The United States has had three coups if you count the first one as being Jekyll Island in November of 1910. The coup plotters met at Jekyll Island and secretly wrote the law that became the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. All of the bankers who met in secret were Rothschild agents. This included Paul Warburg of the Rothschild dominated Kuhn Loeb bank. Nelson Aldrich was a Senator who married into the Rockefeller family. The Rockefellers were created by the Rothschilds as were J P Morgan, the Harrimans and the Bush family.

It is hard to believe that even though 64% of the American public favors a negotiated settlement with Iran over its nuclear program fully 37% of those polled also believe that the United States actually needs Israel’s permission before coming to any kind of agreement. To paraphrase the late great Mitt Romney, is that a […]

Can you guess which political party these 2 are leaders of?Conservatives report that they weigh more than liberals report weighing. That isn't just because more liberals are starving and poor or because conservatives are selfish, greedy bastards who inevitably all turn into Chris Christie and Rob Ford.

Jacob Hornberger | In response to growing public demands, led by JFKfacts.org, that the CIA release its still-secret, 50-year-old JFK-related records to the American people, the CIA has now issued a statement on the controversy. Even more significant, the issue has now reached the White House...

Anthony Gregory | Once again we hear calls to close Guantánamo’s prison camp. Every once in a while, Americans see reminders of this detention facility in the news cycle. Months ago, we heard about the hunger strike, yet it was scarcely in the national headlines early in Obama’s presidency...

John W. Whitehead | Why does a police department which hasn’t had an officer killed in the line of duty in over 125 years in a town of less than 20,000 people need tactical military vests like those used by soldiers in Afghanistan? For that matter, why does a police department...

As journalist Shuler remains unlawfully jailed, Alabama is ranked #1 for judges who override juries to order executions: “hangin’ judges”…..Faith Peeples just doubled her monthly support for the PBC podcast…you can sign up here
Since 2000, Alabama judges have overruled their juries in murder cases, switching from Life Without Parole to death sentence 26 times.  Source:  US Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor
–Supreme Court declines to hear appeal of Texas law that has forced 12 abortion clinics to close

The Real Housewives of Nosepick Junction?by KenQ: Let's say the Right-Wing Noise Machine was blaring away in the forest and there was no one around to hear it. Would that make the Noisemakers any stupider?A: Trick question!

Qatar World Cup: The ‘ugly game’

Migrant workers in Qatar (file photo)

RT | November 20, 2013

Unauthorized demonstrations near the Spanish Parliament could see participants being fined €600,000 ($810,000) under a new Citizen Security bill being introduced by Spain’s ruling rightist Popular Party, local media reported.

Michael Hoffman will be speaking about the JFK assassination conspiracy on the nationally syndicated "Ground Zero" radio program, hosted by Clyde Lewis, Thursday, Nov. 21 at 8 p.m. Pacific. The program is webcast at: http://www.groundzeromedia.org/It is podcast on: iTunesThe show is broadcast on dozens of FM and AM stations from coast to coast. A few are listed below.

by Judith Curry This list will help non-scientists to interrogate advisers and to grasp the limitations of evidence  - William J. Sutherland, David Spiegelhalter and Mark A. Burgman. Nature has published a very interesting comment, titled Twenty tips for interpreting scientific … Continue reading →

RT
November 20, 2013
40,000 NATO troops to stage massive European war games
After the 2014 pullout from Afghanistan, NATO is set to stage huge European war games involving 40,000 troops, about seven times the size of the recent drills in the Baltic, with critics in the crisis-hit EU calling it a waste of money.

Having been mercilessly smeared for 6 years by right-wing media, Obama is now profoundly unpopular in red states. The ultimate "gotcha" moment for Republicans was when they were able to paint the president as dishonest in the "you can keep your healthcare if you like it" statement. Anyone who ever wanted to hate Obama now has all the reason they ever wanted. In Montana, his approval rating has sunk over 10 points since Tester and Obama were running for reelection last year and is now a dismal 34%. Democrats in red states and red districts aren't mentioning him.

Bombers took over Baghdad again, where a string of bombs unnerved both Sunni and Shi'ite residents who had ventured out between rainstorms that have flooded some parts of the city this week. The rains, which are common this time of year, have been deadly in parts of central and southern Iraq. In attacks, though, at least 66 were killed and 142 more were wounded in Baghdad and across the country.

