Prison Planet.com
It’s time to identify the unfolding Middle East crisis for what it is– a wider world war. Alex Jones analyzes the more than nine years of expanding middle east conflict since 9/11, with the U.S. now engaging in 5 simultaneous proxy wars including Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Pakistan and Yemen.
Tensions with Syria, Russia, China and other players may further fan the flames in the region, as top globalists, including Bilderberg attendees, have announced their intention to put ground troops in Libya and kick-off a “big war” encompassing much of Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia.
Despite opposition to the wars in U.S. Congress and throughout the NATO alliance, the Nobel Peace President will continue to try and save face as he escalates deadly conflict on behalf of his masters under a “humanitarian” pretext. The elites have craftily planted the seeds of chaos under the guise of the “Arab Spring” they helped fund and organize, which is now blossoming into an all-out war that could draw in major powers and proxy regimes alike.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Afghan Troop Withdrawal No Change in Plans, June 23 2011
Rachel Maddow
MSNBC
“This is only to draw down the extra troops that President Obama sent in when we last heard from him on this subject in December 2009. This is just drawing down the surge.”
MSNBC
“This is only to draw down the extra troops that President Obama sent in when we last heard from him on this subject in December 2009. This is just drawing down the surge.”
Jobless Claims in U.S. Rise, June 23 2011
Alex Kowalski
Bloomberg
More Americans than forecast filed first-time claims for unemployment insurance payments last week, showing companies are less confident about the expansion than they were earlier this year.
Applications for jobless benefits increased 9,000 in the week ended June 18 to 429,000, Labor Department figures showed today. The level of claims exceeded the highest estimate in a Bloomberg News survey in which the median projection called for 415,000 filings. The number of people on benefit rolls was little changed, while those getting extended payments rose.
Unemployment claims have swelled after dropping to an almost three-year low at the end of February, indicating businesses may be reluctant to hire until demand strengthens. The data underscore Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s comment yesterday that job growth is “frustratingly” slow, a reason policy makers pledged to maintain monetary stimulus.
“The numbers still remain elevated, and they’re still consistent with a labor market that’s improving at a glacial pace,” said Brian Jones, an economist at Societe Generale in New York. “This fits in with Bernanke’s view that the labor market improvement is just not enough.”
Full story here.
Bloomberg
More Americans than forecast filed first-time claims for unemployment insurance payments last week, showing companies are less confident about the expansion than they were earlier this year.
Applications for jobless benefits increased 9,000 in the week ended June 18 to 429,000, Labor Department figures showed today. The level of claims exceeded the highest estimate in a Bloomberg News survey in which the median projection called for 415,000 filings. The number of people on benefit rolls was little changed, while those getting extended payments rose.
Unemployment claims have swelled after dropping to an almost three-year low at the end of February, indicating businesses may be reluctant to hire until demand strengthens. The data underscore Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s comment yesterday that job growth is “frustratingly” slow, a reason policy makers pledged to maintain monetary stimulus.
“The numbers still remain elevated, and they’re still consistent with a labor market that’s improving at a glacial pace,” said Brian Jones, an economist at Societe Generale in New York. “This fits in with Bernanke’s view that the labor market improvement is just not enough.”
Full story here.
Ethnic Minority Babies Outnumber White Toddlers, June 23 2011
Daily Mail
Ethnic minorities now make up the majority of babies in the United States, official figures revealed today.
It is the first time that this has been the case and the change reflects a growing age divide between mostly white, older Americans and predominantly minority youths that could reshape government policies.
Preliminary census estimates also show the share of African-American households headed by women – made up of mostly single mothers – now exceeds African-American households with married couples, a sign of declining U.S. marriages overall but also continuing challenges for black youths without involved fathers.
The findings, based on the latest government data, offer a preview of final 2010 census results being released this summer that provide detailed breakdowns by age, race and householder relationships such as same-sex couples.
Full story here.
Ethnic minorities now make up the majority of babies in the United States, official figures revealed today.
It is the first time that this has been the case and the change reflects a growing age divide between mostly white, older Americans and predominantly minority youths that could reshape government policies.
Preliminary census estimates also show the share of African-American households headed by women – made up of mostly single mothers – now exceeds African-American households with married couples, a sign of declining U.S. marriages overall but also continuing challenges for black youths without involved fathers.
