’s definition of torture: “I don’t think water boarding is torture. My definition of torture is you physically harm someone by cutting them, by cutting their fingers, sticking things in their eyes, sticking their fingers in electric sockets. Water boarding is a frightening experience. But the person does not have physical damage.”
Nov. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Switzerland's federal prosecutor is investigating a case of suspected spying by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency on trade union members in the country.
Swiss investigators, who initiated a probe on Sept. 12, ``have corroborated the suspicions'' and identified the people involved, Jeanette Balmer, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor, said today in an e-mail. Because the case involves a foreign state and suspicions of political crimes, she said, the prosecuto... (more)
Pastor Ted Haggard is now admitting that some of the allegations by former gay escort, Mike Jones are true.
In an e-mail obtained by NEWSCHANNEL 13, Acting Senior Pastor Ross Parsley says Haggard confessed to the board of overseers. Parsley told members of New Life Church; "He has willingly and humbly submitted to the authority of the board of overseers, and will remain on administrative leave during the course of the investigation."
A former male prostitute who accused Colorado Springs pastor Ted Haggard of engaging in gay sex over the course of three years failed a polygraph test administered Friday morning in Denver.
The polygrapher, John Kresnik, said the results "indicated deception" but he also believed the results may have been skewed because the accuser, Mike Jones, was suffering from a migraine and didn’t get much sleep.
"I’m disappointed with myself," Jones said on Peter ... (more)
America is now seen as a threat to world peace by its closest neighbours and allies, according to an international survey of public opinion published today that reveals just how far the country's reputation has fallen among former supporters since the invasion of Iraq.
Carried out as US voters prepare to go to the polls next week in an election dominated by the war, the research also shows that British voters see George Bush as a greater danger to world peace than either the North... (more)
On the 22nd of May, 1856, as the deteriorating American political system veered towards the edge of the cliff, Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina, shuffled into the Senate... (more)
Police marksmen who were involved in the shooting of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes on the tube last year took part in an undercover operation in Kent this week in which another man was shot dead.
The officers are members of Scotland Yard's CO19 firearms unit, who were supporting Flying Squad detectives attempting to stop a suspected armed robbery at a building society bank branch in New Romney on Tuesday evening.
Last night, police would not last night go into d... (more)
A quip by John Kerry in which he told a young audience that securing a good education would avoid them getting "stuck in Iraq" has been seized upon by Republican attack dogs as election fodder. The Senator's comment killed nobody but when Bush joked about not finding WMD in Iraq, he was making light of 655,00 dead victims and nearly 3,000 dead troops - but the media barely battered an eyelid and Bush never apologized.
White House propagandist Tony Snow, takin... (more)
During an interview with conservative pundit Rush Limbaugh, US President George Bush expressed deep concerns about the possibility of the United States leaving the Middle East, raising fears that extremists could topple governments to "control oil resources."
"Give me a second here, Rush, because I want to share something with you," Bush said. "I am deeply concerned about a country, the United States, leaving the Middle East."
Britain has sleepwalked into becoming a surveillance society that increasingly intrudes into our private lives and impacts on everyday activities, the head of the information watchdog warns.
New technology and "invisible" techniques are being used to gather a growing amount of information about UK citizens. The level of surveillance will grow even further in the next 10 years, which could result in a growing number of people being discriminated against and excluded from society, s... (more)
Anti-smoking ads on television produced by tobacco companies and aimed at parents may actually be encouraging children to start smoking, a new research paper reports.
"The tobacco companies are up to their old tricks," said Danny McGoldrick, director of research at the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. "Anyone who thinks that the tobacco companies have reformed are kidding themselves."
McGoldrick was not involved in the study, which was led by researchers at The Cance... (more)
A bizarre six minute video posted to the You Tube website claims to show a focus group responding to questions put to them by a moderator about how the U.S. government should react to a bio-attack, including what they should name quarantine procedures, if they should outlaw criticism of the President, and the terms they should use for the process of canceling an election in the wake of a suicide bombing.
The video was allegedly part of a court a... (more)
Horrible acting, this vid is either a hoax or a psy-op.
During his visit to the Texas Book Festival, author, historian and political commentator spoke with Alex Jones about the current state of the nation under the Bush Administration and what to expect in the near future.
Vidal discusses the importance of due process of law, "the very basis of this country." He contends that the eradication of the Bill of Rights under the 2006 Military Commissions Act has led to a 'Bill of Wrongs.'
An external security advisory committee reporting to the US Department of Homeland Security has produced a highlight critical report advising against the use of RFID technology in government documents.
But the scathing analysis remains stuck in limbo, as a draft report, while the government pushes ahead with plans to include RFID tags in everything from passport and diving licences to library cards.
The Data Privacy and Integrity Advisory Committee o... (more)
WASHINGTON -- A quarter century after the Reagan revolution and a dozen years after Republicans vaulted into control of Congress, a new CNN poll finds most Americans still agree with the bedrock conservative premise that, as the Gipper put it, "government is not the answer to our problems -- government is the problem."
The poll released Friday also showed that an overwhelming majority of Americans perceive, correctly, that the size and cost of government have gone up in the past f... (more)
Compared to the current Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s former president Muhammad Khatami is regarded in Western foreign affairs circles as a moderate. When Khatami visited the US in September, he called on the US and Iran to stop verbally assaulting each other in the interest of dialogue that could build trust and eliminate the frictions between the two countries. Khatami said that the precondition for dialogue was “to eliminate the language of threat.”
<... (more)
“The bad news,” investigative reporter Seymour Hersh told a Montreal audience last Wednesday, “is that there are 816 days left in the reign of King George II of America.”
The good news? “When we wake up tomorrow morning, there will be one less day.”
Hersh, a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine, has been a thorn in the side of the U.S. government for nearly 40 years. Since his 1969 e... (more)
An unmanned aerial vehicle flying over the East Sea detects signs of infiltration from the North Korean military. It sends the information to a command-control center at the Joint Chiefs of Staff and unmanned combat aircraft and submarines begin conducting surgical strikes on major enemy targets.
Ground troops and combat robots are deployed to the enemy headquarters. Robots carry out a reconnaissance mission, transmitting images of enemy forces’ locations to computerized scr... (more)
Civilians make up 98 percent of the tens of thousands of victims of cluster bombs in the 30 years since their introduction during the Vietnam war, according to an NGO report.
Cluster munitions are imprecise weapons, designed to strike a large surface area, and have killed or maimed 104,000 people since then, said Angelo Simonazzi, director general of Handicap International which carried out the study.
"For 30 years governments have failed to address the disproportio... (more)
Apparently Diebold's problems aren't limited to Maryland, Georgia or Alaska -- what a shocker. Down in the Sunshine State, during a week of early voting before next week's nationwide midterm election, certain Diebold machines have been registering some votes for Democrats as selections for the Republican candidate. For instance, Gary Rudolf, a voter at a polling site near Ft. Lauderdale, tried to vote for gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis (D); however, when the Diebold machine gave him the final... (more)
President Bush reportedly said he would "understand" a preemptive Israeli strike against Iran's nuclear sites.
Maariv, citing diplomatic sources, reported Thursday that French President Jacques Chirac discussed Iran s nuclear program with Bush on the sidelines of the recent UN summit.
Asked by Chirac if Israel could attack Iran to prevent it getting the bomb, Bush reportedly said: "We cannot rule this out. And if it were to happen, I would understand it." ... (more)
