A collection of websites, news coverage, and commentary surrounding the Wikileaks releases. This collection includes documents released from the Afghan war diaries and the Iraq war logs, as well as the more recent release of the US State diplomatic cables. Please note, there are thousands of news articles, blog entries, etc. that are not listed below. To access these, the best way is to perform a search for the content you are interested in.
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Did you know that they are selling those full body scanners they want to deploy in airports to anyone who wants to buy them for use on city streets? Did you know that law enforcement is using them without warrants?
American Science & Engineering, a company based in Billerica, Massachusetts, has sold U.S. and foreign government agencies more than 500 backscatter x-ray scanners mounted in vans that can be driven past neighboring vehicles to see their contents, Joe Reiss, a vice president of marketing at the company told me in an interview. While the biggest buyer of AS&E;’s machines over the last seven years has been the Department of Defense operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, Reiss says law enforcement agencies have also deployed the vans to search for vehicle-based bombs in the U.S.
“This product is now the largest selling cargo and vehicle inspection system ever,” says Reiss.
[...]
Though Reiss admits that the systems “to a large degree will penetrate clothing,” he points to the lack of features in images of humans like the one shown at right, far less detail than is obtained from the airport scans. “From a privacy standpoint, I’m hard-pressed to see what the concern or objection could be,” he says.
Absolutely. If you don't have anything to hide why would you object to police randomly x-raying you? Who has any expectation of privacy in their car --- or in their clothes?
But EPIC’s Rotenberg says that the scans, like those in the airport, potentially violate the fourth amendment. “Without a warrant, the government doesn’t have a right to peer beneath your clothes without probable cause,” he says. Even airport scans are typically used only as a secondary security measure, he points out. “If the scans can only be used in exceptional cases in airports, the idea that they can be used routinely on city streets is a very hard argument to make.”
And you certainly shouldn't have any expectation that they won't be keeping some data base. That would be ridiculous. The customer is always right.
The TSA’s official policy dictates that full-body scans must be viewed in a separate room from any guards dealing directly with subjects of the scans, and that the scanners won’t save any images. Just what sort of safeguards might be in place for AS&E;’s scanning vans isn’t clear, given that the company won’t reveal just which law enforcement agencies, organizations within the DHS, or foreign governments have purchased the equipment. Reiss says AS&E; has customers on “all continents except Antarctica.”
Reiss adds that the vans do have the capability of storing images. “Sometimes customers need to save images for evidentiary reasons,” he says. “We do what our customers need.”
Nothing to see here folks. The founders never said that the government couldn't randomly x-ray your car -- and you --- without a warrant. And if they didn't say it, then there can be no law against it. Let's move along.
I love that ad. It clearly delineates which side Grayson is on --- average people. And he reminds his constituents that he sends his own five kids to public schools in the district, which says so much about his faith in the system and his identification with them as a member of the community. It's important that Democrats demonstrate some liberal values instead of identify themselves with conservatives. And as much as we all love Grayson for his aggressiveness and combative style, it's good for people to see that he's doing that for the future of everyone's kids, including his own. (Plus they're cute.)
I do have a sneaking suspicion that his ads will not all be feel good ads like this though. The Republicans have designated him their number one target. As we know he's one that will return fire.
Update: The Washington Post named it their ad of the day.
You've probably seen this outrageous smear ad by now, but if you haven't, take a look:
Think Progress has the full story. Here's an excerpt:
To be able to put out a misleading ad smearing a minority group like the one above, AFF turned to a dubious cast of “experts.” One of the organization’s key media strategists is Larry McCarthy, who is president of media firm McCarthy Marcus Hennings. “In 1988, McCarthy produced the infamous, racially tinged Willie Horton television ad” in the Dukakis-Bush race that helped tank the Dukakis campaign by ginning up racial animus against African-Americans.
AFF’s founder Nick Ryan confirmed to the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) that McCarthy produced the ad. Ryan also told CPI that McCarthy “does a lot of ads for the fund.”
