 PM

Monsanto: The Epitome of Evil :.

I have no formal training in agriculture, farming, gardening, etc. Now, if I can grow a wide variety of food crops using nothing but dirt, dead leaves, chicken shit, open pollinated, organic seeds and water, why would anyone use the frightening, toxic and dangerous pHarming products manufactured by Monsanto?

Monsanto wants to go after everyone, including people who opt out of their stupid, genitically engineered paradigm. Even if their crap blows into your field, they can sue you for damages! Well, I hope that doesn't happen to my crops once I'm finally out in the middle of nowhere. I won't be settling the matter in a courtroom:

In a 5-4 decision, the court sided with the biotech giant, which sued Percy Schmeiser in 1997 after Monsanto agents found the company's patented gene in canola plants on his farm near Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. The court agreed that he stole Monsanto's seed, even though Schmeiser maintained that he inadvertently used seed that had blown into his field.

Schmeiser said he had no interest in planting genetically modified seed. The seed blew into his fields from a neighbor's crop, he said, and rather than profiting from Monsanto's technology, it actually contaminated and ruined a seed Schmeiser had cultivated for 50 years.
posted by Kevin at 3:49 AM

Cryptogon Garden Update

Ahhh, the garden. It's really starting to unfurl. I eat a few handfuls of veggies out of it every day now. Blue lake bush beans, peas and lettuce are good to go. Everything else is growing well. The corn is over my head, the carrots are about three inches long, watermelon, honey dew, and cucumbers are all in progress, as are cabbage, broccoli, onion, and okra. The tomato plants are off the rails. They are fat and lush. I can't wait until they start producing fruit. Here are a few snaps:

The sweet corn is preparing to spawn!

The dreaded, but beautiful, cabbage looper. I wish I had a couple of hens. Bock!

These peas taste like candy; incredibly sweet. The problem I have with them is that I usually gobble them up before they get this big. This one had escaped my glance, and I'm glad it did. Yum.

The cuke vines are out of hand. One has latched on to a corn stalk. Another is sticking up through my cabbage. A few are trying to creep out of the raised bed.

posted by Kevin at 2:47 AM

Summer 2004: The Summer of Terror! :.

* Yawn * Just do it already. Everyone knows it's going to happen. Get on with it:

The FBI is warning law enforcement agencies to be on the alert for the possibility that suicide bombers may attempt to strike inside the United States. A lightly classified intelligence bulletin circulated Thursday to 18,000 U.S. law enforcement bodies is headlined "Possible suicide bomber indicators," and was distributed via the Bureau's secure Law Enforcement Online (LEO) Intranet. It warns local badge-carriers to look for obvious signs of trouble � people wearing heavy, bulky jackets on warm days, smelling of chemicals, trailing wires from their jackets � as well, more subtle ones, such as tightly clenched fists. Someone who never shows his palms could be gripping a detonator rigged to go off when a button is released. "If you shoot him, you're still not safe because his hands relax and the bomb explodes," says a counter-terrorism official.

We're just never going to hear the end of it. It will be surreal, watching the fat, lazy imbeciles brimming with fear and rage. Get your Big Gulp and your Freedom Fries, the homeland is under attack! Film at 11. Maybe the reporters will wear body armor when they broadcast from WalMart. Fantastic.

It may or may not be The End, but at least it will be entertaining.

* Shaking head, stumbling to bed. *
posted by Kevin at 4:14 AM

Email Has Been Heavy

I'll get back to you guys soon. Lots of people writing in lately.
posted by Kevin at 3:50 AM

'In the Mouth of Madness' :.

Drink more:

A lot of you have been asking why I haven't written anything lately.

My jaw dropped about three weeks ago and damn few words have come out of my mouth ever since. Mostly I've been asking for food, lots of food. And watching a lot of movies, the black and white ones, film noir, trying to pretend I don't live in this world of 2004. I think this is what many people do when they reach a certain age, when current events overtake them and they can't cope with it, and try to take refuge in the past.

But let's face it. I can't cope with this reality. It's more than I can handle. The best phrase to describe it? Incredulous stupefaction. My head just wags back and forth involuntarily these days.

Some of my friends say I simply read too much bad news. Since the 9/11 deception, there's been anthrax, Afghanistan, Patriot Act, and Iraq, to list the major chapters that go along with perhaps the worst of all the atrocities, that neverending story about the mass murder of the Palestinians that the world seems so good at ignoring. And I've been writing about all this ceaselessly for the past couple of years. And I don't mean to demean all those wonderful people who have written to me in appreciative support, but hell, there are six billion people in the world, and most of them are not listening, or doing anything constructive to stop this juggernaut of carnage that is really the world's dominant moneymaking operation.

Strife makes money for the rich losers who foment it. And it's getting me down to the point of speechlessness.

What hope exists if people who profess to adhere to the principles of the good life remain silent?
posted by Kevin at 3:46 AM

Material Given to Congress in 2002 Is Now Classified :.

The Justice Department has taken the unusual step of retroactively classifying information it gave to Congress nearly two years ago regarding a former F.B.I. translator who charged that the bureau had missed critical terrorist warnings, officials said Wednesday.

Law enforcement officials say the secrecy surrounding the translator, Sibel Edmonds, is essential to protecting information that could reveal intelligence-gathering operations. But some members of Congress and Congressional aides said they were troubled by the move, which comes as critics have accused the Bush administration of excessive secrecy.

"What the F.B.I. is up to here is ludicrous," Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said in an interview. "To classify something that's already been out in the public domain, what do you accomplish? It does harm to transparency in government, and it looks like an attempt to cover up the F.B.I.'s problems in translating intelligence."

F.B.I. officials gave Senate staff members two briefings in June and July of 2002 concerning Ms. Edmonds, who said the F.B.I.'s system for translating intelligence was so flawed that the bureau missed chances to spot terrorist warnings.
posted by Kevin at 3:40 AM

'U.S. Soldiers Started to Shoot Us, One by One' :.

I feel sick:

It was 10.30pm in the remote village of Mukaradeeb by the Syrian border and the guests hurried back to their homes as the party ended. As sister-in-law of the groom, Mrs Shihab, 30, was to sleep with her husband and children in the house of the wedding party, the Rakat family villa. She was one of the few in the house who survived the night.

"The bombing started at 3am," she said yesterday from her bed in the emergency ward at Ramadi general hospital, 60 miles west of Baghdad. "We went out of the house and the American soldiers started to shoot us. They were shooting low on the ground and targeting us one by one," she said. She ran with her youngest child in her arms and her two young boys, Ali and Hamza, close behind. As she crossed the fields a shell exploded close to her, fracturing her legs and knocking her to the ground.

She lay there and a second round hit her on the right arm. By then her two boys lay dead. "I left them because they were dead," she said. One, she saw, had been decapitated by a shell.

