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Paul Merrell

Voters Say "Yes" to the Republican Who Said "No" to Wall Street | The Nation - 0 views

www.thenation.com/...blican-who-said-no-wall-street

Auction-2014 Libertarians Jones banksters neocons

shared by Paul Merrell on 07 May 14 - No Cached
  • House Speaker John Boehner and his cronies removed North Carolina Congressman Walter Jones from the House Financial Services Committee in late 2012, as part of a purge that removed Republicans who were not all in for Wall Street -- and for Boehner's brand of "service" to the industries that are supposed to be regulated by Congress -- from the one panel with the power to hold bankers and brokers to account. But Jones, who had opposed bank bailouts and favored Wall Street regulation, did not go quietly. He spoke up about the purge and made little secret of his sense that -- though he had split with Boehner on a number of issues -- his biggest "sin" in the eyes of the party leadership was his refusal to bow to the demands of big campaign donors. “This whole place is all about money. Money is more important than policy,” complained Jones, who has in recent years co-sponsored most major pieces of campaign-finance reform legislation in the House -- including a call for a constitutional amendment designed to restore the ability of federal, state and local officials to regulate campaign spending.
  • The congressman's bluntness did not go over well with the masters of the universe on Wall Street. So, this spring, they set out to purge Walter Jones from Congress altogether. They found a consummate DC insider with close ties to the financial-services industry, Taylor Griffin, and filled the challenger's campaign treasury with PAC checks from J.P. Morgan, Wells Fargo and Bank of America, as well as political powerbrokers like former Republican National Committee chairman Haley Barbour and Wayne Berman of the Blackstone Group. It did not stop there. Jones' independence extended far beyond debates over Wall Street bailouts and regulation. The Republican is a social and economic conservative -- make that a social and economic very conservative -- but he has repeatedly broken with the party establishment on issues of war and peace, privacy rights, trade policy and budgets. He even voted against proposals by the darling of Wall Street and the party establishment, Congressman Paul Ryan
  • Bush administration aides and apologists rushed in with public statements and "independent" expenditures to attack Jones for his opposition to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and for his refusal to go along with moves that might lead to wars with Iran and other countries. Former Bush White House spokesman Ari Fleischer gave his enthusiastic backing to Griffin, as did former national security adviser Juan Zarate. Sarah Palin, one of the party's most consistent militarists, came in big for Griffin, who hailed her as an "old friend." A neo-conservative group, the Emergency Committee For Israel, spent at least $250,000 on ads that claimed Jones "preaches American decline." What Jones actually said was that, “Lyndon Johnson’s probably rotting in hell right now because of the Vietnam War, and he probably needs to move over for Dick Cheney.” At the same time, the wealthy champions of Ryan's crony-capitalist approach to budgeting were in with big money for TV ads and direct mail from the "Ending Spending Action Fund" -- a super PAC backed by billionaire businessman Joe Ricketts. By a lot of DC measures, Jones should have been doomed.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • But the ten-term congressman bet that the voters of eastern North Carolina would stick with him. “I’m not going to sacrifice my integrity for anyone or any party,” he said. “It’s the price you pay. I didn’t come (to Washington) to be a puppet for anyone. And I think the public back in my district, which is the most important, has seen I’m willing to do what I think is right.” It was the right bet. On Tuesday, Republican primary voters in eastern North Carolina decided to purge the Wall Street donors and the special interests. The reelected Walter Jones by a solid 51-45 margin.
Paul Merrell

The 28 Pages and the War on Terror: Is Congress in a State of Willful Ignorance? | 28 P... - 0 views