It should also be noted that McCarthy was Roger Ailes' VP of communications during the 1970s and 80s.
In a new promo posted on a "Producers' Blog" at his website, Beck humbly places the rally in the context of the moon landing, the Montgomery bus boycott, Iwo Jima, the signing of the Declaration of Independence, and other landmark historical events. It also not-so-subtly suggests that Beck is following in the tradition of Martin Luther King (which is a farce), Abraham Lincoln, most of the Founding Fathers, Martha Washington, the Wright Brothers, and other notable historical figures.
To give you some sense of the egomania on display here, it starts with the line, "Every great achievement in human history has started with one person. One crazy idea."
And it's "brought to you by Goldline."
Greg Sargent says that Democrats are gleeful about the "I Have A Nightmare" gathering because they think these people will expose themselves to America as the kooks they really are and the people will reject them. But what if they don't? There's ample historical precedent for kooks to break through into the mainstream and it can lead to some very unpleasant outcomes. Yes, Beck is nuts. But he's also the most important figure in the Tea Party movement, which in case anyone hasn't noticed is in the process of taking over one of the two major parties in the most powerful nation in the world. You can deride these people, as I do every day. But it's a mistake to not take them seriously or underestimate their appeal in times like these.
No one should ever count on the people naturally seeing through demagogues. Their power lies in their ability to be convincing even when it doesn't make rational sense and the truly talented ones can change the world. It remains to be see if Beck and his fellow travelers have that kind of juice. But I wouldn't be so sanguine that they don't.
The problem isn't just Fox, I'm afraid. MSNBC just featured a conversation between Chuck Todd, Ron Insana and Melissa Francis on the housing slump and the economy. If you weren't confused before it started, you certainly were at the end.
Chuck said we are just now focusing on housing. Ron pointed out that it's been a problem since the bubble burst. Chuck then wondered if the new slump is the government's fault for propping up the housing market over the last 18 months when we should have "taken our medicine" earlier and allowed nature to take its natural course. (Presumably, Todd is not one who would be swallowing that medicine himself, being a well compensated television celebrity and all.) Melissa said that it depends on your political persuasion if you believe that, although she didn't explain why. Then she said it was terrifying that Nouriel Roubini tweeted that we are going into a double dip recession --- because of the tweeting not the prediction. Chuck said he likes to tweet.
Then Ron Insana said that we need to get more consumer spending going and one of the best ways to do that is by extending ALL the Bush tax cuts so people have more disposable income. I guess the billionaires will start coupon clipping once the tax cuts expire and we need to make sure they keep that extra few million to spend on baubles and employing dead artists. He did also mention a payroll tax holiday in passing. No discussion of more stimulus spending from anyone. (Well played deficit hawks, well played ...)
Chuck then noted that the problem is all those people who took their housing equity and bought big screen TVs which caused a big inventory of houses. He wondered if we are just going to have to live with abandoned subdivisions that will get mowed over eventually. Ron told him that this will work itself out if only lending standards are loosened up. Chuck said he heard that small business owners can't get loans to pay their payrolls and Melissa Francis pointed out that he was completely wrong.
Chuck then thanked both of them for the kind of eye-opening conversation that everyone's having around their kitchen tables.
It was eye opening all right. In the same way that watching a car wreck is eye-opening.
“ Jamie Kilstein and Allison Kilkenny have created an important political radio show that balances humor and unreported news. At a time when media conglomerates dominate the airwaves, independent media like Citizen Radio is vital to national discourse ” - Noam Chomsky
“ Jamie reminds me of why I got into comedy. It’s like watching a combination of George Carlin and Bill Hicks ” - Janeane Garofalo
“Allison Kilkenny’s writing makes me want to vomit” - G. Gordon Liddy, Convicted Watergate criminal
Need I say more?
Seriously, it's a great show and well worth supporting. I did an interview with them the other day and was asked the most interesting and eclectic array of questions I've ever had.
