Glassholes

Posted on February 6, 2014 by WashingtonsBlog

Glassholes by Anthony Freda

A Mini NSA On Your Face

eOnline reports:

A new app will allow total strangers to ID you and pull up all your information, just by looking at you and scanning your face with their Google Glass. The app is called NameTag and it sounds CREEPY.
The “real-time facial recognition” software “can detect a face using the Google Glass camera, send it wirelessly to a server, compare it to millions of records, and in seconds return a match complete with a name, additional photos and social media profiles.”
The information listed could include your name, occupation, any social media profiles you have set up and whether or not you have a criminal record (“CRIMINAL HISTORY FOUND” pops up in bright red letters according to the demo).

Since the NSA is tapping into all of our digital communications, it is not unreasonable to assume that all of the info from your digital glasses – yup, everything – may be recorded by the spy agency.
Are we going to have millions of mini NSAs walking around recording everything … glassholes?
Postscript: I love gadgets and tech, and previously discussed the exciting possibilities of Google Glasses.
But the NSA is ruining the fun, just like it’s harming U.S. Internet business.

Report: Power Plant Attack: “Most Significant Incident of Domestic Terrorism Involving the Grid That Has Ever Occurred”

Mac Slavo February 6th, 2014 SHTFplan.com

Chances are you didn’t hear about it when it happened or the investigation that followed. Last April just outside of San Jose, California the grid system came under direct attack.
Investigators have yet to identify any suspects, but the attack seems to have been well planned. First, someone accessed an underground vault housing fiber optic telephone cables and cut off communications to a large PG&E Substation.
Then, for 19 minutes, someone opened fire from long-range.
The sniper apparently utilized 7.62x39mm rounds, such as those used in an AK-47, to target the oil-driven cooling systems for 17 large transformers. The shell casings found at the scene had been wiped clean of fingerprints. According to Newsmax none of the transformers exploded, but the damage was significant enough for PG&E to force their electricity feeds to reroute through another station in an effort to prevent a widespread blackout.
As of yet police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have no leads. The evidence suggests any number of scenarios with the highest likelihood being a coordinated attack involving a team. But because of its simplicity it’s possible that the attack could have been orchestrated by a lone individual.
Whatever the case, the event prompted the head of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Jon Wellinghoff to call it, “the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred.”
The Wall Street Journal reports:

The 64-year-old Nevadan, who was appointed to FERC in 2006 by President George W. Bush and stepped down in November, said he gave closed-door, high-level briefings to federal agencies, Congress and the White House last year. As months have passed without arrests, he said, he has grown increasingly concerned that an even larger attack could be in the works.
He said he was going public about the incident out of concern that national security is at risk and critical electric-grid sites aren’t adequately protected.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation doesn’t think a terrorist organization caused the Metcalf attack, said a spokesman for the FBI in San Francisco. Investigators are “continuing to sift through the evidence,” he said.
Some people in the utility industry share Mr. Wellinghoff’s concerns, including a former official at PG&E, Metcalf’s owner, who told an industry gathering in November he feared the incident could have been a dress rehearsal for a larger event.
“This wasn’t an incident where Billy-Bob and Joe decided, after a few brewskis, to come in and shoot up a substation,” Mark Johnson, retired vice president of transmission for PG&E, told the utility security conference, according to a video of his presentation. “This was an event that was well thought out, well planned and they targeted certain components.”

(Via the Wall Street Journal)

The most significant power grid attack in U.S. history failed to be reported in any detail by officials or the mainstream media, likely because they did not want to panic the populace.
Could this have been a test for a larger scale event? Certainly.
Since then, what steps have been taken to protect the grid from such attacks, or even other potential scenarios like electro-magnetic pulse devices or solar flares that could wipe out the national power grid within seconds? None.
A single individual could have carried out such an attack. Cut the phone lines. Take aim. Open fire. It’s simple, really.
Now consider the potential damage if a rogue terrorist group or state-sponsored initiative launched a coordinated attack across 50 to 100 critical nodes all over the United States. Such an attack could bring the country to a complete standstill, leaving economic destruction and large-scale destabilization in its wake. A couple of days are manageable, but if the right equipment were to be targeted then it’s possible that repairs would take up to 18 months because many transformer components are sourced from foreign nations and have long build times.
The telecommunications systems, power grid, water  utilities, transportation systems, oil refineries and other critical industries across America are, as reported by U.S. Cyber Command, completely exposed to attack. It could come in the form of a cyber vulnerability, as we saw in Illinois when a utility station’s water pump systems overheated due to a reported digital security breach or when our drone fleet was hacked in the middle east. Or, it could be a physical attack like the one in California, with future incidents potentially involving larger transformers and explosives instead of AK-47′s.
The possibilities exist. Our government knows this, as evidenced by the comments of outgoing DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano who recently said that a crippling attack against U.S. infrastructure elements is inevitable.
The fact is that our infrastructure is outdated and exposed. It will not be repaired any time soon because the costs run into the hundreds of billions of dollars.
Thus, the only real option for Americans is to expect that such an event is coming, and to prepare for it.
Congressman Roscoe Bartlett, who has retired and now lives well outside of populated areas, says people should get out of major cities and have a retreat to avoid the fall-out from a grid collapse. His fears are substantiated by a recent report that claims 9 out of 10 Americans would die within a year of the electricity going out.
But whether you head out to the boonies or stay local, even the Federal Emergency Management Agency recommends having an emergency supply because, as they’ve admitted, any response in a catastrophic scenario will be slow to come. This means that having a preparedness plan complete with evacuation strategies, food supplies, water and other considerations will be essential to survival.
The threat is real.

Innovation And Our Better Future Depend On Preserving Net Neutrality

from the giving-innovators-a-chance dept

Troma Entertainment would never have reached its 40th year as arguably the world's longest running independent movie studio if Net Neutrality or the Open Internet did not exist. I know, I know, some might say, "That would be a good thing." Haha! But without Net Neutrality, we probably would not have visionary innovations like Crowdfunding, Macklemore, Huffington Post, Youtube, Justin Bieber and maybe even Anonymous. Net Neutrality is essential to free speech and allows for a free and diverse Internet of equal opportunity. The Internet, our last democratic medium, is severely threatened as I write this. The American courts and the US government have effectively decided to nullify net neutrality and the major media/broadband conglomerates are down in Washington, D.C. 24/7 spending kabillions of dollars to lobby against our beloved Open Internet.

The mega cartel that controls world media has their ass in a tub of butter. They control or own the cinemas, newspapers, T.V. stations, radio and even Broadway “legitimate” theaters. The only competition they face is on the Internet.

On the Internet, the playing field is level. Troma can compete with Disney if Troma has art or “content” that is interesting or compelling. The mediocre “suits” who control media do not want to get up in the morning and have to think. It’s much easier to have an oligopoly club where they control the marketplace 100%. It’s a club of smugness that promotes cheap-to-make walking feces like the Kardashians or brainless blockbuster movies with non-stop explosions. The “news” we get in The New York Times or on TV is pre-digested baby food. Because of this mainstream disgrace, so many of us go right to the internet for our news, art and commerce.