As a preamble and reprise, I think that it is reasonable for Cowtan and Way to take exception with HadCRU’s failure to estimate temperature in Arctic gridcells and to propose methods for estimating this temperature. At a time when the climate community argued that differences between the major indices and accessibility to CRU data didn’t “matter”, I thought that both mattered. One of the reasons for transparency in CRU data and methods was so that interested parties could carry out their own assessments, as Cowtan and Way have done.

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by  Glen Ford | November 20, 2013

Obamacare is unraveling, not because the administration is particularly incompetent or unlucky, and certainly not as a result of the Republicans’ unrelenting hostility to the Obama health insurance plan. Indeed, ever since the bill’s passage in early 2010, the GOP’s holy war against Obamacare has served to solidify reflexive Democratic support for what has always been a Republican-inspired bill.

Last week I wrote about the potential for the Obama administration’s Asia-Pivot strategy to inflame anti-colonialist sentiment. I lamented that Washington tries simply to get around this popular opposition to the military surge in East Asia instead of acknowledging that people don’t like to be occupied by foreign militaries.

By Jack Rasmus | November 19, 2013

By Kevin Carson | Center for a Stateless Society | November 18, 2013

Nothing like starting out your day with a laugh — and today I have Matthew Lynch (“12 Reasons Why Obama is One of the Greatest Presidents Ever,” Huffington Post, November 15) to thank for it.

By Ramzy Baroud | Palestine Chronicle | November 20, 2013

While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is “the world’s most influential Jew”, Bernard Henri Levy is number 45, according to an article published in the Israeli rightwing newspaper the Jerusalem Post, on May 21, 2010.

By 39, most normal people stop using recreational drugsBoth are wealthy, opportunistic right-wing extremists who gravitated to politics for a myriad of reasons that did not include public service. And although the demeanor and boorish, loud-mouthed bullying that Rob Ford (and brother Doug) demonstrate on TV daily, reminds people more of Chris Christie, it looks like Trey Radel is what we're stuck with.

For those who have been following U.S.-Israel-Iran relations, the one certainty we’ve come to expect is that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will say all kinds of things that aren’t true in order to shift the balance away from peaceful diplomacy and towards war.

By James Petras :: December 28, 2005

Israel Bombs Iran: The US Suffers the Consequences

The primary disagreement in U.S.-Afghan negotiations for a status of forces agreement is over whether U.S. occupation forces should continue to be exempt from Afghan law. Last week I pointed out the irony in all this, since Washington is essentially acknowledging that it expects crimes to continue to be committed by U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

RIA Novosti | November 20, 2013

MOSCOW – A senior Russian diplomat has voiced concerns over US plans to retain nine military bases in Afghanistan after their planned withdrawal from the country.

By Sharmine Narwani | Al-Akhbar | 2013-11-20

The recent high-drama nuclear negotiations in Geneva were riveting, to be sure. Old foes shuttled between conference rooms, chatted amiably in corridors, colluded to guard the sensitive details of their discussions from an eager global media.

So much for “brinksmanship, and the “Do Nothing” Congress huh… And please remember that ALL laws and Regulations are SELECTIVELY ENFORCED!
 

Here is a report on new rules published in the Federal Register. This may hit 3,400 this year, and 77,000 pages.  Here is a report.

Having my fellow Canucks in mind, here is a relink, that deserves much more attention then it originally received. PM William Lyon Mackenzie King. Often known as Mackenzie King.Here in Canada he was PM number 10. Canada's longest serving Prime Minister. This despite the fact he had some strange 'beliefs' Or, perhaps, he employed some occult practices? Of the type  often favoured by the elites? Who knows?

I’ve been a guest in Colorado Springs, Colorado, following a weeklong retreat with Colorado College students who are part of a course focused on nonviolence. In last weekend’s Colorado Springs Gazette, there was an article in the Military Life section about an international skype phone call between U.S. soldiers in Kandahar, Afghanistan and sixth grade girls at a private school in Maryland. ("Carson Soldiers Chat With Friends" November 17, 2013 F4)

Russian Information Agency Novosti
November 20, 2013
Russia Concerned at US Plans for Bases in Afghanistan
MOSCOW: A senior Russian diplomat has voiced concerns over US plans to retain nine military bases in Afghanistan after their planned withdrawal from the country.