The problem with Alan Simpson's comments is bigger than the fact that he said "tits" and insulted women. Not that it wasn't crude and sexist of him, mind you. But the real problem is that he seems to believe that social security is some kind of welfare program for lazy old bastards who should either be rich or set out on an ice floe. Here's what he said:
I’ve made some plenty smart cracks about people on Social Security who milk it to the last degree. You know ‘em too. It’s the same with any system in America. We’ve reached a point now where it’s like a milk cow with 310 million tits!
He's been calling retirees "greedy geezers" for years and seems to think the whole thing is some kind of con game in which elderly people are taking the country for a ride. Does anyone think that is a reasonable approach to this issue, even from the right? It's nuts.
Despite his puerile insults about others' alleged inadequate knowledge, and his ridiculous protestations of having an open mind, we know that he's also tragically uninformed about the way the program works.
And his pathological illogic renders him nearly incomprehensible. Simpson continuously tells the elderly to STFU:
You remember the last time we corrected Social Security, and people calling me. Let me tell you, everything that Bush and Clinton or Obama have suggested with regard to Social Security doesn’t affect anyone over 60, and who are the people howling and bitching the most? The people over 60. This makes no sense. You’ve got scrub out [of] the equation the AARP, the Committee for the Preservation of Social Security and Medicare, the Gray Panthers, the Pink Panther, the whatever.
And here I thought they were greedy geezers who refuse to give up their luxurious retirement for the good of the grandkids, who Simpson is determined to protect:
There are six little people running in and out of my house, called grandchildren, who are absolutely just little lambs led to slaughter. They are totally uncomprehending. They have no idea that when they reach 60—under the present system—they’ll be picking grit with the chickens.
So why does Simpson want to cut those little tykes' social security?
Of course the real question is why on earth did the administration pull this cadaverous joker out of his own cushy, federally funded retirement to head up the ill-conceived deficit commission in the first place? The only generous reason I can think of is that someone thought that he would sabotage it, but there's no evidence they want to do that. And in this era of batshit insane politics, counting on some right wing kook to discredit anything is a very risky thing to do --- even they must know that.
So you have to assume that Simpson's fulfilling his designated role. He will make a deal. All he asks is that the geezer parasites, current and future get it out of their heads once and for all that this society should provide some basic security for everyone.
I don't know about you, but I see FoxNews on in businesses all the time, just droning out its propaganda to people who don't even know what they are listening to. Color of Change is sponsoring an action called TurnOffFox which I think is very interesting.
We don’t have to let Fox’s attempts to stoke fear and hate shape our country’s politics and culture. It’s easy to turn off Fox News in our own homes — but when TVs in public places are tuned to Fox, that also spreads fear, division, and misinformation. Turn Off Fox is about ordinary people and small businesses working together to reduce Fox’s influence in their own communities and across the country.
By organizing businesses and other public places to stop playing Fox News— the cable news network, not local affiliates — we will reduce Fox’s ability to poison our political conversations and divide our country. And we will send a powerful message: that this country will support media that informs us, sheds light on the problems we face, and inspires us to solve them together — not deceptive propaganda that plays on fear and paranoia, spreads confusion and falsehoods, exploits our divisions, and pits us against each other.
They provide step-by-step instructions and materials to make your case and have created a reporting mechanism for feedback.
I like this because if enough people do it, it might over time make FOX something that more people feel uncomfortable with. Sure, there are always going to be ideologues who will defiantly put it on no matter what. But there are far more business people in this country who love their customers more than they love Glenn Beck.
He’s organized protests online, and is the owner of the Tea Party Professionals group on Linkedin. He was also identified as a “LP [Libertarian Party] campaigner and everyone’s-facebook-friend” by a libertarian blog. He also appears to have written for the American Spectator, among other publications.
