Bush Closer to Bombing Iran

Matthew Rothschild
AlterNet
March 25, 2008.

The odds of Bush bombing Iran have gone up dramatically this week.

There’s just no other way to rationally interpret the resignation of Admiral William Fallon as head of Centcom.

Fallon resigned, and more likely was pushed out, after Esquire published an article on him entitled “The Man Between War and Peace.” It said he was the one standing in the way of Bush bombing Iran.

He’s not standing in the way any longer.

Actually, his rival, General David Petraeus, is now more powerful than ever. And as the Esquire article noted, Petraeus has said: “You cannot win in Iraq solely in Iraq.”

Fallon seemed to understand the risk he was taking when he took the job as head of Centcom. He told Esquire: “Career capping? How about career detonating?”

Fallon’s fate as a weathervane for war with Iran has been clear since the time of his confirmation, when he told a source that an attack on Iran “will not happen on my watch.”

His watch just stopped.

He also said, a the time, “There are several of us trying to put the crazies back in the box.”

But the crazies are still bounding around outside the box, and none crazier than Dick Cheney, who is off on a Mideast trip, ostensibly to deal with Israel and Palestine and also with high oil prices.

But there are other purposes, as well. Cheney is visiting Oman, “a key military ally and logistics hub for military operations in the Persian Gulf,” notes U.S. News & World Report.

What’s more, according to U.S. News, “two U.S. warships took up positions off Lebanon earlier this month.” The Pentagon “would want its warships in the eastern Mediterranean in the event of military action against Iran to keep Iranian ally Syria in check and to help provide air cover to Israel against Iranian missile reprisals,” the story said. “One of the newly deployed ships, the USS Ross, is an Aegis guised missile destroyer, a top system for defense against air attacks.”

U.S. News cited three other signs why war is more likely now: Israel’s airstrike on Syria, Israel’s war with Hezbollah, and Shimon Peres’s disavowal of unilateral action.

Here’s one more: The director of national intelligence, Mike McConnell, testified to the Senate on February 5 that maybe in last fall’s NIE he overstressed the fact that Iran had halted its nuclear weapons work. And maybe he overplayed the fact that Iran doesn’t know how to design a nuclear weapon just yet.

And maybe he should have highlighted the fact that Iran was still enriching uranium.

And maybe he should have emphasized that, therefore, Iran still poses a potential nuclear threat.

“In retrospect,” McConnell said, “I would do some things differently.”

Like give Bush and Cheney exactly what they ask for.

Something Admiral Fallon, to his credit, was not prepared to do.

Obama related to Pitt, Clinton to Jolie

Researchers find remarkable family connections for the candidates

The Associated Press

updated 3:46 p.m. ET March 25, 2008

BOSTON - This could make for one odd family reunion: Barack Obama is a distant cousin of actor Brad Pitt, and Hillary Rodham Clinton is related to Pitt's girlfriend, Angelina Jolie.

Researchers at the New England Historic Genealogical Society found some remarkable family connections for the three presidential candidates — Democratic rivals Obama and Clinton, and Republican John McCain.

Clinton, who is of French-Canadian descent on her mother's side, is also a distant cousin of singers Madonna, Celine Dion and Alanis Morissette. Obama, the son of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Kenya, can call six U.S. presidents, including George W. Bush, his cousins. McCain is a sixth cousin of first lady Laura Bush.

Genealogist Christopher Child said that while the candidates often focus on pointing out differences between them, their ancestry shows they are more alike than they think.

"It shows that lots of different people can be related, people you wouldn't necessarily expect," Child said.

Obama has a prolific presidential lineage that features Democrats and Republicans. His distant cousins include President George W. Bush and his father, George H.W. Bush, Gerald Ford, Lyndon Johnson, Harry S. Truman and James Madison. Other Obama cousins include Vice President Dick Cheney, British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill and Civil War General Robert E. Lee.

"His kinships are across the political spectrum," Child said.

Child has spent the last three years tracing the candidates' genealogy, along with senior research scholar Gary Boyd Roberts, author of the 1989 book, "Ancestors of American Presidents."

Clinton's distant cousins include beatnik author Jack Kerouac and Camilla Parker-Bowles, wife of Prince Charles of England.