Net Neutrality is defined as the principle that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) should enable access to all content and applications regardless of the source, and without favoring or blocking particular products or websites, but it’s more than that – it’s our freedom of speech! Free speech--not just giving it, but also free speech in the form of our right to receive diverse news, art, commerce or simply some fat, sweaty teenager blogging about Robin’s nipples in “Batman & Robin.”

The giant devil worshiping international media conglomerates want to create a super highway with expensive prohibitive tolls with faster and better internet for themselves. This will make it impossible for independent artists or innovators because they simply can’t compete. The result will be similar to US television, where the biggest companies own the networks and cable systems etc. and air constant iterations and reruns of their own content. It will become harder to get anything independent into the consciousness of the public. The Internet will become an NBC-ABC-CBS kind of world unless we the people take action.

In 2010, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) created the Open Internet Order which set anti-blocking and anti-discrimination Network Neutrality rules. While the FCC claimed the rules would protect Open Internet, many of us Net Neutrality advocates felt the proposed rules had many loopholes and were made with the purpose of winning support from the telco lobbyists. Of course, we were right. The FCC stated that the rules would make it illegal for ISPs such as Verizon to block services or charge content providers like Netflix for faster Internet highways to their customers. Now, just a few weeks ago-the rules were invalidated by the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia because the FCC chose years ago to classify broadband providers in a manner that exempts them from treatment as common carriers and therefore has no right to regulate them.

If the court ruling stands, then ISPs can hike prices and charge content providers to deliver Internet traffic faster while also eliminating content providers that cannot pay the fees. As consumers, we need to be aware of our standing and that ISPs will now have more control over regulating the content sites we may want to see. If certain sites are faster while others are slow because they can’t pay the tolls, we will get pushed into using only the sites that are quick to load. Those of us who can’t pay the tolls on the super highway will be relegated to the bumpy, slow buffering dirt road. Troma and 1000’s of potential innovators will disappear. I predict Netflix and the like will make sweet-heart deals with the ISP/conglomerate club in order to close the door on competitive future innovators.

We will see the same thing happen with the Internet as we have with the car, telephone, food industry, and with television. People will be kept in the dark and given an illusion of variety, the sharing of information will be controlled by a few big conglomerates and change-the-world innovation like Kickstarter, Anonymous, Bitcoin, Troma and yes, 2 girls 1 cup will all be practically inaccessible. The biggest problem is how these 1st Amendment issues are intentionally being kept from the public. Beware of elected officials and TV talking heads who decry Net Neutrality as “purveyor of piracy and pornography.” This same bogus argument has been used by The Big (White) Boys and the MPAA since the time of VHS. The elite always throw a monkey wrench into new technology to delay it so they can and then take it over. They did it with VHS and they are now trying to do it with the World Wide Web.

We defeated SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) which had nothing to do with stopping piracy. It had to do with stopping competition on the Internet. Congress was surprised at the magnitude of the number of voters who protested against SOPA and who want to preserve an open internet. Many in Congress changed their position on SOPA as a result. We must all make our voices heard and let our elected representatives know that if Net Neutrality and Open Internet go away, they too will go away.

How The Copyright Industry Made Your Computer Less Safe

from the welcome-to-the-world-of-drm dept

I've already written one piece about Cory Doctorow's incredible column at the Guardian concerning digital rights management and anti-circumvention, in which I focused on how the combination of DRM and anti-circumvention laws allows companies to make up their own copyright laws in a way that removes the rights of the public. Those rights are fairly important, and the reason we have them encoded within our copyright laws is to make sure that copyright isn't abused to stifle speech. But, anti-circumvention laws combined with DRM allow the industry to route around that entirely.

But there's a second important point in Doctorow's piece that is equally worth highlighting, and it's that the combination of DRM and anti-circumvention laws make all of our computers less safe. For this to make sense, you need to understand that DRM is really a form of security software.

The entertainment industry calls DRM "security" software, because it makes them secure from their customers. Security is not a matter of abstract absolutes, it requires a context. You can't be "secure," generally -- you can only be secure from some risk. For example, having food makes you secure from hunger, but puts you at risk from obesity-related illness.

DRM is designed on the presumption that users don't want it, and if they could turn it off, they would. You only need DRM to stop users from doing things they're trying to do and want to do. If the thing the DRM restricts is something no one wants to do anyway, you don't need the DRM. You don't need a lock on a door that no one ever wants to open.

DRM assumes that the computer's owner is its adversary.

But, to understand security, you have to recognize that it's an ever-evolving situation. Doctorow quotes Bruce Schneier in pointing out that security is a process, not a product. Another way of thinking about it is that you're only secure until you're not -- and that point is going to come eventually. As Doctorow notes, every security system relies on people probing it and finding and reporting new vulnerabilities. That allows the process of security to keep moving forward. As vulnerabilities are found and understood, new defenses can be built and the security gets better. But anti-circumvention laws make that almost impossible with DRM, meaning that the process of making security better stops -- while the process of breaking it doesn't.

Here is where DRM and your security work at cross-purposes. The DMCA's injunction against publishing weaknesses in DRM means that its vulnerabilities remain unpatched for longer than in comparable systems that are not covered by the DMCA. That means that any system with DRM will on average be more dangerous for its users than one without DRM.

And that leads to very real vulnerabilities. The most famous, of course, is the case of the Sony rootkit. As Doctorow notes, multiple security companies were aware of the nefarious nature of that rootkit, which not only hid itself on your computer and was difficult to delete, but also opened up a massive vulnerability for malware to piggyback on -- something malware writers took advantage of. And yet, the security companies did nothing, because explaining how to remove the rootkit would violate the DMCA.

Given the post-Snowden world we live in today, people are suddenly taking computer security and privacy more seriously than they have in the past -- and that, as Doctorow notes, represents another opportunity to start rethinking the ridiculousness of anti-circumvention laws combined with DRM. Unfortunately, politicians who are way behind on this stuff still don't get it. Recent trade agreements like the TPP and ACTA continue to push anti-circumvention clauses, and require them around the globe, thereby weakening computer security.

This isn't just an issue for the "usual copyright people." This is about actually making sure the computers we use are as secure and safe as they can be. Yet, in a world with anti-circumvention provisions, that's just not possible. It's time to fix that.

Mind Control in the 21st Century - Science Fiction & Beyond

 no "breakaway civ." shit going on HUH ??? more & more &more the dots r becoming  clearer  :) r

05.02.2014//http://english.pravda.ru/science/tech/05-02-2014/126765-mind_control-0/#

By Steven DiBasio

***Part One***

Conspiracy Theory?

"Mind control" is a topic commonly perceived as "conspiracy theory" or "X-Files" fare. That is, it is seen as possibly not "real," and certainly not something about which one should be "overly" concerned. This attitude at least partially arises from the widespread belief or assumption that the human brain is so complicated-("the most complex entity in the universe" is a common formulation)-that it has not, and perhaps cannot, be comprehended in any depth.

One writer, for example, describes the brain as of "perhaps infinite" complexity, while another, David Brooks of the New York Times, writes that it is "probably impossible" that "a map of brain activity" could reveal mental states such as emotions and desires. Similarly, Andrew Sullivan, blogger and former editor of The New Republic, opines that neuroscience is still in its "infancy," and that we have only begun "scratching the surface" of the human brain, and links to a New Yorker piece in support of that position.