"I fell into the mud and an American soldier came and kicked me. I pretended to be dead so he wouldn't kill me. My youngest child was alive next to me."

Mrs Shibab's description, backed by other witnesses, of an attack on a sleeping village is at odds with the American claim that they came under fire while targeting a suspected foreign fighter safe house.

She described how in the hours before dawn she watched as American troops destroyed the Rakat villa and the house next door, reducing the buildings to rubble.

Another relative carried Mrs Shihab and her surviving child to hospital. There she was told her husband Mohammed, the eldest of the Rakat sons, had also died.

As Mrs Shihab spoke she gestured with hands still daubed red-brown with the henna the women had used to decorate themselves for the wedding. Alongside her in the ward yesterday were three badly injured girls from the Rakat family: Khalood Mohammed, aged just a year and struggling for breath, Moaza Rakat, 12, and Iqbal Rakat, 15, whose right foot doctors had already amputated.

By the time the sun rose on Wednesday over the Rakat family house, the raid had claimed 42 lives, according to Hamdi Noor al-Alusi, manager of the al-Qaim general hospital, the nearest to the village.

Among the dead were 27 members of the extended Rakat family, their wedding guests and even the band of musicians hired to play at the ceremony, among them Hussein al-Ali from Ramadi, one of the most popular singers in western Iraq.

Dr Alusi said 11 of the dead were women and 14 were children. "I want to know why the Americans targeted this small village," he said by telephone. "These people are my patients. I know each one of them. What has caused this disaster?"

"I saw something that nobody ever saw in this world," said Mr Nawaf. "There were children's bodies cut into pieces, women cut into pieces, men cut into pieces."

Among the dead was his daughter Fatima Ma'athi, 25, and her two young boys, Raad, four, and Raed, six. "I found Raad dead in her arms. The other boy was lying beside her. I found only his head," he said. His sister Simoya, the wife of Haji Rakat, was also killed with her two daughters. "The Americans call these people foreign fighters. It is a lie. I just want one piece of evidence of what they are saying."

There lay 27 graves: mounds of dirt each marked with a single square of crudely cut marble, a name scribbled in black paint. Some gave more than one name, and one, belonging to a woman Hamda Suleman, the briefest of explanations: "The American bombing."
posted by Kevin at 3:20 AM

Giuliani Hears 'Your Government Trained and Funded Al-Qaeda' at End of Commission Hearing :.

Eleventh public hearing of the 9/11 Commission, with testimony by Fmr. Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Wind the video on to three minutes before the end to hear the family members of the victims chastise the whitewash commission, where a family member of a victim says, "remmeber this, your government trained and funded Al-Qaeda" - as the rest of the 9/11 families applause.
posted by Kevin at 3:05 AM

Smaller Blockquotes

You will notice formatting changes on today's posts. I was experimenting with the BLOCKQUOTE tag and I CSSed the size of the font down a bit. Do you guys like this style of quoting materials better than the old way (italics)?

Would you like to see the quoted passages in italics, as well? Like so:

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consetetur sadipscing elitr, sed diam nonumy eirmod tempor invidunt ut labore et dolore magna aliquyam erat, sed diam voluptua.

Let me know your preference.

QUESTION FOR CSS HEADS: My BLOCKQUOTE is causing the equivalent of like three BRs between the end of the BLOCKQUOTE and the next line. Is there an attribute in CSS that I can mod to make it stop doing this? I've become used to Blogger converting carriage returns in the edit mode to BRs in the code it generates. For me to make BLOCKQUOTEs look right, I have to back up the line that follows right next to the closed BLOCKQUOTE tag. This is a minor pain in the hole. Thanks for any assistance.
posted by Kevin at 7:15 AM

Robotics to Play Major Role in Future Warfighting :.

Rise of the machines:

From Star Wars to The Terminator, Junkyard Wars and Robot Warriors, our glimpse at the potential for tomorrow has amazed and sometimes stunned us.

Well, get ready. The future may be closer than you think.

Project Alpha, a U.S. Joint Forces Command rapid idea analysis group, is in the midst of a study focusing on the concept of developing and employing robots that would be capable of replacing humans to perform many, if not most combat functions on the battlefield.

The study, appropriately titled, "Unmanned Effects: Taking the Human out of the Loop," suggests that by as early as 2025, the presence of autonomous robots, networked and integrated, on the battlefield might not be the exception, but, in fact, the norm.

Related: High School Essays Graded by Computer

Do you get it yet?
posted by Kevin at 7:12 AM

High School Essays Graded by Computer :.

I shit you not:

In the computer lab at Warren Central High School in mid-May, Craig Butler, a junior, squinted at the question on his screen, paused to ponder his answer and began typing.

Craig was one of 48,500 Indiana juniors gathering in high schools across the state to take the end-of-year online English essay test. Unlike most essay tests, however, this one is being graded not by a teacher but by a computer.

Craig has already decided he prefers computer grading. "Teachers, you know, they're human, so they have to stumble around telling you what you need to do," he said at a practice session. "A computer can put it in fine print what you did wrong and how to fix it."

With the increasing number of mandates to test student writing, "there's a certain inevitability to computerized essay grading," said Stan Jones, the Indiana commissioner of higher education. Indiana's computerized essay scoring, he said, will reduce by half the cost of administering a pencil-and-paper test and will free teachers from distributing, collecting and, above all, grading thousands of test booklets.

Do you want to know what's inevetable if this system doesn't collapse, and soon? Your kids will have to face this thing. And they will, because there's a certain inevitability to terminator robots when humans are posessed by the Myth of the Machine.

Related: Robotics to Play Major Role in Future Warfighting

Do you get it yet?
posted by Kevin at 6:54 AM

Savant for a Day :.

Enhancements: Coming soon to a brain near you! I found this article fascinating and frightening at the same time. Rather than examining the potential social causes of our high level cognitive filters, Snyder is using technology to artificially bring down the barriers our brains have erected!

Did anyone stop to think that maybe there's a reason our brains are not allowing the very granular details through to our everyday consciousness? My guess is that it probably has something to do with a self defense mechanism. Look at the endless stream of stressful stimuli that we are bombarded with on a daily basis. It's no wonder our brains shut down to some extent.

Never mind the fact that the main reason behind our increasing dumbness is the relentless creep of technology into every aspect of our lives.* Now, having said that, even I found myself reading this article and thinking, "This is kinda cool."

But consider this: The nature of the brain is probably one of the least understood topics in all of human inquiry. What is known, though, is that it a complex and sensitive bioelectrical system. Many would argue (and I tend to believe) that the brain is also a nexus of very subtle, non-physical components which are, at this time, mostly invisible to reductionist science.

In other words, the brain is not a toy.

