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8/31/2004

New Mexico: Third-Grader Arrested for Disorderly Conduct :.

Mad pig disease spreading fast:

An Espanola third-grader was handcuffed and arrested by police after hitting another student with a basketball, the child's mother and her lawyer say.

"The Legislature never envisioned that the law would be used to lock an 8-year-old in any jail, especially an adult jail," attorney Sheri Raphaelson said.

"This is the most egregious example of poor judgment by police that I've ever seen in my 15 years of practicing law," she said.

According to a juvenile citation for disorderly conduct, Jerry Trujillo was arrested Thursday and booked into the Espanola jail after he "got out of control and refused to go back to class."

Police Chief Richard Guillen, who was not at work Thursday, said he had few details but that officers "couldn't deal with" the boy before taking him into custody.



President Admits War on Terror Cannot Be Won :.

George Bush admitted yesterday the war on terror could not be won, as the Republican party convention, designed to showcase the president as a resolute leader at a time of national peril, was launched in New York.



UK: GPS Tags for Juvenile Offenders :.

GLASGOW is to electronically tag under-16s who are guilty of persistent anti-social behaviour.

It is one of seven areas targeted by the Scottish Executive to pilot the scheme as an alternative to secure care for young people.

The power is available under the recently-approved Anti-Social Behaviour Act and the city council is expected to approve a bid to the Executive for an extra £1.5million to fund the scheme.

Restrictions would be placed on youngsters on where and when they can go to certain places and the tag would automatically alert the authorities if a child broke the order.

David Comley, the city's director of social work services, said the council backed electronic monitoring as one part of a wider range of measures.



Blimp to Provide Convention Coverage for Police :.

HAHAHA!

Authorities are planning to employ a corporate blimp as an alternative intelligence-gathering tool during next week's Republican National Convention in New York City.

Law enforcement officials said the Fujifilm blimp, which has been used in training drills, will patrol over New York throughout the convention week.

Putting high-tech surveillance equipment in a blimp provides advantages over helicopters, the officials said.


Related: Corporate Sponsorship of Florida Police Cars


8/30/2004

Secret Service Attempts Subpoena For Indymedia Logs :.

The FBI and the US Secret Service is again engaging in a fishing expedition to route out dissenting viewpoints, harass people who are simply exercising their free speech rights, and intimidate others from exercising their right to protest in connection with the Republican National Convention. To quote one indymedia volunteer, regarding New York Indymedia:

"It has come to my attention, that our hosting provider, Calyx Internet Access, has been under harassment and scrutiny by the United States Secret Service in a blatant attempt to disrupt our relationship. Furthermore, it has been revealed to me that my contact information, was required to be disclosed to the government, presumably to begin directly harassing me. The SS did not contact the IMC directly in relation to this matter, but instead felt it prudent to put a strain on a place which we do business with. The agents attempted to circumvent Indymedia by contacting Calyx by phone, originally without a warrant or subpoena, in order to obtain user connection logs regarding a particular post on an Indymedia site. The post in question is a repost by an anonymous person containing information that is already available all over the Internet, and publicly available in other forms."


8/26/2004

Apocalypse Now: OVER A MILLION BARRELS OF OIL A DAY LOST TO DEPLETION :.

Behold, The End:

The world is now losing more than a million barrels of oil a day to depletion - twice the rate of two years ago - according to a new analysis published this month in Petroleum Review, the oil and gas magazine of the Energy Institute in London.

The analysis shows that output from 18 significant oil-producing countries, accounting for almost 29 percent of total world production, declined by 1.14 million barrels a day (mb/d) in 2003. The annual rate of decline also appears to be accelerating, contrary to the widely held view that depletion progresses slowly.

Based on data in the latest BP Statistical Review of World Energy, production from this group of 18 countries peaked in 1997 at 24.7 mb/d and by 2003 it had fallen to 22.1 mb/d. In 1998 their total production dropped by less than one percent, whereas last year it declined by nearly five percent.



Rise of the Machines: X-47B Combat Drone :.

Oh sure, we definitely need this... How would we get by without this?

And I can't fire up a yurt:

A US defence contractor has received more than $1bn in funding to build a prototype unmanned fighter aircraft for the American military.

Northrop Grumman will build at least three full-scale flight prototypes for the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) over five years.

The contract win will allow Northrop to continue work on its X-47B combat drone.

It is hoped that many unmanned fighters would be networked and controlled from land or from an aircraft carrier.

Key missions envisaged for the vehicle include suppression of enemy air defences, precision strike, electronic attack and surveillance deep into enemy airspace.



British Bobbies Get Boots with Built-in Microchips! :.

The nightmare is unfurling faster in the U.K. than anywhere else:

British bobbies are all set to wear jackboots with built in microchips as part a drive to make policing the British capital safer.

According to The Mirror, the British Home Office plans to use the microchip boots not only to locate cops on the beat, but also to reach them in an emergency.

This whole move is part of the police's five-year strategy to keep beat officers in touch with their bases.

Emphasising the need for modern technology, Home Office brass said that though the dangers of misuse could not be ruled out, it was still necessary.



Mercenaries, Money and Political Connections :.

Busted:

Simon Mann (51)
The leader of the alleged coup plot in Equatorial Guinea, Simon Mann has spent all of his adult life in the murky worlds of special forces and mercenaries.
The son of an England cricket captain who made a fortune from the Watney's brewing empire, Mann followed the establishment route of Eton and Sandhurst before becoming an officer in the SAS. He left the army in the early 1980s, moving into the security business. In 1993 he set up a mercenary outfit, Executive Outcomes, with the controversial entrepreneur Tony Buckingham. It made millions protecting oil installations in Angola from Unita rebels, and operated against insurgents for the Sierra Leone government. A subsidiary company, Sandline International - set up with a former Scots Guard officer, Tim Spicer - famously shipped arms to Sierra Leone in contravention of a UN embargo.

Married with several children, Mann has houses on the Solent in Hampshire and close to Mark Thatcher in Cape Town. He is currently residing in a cell in Chikurubi prison outside Harare.

Ely Calil (58)
The Chelsea-based millionaire, who is accused by the Equatorial Guinea government of helping to organise the coup from his home in west London, made his fortune by trading Nigerian oil. During his years in London he developed discreet links with senior Tory and Labour politicians. At one time he was financial adviser to the disgraced Tory peer Lord Archer. In 1999 the then disgraced Peter Mandelson rented one of Calil's luxury flats in Holland Park for a year, shortly before he was rehabilitated as Northern Ireland secretary.