And the cover story for the October 2004 issue of Discovery Magazine entitled "The Myth Of Mind Control" advises the reader that while mind control is a "familiar science-fiction" staple, there is little reason for real concern, because actually deciphering the "neural code" would be akin to figuring out other "great scientific mysteries" such as the "origin of the universe and of life on Earth," and is therefore hardly likely. According to the article, as the brain is "the most significant mystery in science" and quite possibly "the hardest to solve," mind control remains at worst a distant concern.

The underlying idea seems to be that sophisticated mind control is unlikely without understanding the brain; and we do not understand the brain.

Understanding the "Neural Code"

Of course, one might question the notion that a full understanding of the "neural code" is a prerequisite for mind control since it is not always necessary to know how something works for it to be effective. Nonetheless, the assumption that the brain is so complex that little progress has been made in "solving" it is itself incorrect.

As neuroscientist Michael Persinger has said, the "great mythology" of the brain is that it is "beyond our understanding; no it's not." In fact, according to inventor and "futurist" Ray Kurzweil, "very detailed mathematical models of several dozen regions of the human brain and how they work...." had already been developed over a decade ago. Kurzweil also said at that time that science is "further along in understanding the principles of operation of the human brain than most people realize...." While the brain may be complicated, "it's not that complicated (emphasis added)."

Similarly, an Air Force report from 1995, in a section entitled "Biological Process Control," predicts that before 2050 "... [w]e will have achieved a clear understanding of how the human brain works, how it really controls the various functions of the body, and how it can be manipulated...:"

One can envision the development of electromagnetic energy sources ... that can couple with the human body in a fashion that will allow one to prevent voluntary muscular movements, control emotions (and thus actions), produce sleep, transmit suggestions, interfere with ... memory, produce an experience set, and delete an experience set.

As disturbing as such "predictions" may be, is it possible that technologies to prevent (or perhaps even impel) muscular movement, control emotions, transmit suggestions, delete memories, create false memories, and so on, have already been developed?

Certainly, even a cursory review of the "open literature" reveals that various sophisticated mind control technologies already exist. Indeed, it is rather shocking to realize how advanced mind control technology was, even several decades ago.

For example, there is the 1974 invention of Robert G. Malech for which a patent was granted in 1976 and assigned to defense contractor Dorne & Margolin, Inc.-for a method of "remotely monitoring and altering brain waves." Moreover, experiments conducted over thirty years ago at the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) showed that basic mind reading from EEG readouts was possible, revealing the existence of "a non-symbolic language" of "brain-wave patterns" which could be deciphered and translated.

Indeed, "...[b]y the late 1960s ... 'remote control' of the human brain-accomplished without the implantation of electrodes-was well on its way to being realized." A means of stimulating a brain "by creating an electrical field completely outside the head" was developed, and it was discovered that electric pulses could stimulate the brain using far less energy than previously "thought ... effectual in the old implanting technique." Not surprisingly, with such developments arose legitimate fears of a future world where "human robots" would perform the bidding of the "military."

And one source quotes a 1970s Pentagon agency report as saying that it will likely be possible in "several years" to induce sounds and words directly into the brain (bypassing the ears), as well as to use "combinations of frequencies and other signal characteristics to produce other neurological effects....," The report notes that the Soviets had observed "various changes in body chemistry" and "functioning" of the brain from the exposure of the brain to various frequencies. Also mentioned are studies at MIT showing that "magnetic brain waves can be picked up ... and amplified as if the brain were a radio transmitter," no implants or electrodes required.

Finally, an article from 1981 describes how "microwave generators" placed in appropriate locations and transmitting at low energy would create "interference patterns" out of the interaction with brainwaves (brain electricity). These interference patterns "could then be built up by computer into a three-dimensional moving picture of mental processes"-in other words, a remote "thought scanner" (and tracking device) could be developed.

Recent "Advances"

In light of these past developments, it is perhaps rather surprising to read modern articles describing supposedly recent innovations in "mind reading" and mind control technology - in which it is sometimes claimed, for example, that scanners, electrodes and proximity to the subject is required to read and "control" minds. Such claims reflect an apparent failure of the science of "mind control" to progress as one might have expected considering the presumed interest, as well as the spectacular rate of advancement of science and technology in general in recent decades.

Of course, it would not be all that surprising if mind control technology has advanced considerably, but that research has been carried out in secret for reasons of "national security." CIA affiliated scientists have certainly conducted much research which they have been prohibited from sharing with their peers, and inventions that implicate "national security" are routinely suppressed under Pentagon secrecy orders. Also, it might seem desirable to hide research programs which sometimes "require" relaxation of ethical standards, such as that of informed consent.

That said, even ignoring the likely existence of a "secret science" of mind control, recent public advancements are quite troubling in their own right.

Some examples:

1. In 2004, 25,000 rat neurons on a glass dish learned to fly an F-22 jet fighter simulator. After scientists placed the neurons on the dish, the neurons quickly began "to reconnect themselves, forming a living neural network-a brain." The lead scientist added that "one day," though of course a "long way off," disembodied brains might actually be used to fly drones, though the current experiment was merely to enhance knowledge of how the brain works, and possibly provide "clues to brain dysfunction."
   
2. In August 2013, researchers revealed that "miniature" human brains had been grown in the laboratory. As is typical, any negative implications or reasons for worry were minimized, while possible "therapeutic" uses were highlighted. Thus, the breakthrough was hailed as a great opportunity to understand "developmental defects." Though the writer does mention "the spectre of what the future might hold," the reader is reassured that the research is "primitive territory"-though one researcher did comment on the "undesirability" of growing larger laboratory brains.
   
3. On July 1, 2013, a magazine reported a claim by neuroscientist Sergio Canavero that it was now feasible to transplant the head of one human to the body of another and reattach the spinal cord.
   
4. Scientists have reconstructed random images viewed by subjects, from fMRI brain scans, in research that "hints" that "one day" scientists might be able to "access dreams, memories and imagery...."
   
5. The brains of two rats have been linked, such that one, located in North Carolina, responded "telepathically" to the thoughts of the other, located in Brazil. The second rat's brain processed signals from the first rat's brain, delivered over the internet, as if they were its own. The scientist speculated about the "future possibility" of a "biological computer, in which numerous brains are connected...."
   
6. A brain-to-brain interface has been created, allowing humans to move a rat's tail just by thinking about it. Readers are told that while it is not yet possible to "communicate brain to brain with our fellow humans ... we may be on our way to ... controlling" other species. But, since it is "still very early days" the writer "hope(s)" that any ethical concerns can be "iron(ed) out." Of note, the study used focused ultrasound to deliver impulses to the rat's brain.
   
7. Continuing the ultrasound "theme": Focused pulses of low intensity low frequency ultrasound, transmitted noninvasively through the skull to the human brain, have been shown capable of producing, not only pain, but also sound, as well as evoking "sensory stimuli." Accordingly, a lab with a "close working relationship" with DARPA, the Department of Defense, and U.S. Intelligence communities, has been looking into using pulsed ultrasound to encode "sensory data onto the cortex"; in other words, producing hallucinations through the remote and direct stimulation of brain circuits. Possibilities are the ability to "remotely control brain activity" and the "creation of artificial memories." Even Sony has gotten in on the act, patenting a device for using ultrasound to produce hallucinations-again described as "transmitting sensory data directly into the human brain." Most troublingly, one source recently alleged that the NSA is using this ultrasound technology to target individuals through their smartphones.
   