What would you think of a medical doctor who devised a new surgical technique that involved the use of chain saw? Well, that's roughly the equivalent of nuttery involved with pulsing the brain with electromagnetic magnetic radiation. These neuroscience quacks have no idea of what they're doing. They actually make genetic engineers seem like knowledgeable professionals!

Watch out:

In a concrete basement at the University of Sydney, I sat in a chair waiting to have my brain altered by an electromagnetic pulse. My forehead was connected, by a series of electrodes, to a machine that looked something like an old-fashioned beauty-salon hair dryer and was sunnily described to me as a "Danish-made transcranial magnetic stimulator." This was not just any old Danish-made transcranial magnetic stimulator, however; this was the Medtronic Mag Pro, and it was being operated by Allan Snyder, one of the world's most remarkable scientists of human cognition.

Nonetheless, the anticipation of electricity being beamed into my frontal lobes (and the consent form I had just signed) made me a bit nervous. Snyder found that amusing. "Oh, relax now!" he said in the thick local accent he has acquired since moving here from America. "I've done it on myself a hundred times. This is Australia. Legally, it's far more difficult to damage people in Australia than it is in the United States."

"Damage?" I groaned.

"You're not going to be damaged," he said. "You're going to be enhanced."

* Don't try to debate me on this, I won't even bother. It's not worth my time to argue the finer points of something that's obvious on its face. Feel free, however, to stuff Lewis Mumford's, Myth of the Machine and Jerry Mander's, In the Absence of the Sacred into your Palm Pilot/cell phone/video camera and smoke it.
posted by Kevin at 6:11 AM

Don't Jerk It for Jesus :.

I'm going to burn karma with my Christian friends on here, but I can't help it. This is too much:

"Rick," a 20-year-old Krispy Kreme employee from Washington, says he has a serious problem: He masturbates.

He recently befriended several other Christian men who share his belief that masturbation is sinful, and together they've pledged not to "defile themselves" for 40 days -- the same amount of time the Bible says Satan tempted Jesus in the desert. They encourage each other to remain steadfast by e-mail and instant messages.

"I'm only a few days into it, but I'm really seeing how used to it that my body really is, and how I am addicted to it," Rick writes in a blog chronicling his quest. "As difficult as it is, I'm contending not only for myself, but the men that are on this fast with me, to be strong, and beat this addiction. Let's do it guys! We can be holy."

Well, this is interesting because researcher and long time Cryptogon contributor, TR, recently informed me of a technique that Christians may use to determine whether or not they're Holy. And they don't have to make up silly games to figure it out. Check out Mark 16:16-18:

16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.

17 And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;

18 They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

So, after these guys manage to NOT peel one off for 40 days, let's see them slurp down a large cup full of rattlesnake venom, which they could obtain from handling the serpent (no pun intended). In fact, they could emphasize the point by letting the snake bite them a few times. (I swear, the pun is not intended.) If they're Holy, there's nothing to worry about. Right?

Well, there might be an easier solution. According to verse 18, these guys could meet up and, "lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." Well, they're all going to be feeling pretty sick (maybe uncomfortable is a better word) after a couple weeks of this nonsense. And the laying on of hands... Well, you get the picture.

Now, why do I devote space on Cryptogon to a story like this? I mean, who cares about some guy's whacked (again, no pun intended) interpretation of the Bible?

"God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East."

-George W. Bush

My advice for Christians and everyone else: Pray to God to keep crazy people out of positions of power.
posted by Kevin at 4:28 AM

Cryptogon Reader Sends $100

One hundred big ones. That's right. This is the largest single contribution to date. Cryptogon reader, AP, indicated that he wanted the site to remain available to the general public (as opposed to a 'subscription only' site). Thanks AP!

Average humanity needs to learn the Right use of money. Money makes things happen in the world. Money in motion builds momentum, so it's best not to let it sit in one place for any length of time. The trick is to send it in the right direction when you move it. Have you noticed that the more money I give away, the more money comes in? Consider that, the next time you're reading Cryptogon on the backs of AP and all of the other contributors.

From this latest contribution, I have sent $10 to infinite-energy.com, the organization associated with murdered cold fusion author and researcher Dr. Eugene F. Mallove. I have also sent $10 to John over at cryptome.org for his unwavering commitment to the 1st Amendment.

I'll tell you what I did with the rest of the money, after I do it. Yep, I have a plan.
posted by Kevin at 2:46 AM

Israel Defies International Fury Over Civilian Attacks, Expands Gaza Offensive :.

Defying international fury and a rare U.S. rebuke, Israel has expanded its bloodiest Gaza Strip raid in years after killing 38 Palestinians in the besieged Rafah refugee camp.

The U.N. Security Council, convened at the behest of Arabs incensed at what they branded a "war crime", urged an end to violence after Israeli forces killed up to 10 Palestinians, many of them youths, at a peaceful protest on Wednesday.

Reflecting its displeasure, the United States, Israel's chief ally, allowed adoption of the U.N. resolution by abstaining rather than using its veto. President George W. Bush urged restraint from the Jewish state.

Senior U.S. officials kept up pressure with phone calls to Israeli counterparts, urging Israel to wrap up the three-day-old raid as quickly as possible, an Israeli political source said.

posted by Kevin at 12:31 AM

Israel Massacres Civilians with Tanks and Helicopter Gunships :.

More: BBC Video Report (Requires RealPlayer)

Made in America:

Israeli forces fired a missile and a barrage of tank shells to hold back a crowd of Palestinians protesting military operations in Gaza on Wednesday, killing at least 10, including children and teens. Overwhelmed doctors treated some of the dozens of wounded on blood-drenched hospital floors.

White smoke rose into the air as Palestinians carried the wounded - including children with bloodied faces - from the scene. Some were evacuated to the hospital in donkey carts, witnesses said.

"I could see the tank, first it fired a tank shell, it landed next to an electricity pole," said Hisham Ashour, 45, who was near the front of the crowd. "We immediately started picking up the wounded who had collapsed to the ground. Many of them were kids."


posted by Kevin at 2:07 PM

American Aircraft Kill More than 40 at Wedding Party :.

Liberation:

A U.S. helicopter fired on a wedding party early Wednesday in western Iraq, killing more than 40 people, Iraqi officials said. The U.S. military said it could not confirm the report and was investigating.

Lt. Col Ziyad al-Jbouri, deputy police chief of the city of Ramadi, said between 42 and 45 people died in the attack, which took place about 2:45 a.m. in a remote desert area near the border with Syria and Jordan. He said those killed included 15 children and 10 women.
posted by Kevin at 2:03 PM

FBI and CIA Protected Nazis After World War II :.

This has been obvious for decades, but here's more information on the subject:

The FBI and other U.S. agencies ignored the murky pasts of alleged Nazi collaborators living in the United States because the government saw them as useful during the Cold War, according to newly released records.
posted by Kevin at 11:40 PM

Atrocities in Iraq: 'I Killed Innocent People for Our Government' :.