28pages.org/...n-a-state-of-willful-ignorance

war & peace 9-11 28-pages ISIL Syria Iraq

shared by Paul Merrell on 15 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • Today more than ever, Americans are struggling to unravel the Gordian knot of overt and covert alliances that comprise the Middle East’s geostrategic landscape. As they do, politicians and pundits constantly remind them that reaching the correct conclusions about the region is imperative if we are to thwart the menace of terrorism and prevent the next 9/11.
  • As if a thicket of misinformation, hit-and-miss journalism and competing propaganda didn’t make the challenge daunting enough, the American people face an even more formidable barrier in their attempts to reach informed and rational conclusions about U.S. policy in the Middle East: the classification of a 28-page finding on foreign government support of the 9/11 hijackers—classification that continues over the objections of the chairman and vice-chairman of the 9/11 Commission and the former senator who co-chaired the inquiry that produced the 28 pages. Preventing a hypothetical “next 9/11″ starts with a clear understanding of what enabled the actual one—yet, even as the U.S. military prepares for the next chapter in the seemingly perpetual War on Terror, Americans continue to be denied critical knowledge about how the September 11 attacks were planned and funded. Reflecting on that disconnect, Kentucky Congressman Thomas Massie recently told Slate, “Until we know what enabled or caused 9/11, we shouldn’t be talking about starting a third war to prevent another 9/11.”
  • For everyday Americans, ignorance about what lies within the 28 pages is imposed; for apparently far too many in Congress, that ignorance is willful. You see—unlike the citizens they represent—when it comes to reading or not reading the 28 pages, legislators enjoy the luxury of a choice: After securing permission through their respective intelligence committee, representatives and senators can venture into a guarded, soundproof room at the Capitol and read the classified findings on foreign government assistance to the 9/11 hijackers in their entirety. Astonishingly—given what’s at stake for the country and for the lives of servicemembers and civilians alike—there are indications only a slim minority have bothered to do so. Rep. Walter Jones North Carolina’s Walter Jones is one congressman who did take the initiative to learn what lies in the 28 pages. Later, he said, “I was absolutely shocked by what I read. What was so surprising was that those whom we thought we could trust really disappointed me.” He added, “The information is critical to our foreign policy moving forward and should thus be available to the American people.”
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • On January 8th of this year, by way of a “Dear Colleague” letter, Jones and Massachusetts Congressman Stephen Lynch urged every one of their fellow House representatives to read the 28 pages for themselves. Among those who heeded their call was Rep. Massie. At a March 11 press conference in which he joined Jones and Lynch in imploring peers to examine the redacted finding, Massie offered a striking description of his reaction to the revelations within the 28 pages, saying: “It was a really disturbing event for me to read those. I had to stop every two or three pages and rearrange my perception of history. And it’s that fundamental…it certainly changes your view of the Middle East.”
  • in what could well emerge as a national security scandal that engulfs much of Congress, there are indications that, when it comes to acquiring essential knowledge to shape policies that safeguard the country, a majority of legislators have thus far made a conscious decision to remain ignorant: As of this writing, 13 of the House’s 432 representatives have joined as cosponsors of a Jones-authored resolution urging the president to declassify the 28 pages. A source on the Hill who is familiar with the declassification effort is personally unaware of any representative who has read the 28 pages over the last several months who didn’t emerge from the experience as a supporter of declassification. When you overlay one of those observations on the other, the result points to a woefully low level of interest among the nation’s legislators in learning what “shocking,” “surprising” and “history-rearranging” facts are contained in the classified passage.
  • Those indications paint a bleak—albeit, tentative—portrait of Congressional diligence in overseeing national security policy. What’s needed now is a precise, name-by-name accounting of which representatives and senators have read the 28 pages and which have not. To that end, 28Pages.org urges constituents, journalists and transparency advocacy organizations to help bring accountability to this essential issue of national security job performance by contacting legislators and asking them two simple, yes-or-no questions: Have you read the 28 pages? If not, have you asked permission from your intelligence committee to do so? Shortly, 28Pages.org will announce its own contribution to this national exercise in Congressional accountability. However, a thorough accounting will only be achieved with the participation of citizens, journalists and transparency advocates. And with every House and 36 Senate seats up for election on Nov. 4, the faster the country collectively assembles a name-by-name roster of 28-pages readership on the Hill, the better position voters will be in to evaluate incumbents using this potent indicator of their attentiveness to matters of national security.
  • We provide a wealth of resources to help citizens do their part, and journalists are encouraged to contact us for insights on this issue.
Paul Merrell

How Wall Street Money Is Driving Out the Last Populist House Republican | The Nation - 0 views

www.thenation.com/...last-populist-house-republican

banksters Auction-2014 North-Carolina Jones Griffin

shared by Paul Merrell on 18 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • Congressman Walter Jones, a Republican who represents a wide swath of eastern North Carolina, might not strike you as a populist. But as a lawmaker, the veteran politician with a slow Southern drawl has become a gadfly in his own party for thumbing his nose at powerful political interests. He is the only GOP co-sponsor of the DISCLOSE Act, a measure to reveal the donors of dark-money campaign advertisements. He is among the loudest critics of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, telling an audience one that “Lyndon Johnson’s probably rotting in hell right now because of the Vietnam War, and he probably needs to move over for Dick Cheney.” And Speaker John Boehner removed Jones from the House Financial Services Committee, which oversees Wall Street. His sin? Bucking leadership and supporting many bills to further regulate the financial sector, along with serving as the last remaining House Republican to have voted for the Dodd-Frank reform package. The Republican establishment has attempted to remove Jones from office by dispatching a number of primary challengers over the years. For this cycle, a former Bush administration aide named Taylor Griffin is the party favorite to finally wipe out Jones. Several outlets, such as Bloomberg News, have reported that Griffin’s candidacy is being heavily promoted by the financial industry. JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and other banks helped fuel the $114,000 fundraising haul Griffin reported in his first campaign disclosure report. Earlier this week, a Super PAC financed in part by hedge fund titan Paul Singer went on air with a negative ad against Jones.
  • What hasn’t been reported, however, is that Griffin himself is a longtime political consultant for the biggest predators on Wall Street. Republic Report has obtained a disclosure report that shows that Griffin’s client list reads like a who’s who of financial interests that have preyed upon North Carolina families for short term gain.
Paul Merrell