8. A researcher was able to make a fellow researcher in a different office move his finger just by thinking about it, in the "first" demonstration of a human brain-to-brain interface.
   
9. A low cost means of tracking people, even through walls, has been developed. While in the past individuals could be tracked anywhere by the "military" using radar technology, this technology might enable entities with fewer resources to track people as well.
   
10. Scientists have remote controlled a worm by implanting magnetic nanoparticles into it, and then exposing the animal to a "radiofrequency magnetic field" which stimulated its neurons. The scientists suggest that their research could lead to "innovative cancer treatments" and "improved diabetes therapies," as well as "new therapies for some neurological disorders which result from insufficient neuro-stimulation."
    
11. Americans can now be spied on in their homes through their internet-connected appliances, according to (former) CIA Director David Petraeus. Petraeus made his statements at about the same time a huge microchip company, ARM, unveiled new processors which will connect home appliances such as refrigerators, washers and driers to the internet.
    
12. LED lights have been ostensibly pushed for their efficiency over traditional bulbs. However, LED lights are also semiconductors capable of inducing "biological and behavior effects."
    

"Breakaway" Science?

While the aforementioned public developments are quite concerning, the reality is they may not actually represent the true state of the art in "mind control" technology. It would not be that surprising, after all, for a domain with national security implications to at some point in its development branch off onto separate "tracks," one public and the other "hidden." If such a bifurcation were to occur, advancements made in secret would not necessarily be incorporated into the public sphere. Eventually perhaps, innovations and breakthroughs would result in the development of an essentially new, covert science.

An example of a domain in which this bifurcation process seems to have occurred is aviation. In the public sphere, the most advanced aircraft might well be the F-22 fighter jet, or perhaps the F-35. However, if insider testimony is credited, these aircraft seem almost primitive in comparison with flying machines developed in secret.

Perhaps the most compelling statements in this regard come from Ben Rich, former Director of Lockheed-Martin's Advanced Development Projects, or "Skunk Works," a Lockheed division notable for its super high-tech, top secret projects, among them the U2 spy plane and the SR-71 Blackbird.

As Joseph P. Farrell reports in his book Saucers, Swastikas, and Psyops, Rich made a number of peculiar and provocative comments at the end of his career, and following his retirement on December 31, 1990 (prior to his death five years later), comments strongly hinting at "the development of ... an off-the-books physics and technology...."

For example, on September 7, 1988, in a presentation to the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics in Atlanta, Georgia, Rich lamented that he was prohibited from discussing Skunkwork's current projects, but he did say that they "call for technologies once only dreamed of by science fiction writers."

In ensuing years, Rich elaborated slightly. For instance, while speaking to the UCLA School of Engineering Alumni Association in 1993, Rich said that "an error in the equations" had been discovered and corrected, making it possible "to travel to the stars." He added, however, that "these technologies are so locked up in black programs, that it would take an act of God to ever get them out to benefit humanity."

Farrell goes on to relay a statement from an unnamed Lockheed retired engineer who was quoted in a magazine article in 1988 as saying that "we have things flying in the Nevada desert that would make George Lucas drool." In the same article an Air Force officer involved in the development of the SR-71 said "[w]e are testing vehicles that defy description. To compare them conceptually to the SR-71 would be like comparing Leonardo da Vinci's parachute design to the space shuttle." And a retired Colonel chimed in: "We have things that are so far beyond the comprehension of the average aviation authority as to be really alien to our way of thinking."

Consider then for a moment the possibility that within the classified world, in 1993, a technology, to quote Ben Rich, "to take ET back home" had already been developed. The implications are enormous, not to mention rather frightening. One wonders where the technology must be in 2014, more than twenty years later.

And if the aforementioned statements are true, and this seems plausible (why would these individuals lie, or even exaggerate, especially to Engineering Associations and Aeronautics institutes), what might this imply about the current state of the art in domains other than aviation, such as neuroscience, which has itself been the subject of intense "weaponization" efforts.

Indeed, what does such a vast discrepancy between what people believe and what is actually true suggest about the nature of our perceived reality in general?

Steven DiBasio

The author can be contacted at steven.dibasio@gmail.com

Дмитрий Судаков

AN INTERESTING GALLOP POLL: US GOVERNMENT BIGGEST THREAT

Posted on February 6, 2014 by Joseph P. Farrell • Filed Under: Other •http://gizadeathstar.com/2014/02/interesting-gallop-poll-us-government-biggest-threat/