McCain's ancestry was more difficult to trace because records on his relatives were not as complete as records for the families of Obama and Clinton, Child said.

Obama and President Bush are 10th cousins, once removed, linked by Samuel Hinkley of Cape Cod, who died in 1662.

Pitt and Obama are ninth cousins, linked by Edwin Hickman, who died in Virginia in 1769.

Clinton and Jolie are ninth cousins, twice removed, both related to Jean Cusson who died in St. Sulpice, Quebec, in 1718.

The New England Historic Genealogical Society, founded in 1845, is the oldest and largest nonprofit genealogical organization in the country.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23797072/

Cops Beat The Living Hell Out Of Peaceful Tibetan Protesters IN AMERICA

Steve Watson
Infowars.net
Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Disgusting video footage of New York cops clubbing and arresting peaceful Tibetan protesters who were merely walking down the street has gone relatively ignored beyond Youtube.

While stories emerge out of China every day of police beating and killing Tibetan protestors in the streets, the same sort of behavior by cops in America tells its own story.

The footage was shot at a free Tibet peaceful assembly in New York on the 14th of March.

It shows the protestors holding flags and signs and peacefully walking down the street towards the UN building in the Turtle Bay neighborhood only to be accosted by police officers with batons.

One officer identified as "Delgado" is seen in the video pushing people as the group crosses the street.

Another officer, identified as "Serano" is caught threatening to kill two protesters as the cameraman passes. He later admits to the threat and apologizes for it.

As the group nears the UN building, cop cars and vans screech onto the sidewalks, cops pour out and begin to beat the protesters with clubs as UN security guards observe without becoming involved.

A non uniformed officer, who seems to be directing the entire operation, then orders the cameraman to step back and move away.

"Look at these cops, clubbing people in front of the UN, unbelievable, protesting to free Tibet, cops clubbing people in their legs on the sidewalk, in front of the UN in America, unbelievable, this is not China." the American cameraman announces in disbelief.

The officer identified as Serano then forces the cameraman away from the melee, telling him to shut the camera off and that he will not talk to him because he may be a reporter.

Several officers then follow the cameraman asking him about his recording of the incident.

Watch the entire video:

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Will the Militarized Police State Shock You Into Submission?

Karen De Coster
LRC Blog
March 23, 2008

This is perhaps one of the most kooky and creepy Security State tactics that I have come across: the EMD safety bracelet, which is being billed as the "last line of defence." A company called Lamperd Firearm Training Systems (scroll down) is trying to commercialize this item as an "airline security product." The company’s video that hawks this device talks about the current facial recognition system called biometrics, where cameras capture photos of people and compare those images to the images of "terrorists" in its "terrorist" database. No matter how sophisticated this technology, it can all too often allow a terrorist on board a plane, and, this technology can also have the effect of creating airport bottlenecks. Ahem. The solution? The "viable, workable answer" is an electronic ID bracelet. This bracelet will replace the need for a ticket and contain all necessary information about the person, and as a bonus, it can allow the passenger to be tracked through the terminal. Crew members would be empowered with radio frequency transmitters to subdue "hijackers." The technology will override a person’s central nervous system and zap them down quicker than you can say "Homeland Security." The company assures us that being dragged through the bracelet process is a "small inconvenience in order to assure your safe arrival." In fact, its studies show that most people would "happily opt" for wearing the bracelet to "insure their own security."

Here’s the Lamperd video on YouTube - you must watch it. Here’s the patent for this device. The patent actually reads this:

Upon activation of the electric shock device, through receipt of an activating signal from the selectively operable remote control means, the passenger wearing that particular bracelet receives the disabling electrical shock from the electric shock device. Accordingly, the passenger becomes incapacitated for a few seconds or perhaps a few minutes, during which time the passenger can be fully subdued and handcuffed, if necessary. Depending on the type of transmission medium used to send the activating signal, other passengers may also become temporarily incapacitated, which is undesirable and unfortunate, but may be unavoidable.

Lamperd even posts a series of letters on its website showing interest in the product for use "outside of airport security," which, of course, is the real reason for the product. Why it can be used for border control to subdue illegal aliens or by local law enforcement agencies to control the "criminal element!"