In June 2002, Calil was arrested by French police in connection with the payments of millions of pounds in illegal commissions in 1995 by a subsidiary of the French oil giant Elf Aquitaine to the Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha. He was later released on appeal without charge, although the payments are still under investigation.

Calil, who has vehemently denied any involvement in the coup plot, has hired British lawyer Imran Khan to fight the high court action brought by the government of Equatorial Guinea.

David Hart (60)
The government of Equatorial Guinea has issued a warrant for the arrest of this Old Etonian businessman with links to the Thatcher family, and claims it has evidence to show he helped to fund the coup plot.

Hart was Margaret Thatcher's chief enforcer during the miners' strike - he handed out money to strike breakers from a suite at Claridges - and served as a special adviser to Malcolm Rifkind and Michael Portillo under previous Tory governments, writing the ill-judged Who Dares Wins conference speech.

Hart is known to have excellent access to the US administration and worked closely with the former CIA director William Casey in the early and mid-1980s.

More recently he has worked as a middle man for a number of defence contractors, and has even written a play. He lives on a 500-acre estate in Suffolk.

Nick du Toit (48)
A former member of the special forces unit of the South African Defence Force - used by the apartheid government in the fight against the ANC - Du Toit was detained with 14 other men in Equatorial Guinea on suspicion of being the mercenaries' vanguard.

After leaving the defence force in the early 1990s, Du Toit is believed to have worked with Mann at Executive Outcomes. He also became involved in business dealings across Africa, including diamond mining in Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola, and fishing rights off the coast. During the 1998 coup attempt in Sierra Leone he was doing diamond deals in the country.

Du Toit was arrested in the capital of Equatorial Guinea, Malabo, immediately after the failed coup attempt, and confessed to being part of the plot.

His wife, who lives in South Africa, claimed afterwards that he had been tortured.



Induce Act :.

Bend over, you're about to get Longhorned by B. Gates and his confederacy of dunces:

Until recently, much of the discussion among tech enthusiasts about a controversial anti-piracy bill known as the Induce Act has focused on the proposed law's improbability.

Put forth by Sens. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), the bill has been ridiculed by techies as so poorly written that it could unintentionally ban an infinite range of everyday tools -- iPods, DVD burners, even paper and pencil.

But since its introduction, nine co-sponsors have signed on, both Democrats and Republicans.

And significantly, that list of co-sponsors now includes two of Congress' most influential members: Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tennessee) and Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-South Dakota).

Also known as the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act (SB2560), the bill would punish tech companies and consumer electronics makers who develop tools that could "induce" or encourage users to make unauthorized copies of copyright material such as music, movies or software.



Seas Seen as Viable Power Source :.

What if the U.S. Government spent $100 billion on this instead of an illegal and unnecessary war in Iraq?

Undaunted by past failures, a new wave of entrepreneurs is seeking to generate electricity by channeling the energy of the Earth's oceans.

In experiments from Southern Australia to Scotland to Northern California, startup energy firms and researchers will be testing a host of technologies in the coming months aimed at generating electricity from the sea.

Among the most ambitious, planned for this fall, is a 486-ton wave turbine that converts wave motion into electricity and will be anchored off the coast of Australia, 150 miles south of Sydney. Energetech, the Australian company that developed the turbine, said it will be the "first plant in the world to make wave energy commercially viable." A similar turbine is to be installed off Point Judith, Rhode Island, in 2006.

Escalating oil prices and worries about global warming have shifted the quest for renewable energy sources into high gear. While wind and solar claim most of the attention, and hopes are high for high-tech hydrogen, the dark horse in this race may be the restless energy of the sea.


8/25/2004

Potential Cyberwar Event Today? :.

Software based attacks, like the one described in this piece, are nothing to worry about in the scheme of things. Network managers have several ways of dealing with them. If terrorists start cutting fiber and blowing up rackspace here and there, on the other hand... well, that's a different ball of wax altogether.

Two years ago, I wrote an essay called Cyberwar: How Terrorists Could Defeat the U.S., and Why They Won't. The main point of the essay was that if "the terrorist threat" was real, "the terrorists" would attack the physical information infrastructure of the United States.

I explained how simple a matter it would be to deliver a kill shot to the United States, and I said that "the terrorists" wouldn't do this because "the terrorists" are a creation of the elite, and the elite need the Internet to keep swindling the rest of us.

But....

Now, two years after I wrote that thing, I wouldn't be surprised if critical network infrastructure was physically destroyed. The global economy is teetering on the brink of collapse. When the macro-scale looting has finally run its course, and the collapse is imminent, why no provide an excellent excuse for the collapse?

Hmmmm. What do you think the reaction on Wall Street would be if, say, the Internet was taken down for a few weeks or months? Hmmmm... Take away the flow of information and you take away the flow of money. Take away the flow of money and you bring down the show. It's really that simple. Nevermind the chaos that would be created in all aspects of our modern, tech centric lives. It's the money, honey. That's what matters.

And why did the Federal Reserve begin transferring money over an Internet-based system this month? The ATM (Asynchronus Transfer Mode) based infrastructure, with its secure, dedicated circuits and decades long track record of reliability were scrapped for a system that relies on Internet infrastructure!!! Crawling with worms, dDOS attacks and script kiddies? Oh sure. Why not?

As for today's potential attack? * yawn * Wake me up when multiple OC-768s go down, we lose a few root DNS facilities and electromagnetic pulse weapons start popping the big iron routers and switches used to move the long haul, intercity and transcon traffic:

e-Jihad Begins Thursday, Internet Predicted to Melt Down by Mid-day

You should probably starting backing up that gig of gmail to local storage. According to a Russian news site, Kaspersky Labs states that terrorists will launch attacks which will paralyze the Internet this Thursday. This tragically coincides with two weeks of script kiddie attacks (which were scheduled to begin this past Sunday) aimed at disrupting the Republican national convention. In addition, many college students are back on campus this week, which provides the e-terrorists and i-subversives with a veritable candyland of insecure boxes on big pipes. Faced with this triple threat, our beloved Internet will surely fall.

The ISC would like to go out on a limb and predict that the Internet will not vaporize into a cloud of nothingness this Thursday, but if it does, it's been our pleasure to help stave off its inevitable annihilation this long.



Oil Gaps Down :.

Shorts have been slaughtered on this thing for weeks. Now the people that went long around $49 are busy collecting their entrails off the ground:

Oil prices fell nearly $2 to just over $43 on Wednesday, dragged down by heavy losses in U.S. gasoline futures after summer driving demand failed to meet expectations.