For those in the international readership here, pardon me while I rant, or better put, vent once again about Amairicunn politics.
As most of you know I don’t like talking about Amairicunn politics, at least, not if it means I have to talk about the Nancy “let’s-vote-on-it-in-the-middle-of-the-night-in-closed-session-to-find-out-what’s-in-it”-Pelosi-corporate socialists in the Dummycrook Party, or the George H.W. “let’s-call-it-’substantial-equivalence’-so-if-it-looks-like-corn-and-tastes-like-corn-it’s-corn-but-we-can-still-patent-it-and-don’t-have-to-do-much-scientific-testing-of-it” Bush-crooks-and-crony-corporate-socialist-crapitalists in the Republithug Party on the other.  I think I’m fairly justified in having such harsh estimations of the twin horrors of Democrats and Republicans, because I used to be the latter, and was raised by two members of the former (well, they were anyway, at least until LBJ cured them of their acute Dummycrookery, just as the Thistle family cured me of chronic Republithuggery. Nor is my mention of LBJ or the Thistle family accidental, for both epitomize the corruption of the American system, and did much to further and systematize it). 
Frankly, I am fed up with the ideologues of both parties. The Dummycrook party is socialist in spite of the reassuring words of its policy wonks and spokesmen, and are, and have always been, the party for Big Government’s ability to interfere with every aspect of life via regulation, “social programs” and a federal code that no human being can possibly ever know, and to do so with a nauseatingly hypocritical appeal to “compassion” and being “the party of the people” Yea. Right. That’s why you have so many millionaires and billionaires like George Soros and Warren Buffet supporting you. Hope and change. Trust me, you are as transparent as you claim to be, but not in quite the way I think you meant. I get it.
And the Republithugs?
The Republithugs are and have always been, in spite of their reassuring words, the party of unfettered corporate power(they call it “the free market” and “capitalism”, when it little resembles the former and their mercantilist version of the latter would make a Rothschild blush with embarrassment and moral indignation), an example of which we may see in the whole GMO fiasco, and the principle of “substantial equivalence.”  And similarly, I am fed up with “free market ideologues” too. If the laissez fare quasi-Randian attitude coming out of certain circles of the Republithug party had their way, we’d still have that form of slavery known as child labor, and Mr. Ford could have made his Model Ts using children on the assembly lines. And that’s no joke either, folks… there’s a reason major corporations are and for “free markets,” where they can export their manufacturing plants overseas and exploit “cheap labor”… but you get the picture I suspect.
And that’s my point; the extremists in both parties have taken over in the name of their favored dogmas of economics, from Keynesianism to the “Austrian school,” and that is why their stock is at an all time low. Thus, to the Chris Matthewses and Sean Hannities and Lanny Davises and Juan Williamses and Rush Limbaughs and Oprah Winfreys and Barbara Walterses: you’re talking to a dwindling audience and increasingly defending the indefensible records of your parties…
In fact, according to a recent Gallup Poll taken last December, the confidence in the institutions of government is not only low, it is breathtakingly low, indeed, almost alarmingly so, for almost 72% say that the government is the biggest threat. That’s almost three fourths of the voting population folks. That’s enormously significant:
Record High in U.S. Say Big Government Greatest Threat
This comes at a time that political identification among Americans who label themselves as “independent” is at another high as well. In other words, the Republithug party is not gaining any windfalls from a position that would normally have been associated with “conservatism.” It’s not that American independents, Republicans, or middle-of-the-road Democrats have really changed their views. It’s rather that the party machineries of both political parties have proven, time and again, that their rhetoric and promises are simply no longer trusted.
None of this, of course, appears to have registered with the party hacks and powers that be, as Billary Clinton appears ready to make a run for a first/third term, and it has been reported that feelers have already been made by a certain member of the Thistle family to have his own go, so, it’s business as usual for Dummycrooks and Republithugs.
Just how deep seated the cynicism runs, however, may be gauged by the recent retirement of well-known Republican pollster Frank Luntz, who after the last (s)election cycle, entered a state of reassessment of his own approach to polling and politics. Seen and heard often on various American television and radio talk shows, Mr. Luntz – whom this author was actually acquainted with at the University of Oxford – came to the conclusion that in spite of being good at what he did in his focus groups, and in the way he understood the political uses of language, he just was not good enough.
But I suggest Mr. Luntz not be too hard on himself, and I suggest the Gallup numbers show why, for even though it is clear that most of these numbers are driven by Republithugs and Independents, the fact that 56% of Dummycrooks are thinking the same thing – in the party of FDR, Truman, LBJ, George McGovern and Obama Health Insurance Company Care – is to my mind highly significant. It is those numbers, more than the Republithug or Independent showing, that indicates that something profound is happening in the population and electorate. So Mr. Luntz should not be too hard on himself: America is in a deep state of crisis, but this is not the usual crisis being manufactured for the moment and by political means. It is a cultural and spiritual problem; nothing has changed, really, politically. What has changed is rather the perception of the system  and the two monopoly political parties themselves, parties that basically are organized conspiracies or shills for various corporate interests. The system and its inherent corruptions, which became endemic during and after World War Two for a variety of reasons (most having to do with the national security state) are now manifest. No amount of rhetoric or terminological adjustment can successfully address this growing perception, because the perception isn’t just about Halliburton, or Dick Cheney, or neo-con 9/11 truthers, or Clinton era Whitewater and Mena scandals, or BCCI or Iran-Contra or Bobby Baker or George Soros or Goldman Sachs or the Federal Reserve Act, or about a runaway derivatives market or mortgage fraud or robo-signing of mortgages in big “too big to fail too corrupt to jail” banks or banksters, or about too many military bases or too many wars and interventions, it isn’t about the influence of lobbyists or political action committees or radical leftists like Saul Alinsky or radical rightists like David Duke, or Dr. Emmanuel or the conservative Heritage Foundation Think tank plan for “health” care and its suspicious resemblance to Obama Health Insurance Company Care,  or the use of the IRS or FBI “Cointellpro” to target Tea Partiers or Martin Luther King, or about gun running to Mexican drug lords and “immigration reform” or bringing drugs back in body bags from Vietnam or Watergate or  money still flowing into CREEP(the Committee to RE-Elect the President) long after Nixon was re-elected for a second term or GATT or NAFTA or goofery Club of Rome or Bilderberg globalists and their secret meetings, or the security cameras on every stoplight in every city, or out of control police tasering the homeless and shooting mentally ill teenagers in front of their parents, or the Council of Ten…er… pardon me, the National Security Council claiming to have the power to round up and hold without warrant or any due process an American citizen whom the Star Chamb… er… the Council of Te… er… the National Security Council deems secretly to be a threat to oligarchical…er… national security…
… it’s about all of it.
And that’s a good thing.
It’s a good thing because it means people are waking up as never before. And in the long term, it’s not going to go away or be mollified by increasingly transparent and meaningless rhetoric of “transparency” or “hope and change” or “a thousand points of light” or even Contracts on America and pledges to “reduce the size of government” on the basis of “conservative principles,” pledges that never materialize. It’s not going go away through focus groups or adjustments of terminology. The cynicism is substantive.   It’s a good thing, because it means people are recovering that most essential human component for informed action, be that action spiritual, cultural, or political(and political action always depends on the first two, and not vice versa). That most essential component is memory. I am bold to suggest that what the Gallup poll shows is that voters in both political parties and in the “independent center” are waking up, and holding the parties and their candidates responsible for their records.
Don’t get me wrong. Most of the people polled in the Gallup poll will trudge off to the (“rig-able”) computer ballot boxes and cast their votes in classical American style for “the lesser of two evils.” (Now stop and think about that for a moment in the light of the track record of both parties, one party which demonizes individual rights and responsibilities [and God help you if you acquire some wealth or stand up for the second amendment!], and the other party which demonizes you for being poor, or needing food stamps, or being homeless or unemployed, the same party which has helped lead the charge – remember George Guilder? – to ship those jobs overseas in the name of free markets.).
I suggest that this Gallup Poll means something else: the first organized opposition that can stake a claim to represent that growing spike represented by the Gallup pool, and that can state that claim in clear, consistent principled fashion, and that will push and act on those principles politically as a part of long term discipline will be the death knell for one or the other of the two parties.  In the meantime, the two political parties that form the American political cartel are increasingly caught in a money-public relations spiral of their own making, having to spend increasing amounts of money on ever more elaborate advertising schemes to convince an increasingly cynical and rightly mistrustful electorate that their party, and its candidates, offer a real choice and opportunity for change, a perception that is increasingly difficult to elaborate and sustain, for the long record of both says otherwise.  If the trend continues, sooner or later the day will come that they’ll hold an “election,” and no one will turn out to vote for one of two choices that the corrupt system presents to them, and the system will stand exposed for what it really is: nothing but an oligarchy and plutocracy wrapped in the outward formalities of a republic.
Once again, I vote “no confidence” to both houses and to all their candidates, at all levels of government, local, state, and federal. Is that guilt by association? You betcha! And I’ll bet that the real meaning of the Gallup poll is that perhaps a growing number of people are seeing and thinking the same or similar things. In this, I suspect the Gallup poll, like all polls, is misreading the signals. To put it simply: the two political parties are different in form but consubstantial in essence, and hence, rhetoric alone divides them(in that respect, consider the last charade of a presidential (s)election where, in a nation debating Obamacare, the choice was between two candidates whose views on that issue were substantially the same, leaving only rhetoric to divide them.) They are both subservient to oligarchical interests. The first organization that can articulate the substance of that political center, wins the long term political power in this country.

Could we harvest energy from a star?

Could we harvest energy from a star?