The findings, based on the latest government data, offer a preview of final 2010 census results being released this summer that provide detailed breakdowns by age, race and householder relationships such as same-sex couples.
Full story here.
Is the Economy Improving?, June 23 2011
The Economic Collapse
Is the U.S. economy improving? That is what Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke would have us believe. Bernanke declared today that the “recovery appears to be proceeding at a moderate pace” and that everything is going pretty much as planned. Sadly, the mainstream media and most of the American people still seem to have faith in the economic pronouncements of Helicopter Ben. They seem to have forgotten all of the Bernanke quotes from before the financial crisis. Bernanke pledged that there would not be a housing crash and that there would not be a recession. It is amazing that anyone still believes that Bernanke has any credibility left.
Of course “economic recovery” is one of Barack Obama’s favorite new terms. He loves to talk about all of the signs that the economy is improving. To Obama, all of the recent bad economic news is no big deal. He says that what we are experiencing right now are simply “bumps on the road to recovery“.
Well, whether you want to call them “bumps” or “potholes” or “massive gaping wounds that are gushing blood all over the place”, the truth is that the U.S. economy is not improving at all. In fact, it is rapidly getting worse.
Let’s take a look at just a few areas of the economy….
FULL STORY
Is the U.S. economy improving? That is what Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke would have us believe. Bernanke declared today that the “recovery appears to be proceeding at a moderate pace” and that everything is going pretty much as planned. Sadly, the mainstream media and most of the American people still seem to have faith in the economic pronouncements of Helicopter Ben. They seem to have forgotten all of the Bernanke quotes from before the financial crisis. Bernanke pledged that there would not be a housing crash and that there would not be a recession. It is amazing that anyone still believes that Bernanke has any credibility left.
Of course “economic recovery” is one of Barack Obama’s favorite new terms. He loves to talk about all of the signs that the economy is improving. To Obama, all of the recent bad economic news is no big deal. He says that what we are experiencing right now are simply “bumps on the road to recovery“.
Well, whether you want to call them “bumps” or “potholes” or “massive gaping wounds that are gushing blood all over the place”, the truth is that the U.S. economy is not improving at all. In fact, it is rapidly getting worse.
Let’s take a look at just a few areas of the economy….
FULL STORY
Media Blackout on Nuclear Plant in Nebraska, June 23 2011
Patrick Henningsen
Global Research
Since flooding began on June 6th, there has been a disturbingly low level of media attention given to the crisis at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Facility near Omaha, Nebraska. But evidence strongly suggests that something very serious has in fact happened there.
On June 7th, there was a fire reported at Fort Calhoun. The official story is that the fire was in an electrical switchgear room at the plant. The apparently facility lost power to a pump that cools the spent fuel rod pool, allegedly for a duration of approximately 90 minutes.
FORT CALHOUN NUKE SITE: does it pose a public risk?
FULL STORY
Global Research
Since flooding began on June 6th, there has been a disturbingly low level of media attention given to the crisis at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Facility near Omaha, Nebraska. But evidence strongly suggests that something very serious has in fact happened there.
On June 7th, there was a fire reported at Fort Calhoun. The official story is that the fire was in an electrical switchgear room at the plant. The apparently facility lost power to a pump that cools the spent fuel rod pool, allegedly for a duration of approximately 90 minutes.
FORT CALHOUN NUKE SITE: does it pose a public risk?
FULL STORY
U.S. Spying on NY Times Reporter?, June 23 2011
Eric W. Dolan
Raw Story
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist James Risen has been subjected to government surveillance and harassment that began under the Bush administration, according to a 22-page affidavit he filed Tuesday.
In his 2006 book, “State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration,” author and New York Timesreporter James Risen describes a CIA effort to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions by secretly providing them with faulty blueprints. In the end, a Russian defector working for the CIA exposed the plot.
Risen was subpoenaed twice to testify about his sources. The first grand jury was was dissolved before he could be forced to testify. For reasons that have not been revealed, U.S. District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema quashed the second subpoena last year.
ABC News reported Risen’s affidavit claims that the government monitored his ingoing and outgoing phone calls to expose his confidential sources.