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Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts
Giuseppe Berto: Selections on war
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Giuseppe Berto
From The Brigand (1951)
Translated by Angus Davidson

William Kurelek (1927-1977) is one of Canada’s most celebrated artists, and his paintings hang in prestigious museums all over the world. Nick Young and Zack Young’s William Kurelek’s The Maze is a beautiful film about this talented artist, profound thinker, and saintly, sweet soul, who as a young man became disconnected from himself and others, displayed frightening behaviors, and was hospitalized in London, diagnosed as schizophrenic.

The other day a friend in southeast Wisconsin sent me a reply to a letter he had written to his congressman about Social Security. His congressman is Paul Ryan.

IMEMC & Agencies | November 20, 2013

Palestinian medical sources have reported that a Palestinian woman was wounded after being rammed by a speeding vehicle of an Israeli settler, near the northern West Bank city of Nablus on Tuesday.
The sources said that Shamsa Sharif, 60 years of age, was moved to the Rafidia Hospital in Nablus, suffering moderate but stable injuries.
Sharif is from Huwwara village, south of Nablus. The settler fled the scene after the incident.

by Judith Curry In addition to traditional fallacies such as ad hominem, discussions of risk contain logical and argumentative fallacies that are specific to the subject-matter. Ten such fallacies are identified, that can commonly be found in public debates on risk. They … Continue reading →

Al-Akhbar | November 20, 2013

Israeli forces demolished a water tank and an agricultural structure in a West Bank village near Nablus on Wednesday, a local official said.
Deputy mayor of Aqraba Bilal Abdul-Hadi told Ma’an news agency that three bulldozers escorted by seven military vehicles stormed the neighborhood of al-Taweel and began demolishing the structures, claiming they were built without authorization.

Or at least that is the cover story? CIA loves them some Plausible Deniability!

Wait. Cousin Barry said the wars were over….

Looks like war to us – Andrew Burton / Reuters
U.S. Army soldiers with Charlie Company, 36th Infantry Regiment, 1st Armored Division set up a supportive position during a mission near Command Outpost Pa’in Kalay in Maiwand District, Kandahar Province in February.
 
NBC

Yesterday, Lebanon. Today, the Sinai, Egypt.Sinai, pretty much Israeli occupied........Egyptian army near Al-Arish in the Sinai peninsulaSuicide bomber in Egypt rams bus carting soldiers, kills 10

Fort Worth police apologize for its role in federal survey

Dr Chris Busby is a brilliant and courageous researcher. In the month following the March 11, 2011 Fukushima disaster he examined air filters  from cars near Fukushima. He compared them to Chernobyl and calculated that Fukushima was 300 times worse than that previous disaster. He has recently calculated just how much radiation would be released if there were another typhoon or earthquake and in a worst case scenario all of the radiation from the spent fuel pools were released at one time. I do not question his numbers. I just disagree with his conclusions.

After frisking us for explosives, the UN repeatedly assures us that we're good people.

Originally posted at TomDispatch. As with the rest of our homeland security state, when it comes to border security, reality checks aren’t often in the cards. The money just pours into a world of remarkable secrecy and unaccountability. Last week, however, the Government Accountability Office released a report about a Transportation Security Administration decision to […]

I see Andrew Sullivan has just published an e-book of his post-/9/11 blogging, a collection of hysterical imprecations aimed at an alleged "fifth column" on "both coasts" out to undermine America’s moral certainty. It is appropriately titled "I Was Wrong." You have to give the guy some credit: what other writer would do this? As […]

As the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination grows near, the media, always suckers for celebrity, is providing saturation coverage of the tragic killing and the emotion-invoking funeral. The American public, also suckers for presidential charisma, consistently rate magnetic presidents, such as Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, much higher than the historians who study […]

I bet Steve Israel wishes he had never recruited Jennifer Garrison, "the Sarah Palin of Ohio," to run for Congress as a Democrat in OH-06. Garrison is extremely conservative-- anti-Choice, anti-environment, virulently anti-gay, anti-worker, pro-NRA and pro-coal.

At least 12 people were killed and 24 more were wounded in fresh attacks. Another seven people were executed.

23 people were killed in a terror bombing of the Iranian embassy in Lebanon today, and also today, the “thisTV” television channel in Spokane, Washington, broadcast from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. “Support Your Local Gunfighter,” a movie in which the star James Garner advises his friend to never gamble on a roulette wheel. The Garner character then does so immediately, placing his bet on number 23 and losing $4500.

NYT caption: Robert L. Wilkins, left, with President Obama and other nominees in June, was picked to fill one of three vacancies on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit."The American people and our judicial system deserve better."-- President Obama"Appointing judges to fill vacant judicial seats is not court-packing.