A frequent commenter on progressive blogs, Majors describes himself on his OpenSalon.com profile as an “Anarcho-capitalist revolutionary sharpening his guillotine.” On Talking Points Memo — where he was flagged with a “Troll Alert” and the subject to a lengthy profile — his bio states that he is “[l]ooking for employment as guillotine operator for citizens’ tribunal.”
Indeed, elsewhere in Majors ‘extensive online presence, there is a clear flirtation with violence as a political tool. In a Facebook note titled “We will remember in November,” Majors listed the names of all the members of Congress who voted for the Affordable Care Act — dubbed the “The Executioner’s List” — followed by a picture of a guillotine and accompanied by this call to action:
Call Capitol Hill and promise them retribution. Not just in their next race, but in their attempt to run for or be appointed to ANY office, and any private enterprise they will engage in in the future. And any member of their family.
Commenting on a TPM story, Majors wrote, “Poor walking cadaver [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid [D-NV] shouldn’t run fake tea party candidates to split the opposition vote against him. Someone might drop a plane on him. They already dropped a truck on his family,” referring to a car accident that seriously injured Reid’s wife and daughter. His Facebook page also features twojokes about President Obama’s death (and that he is a Muslim), and a picture of a sign referencing the Thomas Jefferson quote, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
Like his visitor’s guide, which offered advice to dealing with “African immigrants,” Major’s other writings have clear racial undertones. In a tweet linking to an article about Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan and affirmative action, Majors wrote, “Kagan says Obama is ‘my niggah.’” In another tweet linking to a video of Obama, Majors tweeted, “Poor little flop eared bitch. People are so mean to him.” Upon news of White House economic adviser Christina Romer’s upcoming departure, Majors tweeted, “Congratulations Christiina Romer! A house slave is now free. But all us field slaves are still in chains!” On the Shirley Sherrod dust up, Majors wrote:
[I]t is clear that most black Democrats in politics & the media are complete knaves and idiots (much like their white counterparts). The purpose of their constant race focus is, as Angela Codevilla discusses in his American Spectator article, to have a charge, racism, which which they can convict average Americans of a crime so they can then demand to enslave them.
Majors also posted a picture on his Facebook page comparing First Lady Michele Obama to Chewbacca from Star Wars:
(The Chewbacca comparison is the politically correct one. I've seen many other versions of this image featuring other primates.)
There's much more at the link. I have to say that I was reluctant to say that his Visitor's Guide was racist and I didn't write about it. Alarm bells went off, but I didn't think there was enough there to support calling him on it. But when you see it in the context of his writings, it's fairly clear that this guy has some issues. The violent rhetoric may be the bigger problem, though.
Two recent arguments about the impact of the rising anti-Islam trend in the U.S. -- from the Stupid!Storm around the Manhattan mosque to the lunacy of "national burn a Quran day" -- on the Arab world strike me as not quite right. Last week, Bill Kristol cited the translation of a column by Saudi TV station al-Arabiya director Abd al-Rahman al-Rashed downplaying the relevance of the mosque as evidence that the argument should be over. Meanwhile, several recent articles claim that the mosque had become the #1 topic of discussion on jihadist forums. Both are wrong, in different ways. Most Arab columnists agree with the argument that the anti-mosque movement will badly harm Arab and Muslim views of the United States, contra Rashed, but there isn't as much active discussion of it in the forums as you'd expect. That isn't a reason to relax, though. The impact is likely to be felt not so much on extremists, whose views about America are rather fixed, but on the vast middle ground, the Arab and Muslim mainstream which both the Bush and Obama administrations have recognized as crucial both for defeating al-Qaeda and for achieving broad American national interests. And that mainstream, not the extremists themselves, is where our attention needs to be focused.
A closer look at Arab mainstream media and jihadist forum debates shows what I mean. A scan of the major op-ed pages quickly reveals that Rashed is very much a minority voice in the unfolding Arab debate. Rashed's column caught the attention of anti-mosque activists such as Kristol, because it suited their needs. But if Kristol really wants Americans to take their cues from Arab columnists, here's a more representative sample of commentary over the last few days.