U.S. light crude ended down $1.66 at $43.55 a barrel after falling to its lowest level of $43.22 in 11 sessions.

London Brent last traded down $1.62 at $40.70 a barrel.

Prices are now down nearly $6 from record highs last week.


8/23/2004

Apocalypse Now: Barbie Clothes, Accessories and Perfume for Adult Women :.

Barbie is about to break out of her curvaceous plastic mold and turn into a living breathing person. At least that's what toymaker Mattel hopes will happen when the company launches its Barbie line of clothing and accessories for women later this year.

El Segundo, Calif.-based Mattel, the No. 1 toymaker, showcased its new Barbie brand of vintage T-shirts, cocktail dresses, shoes and coats last week in New York at the International Licensing show.

The Barbie couture clothing collection for adult women, which debuted last spring in Japan, will hit stores in the U.S. stores as early as this fall, said Richard Dickson, senior vice president of Mattel worldwide brands consumer products.


8/21/2004

Couple Sleeping on Beach Executed :.

This is as weird as it is tragic. The story doesn't mention it, but the streaming video piece indicates that the couple was to be married on September 11th. Weird, eh?

Remember the strange murders of Abigail Tapia and Jacqueline Toves in Big Sur nearly a year ago?

Two soon-to-be-married Christian camp counselors reported missing earlier this week were murdered in their sleeping bags on a Sonoma County beach, authorities said. Their autopsies were being performed Friday.

The bodies of Lindsay Cutshall, 23, of Ohio, and Jason Allen, 26, of Michigan, were discovered by chance Wednesday on remote Fish Head Beach, when deputies rescuing a stranded hiker spotted the crime scene from their helicopter.


8/20/2004

300,000 Seek 3,000 Dockworker Jobs :.

Longshore union and port shipping officials yesterday sifted through 300,000 applications submitted as part of a special lottery for 3,000 lucrative temporary dockworker jobs at the nation's largest port complex.



Democracy: Police Ready Sound Weapon in New York :.

Wave your signs and shake your fists at an enemy with God-like powers. The pink-tutu crowd is finally going to get a wake-up call:

Forget the megaphones. Police will have a much more high-tech — and louder — option to make themselves heard over the din of Manhattan traffic and noisy protesters outside the Republican National Convention.

It's called the Long Range Acoustic Device, developed for the military and capable of blasting warnings, orders or anything else at an ear-splitting 150 decibels.


Related: U.S. Troops Have Sound Weapon



OIL TO $49 IN EARLY TRADING :.

$50 today?

I hope it keeps going and brings down the whole damn show. But we're not that lucky. Not yet, anyway.

I'd like to hear from anyone who has the stones to be long or short this thing! What premises are you using? Taking either position seems nuts to me, at this point:

A slowdown in oil's rapid rise is nowhere in sight as escalating violence in Iraq and continued high demand pushed record prices closer to the $50 a barrel mark Friday.

The contract price for U.S. light crude for September delivery jumped to $49 in electronic trading early Friday, up 30 cents from Thursday's record settlement.



U.S. Department of Justice Hit

A U.S. Department of Justice user (wdcsun23.usdoj.gov, IP 149.101.1.123) conducted the following Netscape search at 18/Aug/2004:14:43:47 -0600: israeli executed photos.



Senators Ask Where $8.8 Bln in Iraq Funds Went :.

Someone tell Cheney to empty his pockets:

At least $8.8 billion in Iraqi funds that was given to Iraqi ministries by the former U.S.-led authority there cannot be accounted for, according to a draft U.S. audit set for release soon.

The audit by the Coalition Provisional Authority's own Inspector General blasts the CPA for "not providing adequate stewardship" of at least $8.8 billion from the Development Fund for Iraq that was given to Iraqi ministries.

The audit was first reported on a Web site earlier this month by journalist and retired Col. David Hackworth. A U.S. official confirmed the contents of the leaked audit cited by Hackworth (www.hackworth.com) were accurate.



Scientist Who Paved Way for Dolly the Sheep Found Hanged :.

THE scientist whose pioneering research into human embryonic stem cells paved the way for the creation of Dolly the cloned sheep has been found hanged in his holiday home.

The body of Professor John Clark was discovered on Thursday in the village of Cove, near Eyemouth on the Berwickshire coast.

The 53-year-old professor was the director of the Roslin Institute in Midlothian, one of the world’s leading animal biotechnology research centres.

Prof Clark played a major role in the creation of Dolly - the transgenic sheep that marked a breakthrough in generating human therapeutic proteins in milk. He is believed to have been suffering from depression for some time.



Tattletale Society Explodes: Spy on Your Neighbor for the Homeland :.

Turn in your friends, family and neighbors and get a large order of Freedom Fries!

Off the nation's coasts, recreational boaters scan the waters for "suspicious" acts, from scuba diving in unlikely places to yachtmen sketching bridges or ports.

Manhattan's doormen learn how to spot packages that may contain biological weapons.

In Pennsylvania, amusement park operators train to recognize unusual phone calls or inappropriate requests for information.

Call them the new "first responders" in the war on terror. As average Americans, from truck drivers to handymen, are increasingly standing sentry, they're swelling the ranks of a citizens' army, always poised and on guard.

Last week, terror warnings sent law-enforcement officers fanning out across five financial buildings in Manhattan, Washington, and Newark. But grass-roots groups form another wall of defense, mobilizing in a nationwide watch for suspicious activity - from the supermarket to the state fair.


8/19/2004

OIL GAPS UP $1.48 TO $48.75

Where it stops, nobody knows. I'd like to know how gas prices are remaining stable... even as the price of the underlying commodity has been rising steadily for weeks.



Cell Phone Users Are Finding God :.

The Myth of the Machine run amok:

Once merely a useful tool for keeping in touch on the go, the mobile phone is fast finding a new niche as an instrument of spiritual enlightenment.

From Muslims who use their phones to point them toward Mecca, to Roman Catholics who collect text messages from the Vatican, religious observers across the globe are turning to their cell phones for aid and inspiration in practicing their faith.

In response, service providers and religious institutions are rolling out a host of services to attract the growing ranks of spiritually oriented phone users.

For followers of Islam, companies such as LG Electronics and Dubai-based Ilkone Mobile Telecommunications make phones that aid Muslims in their daily practice by indicating the direction of Mecca, providing the call to prayer or even incorporating the Quran within the phone. Even those with a regular phone can augment it with a religious ring tone or download a lunar calendar.