U.S. and Allied Intelligence Services Had Penetrated The Very Highest Levels of Al Qaeda Prior to 9/11

George Washington Blog
Tuesday, March 25, 2008

No one could have anticipated 9/11, right? While the U.S. knew about Al Qaeda, the 9/11 plotters and hijackers were still somewhat unknown and unpredictable prior to 9/11. Right?

In fact, U.S. and allied intelligence services had penetrated the highest levels of Al Qaeda prior to 9/11. For example:

• In January 2001 -- the French intelligence services gave a report to the CIA entitled "Plan to hijack an aircraft by Islamic radicals". Indeed, "foreign agents had infiltrated Osama bin Laden's network and were carefully tracking its moves" prior to 9/11. The original story from the leading French newspaper makes it clear that such infiltration went to the highest levels of Al-Qaeda's camps, and included listening to the hijackers' debates about which airlines' planes should be hijacked, and that allied intelligence services also listened into satellite phone conversations between the hijackers

• Moroccan intelligence penetrated Bin Laden's inner circle, and reported on Bin Laden's plans to the U.S.

• A longtime CIA officer says, �Egyptians, Jordanians, [and] Palestinians penetrated the bin Laden organization for us. It�s B.S. that we didn�t.� (page 143)

• Former CIA director George Tenet says that �a group of assets from a Middle Eastern service�, working for the CIA, penetrated al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan by September 2001. Bin Laden was dropping hints about the upcoming 9/11 attacks to training camp trainees in the summer of 2001, and US citizen John Walker Lindh was told details of the 9/11 attacks within weeks of joining a training camp that summer

• USA Today states: "U.S. intelligence overheard al-Qaeda operatives discussing a major pending terrorist attack in the weeks prior to Sept. 11 and had agents inside the terror group"

• Indeed, in the summer of 2001, the CIA allegedly told President Bush that the highest levels of Al-Qaeda had been penetrated

In addition, U.S. and allied intelligence services followed the hijacker's every move:

• The Congressional Joint Inquiry into 9/11 discovered that an FBI informant had hosted and rented a room to two hijackers in 2000 and that, when the Inquiry sought to interview the informant, the FBI refused outright, and then hid him in an unknown location, and that a high-level FBI official stated these blocking maneuvers were undertaken under orders from the White House (confirmed here by the Co-Chair of the Joint Inquiry and former Head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Bob Graham)

• The Pentagon also tracked the hijackers before 9/11

• Israel tracked the hijackers' every movement prior to the attacks, and may have sent agents to film the attack on the World Trade Centers

• And Saudi intelligence was "actively following" most of the September 11, 2001, plotters "with precision" prior to the attacks. Saudi Arabia, like Israel, is a very close ally of the U.S.

Moreover, the U.S. intercepted many high-level Al Qaeda phone calls:

• The CIA and the NSA had been intercepting phone calls by the hijackers for years

• The National Security Agency and the FBI were both independently listening in on the phone calls between the supposed mastermind of the attacks and the lead hijacker. Indeed, the FBI built its own antenna in Madagascar specifically to listen in on the mastermind's phone calls. The day before 9/11, the mastermind told the lead hijacker "tomorrow is zero hour" and gave final approval for the attacks. The NSA intercepted the message that day and the FBI was likely also monitoring the mastermind's phone calls. (The NSA claims that it did not translate the intercept until September 12th; however, the above-mentioned FBI translator said that she was frequently ordered to falsify dates of translations regarding 9/11)

• Shortly before 9/11, the NSA also intercepted multiple phone calls from Bin Laden's chief of operations to the United States

• Only two days before 9/11, Osama Bin Laden called his stepmother and told her "In two days, you're going to hear big news and you're not going to hear from me for a while.� US officials later told CNN that �in recent years they've been able to monitor some of bin Laden's telephone communications with his [step]mother. Bin Laden at the time was using a satellite telephone, and the signals were intercepted and sometimes recorded." Indeed, before 9/11, to impress important visitors, NSA analysts would occasionally play audio tapes of bin Laden talking to his stepmother

Moreover, the financiers for Al Qaeda were not mysterious and unknown before 9/11:

• According to intelligence officials in India and the FBI, Pakistan's military chief of intelligence wired $100,000 to the lead hijacker days before 9/11 (mentioned here in an editorial round-up). It is well known that American and Pakistani intelligence service worked closely together for many years. Indeed, the above-described military chief of intelligence who wired the $100,000 to the hijacker actually met with the leaders of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees on the very morning of 9/11
  