Click over for the list. It's not helpful.
But you can't blame mainstream moderate Muslim for being upset. After all, while the teabaggers can't tell the difference between an American construction worker, Coptic Christians and Osama bin laden, actual Muslims know that the so-called terrorist, Ground Zero Mosque builders are Sufis --- the Quaker pacifists of the Muslim world. if we hate them, then we hate all Muslims regardless of what they believe. And they don't like it.
It's very hard to see why anyone thinks this is a good idea unless they want a holy war.
The State Department is maintaining a "counter-misinformation" page on an America.gov blog that attempts to "debunk a conspiracy theory" that President Obama was not born in the United States, as if the topic were equivalent to believing space aliens visit Earth in flying saucers.
However, in the attempt to debunk the Obama birth-certificate controversy, the State Department author confirmed Obama was a dual citizen of the U.K. and the U.S. from 1961 to 1963 and a dual citizen of Kenya and the U.S. from 1963 to 1982, because his father was a Kenyan citizen when Obama was born in 1961.
In a number of court cases challenging Obama's eligibility, dual citizenship has been raised as a factor that could compromise his "natural born" status under Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution. The cases argue dual citizenship would make Obama ineligible even if documentary evidence were shown the public, such as the hospital-issued long-form birth certificate that indicates the place of his birth and the name of the attending physician
Who knew the teabaggers would be upset to be affiliated with flying saucers? They way they go on about "aliens" all the time, I assumed they were right there with it.
In any case, the duel citizenship thing is a new one on me. I'm sure we'll hear more about it.
But this is where they really show their true colors:
The entry "The Obama Birth Controversy" was written by Todd Leventhal, identified as the chief of the Counter-Misinformation Team for the U.S. Department of State. The office appears to have been established "to provide information about false and misleading stories in the Middle East," as described in a biography of Leventhal published on the U.S. Public Diplomacy website...
State Department spokesman Noel Clay confirmed to WND that Leventhal was a State Department employee and that an office of counter-misinformation existed in the State Department.
Clay did not subsequently respond to WND's additional inquiries. He was asked whether Congress authorized the office and to provide information regarding the process within the State Department that checked Leventhal's postings for accuracy and approved them as official U.S. government positions.
"Todd Leventhal is the department's expert on conspiracy theories and information – stories that are untrue, but widely believed," the State Department explains on America.gov. "He enjoys reading obituaries, which tell the personal stories of people who have shaped the fabric of American life."
According to America.gov, Leventhal's qualifications for the job at America.gov include that he "worked for Voice of America for seven years and bikes to work year-round."
On the website, the State Department explains, "Todd became interested in international affairs after a four-month trip to the Soviet Union, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India in 1972."
He's clearly a bike-riding, commie, Muslim terrorist whose job it is to cover up for the commie, Muslim terrorist president. Anyone can see that.
This is the nonsense these people get in their email boxes every day. They watch Fox News, they listen to Rush they belong to the Tea Party and the NRA and they are inundated with information like this designed to make them aggressive and paranoid.
When I think about it, I have to say that it's a testament to their restraint that something truly violent hasn't happened. They are being ginned up to a frenzy and they've mostly just screamed and hollered. I so wonder what will happen if they don't get their way at the ballot box this time, though. I'm not sure something won't crack then.
I hope New York cab drivers have learned about the dangers of provoking good Americans to lash out if they insist on being Muslim. As Ari Fleischer once said, "People need to watch what they say."
But then, it's always possible that this was a set-up as this conservative writer predicted last spring:
The war between the left and right has been ratcheted up this past weekend. Although a philosophical war of words, to the committed Alinsky left it is nonetheless a deadly serious war.
The progressive movement has long been known for its intolerance of opposing philosophies and its propensity for violence to attain its goals. As Noel Sheppard notes, at the 2008 Republican Convention leftist demonstrators hospitalized conventioneers with bricks thrown through bus windows and sandbags dropped from overpasses onto passing cars. The progressive media looked the other way.