The text message, a dominant method of communication in many parts of the world, has also become a valuable religious tool. Indian operator BPMobile lets customers send prayers by SMS to a Bombay temple where they are offered to the Hindu god Ganesh.

In a similar vein, subscribers in the United States and several European countries can receive a daily text message from the pope.



Former U.S. Banker to Become Pakistan Prime Minister :.

HAHAHAHA!

Plucked from Citibank in New York to become finance minister after a 1999 military coup in Pakistan, Shaukat Aziz is just days away from becoming the 23rd prime minister of the turbulent South Asian nation.



Iran Warns of Preemptive Strike :.

Perhaps Mr. Shamkhani got long the crude before his press conference:

IRANIAN Defence Minister Ali Shamkhani warned today that Iran might launch a preemptive strike to prevent an attack on its nuclear facilities, in an interview with Al-Jazeera TV.

"We will not sit (with arms folded) to wait for what others will do to us. Some military commanders in Iran are convinced that preventive operations which the Americans talk about are not their monopoly," Mr Shamkhani said when asked about the possibility of a US or Israeli strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

"America is not the only one present in the region. We are also present, from Khost to Kandahar in Afghanistan; we are present in the Gulf and we can be present in Iraq," said Mr Shamkhani, speaking in Farsi to the Arabic-language news channel through an interpreter.

"The US military presence (in Iraq) will not become an element of strength (for Washington) at our expense. The opposite is true, because their forces would turn into a hostage" in Iranian hands in the event of an attack, he said.


8/18/2004

SEPTEMBER CRUDE OIL $47.01 $47.27 $47.50

Maybe I'll just mention what's happening with the price of oil when it breaks round numbers. $47, $48, $49, etc...


8/17/2004

Florida Looting :.

I'm writing an extended essay that is based on this St. Petersburg Times article. I had to post this ASAP, however, because of my several past references to, "Miller Time."

It actually is Miller Time in Florida!

Down the road in the park sat Vietnam veteran Gary Snyder, drinking Miller High Life. Snyder, who was among only a handful in Harborview who rode out the storm, said residents were anxious about looters, but he was prepared.

"If I see 'em, I'll shoot 'em," he said. "They're gone. I'll tell 'em I had a flashback."



Police Tell Journalists to Leave Najaf or be Shot :.

Mission Accomplished, Liberation, Democracy, etc.:

The Iraqi authorities ordered foreign journalists to leave Najaf yesterday, threatening to arrest or even shoot reporters as US marines and Iraqi government forces resumed the fight against Shia militants.

Iraqi police told the journalists to leave because of a supposed threat by insurgents to bomb their hotel. The intimidation - including shots apparently fired by police at the hotel - came as Iyad Allawi, the interim prime minister, hailed the birth of democracy in Iraq at the opening of a national conference in Baghdad.



Kerry's Blue Blood = Free Pints for Me :.

* Message flag to DG as well *

To Tony, the barman I bet that Kerry would win, I'll take my winnings as an equal split between Guinness and Wife Beater. Thanks ;)

And, if I lose, I'll take my plate of crow well done:

When it comes to American presidential elections, blue blood counts.

So say British researchers who predict that Democratic challenger John Kerry will oust President George Bush on November 2 because he boasts more royal connections than his Republican rival.

After months of research into Mr Kerry's ancestry, Burke's Peerage, experts on British aristocracy, reported yesterday that the Vietnam war veteran is related to all the royal houses of Europe and can claim kinship with Tsar Ivan "The Terrible", a previous Emperor of Byzantium and the Shahs of Persia.

Burke's director, Harold Brooks-Baker, said Mr Kerry had his mother, Rosemary Forbes, to thank for most of his royal connections.

"Every maternal blood line of Kerry makes him more royal than any previous American president," Mr Brooks-Baker said.

"Because of the fact that every presidential candidate with the most royal genes and chromosomes has always won the November presidential election, the coming election - based on 42 previous presidents - will go to John Kerry."


8/16/2004

Robot with Attitude: Armed with Shotgun, WMD Sensor :.

The U.S. Army has been testing a robot armed with a pump-action shotgun for counter-insurgency missions. The unit has already seen action in Iraq.

In combat, the PackBot can be equipped with a pump-action shotgun system capable of recycling and remote firing. A soldier controls the robot through a joystick and receives streaming video from a front-mounted camera transmitting to a personal digital assistant, or PDA.



French Author Urges Slacking :.

Finally, instead of dissembling behind ambiguous notions of Gallic joie de vivre, someone in this leisurely land has declared outright that the French should eschew the Anglo-Saxon work ethic and openly embrace sloth.

Corinne Maier, the author of "Bonjour Paresse," a sort of slacker manifesto whose title translates as "Hello Laziness," has become a countercultural heroine almost overnight by encouraging the country's workers to adopt her strategy of "active disengagement" -- calculated loafing -- to escape the horrors of disinterested endeavor.

"Imitate me, mid-level executives, white-collar workers, neo-slaves, the damned of the tertiary sector," Maier calls in her slim volume, which is quickly becoming a national best seller. She argues that France's ossified corporate cultural no longer offers rank-and-file employees the prospect of success, so, "why not spread gangrene through the system from inside?"



U.S. to Halt Nuclear Fusion Project :.

Open hostility toward research into viable alternatives:

Amidst a prolonged stalemate over where to build the world's largest nuclear fusion facility, the US is halting work on a homegrown fusion project. The decision caused concern among researchers at a fusion meeting earlier this week.

The US is pinning its hopes on ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor), which aims to lay the groundwork for using nuclear fusion as an inexhaustible and clean energy source.

But the project has been stalled since December 2003 because its six members - the US, the European Union, China, Japan, South Korea, and Russia – cannot agree on where to build the facility.


Related: Louisiana Girls Replicate Naudin/Mizuno Cold Fusion Reactor



Hugo Chavez Wins Referendum :.

Will the CIA try another coup?

Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, the world's fourth largest oil exporter, has claimed victory in a popular referendum to oust him.

With 94 percent of the recall vote counted early on Monday morning, 58 percent voted to keep Chavez in office and 42 percent had voted to oust him, said Francisco Carrasquero, president of the election commission.

The result means the leftist populist president will now be allowed to complete the remaining two years of his term.



U.K.: Children of Criminals to be 'Targeted' and 'Tracked' :.

Wow!