Paul Rockwell interviews U.S. Marine, Staff Sgt. Jimmy Massey:

Q: Your feelings changed during the invasion. What was your state of mind before the invasion?

A: I was like every other troop. My president told me they got weapons of mass destruction, that Saddam threatened the free world, that he had all this might and could reach us anywhere. I just bought into the whole thing.

Q: What changed you?

A: The civilian casualties taking place. That was what made the difference. That was when I changed.

Q: Did the revelations that the government fabricated the evidence for war affect the troops?

A: Yes. I killed innocent people for our government. For what? What did I do? Where is the good coming out of it? I feel like I've had a hand in some sort of evil lie at the hands of our government. I just feel embarrassed, ashamed about it.
posted by Kevin at 11:14 PM

Jack Blood Pressued into Removing Information

This is what was taken down from Jack Blood's site:

JackBlood.com Has Traced The Address Of 'Islamic Website' That Posted The Berg Decapitation Video To London, England

After several hours of research, I have learned the web addresses for the 'Islamic Websites' that posted the Nick Berg decapitation video. The website addresses are www.al-asnar.net and www.al-asnar.biz . Both websites have apparently been disabled by 'authorities.' The location of the web server is reportedly in Malaysia. However, the addresses of the publishers for these sites are located in London, England and Nurnberg, Denmark.

The addresses began to disappear from the internet listings as reported on the Power Hour Radio Show. Apparently, 'Big Brother' had been listening to the show and didn't like the news at all.

The location of the publishers for al-ansar.net appears to be at an Arab Press Building, which appears to be shared by different Arab news publications. The name of the organization is the Arab Press House. The building is apparently the headquarters for news magazines such as, Al Jamilla, Sayidaty, and Al Majallah among others.

The London address is the following:

http://www.al-ansar.net

Arab Press House

Abdel Rahman al-Rashed
184 High Holborn, WCIV78P, London
tel. 020 78318181

The other address is located in Nurnberg, Denmark. It apparently belongs to a man named Omar AbuOmar. His email address is:
alansar_alansar@hotmail.com .

The complete mailing address is the following:

http://www.al-ansar.biz

Omar AbuOmar
New Dream St. 33
Nurnberg, Denmark, 42114

Phone: +965.15441211
Email: alansar_alansar@hotmail.com
posted by Kevin at 6:57 PM

Freeway Blogger :.

Nice one:

posted by Kevin at 6:31 PM

White House: There Will Be an Attack Before the Election :.

Getting you ready:

White House officials say they've got a "working premise" about terrorism and the presidential election: It's going to happen. "We assume," says a top administration official, "an attack will happen leading up to the election." And, he added, "it will happen here." There are two worst-case scenarios, the official says. The first posits an attack on Washington, possibly the Capitol, which was believed to be the target of the 9/11 jet that crashed in Pennsylvania. Theory 2: smaller but more frequent attacks in Washington and other major cities leading up to the election.
posted by Kevin at 5:40 PM

Donations to Cryptogon: $50 and $10

WB $50
PQ $10 (From Ireland!)

Gentlemen, thank you!

I am immediately sending $10 to Jules at pathtofreedom.com and $10 to Mike at whatreallyhappened.com.

It may seem weird for me to be giving money away that people have just given to me, but it's not weird at all. Jules and Mike are responsible for some of the information I have been conveying to you guys. These individuals are working hard, everyday, to make a difference. Their work is incredible and should not only be supported, but emulated by all of us to the extent possible.

Note on PQ's contribution: PQ is a reader from Ireland. I haven't mentioned it in the past, but I have received donations from Portugal and Switzerland as well. Truth knows no borders. I am honored that people in other parts of the world see the value of this work, and support it.
posted by Kevin at 3:43 PM

Shampoo Compounds May Block Brain Choline :.

Bathing in toxic compounds; day in, day out... Although, if people can't understand the fluoride issue, I doubt they'll look into this:

The research in animals centers around diethanolamine (DEA), a chemical used in shampoos, lotions, creams and other cosmetics. DEA is used widely because it provides a rich lather in shampoos and keeps a favorable consistency in lotions and creams, but there's also some research that shows it may rob the brain of its ability to make memory cells.

"Depending on the treatment, some mice are stupid, some are not," said researcher Dr. Steven Zeisel.

Research Credit: JM
posted by Kevin at 3:40 PM

Organs into Fuel :.

Cattle brains and other remains that may carry the deadly mad cow disease would be turned into biofuels under a plan announced on Monday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Cattle brains, skull, eyes, spinal column, small intestine and other parts suspected of harboring mad cow disease were banned from human consumption in December as a safety precaution, shortly after the discovery of the first case of mad cow disease in the United States.

Related: Thermal Depolymerization

Related: Cheney's Secret Organ Bank
posted by Kevin at 7:20 AM

Cisco Systems IOS Source Code Stolen :.

Oh man... Where the hell was the Self Defending Network as this caper was going down?

A portion of the Cisco Systems Inc. software that runs most of the networking equipment on the Internet was apparently stolen and published on the Web, Tuesday's Wall Street Journal reported.

The apparent theft might allow hackers to exploit weaknesses in the code and could embarrass Cisco, which has a growing business helping other companies fend off cyberthreats.
posted by Kevin at 6:54 AM

Alternative Energy Magazine Editor, Cold Fusion Author Murdered :.

No suicide note? Beaten to death, car missing... I'm surprised they haven't called this a suicide!

This story will be sent down the same memory hole as the $30 million worth of cocaine on the WalMart truck and the 8,000 AK-47 and other weapons bound for a company in Georgia.

So it goes...

A 56-year-old former Norwich man was killed during a suspected robbery and brutal assault at his family home on Salem Turnpike Friday.

Dr. Eugene F. Mallove, a Norwich Free Academy graduate, published author and father of two, died of multiple injuries to his head and neck, according to an autopsy performed Saturday at the Office of the Chief State Medical Examiner in Farmington. The death was ruled a homicide.

Police would not confirm Mallove's identity Saturday pending positive identification by family members.

Mallove was discovered at the small 119 Salem Turnpike house at 10:55 p.m. Friday after police received a report of an injured person.

At the house, situated at the entrance to Interstate 395 in a primarily commercial area, police found Mallove unresponsive, the victim of an assault. He was later pronounced dead by medical personnel called to the scene.

Police said initial investigation indicated a robbery, during which a physical confrontation took place. Several unidentified items were taken from the scene and Mallove's vehicle was missing, according to a written statement released by Norwich police.