Other facts point towards penetration of the highest levels of Al Qaeda:

• 9/11 family member and "Jersey Girl" Patty Casazza was told by whistleblowers that -- before 9/11 -- the government knew the exact day, the type of attack, and the targets

• One of France's largest newspapers claims that the CIA met with Bin Laden in an American hospital in Dubai in July 2001

Whatever you might think about 9/11, it is beyond dispute that U.S. and allied intelligence services had penetrated "the highest levels" of Al Qaeda prior to 9/11. Al Qaeda and the 9/11 plotters and hijackers were thoroughly known, monitored, tracked and infiltrated before 9/11.

If a domestic gang were this highly infiltrated and closely monitored by the FBI, and yet the FBI allowed the gang to commit a major crime, it would be obvious that the FBI allowed the crime to be committed. Right? Why is 9/11 any different? Indeed, Al Qaeda was arguably more higly infiltrated and monitored than any domestic gang.

Moreover, something very similar happened in 1993, when a government informant offered to stop the 1993 bombing of the world trade center by substituting fake power for real bombmaking materials, but the FBI allowed the bombing to happen anyway (summary version is free; full version is pay-per-view) (see also this news report). It was supposedly Al Qaeda which carried out that attack also.

D.C. Gun Crackdown Meets Community Resistance

Police Ask Residents To Submit To Voluntary Searches

NBC 4
Tuesday, March 25, 2008

WASHINGTON -- A crackdown on guns is meeting some resistance in the District.

Police are asking residents to submit to voluntary searches in exchange for amnesty under the District's gun ban. They passed out fliers requesting cooperation on Monday.

CLICK HERE to watch the video.

The program will begin in a couple of weeks in the Washington Highlands neighborhood of southeast Washington and will later expand to other neighborhoods. Officers will go door to door asking residents for permission to search their homes.

Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said the "safe homes initiative" is aimed at residents who want to cooperate with police. She gave the example of parents or grandparents who know or suspect their children have guns in the home.

Community leaders went door to door in Ward 8 Monday to advise residents not to invite police into their homes to search for weapons.

"Bad idea," said D.C. School Board member William Lockridge. "I think the people should not open your doors under any circumstances, don't even crack your door, unless someone has a warrant for your arrest."

Ron Hampton, of the Black Police Officers Association, said he doesn't expect many in the community to comply.

"This is one of those communities where the police even have problems getting information about crimes that are going on in the community, so to suggest, now, that the police have enough community capital in their hand that the community is going to cooperate with them, I'm not so sure that's a good idea," Hampton said.

FULL STORY: CLICK HERE

March consumer confidence down, outlook grim

By Ruth Mantell, MarketWatch

Last update: 10:14 a.m. EDT March 25, 2008

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- U.S. consumer confidence fell in March, the Conference Board reported Tuesday, and expectations hit a 35-year low as pessimistic views of the business climate, the job market and personal income weighed on sentiment.

The March consumer confidence index fell to 64.5 from a revised reading of 76.4 in February. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch had expected a March reading of 73.3. Confidence has taken a hit in recent months from worries about jobs, housing prices and the economy. Consumer confidence is at its lowest since the Iraq War in 2003.

"Looking ahead, consumers' outlook for business conditions, the job market and their income prospects is quite pessimistic and suggests further weakening may be on the horizon," said Lynn Franco, director of consumer research at the private Conference Board.

Elsewhere Tuesday, the Case-Shiller home price index showed U.S. home prices in 20 major cities declined a record 2.4% in January, falling for the 18th month in a row and bringing down prices a record 10.7% in the past year. See full story.

Hitting its second-lowest level ever, the Conference Board's expectations index fell to 47.9 in March from 58.0 in February. In December 1973, expectations were at 45.2. Those expecting business conditions to worsen over the next six months rose to 25.4% in March from 21.6% in February. Those expecting fewer jobs rose to 29.0% from 28.0%.

Expectations for the inflation rate in 12 months rose to 6.1% from 5.4%.