Children of criminals are to be "targeted" and "tracked" from an early age by the Government to prevent them following their parents into a life of crime, as part of a campaign to tackle the next generation of offenders.

In an offensive on youth crime, a programme to prevent 125,000 children whose fathers are in prison from joining them in jail, is being planned by the Home Office.

In an interview with The Independent, Hazel Blears, the Policing minister, says she is optimistic that "tracking" and "targeting" can help prevent children becoming criminals like their parents.


8/15/2004

Federal Reserve to Begin Transferring Money Over an Internet-Based System :.

HAHA! Excellent! Not long to wait now:

With little fanfare, the Federal Reserve will begin transferring the nation's money supply over an Internet-based system this month — a move critics say could open the U.S.'s banking system to cyber threats.

The Fed moves about $1.8 trillion a day on a closed, stand-alone computer network. But soon it will switch to a system called FedLine Advantage, a Web-based technology.

Proponents say the system is more efficient and flexible. The current system is outdated, using DOS — Microsoft's predecessor to the Windows operating system.

But security experts say the threat of outside access is too big a risk.

"The Fed is now going to be vulnerable in two distinct ways. A hacker could break in to the Fed's network and have full access to the system, or a hacker might not have complete access but enough to cause a denial or disruptions of service," said George Kurtz, co-author of "Hacking Exposed" and CEO of Foundstone, an Internet security company.

"If a security breach strikes the very heart of the financial world and money stops moving around, then our financial system will literally start to collapse and chaos will ensue."



Wiretapping the Web :.

As if hacking worries weren't enough, two recent legal developments have raised further fears among Web privacy advocates in the United States. In one case, the Federal Communications Commission voted 5-0 last week to prohibit businesses from offering broadband or Internet phone service unless they provide Uncle Sam with backdoors for wiretapping access. And in a separate decision last month, a federal appeals court decided that e-mail and other electronic communications are not protected under a strict reading of wiretap laws. Taken together, these decisions may make it both legally and technologically easier to wiretap Internet communications, some legal experts told NEWSWEEK. "All the trends are toward easier to tap," says Kevin Bankston, an attorney at the nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation.



DVD Player Profits Down to $1 :.

The finish line in the race to the bottom is in sight!

The revolution in consumer electronics that was supposed to make everyone rich apparently isn't.

Commoditization is hitting China's DVD player manufacturers hard, according to researcher iSuppli. Between January and May, the average selling price of a DVD player exported out of the Guangdong province came to $40.80, leaving just about $1 in profit margins for the manufacturers.


8/13/2004

SEPTEMBER CRUDE $46.58 :.

* Shaking head and mumbling to myself. *

Crude oil futures rose above $46 a barrel in New York on speculation a referendum in Venezuela on Hugo Chavez's presidency will disrupt shipments from the fourth- largest supplier to the U.S.



Louisiana Girls Replicate Naudin/Mizuno Cold Fusion Reactor :.

Dear Mr. Naudin

We used your formulas (for steam generation and water heating), but next year's project we hope to condense the steam and say that any difference in the starting weight and the ending weight (plus the condensed steam vapor), will have been converted into Oxygen and Hydrogen. This formula will give us even more energy conversion efficiency.

We performed 124 experiments and our best was result was 147% with an average of 117%, even including our learning curve of how to operate the device.

Morgan H. and Marissa C.
Louisiana, USA



Goss Wants American Stasi :.

Rep. Porter Goss, President Bush's nominee to head the CIA, recently introduced legislation that would give the president new authority to direct CIA agents to conduct law-enforcement operations inside the United States-including arresting American citizens.

The legislation, introduced by Goss on June 16 and touted as an "intelligence reform" bill, would substantially restructure the U.S. intelligence community by giving the director of Central Intelligence (DCI) broad new powers to oversee its various components scattered throughout the government.

But in language that until now has not gotten any public attention, the Goss bill would also redefine the authority of the DCI in such a way as to substantially alter-if not overturn-a 57-year-old ban on the CIA conducting operations inside the United States.

The language contained in the Goss bill has alarmed civil-liberties advocates. It also today prompted one former top CIA official to describe it as a potentially "dramatic" change in the guidelines that have governed U.S. intelligence operations for more than a half century.



New Zealand Imposes Diplomatic Sanctions on Israel Over Mossad Operation :.

Helen Clark's courage should be commended!!! She did what any sensible leader would do when faced with a clear and present danger like the state of Israel.

Kiwis now need to be on the lookout for Israeli false flag operations. The threat against the All Black rugby team in South Africa remains ambiguous, but because New Zealand has had the courage to stand up to Israel, I would not be surprised at all if New Zealand winds up with a sudden al Qaeda problem:

The New Zealand government last month protested to Israel after two Israeli citizens, believed to be acting on behalf of the secret service agency Mossad, were convicted of passport fraud. Elisha Cara, 50, and Uriel Kelman, 31, were jailed for six months—far less than the maximum possible sentence of five years—after an Auckland court found them guilty of seeking to obtain a New Zealand passport through illegal means and participating in an organised crime group for that purpose. The two were also fined $NZ50,000 each. Both men are appealing their convictions.

As soon as the sentences were handed down on July 15, Prime Minister Helen Clark issued a strongly-worded diplomatic rebuke. She said Israel had “demeaned the integrity” of the New Zealand passport system. Further, the incident constituted a serious breach of New Zealand’s sovereignty and had severely strained relations between the two countries. Her government had formally sought an explanation and apology from Israel at the time of the arrests three months earlier, but none had been forthcoming.

Following the verdict, Clark suspended all high-level visits between the two countries. She declared that an expected request by Israeli President Moshe Katsav to include New Zealand on his scheduled visit to Australia in August would be declined. Israelis visiting in an official government capacity would now need to apply for visas while foreign ministry consultations planned for later in the year were cancelled. Approval for the appointment of the new Israeli ambassador was to be delayed, and New Zealand officials would observe "strict constraints" on contact with honorary consuls.



Russia to Boost Defense Orders by 40% in 2005 :.

I've been telling people, in private, that I believe the Russian government shut down Yukos because of strategic military reasons. Key word, "believe." I have no proof of this, but I don't buy the justification that back taxes are the cause. The establishment of Yukos was a crime in the first place.

With the U.S. drawing a bead on every piece of dirt that contains more than a few drops of oil, if you were a Russian military planner, what would you do?

President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that Russia would boost its military procurement budget by 40 percent next year, news agencies reported.


8/12/2004

Hewlett-Packard Drops 13% in One Day :.