Several hours later, Mallove's 1993 green Dodge Caravan was found in the Foxwoods employee parking lot on Route 2 in Preston. The vehicle is easily identifiable by several large bumper stickers, including an American flag and his company Web site, www.infinite-energy.com, in the rear window. The New Hampshire license plate bears the registration INFNRG.

In New Hampshire, Mallove was the president of the nonprofit New Energy Foundation and since 1995 the editor-in-chief of the organization's magazine Infinite Energy.

The bimonthly magazine covers topics of new technological innovations in energy and science and follows developments in the field, according to its Web site.

He is the author of numerous technical articles and of several books, including the Pulitzer-nominated book on cold fusion titled, "Fire and Ice: Searching for the Truth Behind the Cold Fusion Furor."
posted by Kevin at 6:46 AM

Israeli Military Takes Page from Serb Playbook :.

At least the U.S. didn't give the Serbs billions of dollars to fund their crimes against humanity:

"My brother was against us leaving," said Hamad. "He said we should stay and defend the house, but there were too many children. So he helped us move all the kids and then said he was going back to pick up some important documents. We pleaded with him not to go, but he was stubborn."

Ashraf Qishta was last seen alive by his relatives standing in the doorway of his home with a white flag in one hand and an axe in another.

"He thought the Israelis would respect him if he stood there and said he would defend his house," said Hamad. "They just shot him in the chest. The bulldozer pulled the building on to him. When we found him we could see where the blade hit his head."

That night, several rows of houses in Saladin disappeared under the bulldozers.

Yesterday Hamad Qishta was bundling up the pathetic remains of his home plus a few pots and pans given to him by the Red Cross.

"They bulldozed my home so I moved my things to my sister's place. Now I think they will bulldoze it too," he said.
posted by Kevin at 6:38 AM

Bush Told Geneva Convention 'Obsolete' :.

Military intelligence, jumbo shrimp, living dead, working vacation, international law:

The Iraq prisoner abuse scandal shifted today to the question of whether the U.S. administration set up a legal foundation that opened the door for the mistreatment.

Within months of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, White House counsel Alberto Gonzales reportedly wrote President George W. Bush a memo about the terrorism fight and prisoners' rights under the Geneva Convention.

"In my judgment, this new paradigm renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions," Newsweek magazine quoted the memo as saying. Secretary of State Colin Powell "hit the roof" when he read the memo, according to the account.
posted by Kevin at 6:28 AM

E.U. Seeks Quantum Cryptography Response to ECHELON :.

My gut reaction is, even though they will have confidence in the integrity of their private keys, how do they know the keys are actually as strong as they think they are? What if a 4096 bit key only has 100 bits of true entropy? How random are the random numbers? Did the complier insert any Easter eggs into the encryption program executable? You step through all of your binaries to make sure the compiler implemented your code properly, right? HAHA! (Surely, some troll, wearing a tinfoil hat, has written his own compiler in binary to avoid this concern.)

The thing to do would be to send all of the high value traffic over a quantum crypto system, not just the keys. Now that would be a TFA (Through F*cking Around) solution. Obviously, this would be prohibitively expensive and cumbersome.

I just don't believe in PGP, twofish, blowfish or any of the rest of it. I mean, I believe in them if the attacker is a 14 year old boy with a packet sniffer on the wire. I believe in them if the attacker is my PHB (assuming he doesn't have access to my private key and he hasn't installed a key logger on my system, which is assuming a lot). But with the NSA as the attacker? Brother, you better have your shit together.

This is why quantum crypto is cool. As soon as the attacker looks at the data, the data changes and the operator of the system knows he's been set up the bomb! I'd like to see the Dark Knights inside the NSA figure out how to get around that one:

The European Union is to invest $13 million over the next four years to develop a secure communication system based on quantum cryptography, using physical laws governing the universe on the smallest scale to create and distribute unbreakable encryption keys, project coordinators said Monday.

If successful, the project will produce the cryptographer's holy grail -- absolutely unbreakable code -- and thwart the eavesdropping efforts of espionage systems such as Echelon, which intercepts electronic messages on behalf of the intelligence services of the U.S., Britain, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.
posted by Kevin at 4:55 AM

Nerve Gas Used for First Time Against Coalition :.

This means that either the CIA finally managed to pull off a stunt involving planted WMDs, or the Iraqi insurgency finally found some of the munitions that the U.S. provided to Saddam Hussein back in the 1980s. Take your pick, but keep in mind, even Kimmitt admits that insurgents probably didn't know the shell contained sarin. Perhaps someone will get a chance to ask Saddam Hussein where he initially got the artillery shells containing sarin. Hmmm, that might just be an interesting thing to do:

The explosion of a roadside bomb containing a small quantity of the nerve agent sarin near a US military convoy in Iraq marks the first time that chemical or biological agents have been detected in attacks on US troops.

Two soldiers were treated for "minor exposure to nerve agent", according to the military, but it was not clear how seriously they were affected. The sarin was contained in a 155mm artillery shell, one of the more common devices used in the past year for roadside bombs.

Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt said the shell appeared to be of a type of which the Iraqi regime claimed to have destroyed before the 1991 Gulf war. He said it was unlikely that the insurgents who planted it knew it contained sarin.
posted by Kevin at 4:27 AM

Donations to Cryptogon: $25, $1.95 and $.08

MS $25
PF $1.95

Thanks to both of you!

In other funding news, Cryptogon had 732 visits yesterday, an above average traffic day, the Alex Jones interview with Fintan Dunne was downloaded 168 times (5.8 gigs of bandwidth burned so far on that alone) and a total of four, 4, cuatro, people clicked the "2 Cent" button at the right. HAHAHA! I put a button up that allows people who view the site to contribute money, even if it's just 2 cents, and a total of four people clicked it in 24 hours. HAHAHAHA! That's hilarious and incredible all at once.

I understand, being dirt broke, not having credit cards, not having bank accounts, not being able to use PayPal, and every other reason I've heard from people.... But why wouldn't you just click a God damned button after you're finished reading Cryptogon each day? Your popup killer handles the popups and then you surf away to some other site. But no, that's too much to ask, I guess. That's really incredible.

No wonder the so called "progressive" movement is totally doomed. The vast majority of the people who purport to share these views won't even click a button on a webpage to help out! Yet, there's a tiny fraction of 1% of you who have contributed cold, hard dollars. And a couple of you have contributed in excess of $50.

This is an extremely valuable life lesson. There's just a VERY small number of us who get it. Remember this: 732 visits and four people clicked that thing.

Maybe you think clicking that button is so insignificant that it's not even worth the effort. If 500 people clicked that button each day, that's $300 a month! I don't know about you, but that's a life altering amount of money to me.

(Thanks, by the way, to the four people who clicked the button. And it only works once every 12 hours per IP address, fyi, in case you were going to try to help out by clicking it millions of times.)

