One of the peripheral benefits from the Scooter Libby trial (apart from the pleasure of watching the Bush Administration lies exposed) is the release of documents that provide concrete evidence of the events that produced Nigergate (or, if you prefer, Plamegate). Scooter may be claiming a foggy memory but if you read and compare the new documents with previous material, such as the Senate Intelligence Committee Report on Iraq released in the summer of 2004, the fog will lift and you'll glean so... (more)
Twice as many Islamist terror plots have been disrupted since the July 7 suicide bombings as has previously been made public, Britain's security services insist.
A further six plots, which have been kept secret until now for security reasons, had been planned by groups across Britain since the London Underground and bus bombings in 2005.
Whitehall sources refused to provide precise details on security grounds.
The revelation demonstrates the scale of ... (more)
Police want to use search arches - similar to metal detectors used at airports - to catch people carrying knives into Oxfordshire secondary schools.
They have said the arches, introduced into the force last November, will also be set up at entrances to shopping centres and Oxford's bus and railway stations.
But details of when and where they will be used will not be publicised, so the measures retain a surprise element.
... (more)
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has recently adopted a new system for Internet users requiring individuals to use their true identity when registering on-line. The new system was designed to allow increased CCP surveillance of Internet use in China.
A Chinese blog named "United Blog Community" was formally initiated on January 29 in Beijing. According to the CCP's official media outlet, Xinhua News Agency, "United Blog Community" does not ... (more)
In an effort to tackle the ticket touts, the Glastonbury Festival has introduced a registration process that involves photographic identification. More than 100,000 people signed up on the first day of the festival's registration system. With numbers like that, it is clear that festival goers don’t have an issue with big brother type regulation as long as it is for the greater good. If such a free-spirited, free-living demographic is willing to embrace such a system... (more)
A Penn Law School student who allegedly fired his weapon at the door of two neighbors he suspected of terrorism was suspended yesterday from the law school.
His lawyer, Peter Bowers, said the attack on the men he believed were terrorists - actually two roommates studying bio-engineering at Drexel University - "appears to have been a mental health or emotional issue."
Authorities "need to do appropriate mental health evaluations," Bowers said.
Olbermann compares Bush's 2002 comments in the build up to the war in Iraq to those in 2007 in the midst of heightening tension with Iran. The rhetoric is almost identical... (more)
Jan. 31 (Bloomberg) -- In 1969, a year after he was elected U.S. president, Richard Nixon renounced the ``use of any form of deadly biological weapons that either kill or incapacitate.''
Nixon's declaration is one of the few cheerful spots in ``The Living Weapon,'' a PBS program that airs Feb. 5 at 9 p.m. New York time.
The U.S. got into the germ-warfare business in 1942 at the request of Britain, which feared that Adolf Hitler was cooking up world-class pes... (more)
The United States is planning what will be a catastrophic attack on Iran. For the Bush cabal, the attack will be a way of "buying time" for its disaster in Iraq. In announcing what he called a "surge" of American troops in Iraq, George W Bush identified Iran as his real target. "We will interrupt the flow of support [to the insurgency in Iraq] from Iran and Syria," he said. "And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry... (more)
Tacoma, WA- In an unprecedented two-day Citizens’ Hearing held over the weekend, more than 600 citizens joined a distinguished tribunal panel in listening to testimony about the legality of the US invasion of Iraq. The Hearing was convened to present evidence that Lt. Ehren Watada would have presented in his February 5 court martial on the question that the military ruled barred from entry last week — the question of the Iraq War’s legality. Lt. Watada has repeatedly asserted t... (more)
"According to Chanan Suarez-Diaz, who also received a Purple Heart for his service in Iraq, the psyched up emotions among the troops resulted in US soldiers taking "trophies" of brain matter from Iraqis they killed and putting such in their refrigerators on base."
People who question the official history of recent conflicts in Africa and the Balkans could be jailed for up to three years for "genocide denial", under proposed EU legislation. Germany, current holder of the EU's rotating presidency, will table new legislation to outlaw "racism and xenophobia" this spring.
Included in the draft EU directive are plans to outlaw Holocaust denial, creating an offence that does not exist in British law. But the proposals, seen by ... (more)
“More than 10 blinking electronic devices planted at bridges and other spots in Boston threw a scare into the city Wednesday in what turned out to be a publicity campaign for a late-night cable cartoon. Most if not all of the devices depict a character giving the finger,” reports the Associated Press. “Highways, bridges and a section of the Charles River were shut down and bomb squads were sent in before... (more)
The New York Times reported today that the Pentagon has altered how nonfatal casualties are tallied on its website, thus resulting in lower casualty totals.
According to Dr. Michael Kilpatrick, deputy director of force health protection and readiness at the Defense Department, "the previous method of tallying casualties was misleading and might have made injuries and combat wounds seem worse and more numerous than they really were," the Times reports.
Senator John Warner “announced that he was amending his nonbinding resolution that says the Senate ‘disagrees’ with the buildup, adding clauses opposing any cutoff of funds for troops in the field and calling for written commitments from the Iraqi government to achieve certain goals,” according to the Los Angeles Times. “The revised resolution drew the immediate endorsement of Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and Sen. Olympia J. Snow... (more)
Before the U.S. House of Representatives, January 18, 2007
Mr. Speaker, I have never met anyone who did not support our troops. Sometimes, however, we hear accusations that someone or some group does not support the men and women serving in our armed forces. This is pure demagoguery, and it’s intellectually dishonest. The accusers play on emotions to gain support for controversial policies, implying ... (more)
Summary: Cal Thomas is the latest conservative figure to use the TV show 24 to forecast a nuclear attack on the United States. Conservatives have also looked to the TV series for justification of aggressive interrogation procedures.
In his January 30 syndicated column, Cal Thomas attacked "ideologically decrepit" Iraq war protesters and claimed: "Unlike Vietnam, the Islamofascists won't ... (more)
Been to the DMV lately? That’s your local Department of Motor Vehicles. Maybe you avoided it all together by applying on-line or by mail. But chances are you faced long lines and delays. Well, you might look back on the experience next year and think it was a breeze compared to what the federally mandated Real ID Act will require you to do. Let me explain.
Back in 2005, Congress approved an $82 billion dollar spending bill that incorporated a description of a new securit... (more)
WASHINGTON — Risking broad penalties for their residents, lawmakers in several states are fighting implementation of the Real ID Act, a federal measure that seeks to prevent non-compliant cardholders from boarding airplanes or entering federal facilities.
Opponents say national standards for drivers' licenses would be a costly creep into the arms of big brother. Supporters say it is intended to protect Americans' from fraud and potentially terror-related crimes.
John Reid, the Home Secretary, has been warned that Britain's safety could be put at risk if he succeeds in an attempt to lengthen the period that terrorist suspects can be held without charge. He told the Cabinet yesterday that he wanted to increase the 28-day maximum detention period available to detectives investigating alleged terrorist plots.
Mr Reid was accused of trying to make political capital from the massive operation by West Midlands Police. But... (more)
Details are emerging about the involvement of a Taliban-aligned drug lord with the U.S. government, The New York Times will report on its Friday front page.
"In April 2005, federal law enforcement officials announced that they had arrested an Afghan drug lord and Taliban ally named Hajji Bashir Noorzai in New York and charged him with drug smuggling," writes James Risen for the Times. "Now, as Noorzai's case moves toward trial, likely later this year, a f... (more)