This isn't some piss pot penny stock. Hewlett-Packard is a Dow 30 component!

Hewlett-Packard Co. posted third- quarter earnings it described as "unacceptable" and cut its forecast, triggering the biggest share decline in almost three years. Chief Executive Carly Fiorina blamed price-cutting and fired three executives.



OIL $45.50

Make your time.



David Holmgren Talks About Peak Oil and Permaculture :.

A number of respected scientists are stating that global oil production will peak and begin its terminal decline much sooner than we would like to think. David Holmgren is one of the co-originators of the permaculture concept, and has been developing permaculture as a system of principles and practices suited to this era of 'energy descent'. In this interview he talks about:

Peak Oil, the problems of energy intensive industrial agriculture, the future of suburbia, Howard Odum and his ideas regarding embodied energy and systems ecology, the trends David sees emerging as we pass the oil peak,
and his hopes for the role permaculture might play to make the energy peak less of a catastrophe, and more of an opportunity.


8/11/2004

Visits to Cryptogon from U.S. Military Central Command in Iraq and U.S. National Security Agency

CENTCOM user (cache1.iraq.centcom.mil, IP 214.13.130.142) conducted the following Google search: orha centcom microsoft exchange email user id

NSA user (mobpush160.ncsc.mil, IP 144.51.198.160) conducted the following Netscape search: Government Micro Resources Inc. and Seisint Inc.



Minority of Jobs Require College :.

Get those degrees!!! HAHAHAHA! Hopefully, your college or university will give you a nice supply of hairnets and nametags to go with your degree in ______ <---- fill in the blank:

Nationally, jobs requiring college degrees will remain stagnant at about 27 percent through 2012, said the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a labor-funded think tank in Washington, D.C.

Both reports challenge the popular notion that this country can educate itself out of unemployment by replacing jobs lost to technology and off-shoring with highly skilled, highly paid work. They also suggest that a college degree is not the ticket to the American dream it once was thought to be.

"There is no pent-up demand that exists now or will in the future," said Lawrence Mishel, author of last month's EPI report, "Jobs in the future: No boom in the need for college graduates."



Bush Names Porter Goss to Head CIA :.

I think a portal to a terrifying netherworld must be located in Florida.

Florida has been a center of covert operations and global narcotics hub for half a century. A Bush family member is the governor. Throw in the 2000 presidential election scandal, and the 9/11 hijackers at "flight school"... A couple of days ago, six people were murdered over a video game.... And now: The next head of the CIA is an eight-term congressman from Florida!

President George Bush turned yesterday to a Republican congressman with intelligence expertise to lead the CIA through an era of change following the September 11 terror attacks.

If approved by the Senate, Porter Goss, 65, a former CIA operative and leader of the House intelligence committee, will be responsible for restructuring the CIA after failures of intelligence on the September 11 attacks and the Iraq war.

He replaces George Tenet, a holdover from the Clinton era who stepped down last month amid scathing criticism of CIA intelligence on the 9/11 attacks, and on Saddam Hussein's weapons arsenal.

"He knows the CIA inside and out. He is the right man to lead this important agency at this critical moment in our nation's history," Mr Bush said in making the announcement at the White House Rose Garden.

An eight-term congressman from Florida, Mr Goss's experience was not challenged yesterday. He has run the intelligence committee since 1997, and spent 10 years as a case officer in the CIA at the height of the Cold War.


8/10/2004

Two Cryptogon Readers Contribute $50 Each

Much appreciated, guys. Thank you very much.



Apocalypse Now: New Yorkers Embrace Cuddle Parties :.

It's not about sex and all about the touchy-feely experience of snuggling up to perfect strangers wearing pyjamas.

The grab fests are called cuddle parties, and since they started in New York in February, hundreds of people have paid $30 each to touch and embrace others in intimate gatherings.

Everyone needs to be cuddled, especially in lonely New York, say creators Reid Mihalko and Marcia Baczynski who say it's a good way to meet new and interesting people.

But the rules are clear. The PJs stay on the whole time and participants are reminded of Rule No. 7: "No dry humping!"

In case things get too steamy, a small chime is kept on hand. Before the cuddling begins, the chime is struck several times so everyone gets the message.

"We've never used it," said Mihalko, who said sexual arousal does occur, and that participants shouldn't be turned off or scared by erections. "They happen."



For Today's Savers, it's the 1970s All Over Again :.

Make your time:

In the 1926-2003 period, Treasury bills returned an average of 3.7%, while inflation averaged 3%.

But think about last year: Treasury bills returned 1%, about 2% less than the rate of inflation. The comparison gets worse if you consider taxes.

Over longer periods of time, risk-free intermediate- and long-term government bonds have provided an average return of 5.4%, well over the 3% average inflation rate. As a result, borrowers compensated savers for both taxes and liquidity risk.

Not today.

Money is free. While a saver has to commit to five years to get a 3.63% return on the average bank CD, home equity lines of credit are advertised as low as 3%, tax-deductible. So while savers earn a net 2.72% and lose purchasing power, borrowers pay a net 2.25% and gain through inflation.

The last time the markets were this kind to borrowers -- and this cruel to savers -- was the 1970s. The period was followed by the annihilation of the thrift industry and a real estate bust that took more than a decade to clean up.


Research Credit: TR


8/9/2004

Big Business Becoming Big Brother :.

Corporations are the enemy! Do you get it yet?

The government is increasingly using corporations to do its surveillance work, allowing it to get around restrictions that protect the privacy and civil liberties of Americans, according to a report released Monday by the American Civil Liberties Union, an organization that works to protect civil liberties.

Data aggregators -- companies that aggregate information from numerous private and public databases -- and private companies that collect information about their customers are increasingly giving or selling data to the government to augment its surveillance capabilities and help it track the activities of people.

Because laws that restrict government data collection don't apply to private industry, the government is able to bypass restrictions on domestic surveillance. Congress needs to close such loopholes, the ACLU said, before the exchange of information gets out of hand.

"Americans would really be shocked to discover the extent of the practices that are now common in both industry and government," said the ACLU's Jay Stanley, author of the report. "Industry and government know that, so they have a strong incentive to not publicize a lot of what's going on."


Related: The Surveillance-Industrial Complex



Oil Reaches $44.97 :.

Crude oil rose to a record $44.97 a barrel after Iraq cut shipments to tankers in the Persian Gulf because of warnings of possible attacks on petroleum-industry infrastructure.