I'm wondering... Should Cryptogon become a private information service? Several people have contributed money (and beer), and as far as I'm concerned, I work for them. Those of you who have supported this effort, how do you feel? Do you mind carrying the weight of all these slackers on your shoulders? Would you rather see it go private? By taking it private, the people who take it seriously will still see it, and I'd block the cops and spooks who are, doubtlessly, doing nothing good with the information I'm posting here. I mean, if most of you can't even click a button to help out... I don't even want you reading this thing. You're useless. You're bums. No, actually, you give bums a bad name. Go away. Go watch MTV or Fox News.

And to the guy who keeps wanting me to get eGold, just click the 2 cent button instead of sending emails about eGold. ;)
posted by Kevin at 2:38 AM

Alex Jones and Fintan Dunne Unravel Berg PSYOP

This is an excellent discussion between Alex Jones and Irish researcher, Fintan Dunne. I was so moved by the quality of the information in this dialog that I decided to host the 35MB file for TWO DAYS ONLY. Save this file, locally, right now!

The bottom line: This thing is so sloppy, it's not sloppy at all. There are multiple layers to it.

The message to the average viewer: Be afraid of the terrorists, we (the military/police/etc.) need to torture people like you see in this video because they're so evil.

The message to people like you (alternative media consumer) and me (alternative media producer/analyst): Don't mess with us. You're smart enough to figure out what we're capable of doing. Therefore, you must be aware that you're powerless to do anything to stop us. Give up. Submit. Or this just might happen to you!

Can you see how they orchestrated the release of the torture materials and then legitimized that activity with this Berg video!?

Also keep in mind the following passage from the 1995 Pentagon publication Strategic Assessment: The Internet by Charles Swett:

The Internet could also be used offensively as an additional medium in psychological operations campaigns and to help achieve unconventional warfare objectives.
posted by Kevin at 5:14 AM

U.S. Shifts 4,000 Troops from South Korea to Iraq :.

There is going to be a draft:

The United States on Monday officially made request to South Korea for redeploying part of United States Forces Korea (USFK) to Iraq, and Seoul already accepted the demand, reported South Korean Yonhap News Agency.

United States Deputy National Security Advisor Steve Hadley called South Korea's Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon earlier Monday, officially asking for redeploying one brigade-level or 4,000 US forces here to Iraq, reported South Korean Yonhap News Agency.
posted by Kevin at 3:49 AM

U.S. Moving with Switch to 'Biometric' Passports :.

Americans get scanned, probed and surveiled while thousands of miles along the borders between the U.S., Canada and Mexico are wide open!

In the near future, Americans returning from abroad will have their faces scanned by cameras at ports of entry, then compared by computer to digitized photos encoded on high-tech chips in their passports for verification.

The goal is to prevent known terrorists from entering the country and to make the use of stolen passports virtually impossible.

Because such biometric identification incorporates a person's unique physical characteristics, including fingerprint swirls or iris patterns, it is considered the best method yet invented of authenticating someone's identity.

The State Department plans to start issuing the first biometric passports in a trial run in the fall and hopes to ramp up to full production next year.
posted by Kevin at 3:25 AM

India Stock Market Crash :.

Halted twice...

Indonesia down 6.5%

Japan down 3.1%

South Korea down 5.1%
posted by Kevin at 3:00 AM

Grocery Store Checker Asks TR a Question

Researcher and long time Cryptogon contribututor, TR, seeing the writing on the wall, fled California for an undisclosed location somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. He just sent this email:

Today I was at the grocery store. While I was at the check-out line,
the checker said, "Are you getting prepared? I haven't started yet, but
I need to get going on it." I said, "On what?" She said, "On growing
my own food, to prepare for the coming hikes in food prices." I
shockingly asked, "What hikes?" She matter-of-factly replied, "Well,
with the price of gas going up, the food prices could double over the
summer." I said, "You don't say. I've got some chickens and a garden
going but I'd like to do more." She said, "Me too." I then asked her
why she didn't already have her garden ready. She sighed and admitted,
"I guess I've just been too busy working here." And there you have it.
People are too busy serving their PHBs to change their lifestyles.

I think we are witnessing the beginnings of an awakening stage. As the
price for gas--and thus all other goods and services--rise, people will
suddenly begin to realize that it makes more sense to go to the source
for their basic needs. Why go to Albertson's for eggs, when you can go
to the chicken in your backyard? Why ship tomatoes 1,000 miles to your
nearest Safeway, when you can get tomatoes two feet from your backdoor?
The reason most people don't go to the source is that right now it SEEMS
easier to go to work and just buy what you need from the store.
However, as gas prices continue to rise, that will no longer be an
economically viable option. Instead people are going to be forced into
growing their own food. When a dozen eggs costs six, or even twelve,
bucks, people are going to finally get it. They're then going to have
to go crawling on their hands and knees to that backyard chicken for
their eggs. Let's hope that when that moment comes, the chicken will
still be around to save their butts.
posted by Kevin at 2:35 AM

Car Bomb Kills Head of Iraq Ruling Council :.

How much further off the rails can this thing go?

The head of Iraqi Governing Council was killed today in a car bombing near a US checkpoint in central Baghdad, an Iraqi official said.

Abdel-Zahraa Othman, also known as Izzadine Saleem, was among four Iraqis killed in the blast, according to Redha Jawad Taki, a member of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a Shia Muslim organisation.
posted by Kevin at 2:29 AM

Dave Emory Lecture: Half Great, Half Rat Poison

On Saturday, I decided to drive up to Santa Monica to see Dave Emory give a two part lecture. The titles of the talks were:

Why Do Men Have Nipples?

Dave Emory's Views on God, the Nature of Existence and Consciousness and the Meaning of Life

and

What Lies Ahead? A Preview of the 2004 Elections

I'm writing this up for two reasons. I spoke with a couple of people at the event who might visit Cryptogon, and I think these issues will speak to Cryptogon regulars as well.

First of all, I want to say that I like Dave Emory very much. (I even threw $8, a couple quarters, some dimes and pennies in the plastic bag that he circulated around the room.) I've listened to him for about 15 years. I think he is, without a doubt, the leading authority in the world on matters involving members of the Third Reich in the post World War II era. His work on the Gehlen organization (RFA-37 How the US Lost the Second World War) played a substantial role in the formation of my world view.

As long as I've been listening to Dave Emory, I've never heard him mention anything related to religious or spiritual matters. According to Dave, the situation is now so dire that we should all, basically, get our spiritual houses in order.

This first part of the talk was great. He said that average people are so focused on just trying to survive that they are unable and/or unwilling to examine matters of wider significance. Additionally, those people who are noticing what is happening are often, "Physically frightened, overwhelmed and depressed." He focused on the Pentagon report that warns of catastrophic climate changes that are beginning to take place. (Old news to Cryptogon regulars.)