US Media Ignores CIA Cover-up on Torture - Consortiumnews - 0 views

consortiumnews.com/...gnores-cia-cover-up-on-torture

war & peace torture CIA Feinstein VIPS

shared by Paul Merrell on 16 Sep 16 - No Cached
  • MEMORANDUM FOR: Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Vice Chairman, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity SUBJECT: U.S. Media Mum On How Your Committee Faced Down Both CIA and Obama We write to thank you for your unwavering support for your extraordinarily courageous and tenacious staff in (1) investigating CIA torture under the Bush/Cheney administration and (2) resisting CIA/White House attempts under the Obama administration to cover up heinous torture crimes like waterboarding.
  • With well over 400 years of intelligence experience under our collective belt, we wondered how you managed to get the investigation finished and the executive summary up and out (though redacted). We now know the backstory – thanks to the unstinting courage of the committee’s principal investigator Daniel Jones, who has been interviewed by Spencer Ackerman, an investigative reporter for The (UK) Guardian newspaper. The titanic struggle depicted by Ackerman reads like a crime novel; sadly, the four-part series is nonfiction: I. “Senate investigator breaks silence about CIA’s ‘failed coverup’ of torture report” II. “Inside the fight to reveal the CIA’s torture secrets” III. ” ‘A constitutional crisis’: the CIA turns on the Senate” IV. “No looking back:  the CIA torture report’s aftermath“
  • Remarkably, a full week after The Guardian carried Ackerman’s revelations, none has been picked up by U.S. “mainstream” newspapers. Not the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post – not even The Hill. (As for alternative media, Charles P. Pierce’s timely piece for Esquire whetted his readers’ appetite for the gripping detail of the Guardian series, explaining that it would be “unfair both to Ackerman’s diligence and Jones’s courage” to try to summarize even just the first installment. “Read the whole damn thing,” Pierce advises.)
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • And so, the culprits who should be hanging their heads in shame are out and about, with some still collecting book royalties and some blithely working for this or that candidate for president. As if nothing happened. Sadly, given the soporific state of our mainstream media – particularly on sensitive issues like these – their silence is nothing new, although it does seem to have gotten even worse in recent years. The late William Colby, CIA director from 1973 to 1976, has been quoted as saying: “The CIA owns everyone of any significance in the major media.” Whether or not Colby was quoted correctly, the experience of the past several decades suggests it is largely true. Better sourced is a quote from William Casey, CIA director from 1981 to 1987: “We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.”
  • In these circumstances, we know from sad experience that there is no way any of us can get on any of the Sunday talk shows, for example – despite our enviable record for getting it right. Nor does it seem likely that any of the “mainstream” media will invite you to discuss the highly instructive revelations in The Guardian. We respectfully suggest that you take the initiative to obtain media exposure for this very important story.
Gary Edwards

Obama Stimulus Dollars Funded Soros Empire | The Soros Files - 1 views

sorosfiles.com/...llars-funded-soros-empire.html

soros obama-stimulous Crony-Socialism

shared by Gary Edwards on 13 May 12 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 13 May 12
     
    excerpt: Newly recently released tax documents reveal how billionaire "philanthropist" George Soros expanded his U.S.-based empire by using funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, also known as the Obama stimulus. Soros and Obama worked hand-in-glove through the stimulus, which has been called the largest single partisan wealth transfer in American history. In 2010, tax records show that Soros, a convicted inside trader with extensive knowledge of the American financial system and government policies under Obama, deployed grantees from his Open Society Foundations1 to lobby for and acquire federal contracts for job training, green energy, and community redevelopment programs.  By gaining control over those resources, Soros advanced his agenda for "green economics," open borders, and increased government handouts. In short, he grew his empire, which includes much of the "progressive" movement in the U.S., as the federal government and Obama's political constituencies grew in power and influence. This report analyzes George Soros's grants to organizations in 2010.  The records show massive coordination of non-profit networks in the states and nationally.  Four powerful organizations and coalitions - The STAR Coalition, The Gamaliel Foundation, the Apollo Alliance, and Green for All - are given detailed scrutiny in this regard, with the involvement of Van Jones getting special mention. Jones is the former Obama "Green Jobs Czar" fired after information about his communist past surfaced through the work of anti-communist blogger Trevor Loudon and then-Fox News personality Glenn Beck.  The lobbying power of such efforts ensured that stimulus funds flowed from taxpayers into union coffers and into the hands of other activists who had been instrumental in putting President Obama into office. This report, "Obama Stimulus Dollars Funded Soros Empire," includes an analysis of how Soros-funded organizations and networks
Gary Edwards

Dreams From My Real Father (Full Movie) | Before It's News - 0 views

beforeitsnews.com/...My_Real_Father_Full_Movie.html

Joel-Gilbert Obammunism Dreams-of-my-real-father Marxism saul-alinsky

shared by Gary Edwards on 07 Jul 12 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 07 Jul 12
     
    Incredible!!  I saw the interview Alex Jones of InfoWars had with Joel Gilbert about his research into the real Barack Housain Davis-Obama.   this is the movies Joel made based on those years of research. Note that Joel's research indicates that Obama's real father is the Marxist Frank Marshall Davis.  Which means he is a natural born citizen.  Albeit one that changed his citizenship when his mother married Sotero, the Indonesian.  Obama never reinstated his lost citizenship, failing to register for the draft at 18 yrs of age.  He also attended  aprivate school in Hawaii and Occidental on a foreign exchange student scholarship. excerpt: Published on Jul 6, 2012 by Rickvsnewworldorder What are the true origins of Obama's life and politics? At age 18, Barack Obama admittedly arrived at Occidental College a committed revolutionary Marxist. What was the source of Obama's foundation in Marxism? Throughout his 2008 Presidential campaign and term in office, questions have been raised regarding Barack Obama's family background, economic philosophy, and fundamental political ideology. Dreams from My Real Father is the alternative Barack Obama "autobiography," offering a divergent theory of what may have shaped our 44th President's life and politics. In Dreams from My Real Father, Barack Obama is portrayed by a voiceover actor who chronicles Barack Obama's life journey in socialism, from birth through his election to the Presidency. The film begins by presenting the case that Barack Obama's real father was Frank Marshall Davis, a Communist Party USA propagandist who likely shaped Obama's world view during his formative years. Barack Obama sold himself to America as the multi-cultural ideal, a man who stood above politics. Was the goat herding Kenyan father only a fairy tale to obscure a Marxist agenda, irreconcilable with American values? This fascinating narrative is based in part on 2 years of research, interviews, newly unearthed footage and photos, and the wr
Paul Merrell