February 4th, 2014 in Astronomy & Space / Space Exploration  // http://phys.org/news/2014-02-harvest-energy-star.html

Dyson Sphere. Credit: Eburacum45

Dyson Sphere. Credit: Eburacum45

Our civilization will need more power in the future. Count on it. The ways we use power today: for lighting, transportation, food distribution and even entertainment would have sounded hilarious and far fetched to our ancestors.
As our technology improves, our demand for power will increase. I have no idea what we'll use it for, but I guarantee we'll want it. Perhaps we'll clean up the oceans, reverse global warming, turn iron into gold, or any number of activities that take massive amounts of energy. Fossil fuels won't deliver, and they come with some undesirable side effects. Nuclear fuels will only provide so much power until they run out.
We need the ultimate in energy resources. We'll want to harness the entire power of our star. The Soviet astronomer Nikolai Kardashev predicted that a future civilization might eventually harness the power of an entire planet. He called this a Type I civilization. A Type II would harness the entire energy output of a star. And a Type III civilization would utilize the power of their entire galaxy. So let's consider a Type II civilization.
What would it actually take to harness 100% of the energy from a star? We'd need to construct a Dyson Sphere or Cloud and collect all the solar energy that emanates from it. But could we do better? Could we extract material directly from a star?
You bet, it's the future!

This is an idea known as "stellar lifting". Stealing hydrogen fuel from the Sun and using it for our futuristic energy needs. In fact, the Sun's already doing it… poorly. Stars generate powerful magnetic fields. They twist and turn across the surface of the star, and eject hydrogen into space. But it's just a trickle of material. To truly harness the power of the Sun, we need to get at that store of hydrogen, and speed up the extraction process.
There are a few techniques that might work. You can use lasers to heat up portions of the surface, and increase the volume of the solar wind. You could use powerful magnetic fields to carry plasma away from the Sun's poles into space.Which ever way it happens, once we've got all that hydrogen. How do we use it to get energy? We could combine it with oxygen and release energy via combustion, or we could use it in our space reactors and generate power from fusion.
But the most efficient way is to feed it to a black hole and extract its angular momentum. A highly advanced civilization could siphon material directly from a star and send it onto the ergosphere of a rapidly spinning pet black hole.

Plasma on the surface of the Sun. Credit: Hinode

Here's Dr. Mark Morris, a Professor of Astronomy at UCLA. He'll explain:
"There is this region, called the ergosphere between the event horizon and another boundary, outside. The ergosphere is a very interesting region outside the event horizon in which a variety of interesting effects can occur. For example, if we had a black hole at our disposal, we could extract energy from spinning black holes by throwing things into the ergosphere and grabbing whatever comes out at even higher speeds."
This is known as the Penrose process, first identified by Roger Penrose in 1969. It's theoretically possible to retrieve 29% of the energy in a rotating black hole. Unfortunately, you also slow it down. Eventually the black hole stops spinning, and you can't get any more energy out of it. But then it might also be possible to extract energy from Hawking radiation; the slow evaporation of black holes over eons. Of course, it's tricky business.

Artist’s impression of a Star feeding a black hole. Credit: ESO/L. Calçada

Dr. Morris continues, "There's no inherent limitation except for the various problems working in the vicinity of a massive black hole. One can't be anywhere near a black hole that's actively accreting matter because the high flux of energetic particles and gamma rays. So it's a hostile environment near most realistic black holes, so let me just say that it won't be any time soon as far as our civilization is concerned. But maybe Type III civilizations so far beyond us that it exceeds our imagination won't have any problem."
A Type 3 civilization would be so advanced, with such a demand for energy, they could be extracting the material from all the stars in the galaxy and feeding it directly to black holes to harvest energy. Feeding black holes to other black holes to spin them back up again.
It's an incomprehensible feat of galactic engineering. And yet, it's one potential outcome of our voracious demand for energy.
Source: Universe Today
"Could we harvest energy from a star?." February 4th, 2014. http://phys.org/news/2014-02-harvest-energy-star.html

23 Lies and Reasons Obama Should Be Impeached (Video)

is there any~thin dumber than an dummycock or republipube ? you's fucks just keep "falling" 4 the same old shit ...what now 4 about 125 yrs ?  ...isn't it "time" you's put yer fucking hands down ....your embar~assing U.S.  :0 my name is cockhead & i en~dores  this msg  ?  ah um p.s. any $'s u's send me  .....um gonna piss it away :o  hookers (if my wife lets me ;(  ) maybe the "ponies", slots, lot tics, maybe an online "chat" session Lol  wit a nice gal  ?  or maybe some "organic"   ???  LMMFAO (laughing my motherfucking ass off ) yea know fer the pain/sight prob's  ....maybe "buy" a scrip ??? fer it  ... just "know" um work~in fer ya  :o  4 the kids .. oh ah um yea & an "vacation"

Thursday, February 6, 2014

23 Lies and Reasons Obama Should Be Impeached

(Before It's News)

Here is a list of promises made that never came true:
#1 “If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor. Period. If you like your health care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan. Period. No one will take it away. No matter what.”
#2 “My administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in government.”
#3 “We agree on reforms that will finally reduce the costs of health care. Families will save on their premiums…”
#4 “I don’t want to pit Red America against Blue America. I want to be the president of the United States of America.”
#5 “We’ve got shovel-ready projects all across the country that governors and mayors are pleading to fund. And the minute we can get those investments to the state level, jobs are going to be created.”
#6 “And we will pursue the housing plan I’m outlining today. And through this plan, we will help between 7 and 9 million families restructure or refinance their mortgages so they can afford—avoid foreclosure.”
#7 “I will sign a universal health-care bill into law by the end of my first term as president that will cover every American and cut the cost of a typical family’s premium by up to $2,500 a year.”
#8 “We reject the use of national security letters to spy on citizens who are not suspected of a crime.”
#9 “For people with insurance, the only impact of the health-care law is that their insurance is stronger, better, and more secure than it was before. Full stop. That’s it. They don’t have to worry about anything else.”
#10 “We will close the detention camp in Guantanamo Bay, the location of so many of the worst constitutional abuses in recent years.”
#11 “Allow Americans to buy their medicines from other developed countries if the drugs are safe and prices are lower outside the U.S.”
#12 “We will revisit the Patriot Act and overturn unconstitutional executive decisions issued during the past eight years.”
#13 “Will ensure that federal contracts over $25,000 are competitively bid.”
#14 “We reject sweeping claims of ‘inherent’ presidential power.”
#15 “Will eliminate all income taxation of seniors making less than $50,000 per year. This will eliminate taxes for 7 million seniors — saving them an average of $1,400 a year– and will also mean that 27 million seniors will not need to file an income tax return at all.”
#16 “We support constitutional protections and judicial oversight on any surveillance program involving Americans.”
#17 “If we have not gotten our troops out by the time I am president, it is the first thing I will do. I will get our troops home, we will end this war. You can take that to the bank.”
#18 “Will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.”
#19 “The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation.”
#20 “We have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division and conflict and cynicism…. That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, ‘Not this time….’”
#21 “We’ve got to spend some money now to pull us out of this recession. But as soon as we’re out of this recession, we’ve got to get serious about starting to live within our means, instead of leaving debt for our children and our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren.”
#22 “[T]oday I’m pledging to cut the deficit we inherited in half by the end of my first term in office. This will not be easy. It will require us to make difficult decisions and face challenges we’ve long neglected. But I refuse to leave our children with a debt that they cannot repay — and that means taking responsibility right now, in this administration, for getting our spending under control.”
#23 “I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear that I will execute the office of president of the United States faithfully, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the constitution of the United States.
To put things in perspective every President has a list.  Every President is a liar.  Obama is no different than his predecessors and certainly not the worst.  I can think of a few more guys worse than Obama (Wilson, FDR,Lincoln, Buchanan, etc.)  Those guys either violated the constitution, committed human rights abuses, just plain sucked or all three combined, worse than Obama in my opinion.