Following the passage of ObamaCare, much media frenzy has surrounded incidents where a coffin was put on congressman Carnahan's front lawn (didn't happen) and a brick was thrown through congresswoman Slaughter's Niagara Falls office window. Of course, the last time someone smashed Democratic Party office windows, a Democrat was found responsible.
Now, new incidents of Democrat windows being broken have been reported, some credible, some not. These are being used by the progressive media as a weapon against the Tea Party conservatives. Since this type of childish vandalism is a signature act of progressivism, I would search for suspects on the left side of the aisle.
The Tea Party demonstrations in DC the previous weekend were noted by the progressive media only for an "alleged" incident (although some reports did not use the word "alleged") of a black congressman being "spit on", and another of someone shouting the "n-word".
The question I have is, why did these congresspeople, including Emmanuel Cleaver (the alleged "spitee", who actually walked too close to a protester shouting "kill the bill" and got sprayed), Barney Frank, and Nancy Pelosi deliberately march into the demonstration and confront the Tea Partiers? After all, wasn't it Nancy herself who said she was "frightened" by these supposedly violent people? Is it possible that they wanted to provoke a reaction from the crowd to be used by the media to demonize the Tea Party movement (i.e., "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it")? Is it also possible that when there was nothing sufficiently provoked by the lawmakers' confrontation, they decided to fabricate it? I believe their previous record of untruthfulness supports this hypothesis.
It's to be expected that Godless leftists and their extremist Muslim allies would be working together to provoke Real Americans to become violent. It's right out of the Jewish Saul Alinsky playbook.
I have to give it to Boehner. His speech today was almost elegant in its pompous vapidity. He's got a real gift for saying absolutely nothing with the careless aplomb of an empty playboy years past his prime.
Unfortunately, he's actually a thoroughly corrupt tool of corporate interests who wields great power over millions of people and as the potential speaker of the House his actions are of much greater interest than his shallow rhetoric.
Blue America and its partner Americans for America responded to his dull remarks with its latest ad set to start running tomorrow morning. His actions speak much louder than his words:
A big tip 'o the hat to Dan Manatt and his creative team at Americans for America for turning that ad around immediately upon hearing Boehner's plodding words this morning. But for the millions of Americans who are suffering because of Republican policies that created their problems and Republican obstructionism that's keeping anyone from solving them, it would be very hard to find inspiration in such drivel.
Notice this DNC ad below, which I like a lot. They used it yesterday-- while Justin Coussoule was racking up endorsements from Tim Ryan (D-OH), Steve Filner (D-CA) and the Congressional Progressive Caucus-- to ask for money: "Boehner's horrible; he's going to eat your children; send us your money." But not a world about Boehner having an opponent. But he does; it's Justin Coussoule and you can donate towards electing him and defeating Boehner right here. Remember, when Boehner is shrieking "Where are the jobs, Mr. President," it isn't the DCCC or DNC telling voters in southwestern Ohio that it was Boehner who engineered the 2008 no-strings-attached Wall Street bailout; it's Justin Coussoule. And it isn't the DNC or the DCCC telling voters in Ohio that the trade policies, like NAFTA, that Boehner has been pushing for two decades explains where the jobs are; it's Justin Coussoule. Let's help him.
When you recognize that GDP growth in the second quarter of 2010 was only 2.4%, and could revise to just 1% after all the data comes in, this estimate from CBO is horrifying:
The massive stimulus package boosted real GDP by up to 4.5 percent in the second quarter of 2010 and put up to 3.3 million people to work, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said on Tuesday.
CBO’s latest estimate indicates that the stimulus effort, which remains a political hot potato ahead of the November congressional elections, may have prevented the sluggish U.S. economy from contracting between April and June.
Economists surveyed by Reuters expect that revised numbers due out on Friday will show that the economy grew at an anemic 1.4 percent pace during that time period — less than the boost of at least 1.7 percent that the stimulus provided, according the CBO estimate.