Faced With The Security State, Groklaw Opts Out | Popehat - 0 views

www.popehat.com/...ecurity-state-groklaw-opts-out

surveillance state NSA NSA-blowback Groklaw

shared by Paul Merrell on 21 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • For ten years Pamela Jones has run Groklaw, a site collecting, discussing, and explaining legal developments of interest to the open-source software community. Her efforts have, justifiably, won many awards. She's done now.
  • That's not why she's stopping. Pamela Jones is ending Groklaw because she can't trust her government. She's ending it because, in the post-9/11 era, there's no viable and reliable way to assure that our email won't be read by the state — because she can't confidently communicate privately with her readers and tipsters and subjects and friends and family.
  • In making this choice, Jones echoes the words of Lavar Levison, who shut down his encrypted email service Lavabit. Levison said he was doing so rather than "become complicit in crimes against the American people": “I’m taking a break from email,” said Levison. “If you knew what I know about email, you might not use it either.” Lavabit was joined by encryption provider Silent Circle:
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • The extent of NSA surveillance is unknown, but what little we see is deeply unsettling. What our government says about it can't be believed; the government uses deliberately misleading language or outright lies about the scope of surveillance. So I don't blame Pamela Jones or question her decision. It's not the only way. I don't think it's my way, yet — though I am having some very concerned conversations about whether it's safe, or even ethical, to have confidential attorney-client communications by email.
  • I hope that Pamela's decision will arouse the interest, or attention, or outrage, of a few more people, who will in turn talk and write and advocate to get more people involved. Groklaw was a great resource; citizens will care that it's gone. (The government and its minions won't.) Pamela's choice will likely be met with the usual arguments: the government doesn't care about your emails. If you have nothing to hide you have nothing to worry about. This is about protecting us from terrorist attacks, not about snooping into Americans' communications. Don't you remember 9/11? I tire of responding to those. Let me offer one response that applies to all of them: I don't trust my government, I don't trust the people who work for my government, and I believe that the evidence suggests that it's irrational to offer such trust.
Paul Merrell

The NSA says it 'obviously' can track locations without a warrant. That's not so obvious. - 0 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...a-warrant-thats-not-so-obvious

surveillance state NSA NSA-targets location-data constitutional law

shared by Paul Merrell on 05 Dec 13 - No Cached
  • In conversations with The Washington Post over Barton Gellman and Ashkan Soltani's recent story on cellphone location tracking, an intelligence agency lawyer told Gellman, "obviously there is no Fourth Amendment expectation in communications metadata.” But some experts say it's far from obvious that the 1979 Supreme Court case on which the administration bases this view gives the government unfettered power to scoop up Americans' cellphone location data.
  • And there's some reason to believe that a majority of the current Supreme Court justices might agree with her on the location data aspect of metadata. The most recent Supreme Court case involving location tracking, United States v. Jones was settled on narrow trespassing grounds in 2012. But five Supreme Court justices signed on to concurring opinions that questioned whether Smith v. Maryland holds up in the face of modern technology.  An opinion concurring in judgment with the Jones decision written by Justice Samuel Alito, and joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan specifically noted the prevalence of smartphones and argued that "the use of longer term GPS monitoring in investigations of most offenses impinges on expectations of privacy."
  • A separate concurring opinion from a fifth justice, Sonia Sotomayor made many of the same arguments, saying "fundamentally, it may be necessary to reconsider the premise that an individual has no reasonable expectation of privacy in information voluntarily disclosed to third parties" -- and even went further by arguing that "awareness that the Government may be watching chills associational and expressive freedoms."
  • Paul Merrell on 05 Dec 13
     
    A Supreme Court majority also specifically reserved judgment on whether the principles of Smith v. Maryland would apply in cases involving dragnet surveillance, specifically referring to Smith, in the case of Amnesty International v. Clapper, last year. Both Amnesty Int'l  and Jones were decided before revelations of widespread NSA surveillance broke beginning in June, 2013. Since then, the mood of the nation has changed enormously, from ignorant to informed and mostly objecting.  That factor will weigh heavily in the Supreme Court's inevitable decision on whether dragnet seizure of call metadata is constitutional.   So it takes some chutzpah for government lawyers to claim that Smith v. Maryland authorized warrantless gathering of telephone metadata in the dragnet context where no single person is suspected of a crime. The Supreme Court has never so held. At stake: whether we become an Orwellian state.
Gary Edwards

Intrade Prediction Markets - 0 views

www.intrade.com/

intrade prediction-markets election politics polls

shared by Gary Edwards on 29 Oct 08 - Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 29 Oct 08
     
    The InTrade realtime electoral vote predictor has been tracking Dow Jones stock market averages with near perfect precision. As Obama's stock rises on InTrade, (and McCain's falls), the Dow Jones sinks. Meaning, McCain's InTrade value is tracking the stock market averages with an incredible precision. This should not come as a surprise since InTrade Prediction Market investors are betting on what they believe to be the elections outcome. They do not bet on who they personally favor or politically support. McCain has an investor friendly - free market friendly - capitalist friendly tax plan. Obama is a socialist bent on taxing the productive members of the economy to redistribute those valuable investment and business resources to the least productive. Obama is not offering a wealth producing - jobs producing plan. Socialism is not what made America an economic powerhouse - a wealth producing engine the likes of which mankind had never previously seen or imagined. Free market capitalism balanced with Constitutional rule of law, property ownership and individual freedom account for this success. All of which the free market traders at the Irish InTrade market seem to recognize as important.
Gary Edwards