In 19 minutes, a team of snipers destroyed 17 transformers at a power station in California

February 5, 2014 

SHARE : http://intellihub.com/in-19-minutes-a-team-of-snipers-destroyed-17-transformers-at-a-power-station-in-california/

When a real terrorist attack happens, sometimes we don’t hear about it until months afterward (if we ever hear about it at all).  For example, did you know that a team of snipers shot up a power station in California?

Michael Snyder | The Truth

The terrorists destroyed 17 transformers and did so much damage that the power station was shut down for a month.  And it only took them 19 minutes of shooting to do it.
Of course most Americans have absolutely no idea that this ever happened, because they get their news from the mainstream media.  The chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission at that time says that this was “the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred”, and yet you won’t hear about it on the big news networks.  They are too busy covering the latest breaking news on the Justin Bieber scandal.
And maybe it is good thing that most people don’t know about this.  The truth is that we are a nation that is absolutely teeming with “soft targets”, and if people realized how vulnerable we truly are they might start freaking out.
If you have not heard about the attack on the Silicon Valley substation yet, you should look into it.  The following is an excerpt from a Business Insider articleabout the sniper assault…

The Wall Street Journal’s Rebecca Smith reports that a former Federal Energy Regulatory Commission chairman is acknowledging for the first time that a group of snipers shot up a Silicon Valley substation for 19 minutes last year, knocking out 17 transformers before slipping away into the night.
The attack was “the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred” in the U.S., Jon Wellinghoff, who was chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission at the time, told Smith.

Evidence found at the scene included “more than 100 fingerprint-free shell casings“, and little piles of rocks “that appeared to have been left by an advance scout to tell the attackers where to get the best shots.”
So much damage was done to the substation that it was closed down for a month.
And what happens if they decide to attack a nuclear power facility next time and use even bigger weapons?
Could we have another Fukushima on our hands?
In a previous article, I discussed a very disturbing report that showed that our nuclear facilities are indeed extremely vulnerable…

Commercial and research nuclear facilities across the U.S. areinadequately protected against the threat of terrorism, according to the results of new study released this week by the Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Project (NPPP) at the University of Texas at Austin’s LBJ School of Public Affairs. The two biggest terror threats facing these facilities, according to the report, are the theft of bomb grade nuclear materials andsabotage attacks aimed at causing a nuclear reactor meltdown.
The study, entitled “Protecting U.S. Nuclear Facilities from Terrorist Attack: Re-assessing the Current ‘Design Basis Threat’ Approach,” found not one of the 104 commercial nuclear reactors in the U.S. is protected against a “maximum credible terrorist attack,” such as 9/11. In fact, nuclear facilities are not required to protect themselves against airplane attacks, assaults by large teams of terrorists or even high-power sniper rifles.

The truth is that we are far, far more vulnerable to terror attacks than most Americans would dare to imagine.
So why isn’t the federal government doing more to protect us?
Well, the reality is that their resources are already stretched pretty thin and they can’t even protect their own computers.  According to another report that was recently released, breaches of government computer networks go undetected 40 percent of the time…

A new report by Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) detailswidespread cybersecurity breaches in the federal government, despite billions in spending to secure the nation’s most sensitive information.
The report, released on Tuesday, found that approximately 40 percent of breaches go undetected, and highlighted “serious vulnerabilities in the government’s efforts to protect its own civilian computers and networks.”
“In the past few years, we have seen significant breaches in cybersecurity which could affect critical U.S. infrastructure,” the report said. “Data on the nation’s weakest dams, including those which could kill Americans if they failed, were stolen by a malicious intruder. Nuclear plants’ confidential cybersecurity plans have been left unprotected. Blueprints for the technology undergirding the New York Stock Exchange were exposed to hackers.”

Are you starting to get the picture?
We are not nearly as “secure” as we like to think that we are.
In recent months, we have seen that our private financial information is not even secure at the largest retailers in the entire country.  By now you have probably already heard about the horrifying security breach that happened at Target during the holiday season…

The holiday shopping season breach affected up to 110 million customers, including 40 million credit and debit cards and up to 70 million customers’ personal information.
The discount retailer discovered the breach in mid-December, notified customers several days later, and launched an investigation with the help of a private security firm and law enforcement.

And experts tell us that because credit card companies are cutting corners by using outdated technology that is less expensive that these kinds of credit card hacks will continue to happen all over the country.
So what are you going to do when you wake up some day and none of your credit cards or debit cards will work because the entire system has been compromised by hackers?
What are you going to do when you wake up some day and you have no power for an extended period of time because a team of terrorists has destroyed the entire power grid in your area?
What are you going to do when you wake up some day and a wave of nuclear radiation is heading your way because terrorists have attacked a nuclear power facility close to where you live?
We are an extremely vulnerable nation that literally has thousands of big, fat juicy “soft targets” that could be attacked at any moment.
We have been very fortunate to live during an era when we have generally been safe from such attacks, but the world is rapidly changing before our very eyes.
So let us hope for the best, but let us also prepare for the worst.

THIS ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED AT The Truth

Spy Agency Engaged In Internet “False Flag” Attacks

By Washington's Blog

Global Research, February 06, 2014

Washington's Blog

Region: USA

Theme: Intelligence, Police State & Civil Rights

Spy Agency “Masqueraded As An Enemy In A ‘False Flag’ Operation”

We’ve warned since 2009 (and see this) that the government could be launching cyber “false flag attacks” in order to justify a crackdown on the Internet and discredit web activists.
A new report from NBC News – based on documents leaked by Edward Snowden – appear to confirm our fears, documenting that Britain’s GCHQ spy agency has carried out cyber false flag attacks:

In another document taken from the NSA by Snowden and obtained by NBC News, a JTRIG official said the unit’s mission included computer network attacks, disruption, “Active Covert Internet Operations,” and “Covert Technical Operations.” Among the methods listed in the document were jamming phones, computers and email accounts and masquerading as an enemy in a “false flag” operation. The same document said GCHQ was increasing its emphasis on using cyber tools to attack adversaries.

Postscript:  We await further revelations of “false flag” attacks by spy agencies.

The Global Elite is Insane

no shit ! & hows that work~in fer us ,folks ? but if u think these fucks (elites) r go "peacefully" ...there is no "easy" way 2 clean out ass pipes ;O

06.02.2014 //http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/06-02-2014/126767-global_elite-0/#

By Robert J. Burrowes

In a recent report titled 'Working for the Few: Political capture and economic inequality' Oxfam informs us that 'Almost half of the world's wealth is now owned by just one percent of the population'. Their report goes on to recommend that the World Economic Forum http://www.weforum.org/, an elite gathering held annually in Davos, Switzerland, take economic and political measures to ensure a more equitable distribution of wealth.