Consumers' views of present-day conditions declined to 89.2 in March from 104.0 in February. Those claiming business conditions are bad rose to 25.4% from 21.3%. Those saying jobs are "hard to get" rose to 25.1% from 23.4%, and those saying jobs are "plentiful" fell to 18.8% from 21.5%.

Ruth Mantell is a MarketWatch reporter based in Washington.

Home prices fall a record 10.7% in past year

Of 20 cities, only Charlotte, N.C. holds on to meager appreciation

By Rex Nutting, MarketWatch

Last update: 9:43 a.m. EDT March 25, 2008

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Home prices in 20 major U.S. metro areas have plunged a record 10.7% in the past year as prices continued to decelerate, Standard & Poor's said Tuesday.

The 20-city Case-Shiller home price index fell a record 2.4% in January, the 18th consecutive decline in prices. For 10 major cities, prices fell 2.3% in January and 11.4% for the past 12 months.

"No markets seem to be completely immune from the housing crisis,' said David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at S&P.

Of the 20 cities, only Charlotte, N.C., has managed any gains in the past year, rising a meager 1.8%. For the fifth straight month, all 20 cities recorded lower prices compared with the previous month.

Home prices in 10 of the 20 cities have fallen at double-digit rates in the past year.

Falling prices have eroded Americans' wealth, cutting into their ability to borrow against their home or to sell for a profit. Millions of Americans now owe more on their home than it is worth.

Falling home values could also trigger higher monthly payments for many homeowners.

But falling prices are likely a necessary ingredient in getting the housing market growing again. Many economists expect prices to ultimately fall 20% to 30% from the peak; they are now down 12.5%.

"With supply overhang enormous and mortgage financing tougher to obtain, home prices are going to decline considerably further in the quarters ahead," wrote Joshua Shapiro, an economist for MFR.

The Case-Shiller index tracks sales of the same homes over time, so it's not influenced by the mix of homes sold in a period. However, it closely tracks only 20 cities, many of which had participated in the housing bubble earlier in the decade.

A similar index published by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight will be released later Tuesday. The OFHEO index covers more geographic areas, but does not include nonconforming mortgages such as jumbo loans or subprime loans. The OFHEO index has fallen 1% in the 12 months ending in December.

In the Case-Shiller index in January, prices fell 5.1% in Las Vegas, Nev., and 4.1% in Phoenix, Ariz. The smallest decline was the 0.2% in Charlotte.

For the past year, the biggest price declines have been in Miami and Las Vegas, both down 19.3%. Two cities that had continued to see price increases last year -- Seattle and Portland, Ore. -- turned negative in January.

Iran 'behind Green Zone attack'

BBC News
Monday, March 24, 2008

The most senior US general in Iraq has said he has evidence that Iran was behind Sunday's bombardment of Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.

Gen David Petraeus told the BBC he thought Tehran had trained, equipped and funded insurgents who fired the barrage of mortars and rockets.

He said Iran was adding what he described as "lethal accelerants" to a very combustible mix.

There has as yet been no response from Iran to the accusations.

In response to the news that 4,000 US military personnel have now been killed in Iraq, he said it showed how much the mission had cost but added that Americans were realistic about it.

He also said a great deal of progress had been made because of the "flipping" of communities - the decision by Sunni tribes to turn against al-Qaeda militants.

The extent of this had surprised even the US military, he said.

'Promises violated'

In an interview with BBC world affairs editor John Simpson, Gen Petraeus said violence in Iraq was being perpetuated by Iran's Quds Force, a branch of the Revolutionary Guards.

"The rockets that were launched at the Green Zone yesterday, for example... were Iranian-provided, Iranian-made rockets," he said, adding that the groups that fired them were funded and trained by the Quds Force.

"All of this in complete violation of promises made by President Ahmadinejad and the other most senior Iranian leaders to their Iraqi counterparts."

The barrage hit the Green Zone on Sunday morning. Some rockets missed their targets killing 15 Iraqi civilians.

Later in the day four US soldiers died when their patrol vehicle was blown up by a bomb in southern Baghdad, putting the total number of US fatalities above 4,000.

This and other bloodshed on Sunday came despite an overall reduction in violence since last June, when the US deployed an extra 30,000 troops for the surge.

Days earlier, Mr Bush marked the fifth anniversary of the invasion, saying that it had made the world a better place.