FBI Source: Clinton Foundation Can Bring Down Entire Government » Alex Jones'... - 1 views

www.infowars.com/n-bring-down-entire-government

Hillary

shared by Gary Edwards on 08 Jul 16 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 08 Jul 16
     
    "The Clinton Foundation is a "massive spider web of connections and money laundering implicating hundreds of high-level people," according to an anonymous insider who revealed why the FBI stopped short of indicting Hillary Clinton. Before FBI Director James Comey announced the FBI wouldn't recommend pressing charges against Clinton, an insider with "intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the Clinton case" hosted an little-publicized AMA session on 4Chan, and the statements he made on July 2 corroborate with later developments of the scandal. "There is enough for her and the entire government to be brought down," he revealed. "People do not realize how enormous this whole situation actually is." "Whether she will be [indicted] or not depends on how much info others involved gets out, and there are a lot of people involved." Since then, both the FBI and the DOJ declined to press charges against Clinton, and other sources revealed the Clinton Foundation is now under scrutiny. "The problem is with the Clinton Foundation as I mentioned, which you should just imagine as a massive spider web of connections and money laundering implicating hundreds of high-level people," the source said. "Though I do not have a high opinion of Hillary, she is just a piece - albeit a big piece - of this massive sh*tstorm." Those implicated extends to the Justice Dept. "The DOJ is most likely looking to save itself," he continued. "Find everyone involved in the Clinton Foundation, from its donors to its Board of Directors, and imagine they are all implicated." This would explain why Bill Clinton forced himself on Attorney General Loretta Lynch's plane at the Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport last week; Clinton insider Larry Nichols said blackmail was likely involved. "Bill Clinton met with Lynch, and he was there to assure her that when Hillary gets to be president she'll be able to keep her job," said Nichols on the Alex Jones Sh
Paul Merrell

How Strong Is ISIS In 2017? Islamic State Fighters Being Wiped Out From Mosul And Raqqa... - 0 views

www.ibtimes.com/osul-raqqa-faster-they-2499737

war & peace Isil Mosul Raqqa

shared by Paul Merrell on 03 Mar 17 - No Cached
  • The U.S-led coalition effort against the Islamic State group is wiping off its fighters at a faster pace than the group can replace them, said Maj. Gen. Rupert Jones, deputy commander for the Combined Joint Task Force coalition, the New York Times reported Tuesday. U.S.-backed Iraqi forces Tuesday fought their way to within the firing range of Mosul's main government buildings, a major target in the offensive to remove ISIS militants from their remaining stronghold in the western side of the city, Reuters reported. 
  • "We are killing Daesh at a rate that they simply can't sustain," Jones said, using an Arabic acronym for the militant group. "The enemy cannot sustain the attrition that they are suffering and therefore they lose terrain, they lose battles." 
  • Early last month, the top American commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend, said that U.S.-backed forces will recapture ISIS' two major strongholds — the cities of Raqqa in Syria and Mosul in Iraq — within the next six months, the Associated Press reported.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Although the ISIS battle will not be over even with the group's fall in Mosul or Raqqa, it would be the beginning of the end, Jones said, according to the Times. "The inevitability of their destruction just becomes really a matter of time," he said, adding that the group's leadership was now focused on little more than survival.Despite news of ISIS losing out on its territories in Iraq and Syria, U.S. military leaders have warned that the militant group might turn into a more classic insurgency once it loses Raqqa and Mosul, which means that the broader fight could go on till years.
Gary Edwards

iTunes - Podcasts - Stansberry Radio by Stansberry and Associates - 0 views

itunes.apple.com/...id481026239

Porter-Stansberry Podcast Alex-Jones

shared by Gary Edwards on 23 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 23 Dec 11
     
    Download the Alex Jones podcast interview with Porter.
Paul Merrell

The Government Can No Longer Track Your Cell Phone Without a Warrant | Motherboard - 0 views