Iraq's Southern Oil Co. stopped pumping oil after militia troops threatened to attack oil facilities, Agence France-Presse reported, citing an official at the state-run company. Russia's railway monopoly said it will continue shipments from OAO Yukos Oil Co., Russia's largest oil exporter. Concern over stability of Yukos shipments has bolstered prices.

"There is no limit to how high crude oil can go," said Carl Larry, an associate director of energy futures at Barclays Capital Inc. in New York. "There is too much demand and terrorism. There are problems in Iraq, Russia and Venezuela that threaten supply."



Manchurian Candidate

This film is a must see!

Related: 18,000 CIA Mind Control Documents Released



International Team to Monitor Presidential Election :.

What will these numbnuts report? Kerry was elected fair and square!? Bush was elected fair and square!? HA!

A team of international observers will monitor the presidential election in November, according to the U.S. State Department.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe was invited to monitor the election by the State Department. The observers will come from the OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights.

It will be the first time such a team has been present for a U.S. presidential election.



Motive for Slaughter of Six People in Florida: Video Game and Clothes :.

A dispute over clothes and a video game system between a young woman and a squatter in her grandparents' house apparently sparked the vicious beating and stabbing murders of six people whose bodies were found late last week in a blood-spattered home, police said.



Prozac Found in Britain's Drinking Water :.

Is commentary necessary for this?

Traces of the anti-depressant Prozac have been found in Britain's drinking water supply, setting off alarm bells with environmentalists concerned about potentially toxic effects.

The Observer newspaper said Sunday that a report by the government's environment watchdog found Prozac was building up in river systems and groundwater used for drinking supplies.

The exact quantity of Prozac in the drinking water was unknown, but the Environment Agency's report concluded Prozac could be potentially toxic in the water table.

Experts say that Prozac finds its way into rivers and water systems from treated sewage water, and some believe the drugs could affect reproductive ability.

A spokesman for Britain's Drinking Water Inspectorate said Prozac was likely to be found in a considerably watered down form that was unlikely to pose a health risk.


Research Credit: AL


8/8/2004

Al-Qaida Made Pre-9/11 Diamond Buy :.

Hint: Israelis control the global trade in diamonds:

A series of witnesses place six top al-Qaida fugitives in Africa buying up diamonds in the run-up to the Sept. 11 attacks, according to a confidential report by U.N.-backed prosecutors obtained by The Associated Press.

The first-person accounts detailed by the prosecutors add to long-standing claims that al-Qaida laundered millions of dollars in terror funds through African diamonds before launching its deadliest offensive.


Related: Inside Israel's Diamond Trade



Ford Unveils Gas-Electric Hybrid SUV :.

There is one problem with hybrid vehicles---they still require gas. The move to gas burning hybrids is too little too late, a figleaf for a society standing on the edge of oblivion. For Ford, a company whose vehicles have a lower average miles per gallon rating today than when the Model T was introduced in 1908, the introduction of this hybrid seems like folly:

The Ford Motor Co. kicked off formal production Thursday of a hybrid version of its Escape SUV, the world's first gas-electric hybrid sports utility vehicle and the first hybrid vehicle produced by an American automaker.

For those of you who are thinking, "Can't Kevin say anything nice?" there is this: The hybrids do offer a platform upon which revolutionary change could occur. Just remove the requirement of having to burn conventional gasoline from the hybrid and that would be substantial development.

See Related: Toyota Unveils Highlander Hybrid SUV


8/6/2004

Outsource This: Stocks Fall Sharply on Weak Job Figures :.

Investors sold off stocks Friday, sending prices sharply lower, as the market flinched at a new report showing the economy created far fewer jobs in July than had been expected.

Payroll figures released early Friday showed employers added just 32,000 jobs last month, data low enough to warrant worries that a slowing in the economy in June may have been more just a brief pause.

The July job report reflects the weakest increase in hiring since December and comes after a revised gain of just 78,000 in June, even less than previously reported. Economists had forecast the creation of roughly 243,000 jobs for July.


Related: CNN Survey Results

The survey on CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight web page asks:

Does the current economic environment feel like a recovery to you?

Yes
No


Here is a screen shot of the results:




Onion Routing with Tor :.

I'm running Tor with Privoxy and have my system behind two firewalls... Would someone please pass the aluminum foil? I think my hat needs another layer (shiny side out, of course):

Computer programmers are modifying a communications system, originally developed by the U.S. Naval Research Lab, to help Internet users surf the Web anonymously and shield their online activities from corporate or government eyes.


8/5/2004

OIL SURGES TO $44.40 :.

OPEC came out and said they just happened to have spare capacity. How convenient. I guess the people who throw these oil futures contracts around will believe it when they see it. Until then, new highs:

Oil prices zoomed higher on Thursday as fears of a potential loss of supply from Russia returned. Crude futures rose more than 3 percent in afternoon trading, topping $44 a barrel.



Meow: The End :.

Two kittens have been born using a new cloning method that may be safer and more efficient than traditional methods, a U.S. company said Thursday.

Genetic Savings & Clone promises to clone anyone's pet---for $50,000 or so---and started with chief executive officer Lou Hawthorne's own pet cat.

The two kittens, Tabouli and Baba Ganoush, were born to separate surrogate mothers in June, the company said.

Its report was not submitted for the traditional scientific review process and has not been scrutinized by cloning experts. But the company says it's less interested in the scientific questions and medical promise of cloning and more interested in its business model---helping people make copies of their beloved pets.


8/4/2004

Stressed Israeli Soldiers to be Treated with Cannabis :.

Ahhh, heavily armed and stressed out potheads! Excellent! The fascist state of Israel turns to smacking up its war criminal soldiers:

Israeli soldiers suffering from combat stress after tours of duty in the Palestinian territories could soon be treated with cannabis to relieve their symptoms, the Maariv daily reported Wednesday.

Related: Cryptogon Special Report: Are U.S. Troops Being Drugged for Urban Combat Operations in Iraq?



Future Warrior Exhibits Super Powers :.

Borg-style supersoldiers?! I doubt that the insane whims of these madmen will have a chance to materialize. Hopefully, society will collapse before this nonsense emerges from the prototype phase:

"The 2010 Future Force Warrior system will meet the more immediate, short-term demands of our fighting warriors in the battle space, while the 2020 model will remind you of an ominous creature out of a science fiction movie," DeGay said.



Crude Oil Rises to Record on Concern About OPEC's Capacity :.