And in his explanation of why he attended the recent Forum in Davos, Kumi Naidoo, the Executive Director of Greenpeace International tells us 'If we manage to shift the consciousness of one CEO or senior political leader, who may do the same with a couple of his peers, then I think it is worth it. It is also worth being there, listening and observing, understanding some of the forces that shape our world and importantly feeding that information back to the rest of Greenpeace and other civil society allies.'

As anyone who pays even the slightest realistic attention to the global elite already knows, the elite's efforts to maximise its political and economic clout, and hence its wealth, at the expense of everyone else and the Earth itself, are carefully crafted. And this is not going to change on our recommendation or because we talk to them, or even because we listen to them. Moreover, the reason is simple.

The global elite is insane. And it is incredibly violent.

I would like to illustrate this insanity and violence briefly, explain what I mean by 'insane' and then outline a strategy to resist it.

In a video statement in 2012, the world's richest woman, Gina Rinehart, called for Australian workers to be paid $A2 per day - see here  and here - in a national economy where the current legal minimum wage is $A124 per day for a full-time adult worker. But Rinehart is not alone in advocating or, indeed, implementing such policies. Slave 'wages' are a common occurrence all over the world as most factory workers, particularly those employed by the world's largest corporations in Africa, Asia and Central/South America, can readily testify.

We also know that 50,000 people (85% of them children) die in Africa, Asia and Central/South America each and every day essentially because they do not have enough to eat: http://starvation.net/ This is a death rate that results in a cumulative death total that dwarfs both the death rate and the total number of deaths in all war throughout human history. Incredibly, even the number of deaths on 6 and 9 August 1945, when nuclear weapons were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, resulted in less than 50,000 individual deaths for each of these two days (and each of those subsequent). Apart from this, we know that about one billion people around the world go to bed in a semi-starved condition each night. Moreover, we know that the global elite takes deliberate measures to maintain and exacerbate this cruel state of affairs by planning and working to implement such atrociously unjust economic arrangements as those outlined in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Free Trade Agreement (TAFTA) on top of the already highly damaging economic structures and relationships of capitalism.

How do you feel when you read these facts? If you are like me, you are horrified at the thought that you might starve yourself, you empathise deeply with those who suffer this fate and you make some effort to ameliorate it or change it (ranging from giving a donation, preferably to an organisation with more political savvy than Oxfam and Greenpeace, to campaigning to resist implementation of the TPP and TAFTA). You do this because you feel empathy, sympathy and compassion. You do this because you perceive the injustice and you want to take some action, at least, to change it. You identify with your fellow human beings who are suffering.

Insanity is widely understood to refer to a state of mind that prevents normal perception, behaviour or social interaction; it describes someone who is considered to be seriously mentally ill.

Do you believe that individual members of the global elite share your perception (which is shaped by your empathy, sympathy and compassion)? Who is normal: you or them? Are individual members of the global elite behaving and interacting as you would? Do they share your conception of what a desirable human community - with its basis in such values as love, solidarity, equity, justice and sustainability - might look like?

It is clear to me that, as a result of the violence they each suffered as a child, we can readily conclude that each individual within the global elite falls within the definition of 'insane': someone who is incapable of 'normal perception, behaviour and social interaction', someone who is incapable of love, compassion, empathy and sympathy. And this is why they do not join efforts to restructure the global economy to ensure distributive justice for all and disburse their personal wealth to those most in need as a measure of their commitment to the creation of a humane world based on equity, justice and sustainability.

So how did this insanity occur? In essence, these individuals suffered an extraordinary level of terror and violence during childhood leaving them particularly badly emotionally damaged. See 'Why Violence?' http://tinyurl.com/whyviolence Specifically, for example, two central psychological characteristics of these individuals are that they are terrified and self-hating but, because they unconsciously suppress their awareness of this terror and self-hatred (because it is too painful to feel), they project it as fear of and hatred for 'legitimised' victim groups, including working people and 'poor' people in Africa, Asia and Central/South America. Because of the violence they suffered as children, these individuals never developed a conscience, they never developed the capacity to love, and they never developed the emotional responses of compassion, empathy and sympathy. And this is why they do not care.

It takes persistent violence inflicted throughout childhood to destroy an individual's innate capacity to develop love, compassion, empathy and sympathy. Tragically, any member of the global elite, as well as any of their paid agents in the professional class (the political lackeys who generate the delinquent legislative frameworks that facilitate the exploitation of ordinary people, the business executives who undertake the daily management of this exploitation, the academics who justify it, the judges and lawyers who defend it and repress its opponents, and the media personnel who obscure the truth about it), has suffered this degree of violence, or very close to it, throughout their childhood.

And this is why these individuals are incapable of understanding that hoarded money and resources cannot provide them with security, particularly in the world that is coming. They are incapable of understanding that true security is the result of cooperative human relationships and a cooperative relationship between humans and the natural world.

Resisting Elite Violence Strategically

So how do we strategically resist the insanity and violence of the global elite? How do we replace elite-controlled structures with ones that meet the needs of all human beings as well as the planet and other species? And how do we do all of this within a timeframe in which the Earth's ecological limits are not fundamentally breached?

To do all of these things, we need an integrated strategy that tackles the fundamental cause of violence while tackling all of its symptoms simultaneously. This strategy has four primary elements.

First, and most importantly, we must review our child-raising practices to exclude all types of violence (including those I have labelled 'invisible' and 'utterly invisible') so that we no longer create insane individuals and perpetrators of violence. See 'Why Violence?' http://tinyurl.com/whyviolence and 'Fearless Psychology and Fearful Psychology: Principles and Practice'  Let us create people of conscience, people of courage, people who care.

Second, we must noncooperate, in a strategic manner, with elite-controlled structures and processes while simultaneously creating alternative, local structures that allow us to self-reliantly meet our own needs in an ecologically sustainable manner. Anita McKone and I have mapped out a fifteen-year strategy for doing this in 'The Flame Tree Project to Save Life on Earth' http://tinyurl.com/flametree

Third, we must keep planning and implementing sophisticated campaigns of nonviolent resistance to prevent/halt wars, end economic exploitation and save threatened ecosystems, as well as strategies of nonviolent defense to liberate Palestinians, Tibetans and other oppressed populations in those circumstances in which elite violence must be directly confronted (see Robert J. Burrowes The Strategy of Nonviolent Defense: A Gandhian Approach, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996 and Gene Sharp The Politics of Nonviolent Action, Boston: Porter Sargent, 1973).

And fourth, we must courageously pay the price of violent elite repression when we resist nonviolently, knowing that many of us are going to be imprisoned (sometimes as 'psychiatric' patients), some of us will be tortured and a great many of us will be killed.

In summary, if we are to effectively resist the elite's violence in our lives and take concrete steps to create our nonviolent world community, then we must recognise that individual members of the global elite are insane and cannot take responsibility for ending their violence. Instead, we must take responsibility for ending their violence while creating a world in which damaged individuals are unlikely to be created and, if they are created, they cannot wreak havoc on the rest of us.

If you would like to consider publicly committing yourself to helping to make this nonviolent world a reality, you can read (and, if you wish, sign online) 'The People's Charter to Create a Nonviolent World'

Robert J. Burrowes  

Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and
ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an
effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a
nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of 'Why Violence?'
http://tinyurl.com/whyviolence His email address is flametree@riseup.net
and his website is at http://robertjburrowes.wordpress.com

Дмитрий Судаков