motherboard.vice.com/...r-cell-phone-without-a-warrant

surveillance state location-data 4th Amendment litigation

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • The government and police regularly use location data pulled off of cell phone towers to put criminals at the scenes of crimes—often without a warrant. Well, an appeals court ruled today that the practice is unconstitutional, in one of the strongest judicial defenses of technology privacy rights we've seen in a while.  The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled that the government illegally obtained and used Quartavious Davis's cell phone location data to help convict him in a string of armed robberies in Miami and unequivocally stated that cell phone location information is protected by the Fourth Amendment. "In short, we hold that cell site location information is within the subscriber’s reasonable expectation of privacy," the court ruled in an opinion written by Judge David Sentelle. "The obtaining of that data without a warrant is a Fourth Amendment violation."
  • In Davis's case, police used his cell phone's call history against him to put him at the scene of several armed robberies. They obtained a court order—which does not require the government to show probable cause—not a warrant, to do so. From now on, that'll be illegal. The decision applies only in the Eleventh Circuit, but sets a strong precedent for future cases.
  • Indeed, the decision alone is a huge privacy win, but Sentelle's strong language supporting cell phone users' privacy rights is perhaps the most important part of the opinion. Sentelle pushed back against several of the federal government's arguments, including one that suggested that, because cell phone location data based on a caller's closest cell tower isn't precise, it should be readily collectable.  "The United States further argues that cell site location information is less protected than GPS data because it is less precise. We are not sure why this should be significant. We do not doubt that there may be a difference in precision, but that is not to say that the difference in precision has constitutional significance," Sentelle wrote. "That information obtained by an invasion of privacy may not be entirely precise does not change the calculus as to whether obtaining it was in fact an invasion of privacy." The court also cited the infamous US v. Jones Supreme Court decision that held that attaching a GPS to a suspect's car is a "search" under the Fourth Amendment. Sentelle suggested a cell phone user has an even greater expectation of location privacy with his or her cell phone use than a driver does with his or her car. A car, Sentelle wrote, isn't always with a person, while a cell phone, these days, usually is.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • "One’s cell phone, unlike an automobile, can accompany its owner anywhere. Thus, the exposure of the cell site location information can convert what would otherwise be a private event into a public one," he wrote. "In that sense, cell site data is more like communications data than it is like GPS information. That is, it is private in nature rather than being public data that warrants privacy protection only when its collection creates a sufficient mosaic to expose that which would otherwise be private." Finally, the government argued that, because Davis made outgoing calls, he "voluntarily" gave up his location data. Sentelle rejected that, too, citing a prior decision by a Third Circuit Court. "The Third Circuit went on to observe that 'a cell phone customer has not ‘voluntarily’ shared his location information with a cellular provider in any meaningful way.' That circuit further noted that 'it is unlikely that cell phone customers are aware that their cell phone providers collect and store historical location information,'” Sentelle wrote.
  • "Therefore, as the Third Circuit concluded, 'when a cell phone user makes a call, the only information that is voluntarily and knowingly conveyed to the phone company is the number that is dialed, and there is no indication to the user that making that call will also locate the caller,'" he continued.
  • Paul Merrell on 13 Jun 14
     
    Another victory for civil libertarians against the surveillance state. Note that this is another decision drawing guidance from the Supreme Court's decision in U.S. v. Jones, shortly before the Edward Snowden leaks came to light, that called for re-examination of the Third Party Doctrine, an older doctrine that data given to or generated by third parties is not protected by the Fourth Amendment.   
Gary Edwards

Works and Days » Zero Jobs 101 - the Psychology of Alienating Employers - 0 views

pajamasmedia.com/...job-killing-101

VDH Obammunism financial-collapse crony-socialism

shared by Gary Edwards on 07 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • Here is the lament I heard: the near $5 trillion in borrowing in just three years, the radical growth in the size of the federal government and its regulatory zeal, ObamaCare, the Boeing plant closure threat, the green jobs sweet-heart deals and Van Jones-like “Millions of Green Jobs” nonsense, the vast expansion in food stamps and unemployment pay-outs, the reversal of the Chrysler creditors, politically driven interference in the car industry, the failed efforts to get card check and cap and trade, the moratoria on new drilling in the Gulf, the general antipathy to new fossil fuel exploitation coupled with new finds of vast new reserves, the new financial regulations, an aggressive EPA oblivious to the effects of its advocacy on jobs, the threatened close-down of energy plants, the support for idling thousands of acres of irrigated farmland due to environmental regulations, the constant talk of higher taxes, the needlessly provocative rhetoric of “fat cat”, “millionaires and billionaires,” “corporate jet owners,” etc. juxtaposed, in hypocritical fashion, to Martha’s Vineyard, Costa del Sol, and Vail First Family getaways — all of these isolated strains finally are becoming a harrowing opera to business people.
  • “This bunch doesn’t like me much and I’m going to hunker down, hoard my cash, and sit out the next year and a half until they are gone.”
  • And the administration’s efforts to counteract these symbols and impressions by courting a high-profile, hyper-capitalist Warren Buffett, or a GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt have proven even more ironic:
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • the former calls for higher taxes that his firms seek to avoid, or targets his post-mortem wealth to (more efficient?) private foundations that rob the Treasury of billions in lost inheritance taxes, or knows higher taxes won’t much matter to his tens of billions in net worth;
  • the latter’s firm paid no 2010 U.S. income taxes on many of its profits and outsourced jobs overseas.
  • Borrow another $5 trillion?
  • Gary Edwards on 07 Sep 11
     
    Nobody lays it out so quickly and too the point as VDH..... awesome summary of sweeping reach.  I've been hesitant to apply the term "crony capitalism" to Obama even though his Bankster relationships and continuing bailouts scream loudly.  It seems to me that the term "crony socialism" better fits the full range of fascist power brokering Obama engages in.  Big Government, Big Banksters, Big Unions, Big Media, Big Education.  If anything, Obammunism is BIG! VDH excerpt: Here is the lament I heard: the near $5 trillion in borrowing in just three years, the radical growth in the size of the federal government and its regulatory zeal, ObamaCare, the Boeing plant closure threat, the green jobs sweet-heart deals and Van Jones-like "Millions of Green Jobs" nonsense, the vast expansion in food stamps and unemployment pay-outs, the reversal of the Chrysler creditors, politically driven interference in the car industry, the failed efforts to get card check and cap and trade, the moratoria on new drilling in the Gulf, the general antipathy to new fossil fuel exploitation coupled with new finds of vast new reserves, the new financial regulations, an aggressive EPA oblivious to the effects of its advocacy on jobs, the threatened close-down of energy plants, the support for idling thousands of acres of irrigated farmland due to environmental regulations, the constant talk of higher taxes, the needlessly provocative rhetoric of "fat cat", "millionaires and billionaires," "corporate jet owners," etc. juxtaposed, in hypocritical fashion, to Martha's Vineyard, Costa del Sol, and Vail First Family getaways - all of these isolated strains finally are becoming a harrowing opera to business people.
Gary Edwards