If a butterfly so much as farts, watch out:

Crude oil futures rose to a record in New York on concern OPEC, the source of more than a third of the world's oil, can't boost production fast enough to meet rising demand in the U.S., China and India.



Key Iraqi Oil Pipeline Blown Up :.

A major attack on the main pipeline connecting the oilfields of Kirkuk with the Turkish port of Jihan has halted limited exports from northern Iraq, a Northern Oil Company official said.



Statue of Liberty Reopens

What's wrong with this picture?


8/3/2004

"Your tax dollars went into a lot of civilians. I was there. I pulled the trigger." :.

U.S. Marine Staff Sgt. Jimmy Massey, eye-witness to, and participant in, U.S. war crimes in Iraq:

"We shot a man with his hands up," he said, "We even shot women and children."

Massey was one of three Iraq War veterans to speak yesterday at a forum sponsored by the Veterans Education Project and the American Friends Service Committee.

Massey told the audience of his disillusionment with the war. The only one of the three to engage in combat, the 12-year veteran from North Carolina said he was fully prepared to kill or be killed. But that was before the war.

Today he said he takes five different anti-depressant and anti-anxiety pills to help him deal with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Firing on civilians and securing oil fields was not the duty he signed up for, he said.

"Why are Marines learning to shut down oil wells - are we the Environmental Protection Agency now?" he asked as he told the audience of his realization that this war was not one he agreed with.

He started asking questions and was reassigned to combat duty.

"I'm in the desert, I'm gung-ho, ready to kill," he said, putting "your tax dollars to work. Unfortunately, your tax dollars went into a lot of civilians. I was there. I pulled the trigger.



Compulsory Mental Health Screening for Children and Pregnant Women :.

This crosses the line, in my opinion. When shrinks, backed by cops, are knocking on peoples' doors, well... you'll know what to do.

I would like to hear stories of illegal births in Illinois, or elsewhere. I would like to hear from anyone who is planning to resist this by ALL possible means. Send email via anonymous methods. Review this article for information on how to send anonymous email:

The mental health program will develop a mental health system for "all children ages 0-18 years," provide for screening to "ensure appropriate and culturally relevant assessment of young children's social and emotional development with the use of standardized tools."

Also, all pregnant women will be screened for depression and thereafter following her baby's birth, up to one year. Follow-up treatment services will also be provided.

Trainor said that he is trying to get parents and citizens out to voice their opinion about the new program.

Apparently, children's mental health will be assessed along with their academic standards in the new proposed testing. The Illinois State Board of Education has been given the responsibility to develop the appropriate tests, according to last year's legislation.



Latest Memory Hole Directives :.

Last week, the American Library Association learned that the Department of Justice asked the Government Printing Office Superintendent of Documents to instruct depository libraries to destroy five publications the Department has deemed not "appropriate for external use." The Department of Justice has called for these five these public documents, two of which are texts of federal statutes, to be removed from depository libraries and destroyed, making their content available only to those with access to a law office or law library.

The topics addressed in the named documents include information on how citizens can retrieve items that may have been confiscated by the government during an investigation. The documents to be removed and destroyed include: Civil and Criminal Forfeiture Procedure; Select Criminal Forfeiture Forms; Select Federal Asset Forfeiture Statutes; Asset forfeiture and money laundering resource directory; and Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act of 2000 (CAFRA).



Boston Martial Law Pictures :.

From Alex Jones.


8/1/2004

U.S. Raises Threat Level at Key Financial Sites :.

Blah:

The United States on Sunday raised the terrorism threat level to code orange (high) for the financial services sector of New York City, northern New Jersey and Washington, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge announced.

Ridge cited "new and unusually specific information about where al Qaeda would like to attack."




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:. Reading

Fatal Harvest: The Tragedy of Industrial Agriculture by Andrew Kimbrell Readers will come to see that industrial food production is indeed a "fatal harvest" - fatal to consumers, as pesticide residues and new disease vectors such as E. coli and "mad cow disease" find their way into our food supply; fatal to our landscapes, as chemical runoff from factory farms poison our rivers and groundwater; fatal to genetic diversity, as farmers rely increasingly on high-yield monocultures and genetically engineered crops; and fatal to our farm communities, which are wiped out by huge corporate farms.

Friendly Fascism: The New Face of Power in America by Bertram Myron Gross This is a relatively short but extremely cogent and well-argued treatise on the rise of a form of fascistic thought and social politics in late 20th century America. Author Bertram Gross' thesis is quite straightforward; the power elite that comprises the corporate, governmental and military superstructure of the country is increasingly inclined to employ every element in their formidable arsenal of 'friendly persuasion' to win the hearts and minds of ordinary Americans through what Gross refers to as friendly fascism.

The Good Life
by Scott and Helen Nearing
Helen and Scott Nearing are the great-grandparents of the back-to-the-land movement, having abandoned the city in 1932 for a rural life based on self-reliance, good health, and a minimum of cash...Fascinating, timely, and wholly useful, a mix of the Nearings' challenging philosophy and expert counsel on practical skills.

Silent Theft: The Private Plunder of Our Common Wealth by David Bollierd In Silent Theft, David Bollier argues that a great untold story of our time is the staggering privatization and abuse of our common wealth. Corporations are engaged in a relentless plunder of dozens of resources that we collectively own—publicly funded medical breakthroughs, software innovation, the airwaves, the public domain of creative works, and even the DNA of plants, animals and humans. Too often, however, our government turns a blind eye—or sometimes helps give away our assets. Amazingly, the silent theft of our shared wealth has gone largely unnoticed because we have lost our ability to see the commons.

The Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live It: The Complete Back-To-Basics Guide by John Seymour The Self Sufficient Life and How to Live It is the only book that teaches all the skills needed to live independently in harmony with the land harnessing natural forms of energy, raising crops and keeping livestock, preserving foodstuffs, making beer and wine, basketry, carpentry, weaving, and much more.

When Corporations Rule the World by David C. Korten When Corporations Rule the World explains how economic globalization has concentrated the power to govern in global corporations and financial markets and detached them from accountability to the human interest. It documents the devastating human and environmental consequences of the successful efforts of these corporations to reconstruct values and institutions everywhere on the planet to serve their own narrow ends.

The New Organic Grower: A Master's Manual of Tools and Techniques for the Home and Market Gardener This expansion of a now-classic guide originally published in 1989 is intended for the serious gardener or small-scale market farmer. It describes practical and sustainable ways of growing superb organic vegetables, with detailed coverage of scale and capital, marketing, livestock, the winter garden, soil fertility, weeds, and many other topics.