He said, "You're going to have to deal with these things or they're going to deal with you."

As a result of all of this, he said, "Religious faith is essential," and "There's no such thing as atheists in fox holes, and we're all in fox holes." Then he said, "Religion is for people who are afraid of going to Hell. Spiritualism is for people who have already been there."

Now, Dave isn't, by any means, telling us to go find a snake handler or a corrupt priest, and nope, "Repent now all ye sinners," isn't going to cut it. Dave is advocating a wholly secular, spiritual and personal approach. Dave's truth lies in finding correlations between tangible, observable phenomena in the physical world with aspects of religious writings such as the The Dhammapada.

I'm going to throw out some bullet points that describe his view on these matters:

* He believes in a Supreme Being. This Supreme Being couldn't care less about us in our day to day lives. Dave finds various religious personifications (old men with flowing, white beards, etc.) of this Supreme Being laughable; wholly ridiculous.

* He believes, "in the probability of reincarnation."

* Like a high school physics teacher, Dave reminds us that matter and energy are finite in the universe. There is only transformation of energy and material from some form into another. Life is a form of energy. The energy is concentrated in us at birth and it is dispersed/transformed at death.

* Language is a form of information. Information is energy. Language determines what we are as human beings. He used the example of a photograph of a group of people being essentially useless at conveying any significant meaning about individuals. Words do this.

* Language is the key to understanding consciousness. Conscious memory in individuals is tied to the development of a verbal capacity.

* Proof of a Supreme Being, for Dave Emory, arrived on page one of the New York Times on April 30, 2001 in an article entitled, "Listen Closely: From a Tiny Hum Came a Big Bang."

* In 20 words or less: Scientists are observing harmonics from the "Sound" that set the initial mass of the universe on its course of expansion.

* Dave thinks the sound that initiated the Big Bang is the "Word" of God described in Christianity. Other religions describe utterances and sounds from a Supreme Being that relate to creation.

* Dave asks the rhetorical question: What made that sound?

* The fact that harmonics from this initial "Word" are in all matter in the universe leads Dave to believe that we have a predisposition to religious belief. That is, a tiny bit of the maker is in all of us and everything.

* Dave recalls earlier stages in life when happiness meant cold beer and warm women. [I'll drink to that.] But he laments that, as one gets older, these referents to happiness become less meaningful. [I'll drink to that, again!]

* So, on life sucking, in general: This is where Buddhism speaks to Dave in meaningful ways. (He likes Buddhism most of all, but said he wasn't affiliated with any organizations.)

* Wanting/Desire and Attachment are the causes of all strife. Standard axiom in Buddhism.

* He sees Karma as a resonant wave phenomenon. The more gravitational pull that you have on things (and that they have on you), the worse off you're going to be in terms of karma and the wheel of rebirth.

* "As ye sow, so shall ye reap."

* The goal is to become less attached and lighter.

* Dave finally got into the topic of why men have nipples. The males are an evolutionary scheme to create a warrior creature capable of protecting the females and their offspring from threats in the natural world. As such, all humans start out as females, but some, roughly half, mutate into males. Why would this happen? What's the benefit?

* The more complex the organism, the more intelligent, the longer it takes for that organism to become viable in the natural world. That is, an organism with greater mental capacity takes longer to develop, and is, therefore, exposed to physical threats for a longer period of time before it is able to defend itself. Dave calls this the psycho social moratorium, although I think, technically, this is more of a psychological development factor than a physical one. Compared to all other animals, humans, take the longest period of time to develop into socially viable individuals. We are also endowed with the highest levels of mental capacity, cultural complexity and tool making ability. [Note: Read Lewis Mumford's, "Myth of the Machine" if the last few sentences interest you.]

* Dave spoke about television and how destructive it is. It's physically dangerous. He said something very close to, "You are acting against the fundamental makeup of your being," when you watch TV. This is because the TV is primarily a visual projection system that bypasses the mechanisms that have been established in your brain for processing information. He stresses "The Word," "The Word," "The Word." Read more. Listen to the radio, if you can't stand to read. And shoot your television.

* On average Christians, Dave said, "They have the right string, but the wrong yo-yo."

* When we die, Dave doesn't think that there is going to be an individual accounting of you did this or you did that, but he feels that at the end of the universe, in the final analysis, there is going to be an accounting, and you better have damn well sorted out your karma by then. He said, "You are going to cross paths with whatever made that Sound at the beginning." I didn't write down exactly what he said after that, but it was something like, "If you think you're going get the better of It, you're an idiot."

He thought the following books were excellent:

The Physics of Immortality: Modern Cosmology, God and the Resurrection of the Dead, by Frank J. Tipler

The Hidden Face of God: Science Reveals the Ultimate Truth by Gerald L. Schroeder

That was a snapshot of the first part of the lecture. I really liked it. My personal cosmology is more complex than his, and perhaps more sinister, but I like his. I would like his to be right.

It pains me, now, to have to write about the second half of Dave's talk. But it MUST be done.

Almost immediately, I found myself wondering how someone as smart as Dave Emory could, at the same time, be so stupid.

It boils down to this: Dave is a Democrat.

Dave spoke at length about how there are problems with Amy Goodman and how Ralph Nader is a millionaire that is potentially a CIA asset. I agree, with having serious reservations about people on the Left like Goodman and Nader. A member of the audience spoke out about the support Democracy Now gets from George Soros, the billionaire financier and speculator who is now associated with the Carlyle Group. Dave then went on to support Kerry and talk about Gore like he was the best friend the environment ever had.

Questions about 9/11. What does Dave think about the technical problems and serious discrepancies in the official story of how the events of the day went down?

I was in such shock that I don't know if I wrote down the exact quote of what he said, but it was something very close to, "I think the events of 9/11 are exactly what they appeared to be." One woman went off the rails at that point, openly confronting Emory, offering anyone in the audience free books and information to the contrary.

I yelled out, "Dave, what about the local New York CBS reporter in a helicopter who reported secondary explosions in both buildings immediately before each one collapsed?"

He said something like, "I saw them come down and I didn't see any such thing. He may have thought he was seeing secondary explosions and maybe it was just debris being ejected."

I was looking right at the guy, thinking, "Ladies and gentlemen, we have just lost cabin pressure."

Then he took a strange turn and his motivation became a bit more clear to me. I think Dave wants, more than anything, to be viewed as a legit source of information in mainstream circles, probably because he sees this as the only possible way of making any impact. He's pushing 55 and he's been at this a long LONG time. I don't think he likes the fact that he's still relegated to weird radio stations that are last in every market in which they're heard. (And they are last. Gary Null purchased the Arbitron data and talked about how the Pacifica stations are dead last in ratings.) He made references to having to stick to information that is out in the mainstream so as to not sound nuts! And I'm sitting there wondering, "Well how much more mainstream can you get than information from a CBS news reporter???"