So not only would the economy have contracted at extreme rates throughout late 2008 and 2009, but without the stimulus the economy would STILL be contracting. That’s a testament to how completely shaky the recovery is right now. And the scariest part is this final line: “CBO said it expects the effects of the stimulus to gradually diminish over the remainder of the year.”
That was dday who goes on to point out that although it's great that the administration was able to prevent the worst case scenario from coming true, it's also sadly true that this information makes it more clear than ever that the stimulus was inadequate to do the job it needed to do. And it's also true that the inept use of the bully pulpit, particularly on deficit fever (which even DFH's knew from the beginning was playing into the hands of the wealthy wingnut elite) and the silly rhetoric of "Recovery Summer" has effectively bound the hands of the government going forward.
The stimulus was definitely better than nothing. It may have prevented a depression and (so-far) a double dip recession. But better than nothing isn't really adequate to the times. Obviously, the Republicans would be even worse, but that just isn't very comforting
It's short. Listen to it so you can see how someone who has no idea what he's talking about is able to reconcile totally conflicting ideas --- within the same sentence. It makes no sense, but he seems quite pleased with it.
I had heard these were coming, but I didn't realize they were already on the market:
The 7½-foot-tall Assault Intervention Device emits a focused, invisible ray that causes an unbearable heating sensation in its targets – hopefully stopping inmates from fighting or doing anything other than trying to get out of its way, sheriff's officials said.
The device, unveiled Friday at Pitchess Detention Center, will be mounted near the ceiling in a dormitory housing about 65 prisoners, according to Commander Bob Osborne of the Sheriff's Department Technology Exploration Program.
"We hope that this type of technology will either cause an inmate to stop an assault or lessen the severity of an assault by them being distracted by the pain as a result of the beam," Osborne said. "So that we have fewer injuries, fewer assaults, those kinds of things."
Deputies have tested the device on themselves and say the beam is painful – especially when it's not expected.
"I equate it to opening an oven door and feeling that blast of hot air, except instead of being all over me, it's more focused," Osborne said. "And you begin to feel this warming feeling, and then you go 'Yow, I need to get out of the way."'
The pain can be stopped by moving out of the beam's path, which targets do instinctively.
Deputies say it should reduce injuries by speeding up the time it takes to break up a fight. Normally if a fight breaks out, deputies can't move in immediately, but have to take the time to assemble a team while the fight continues.
They love the idea of being able to cause pain without "injury," whatever that means.
"This device will allow us to quickly intervene without having to enter the area and without incapacitating or injuring either combatant," said Sheriff Lee Baca in a statement
Ok, so these guys have been convicted of a crime and are in custody. Their freedoms (although not their human rights) have been taken away for cause and they are unquestioningly subject to the states' orders. But imagine a society in which the police (for our own good) use methods like this to break up political protests. And then further imagine that same society some time later in which its people have been trained like Pavlov's dogs to comply with authorities' orders. Authorities, by the way, which are sheltered from danger by being able to control its subjects from a distance:
The device is controlled by a joystick and computer monitor and emits a beam about the size of a CD up to distances of about 80 to 100 feet. The wave travels at the speed of light and penetrates the skin up to 1/64 of an inch.
"If you got in the way, you'll know," said Mike Booen, vice president of advance security at Raytheon, which has been working on the device for about 20 years. "You feel the effect in less than a second. No one can stand there for more than about three seconds because it really hurts."
[...]
The technology was originally designed as a less-lethal weapon for military applications. Larger versions, including one which can heat up a person's entire torso, were mounted on a back of Hummer to use for crowd control purposes.
"When you get that many of your pain receptacles telling you brain 'This needs to stop,' you can't think of anything else," Booen said. "And that tends to be very effective."
I wonder what happens if people subject to these heat rays can't get away? For instance, if they are in a confined area. Like a prison. Or a crowd.