California: Urgent Last-Minute Action to Stop NDAA "Indefinite Detention" - Tenth Amend... - 1 views

blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/...stop-ndaa-indefinite-detention

tenth-amendment tenthers NDAA

shared by Gary Edwards on 08 Apr 13 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 08 Apr 13
     
    From the Tenth Amendment Center:   "On Tuesday, April 9th, the California Assembly Public Safety Committee will hold a hearing and do-or-die vote on AB351.   Passage of this bill would be a serious setback to those advancing the power of "indefinite detention" in the United States. AB351 NEEDS YOUR HELP RIGHT NOW TO PASS. 1. CALL all the members of the Public Safety Committee.  Call in the evenings or on the weekend as well.  We want them to have a flood of messages in support by the time they have the hearing on Tuesday.  Be VERY respectful, but be strong. Urge each of them to vote YES on AB351. Tom Ammiano, chair (916) 319-2017 Melissa Melendez, vice-chair (916) 319-2067 Byron Jones-Sawyer, Sr. (916) 319-2059 Holly J. Mitchell (916) 319-2054 Bill Quirk (916) 319-2020 Nancy Skinner (916) 319-2015 Marie Waldron (916) 319-2075 "
Gary Edwards

Secret White House Email Accounts Uncover IRS-Obama Smoking Gun : palookavillepost.com - 0 views

www.palookavillepost.com/...-uncover-irs-obama-smoking-gun

Obammunism IRS-gate Tea-Party-Patriots

shared by Gary Edwards on 23 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • During an investigation of President Barack Hussein Obama’s political appointees and White House aides, FBI agents discovered secret government email accounts they say were used as primary means for Obama’s staff to interact with IRS officials for day-to-day business.
  • Investigators became curious about the possibility of such accounts after Congress requested all emails from the White House regarding the Benghazi, IRS and other scandals, and the White House could only produce a handful of emails that discussed those topics.
  • “We had one of our hackers get into a White House intern’s computer, and that’s where we located a slew of private email accounts not associated with Federal government accounts,” said a spokesman for the powerful federal police agency.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • “The content of the emails is still being reviewed, but it is clear that people inside the White House knew about the IRS targeting conservatives, and that somebody with the nickname “Basketball Jones” was the person who told American forces to stand down during the attacks in Benghazi.”
  • Emails sent to people outside of the secret network of White House email accounts were programmed to automatically be deleted five minutes after opening the message, just like on Mission Impossible. This explains the absence of White House emails received by IRS officials.
  • “The White House tried to cover their tracks by saying that former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman visited the White House 157 times, and that they never used email to communicate,” said the FBI spokesman.
  • Only a few of the emails have been reviewed, but already several of them indicate that President Obama not only knew about the scheme, but he himself ordered the IRS to flood the Tea Party with paperwork and fees.
  • Here is one transcript of a hidden email from an unknown White House aide in April, 2011:
  • “Hey Shulman… What’s up?… Don’t forget BJ(Basketball Jones) wants you to kick up the fees on anyone with Tea Party or Conservative in their names… try to see if you can make them hire expensive tax attorneys too… bog them down with paperwork so they can’t campaign for milk boy(Mitt Romney) or Ru Paul(Ron Paul)… sorry you missed the Easter Egg Hunt… maybe next year… I’d invite you to stay in the Lincoln bedroom but that costs real money… send me a report on how many Tea Party groups quit because of being jerked around…ASAP… Chow!”
  • Gary Edwards on 23 Jun 13
     
    Although this article has zero credibility and even less reference checking, everyone in America knows that Obama ordered the IRS hit on Tea Party Patriots, Conservatives and Jewish Homeland organizations.  That the IRS admits to violating the Constitutional civil rights of tens of millions of law abviding Americans, and did so in ways that only benefit the Obama re-election campaign is proof enough for anyone who loves liberty.
Gary Edwards

Articles by Mark Dice - 0 views

markdice.com/index.php

Mark-Dice New-World-Order Illuminati Globalist Globalist-Elites

shared by Gary Edwards on 10 Jul 13 - No Cached
  • Gary Edwards on 10 Jul 13
     
    Libertarian writer and researcher, Mark Dice, has provided a list of articles he has written.  Mark's literary works include: ... "The Illuminati: Facts & Fiction" ...... separates and analyzes the various claims and evidence about the Illuminati, their history, beliefs, members, organizations, and activities. This is a supplement for Mark's previous book - ..... "The Resistance Manifesto",  which focuses more on the New World Order, the 9/11 attacks, Big Brother, and how the political agendas of the elite are fulfilling Bible prophecy.   .... "The New World Order" ....   His website, markdice.com has high light summary of his work that's quite interesting: A detailed analysis of the September 11th attacks and evidence they were aided by elements within U.S. and foreign intelligence agencies to be used as a reason to jumpstart the "War on Terror" and the erosion of privacy and personal liberties outlined in the constitution. The Knights Templar, the real Holy Grail, and the role the Templars played in the formation of the Illuminati mafia. Quotes from the original writings of the Illuminati founders and how the organization drew up plans over 200 years ago to take over every major institution of power and influence in the world through deception and criminal activity. An expose on the Bohemian Grove resort including quotes from President Richard Nixon, senator John Decamp, and information from Chris Jones who worked at the club and became an informant on the activities within the compound. The secrets of Freemasonry and a history of the organization and their influence on society and quotes from the bible of Freemasonry on how the organization knowingly deceives lower level members and nonmembers as to the true secrets and goals of the fraternity. The history and meaning of the mysterious Georgia Guidestones monument and why the elite want to reduce world population to 500 million by killing billions of people through wars and plagues. A history of
Paul Merrell