On Kerry and Bush both being members of Skull & Bones: This was interesting. He essentially laughed it off at first, but then he acknowledged that, "Maybe They think Kerry can run things better than Bush." So, Dave can have moments of clarity. But it's like Chomsky.... Kerry is evil, but he's slightly less evil than Bush. The moral of the story, boys and girls: Bush is a gallon of rat poison. Kerry is a half gallon of rat poison. That's the logic of the aging, Left, dissident. Listen up, you old farts: You're still going to die if you drink a half gallon of rat poison!

It's clear to me now. Most of the people in the room were Democrats. Dave is a Democrat. Dave is from Northern California, which is full of Democrats. Dave is dependent on the meager handouts he gets from, yep, you guessed it, Democrats. Now, understand, these are active people. The most active. Think of the freakishness of this crowd. About one hundred people showed up to a place on Saturday night, paid $10 to hear a guy talk about the collapse of society, his thoughts on consciousness, religion, etc., and how Bush is evil and vote for Kerry, etc. FOR 4 HOURS. Dave even said that this crowd was made up of people who least needed to hear the message.

The sad reality is that very few people are capable of hearing about what actually has to happen.

[Reader, prepare yourself, I am about to unfurl.]

Very few people are willing to accept the fact that our only real chance of survival is to leave the system and re-establish right human relationships, and a balance with the natural world, outside of the societies currently in existence---BEFORE THEY COLLAPSE. This is the only option that offers even a slim hope for the survival of the human race in any form we would like to see. Dave sees the collapse on the horizon, as do many others. What's his solution? Find religion and vote for Kerry.

This is the state of the people who purport to be at the cutting edge of what's going on. This is the state of the people who purport to form the vanguard of progressive political thought. And even in this group, we started to bicker about the details of how the thing came down, is coming down, will come down.... The smart move---self-sufficiency in small groups outside of cities---however, is unthinkable for most people. Even to the people in this room, who would be classified as radical by most definitions.

As the talk ended, and people started to move outside to continue the banter, someone started trying to give newspapers away, yelling at the crowd about how the religious right was as bad as Al Qaeda. A crowd was gathering, listening, nodding heads, etc.

I walked away, quietly, feeling sorry them all.

This was my last Dave Emory lecture. While I found the first part of the talk interesting, I don't see any reason to attend another if the practical, tangible advice at the end of the day is, "Vote for Kerry."

My advice to anyone who is serious about doing something real and meaningful: RUN FOR YOUR LIFE, RIGHT NOW. Run for your life. It's that simple.

If you try to run after "it" happens, you might as well forget it. If you have a place "in the hills," you should already be there. Think hard about what you should take with you. Build an arc with the things you think are important to the survival of the human race. Take an encyclopedia with you. Take some of the books I have listed on the right side of this webpage. Take some heirloom seeds with you. Have kids out there and tell them what happened and why they MUST NOT allow it to happen again.

Yes. This means you should stop voting, stop working at the job you hate and stop buying shit from WalMart. This also means that you may not have much money, but chances are, you don't have much money anyway. And what do you care if you are self-sufficient, or getting close to it?

Oh, but wait, Kevin, if "it" comes down, that will mean that there will be chaos, violence and, and, and... I won't get any new DVDs or that neat sweater or the new video game...

Hey, nobody said it was going to be easy, but it just might be paradise compared to what this thing is about to become. Besides, if this society doesn't come down, if the genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, robotics and surveillance research all continue apace, your children are going to inherit a dystopia that is so incomprehensible that science fiction authors will be struck dumb by it. A total, systemic collapse would be extremely bad, and it's the best of all possible outcomes at this point. Pray for it.

Yeah, I'm nuts. I know. But if what I'm saying is nuts, what would you call the belief that "getting on talk radio" or voting for Kerry is going to accomplish anything? That's what Dave Emory advocates.

Dave, I like you, I respect you, but it's time to throw in the towel on the Democrats, the Republicans, the Greens, Pinks, Blues and Reds. This system is down. D.O.W.N. Nobody is coming to save you or me or anyone else.

If you're afraid, that's fine, you should be. Now get over it and figure out how you're going to get your land. And if you're lucky enough to have land, by God, you had better be getting proficient in the skills you need to live off of that land. You have an obligation to the human race to learn those skills and to pass them on to others.

People are making the mistake of squirting out babies in toxic, polluted cities that are, quite literally, on the verge of collapse. Friend, don't disconnect your brain from your biological predisposition to multiply. What's the point of having a child in a prison? Sure, go forth and multiply! But do it in a place where you and your children will have a fighting chance to not just survive, but to prosper. Build a new society outside of this doomed society, rebuild the culture, before you are forced to do these things under the yoke of chaos and starvation. Choose your wife/husband, friends and neighbors wisely. You're going to need their help, and they're going to need yours.
posted by Kevin at 2:11 AM

Lynndie England Audio: It Was a PSYOP :. (mp3)

The Abu Ghraib war crimes were ordered by senior military intelligence and CIA case officers. This was not a case of a few military personnel misbehaving. They were ordered to do this.

Now, if senior military intelligence and CIA case officers were taking the pictures, why did the materials become public? The last time I checked, MI and spook types don't go around handing out CD-ROMS containing evidence of their war crimes.

Story from CBS News:

In an exclusive interview with Brian Maass of Denver CBS station KCNC-TV, England also confirmed that abuses worse than those depicted in the photos were carried out at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad, but she declined to discuss them.

England, 21, repeatedly insisted that her actions were dictated by "persons in my higher chain of command."

In the photos, England is seen smiling, cigarette in her mouth, as she leans forward and points at the genitals of a naked, hooded Iraqis. Another photo taken at Abu Ghraib shows her holding a leash that encircles the neck of a naked Iraqi man lying on his side.

"I was instructed by persons in higher rank to stand there and hold this leash and look at the camera," she said.

"We thought that's how they did it," England said. "We're not trained as MI or CIA -- mind games, intimidation, it sounded pretty typical to us."

England said the actions depicted in the photos were intended to put psychological pressure on the Iraqi prisoners.

"Well, I mean, they [the photos] were for psy-op reasons," she said.
posted by Kevin at 4:58 PM

Seymour Hersh Unfurls on Rumsfeld :.

The roots of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal lie not in the criminal inclinations of a few Army reservists but in a decision, approved last year by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to expand a highly secret operation, which had been focussed on the hunt for Al Qaeda, to the interrogation of prisoners in Iraq. Rumsfeld�s decision embittered the American intelligence community, damaged the effectiveness of �lite combat units, and hurt America�s prospects in the war on terror.
posted by Kevin at 3:49 PM