I guess they'll think twice before they do anything again that might precipitate such pain. After all, "when you get that many of your pain receptacles telling your brain 'this needs to stop'" and you can't stop it, I'd assume there might be some psychological after effects.
But hey, it's all good:
"With this device, we can affect people that we need to have experience that effect and not have anything happen to other people," Osborne said. "And there's nothing to clean up, and no injuries."
Prince Alwaleed has grown close with the Murdoch enterprise, recently endorsing James Murdoch to succeed his father and creating a content-sharing agreement with Fox News for his own media conglomerate, Rotana. As irony would have it, the Arab News just published this picture today of Prince Alwaleed meeting with News Corp executives to discuss how to “further strengthen the strategic corporate alliance between Rotana and News Corp”:
As Eric Cantor would say: "Come on!"
*I didn't see this segment until after I had written the previous post, but it certainly does fit the theme. I vote for evil rocks with mouths.
A lot of smart people, Krugman in particular, are making the observation that the bankers, economists and Big Money Boyz are making it up as they go along and it certainly does seem that way. No matter what the circumstances, they profess that it's impossible for the Fed or the government to do anything to help average people and that tax cuts for the wealthy are the answer to every problem in good times and bad.
Krugman writes:
Let me try to explain what bothers me about this sort of thing, aside from the fact that it would be an utter disaster for the economy: it’s the way Rajan — and many other economists — seem to be making up new doctrines on the fly to justify their policy prejudices.
I’m all in favor of innovative thinking. But my view is that what you say about policy at any given time should be based on some kind of model — and furthermore, you should be willing to apply the same model to other situations, not make it a one-off used to justify what you happen to favor right now.
This discussion reminds me of the old perennial "why are we in Iraq?" The Very Serious people always had different reasons, but they supported the same conclusion: we just needed to be there. I don't know if this comes from faith based ideology, herd instinct or conspiracy. It could also be class/social bias (village syndrome) or simple careerism. Whatever it is, it's a problem.
Krugman thinks the economic elite are for for monetary tightening because they are biased against easy money and will find any basis they can to justify that. The question then becomes, why would anyone have an bias against easy money unless they are attaching a moral value to it? There can be no scientific basis for rejecting it. It's just another tool in the central bank toolbox right? My guess is that they *believe* the little people must pay the price for the excesses of the elites because that's their natural role in the economic scheme of things and that the economic elites must be left unfettered to "produce" lest they go on strike or otherwise refuse to do their part. (Bond vigilantes! Confidence fairies!) This also requires the little people to pay the price. This is theology not science and not even ideology. They simply believe.
Whether this comes from social or professional pressure or from true conviction is harder to know. But it doesn't matter. Very Serious People agree and that's all it takes for terrible decisions to be made and then compounded over and over. Perhaps we should deal with the root of that problem at some point.
It is crazy to speculate that Monsanto might be purchasing civil disobedience in Italy in order to plant Frankencorn. The farmer in this article is simply a humble idealist who believes in the freedom to do whatever he wants on his land. The fact that he name-checked Ron Paul means nothing. Every Italian farmer has heard of him: Ron Paul's the most famous living American, after all.
And only the most unserious people question reports that most of the oil from the BP catastrophe in the Gulf has been dispersed and will not harm anyone or anything.
Ooops, okay, that last one may not be so crazy to doubt. But don't blame me, if industry funded scientists tell me that poof! magically, 75% of the oil from the biggest drilling accident on record disappeared overnight, who am I to say no? Complicated statistics like that always confuse me. Math class is tough!
Regardless, there's no reason not to trust the other stories. These are facts, people:
Assange/Wikileaks was absolutely not the victim of a dirty Pentagon trick. And Monsanto did nothing, not even indirectly, to fuel that Italian farmer's innocent passion for their lousy, crummy-tasting, heirloom-wrecking corn.
Remember: Trust the authorities. What They say is authoritative.
Except maybe sometimes, when they lie with impunity through their fucking teeth and dare anyone to prove it.