The Informants | Mother Jones - 0 views

www.motherjones.com/...fbi-terrorist-informants

war & peace FBI sting-operations anti-terrorism enrapment

shared by Paul Merrell on 20 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • Over the past year, Mother Jones and the Investigative Reporting Program at the University of California-Berkeley have examined prosecutions of 508 defendants in terrorism-related cases, as defined by the Department of Justice. Our investigation found: Nearly half the prosecutions involved the use of informants, many of them incentivized by money (operatives can be paid as much as $100,000 per assignment) or the need to work off criminal or immigration violations. (For more on the details of those 508 cases, see our charts page and searchable database.)
  • Sting operations resulted in prosecutions against 158 defendants. Of that total, 49 defendants participated in plots led by an agent provocateur—an FBI operative instigating terrorist action. With three exceptions, all of the high-profile domestic terror plots of the last decade were actually FBI stings. (The exceptions are Najibullah Zazi, who came close to bombing the New York City subway system in September 2009; Hesham Mohamed Hadayet, an Egyptian who opened fire on the El-Al ticket counter at the Los Angeles airport; and failed Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad.) In many sting cases, key encounters between the informant and the target were not recorded—making it hard for defendants claiming entrapment to prove their case. Terrorism-related charges are so difficult to beat in court, even when the evidence is thin, that defendants often don't risk a trial.
  • "The problem with the cases we're talking about is that defendants would not have done anything if not kicked in the ass by government agents," says Martin Stolar, a lawyer who represented a man caught in a 2004 sting involving New York's Herald Square subway station. "They're creating crimes to solve crimes so they can claim a victory in the war on terror."
Paul Merrell

Justice Dept. to Require Warrants for Some Cellphone Tracking - The New York Times - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...r-some-cellphone-tracking.html

surveillance state DoJ-policy Stingray-surveillance warrants

shared by Paul Merrell on 05 Sep 15 - No Cached
  • The Justice Department will regularly require federal agents to seek warrants before using secretive equipment that can locate and track cellphones, the agency announced Thursday, the first regulations on an increasingly controversial technology.The new policy, which also limits what information may be collected and how long it can be stored, puts a measure of judicial oversight on a technology that was designed to hunt terrorists overseas but has become a popular tool among federal agents and local police officers for fighting crime.Civil libertarians have expressed grave privacy concerns about the technology’s proliferation, but the new Justice Department policies do not apply to local police forces.
  • The device, commonly called a cell-site simulator or StingRay, tricks cellphones into connecting with it by acting like a cell tower, allowing the authorities to determine the location of a tracked phone. In doing so, however, the equipment also connects with all other phones in the area, allowing investigators to collect information on people not suspected of any crime.The device is also capable of capturing calls, text messages, emails and other data. Until Thursday’s regulations, the rules for the use of that information and the duration it could be kept had not been detailed and varied across the department’s offices and agencies.
  • Paul Merrell on 05 Sep 15
     
    A policy is not a law. DoJ is trying to spread some tanglefoot for civil liberties organizations that are prepping litigation over unfettered abuse of Stingray devices by federal, state, and local officials. Warrantless use of Stingrays has been severely undermined by recent Supreme Court rulings, notably U.S. v. Jones and Riley v. California.
Paul Merrell

Paul Offers NDAA Amendment to Drive Release of 28 Pages | 28Pages.org - 0 views

28pages.org/...t-to-drive-release-of-28-pages

war & peace 9-11-Truth 28-pages legislation

shared by Paul Merrell on 07 Jun 15 - No Cached
  • Following through on intentions he announced earlier this week, Senator Rand Paul today offered an amendment to the pending National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would require the president to declassify 28 pages on foreign government links to the 9/11 hijackers. The language is identical to S.1471, the bill Paul introduced on Monday with Senators Ron Wyden and Kirsten Gillibrand. In a story on Paul’s new move, The Hill’s Julian Hattem said the proposed amendment “heightens the profile of the fight and may increase the stakes for the opponents.”
  • While there are a growing number of vocal champions of the declassification of the 28 pages, those who want the 28 pages kept under wraps have worked quietly and effectively out of public view. As we wrote earlier this year, “It’s likely that among the most powerful of those unseen opponents of 9/11 transparency are two strange bedfellows: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia—which has fueled the growth of terror, and the U.S. intelligence community—which is charged with thwarting terror.” Paul’s amendment to the must-pass NDAA could force some of those opponents—and, more specifically, their Senate allies—out of the shadows.
  • However, the language may also offer President Obama an opportunity to continue his administration’s refusal to release the 28 pages, as it says he is not required to declassify sources and methods if that release would “result in imminent lawless action or comprise presently on-going national security operations.”
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • In 2003, Bush invoked “sources and methods” when defending his decision to classify the pages, saying “Declassification of that part of a 900-page document would reveal sources and methods that would make it harder for us to win the war on terror. … It would help the enemy if they knew our sources and methods.” Among many who have read the 28 pages, Congressman Walter Jones denies that declassification would harm national security in any way, pointing to other motives for the secrecy. “There’s nothing in it about national security. It’s about the Bush administration and its relationship with the Saudis,” Jones told The New Yorker.
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