Full article here
Raw Story
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist James Risen has been subjected to government surveillance and harassment that began under the Bush administration, according to a 22-page affidavit he filed Tuesday.
In his 2006 book, “State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration,” author and New York Timesreporter James Risen describes a CIA effort to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions by secretly providing them with faulty blueprints. In the end, a Russian defector working for the CIA exposed the plot.
Risen was subpoenaed twice to testify about his sources. The first grand jury was was dissolved before he could be forced to testify. For reasons that have not been revealed, U.S. District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema quashed the second subpoena last year.
ABC News reported Risen’s affidavit claims that the government monitored his ingoing and outgoing phone calls to expose his confidential sources.
Full article here
Obama Bringing World Leaders to Chicago; G-8, June 23 2011
LYNN SWEET AND FRAN SPIELMAN
Bloomberg
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama will bring world leaders to Chicago next May for a G-8 summit and a NATO meeting — gatherings Mayor Rahm Emanuel said will provide an international showcase for the city, despite financial and security headaches.
Obama will announce the meetings — where Afghanistan and the NATO alliance will be on the agenda — during a Wednesday night speech on his plan to draw down troops in Afghanistan.
An Obama White House administration official told the Chicago Sun-Times that the two distinct meetings will take place at the same time in the president’s adopted hometown, in locations to be determined. The 2012 summits in Chicago “will provide President Obama with opportunity to continue his leadership of our most important security alliance, to fulfill commitments made by allied leaders in Lisbon in November 2010, and to sustain our joint work to revitalize NATO to prepare it to effectively meet challenges of the 21st century,’’ the official said.
“They will review the progress in Afghanistan since the Lisbon NATO Summit, and discuss the next phase of our transition to full Afghan security in 2014.”
The meeting will run from May 15-22, 2012 and will be an opportunity for Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s former White House chief of staff, to show off the city to the world.
Full article here
Bloomberg
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama will bring world leaders to Chicago next May for a G-8 summit and a NATO meeting — gatherings Mayor Rahm Emanuel said will provide an international showcase for the city, despite financial and security headaches.
Obama will announce the meetings — where Afghanistan and the NATO alliance will be on the agenda — during a Wednesday night speech on his plan to draw down troops in Afghanistan.
An Obama White House administration official told the Chicago Sun-Times that the two distinct meetings will take place at the same time in the president’s adopted hometown, in locations to be determined. The 2012 summits in Chicago “will provide President Obama with opportunity to continue his leadership of our most important security alliance, to fulfill commitments made by allied leaders in Lisbon in November 2010, and to sustain our joint work to revitalize NATO to prepare it to effectively meet challenges of the 21st century,’’ the official said.
“They will review the progress in Afghanistan since the Lisbon NATO Summit, and discuss the next phase of our transition to full Afghan security in 2014.”
The meeting will run from May 15-22, 2012 and will be an opportunity for Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s former White House chief of staff, to show off the city to the world.
Full article here
Cop Trespasses, Arrests Woman for Taking Video, June 23 2011
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
As Officer Mario Masic of the Rochester, New York, police demonstrates in the video below, it is no longer safe to shoot video on your own property in America.
It is entirely legal to stand on your own front yard and photograph the police or anybody else in a public street.
But if the police think you’re “anti-cop,” they’re going to violate your rights and arrest you. Masic considered Emily Good’s iPhone recording a threatening act opposed to the authority of the police – as they searched a man for drugs outside of her home – and so he arrested her after demanding she go back insider her home and she refused, citing her property rights.
The fact is the cop trespassed on her property and threatened her. But then property rights in America are almost completely gone now. Cops no longer respect the law or the Constitution. They are not much different than cops in third world hell-holes like Mexico.
The only thing that stands between the people and total police control is the Second Amendment. Far too many of our so-called “representatives” are working to nullify that.
It’s only a matter of time before we descend into a total police state, that is unless people begin to stand up for the rights.
See the RT story on the incient here.
Infowars.com
As Officer Mario Masic of the Rochester, New York, police demonstrates in the video below, it is no longer safe to shoot video on your own property in America.
It is entirely legal to stand on your own front yard and photograph the police or anybody else in a public street.
But if the police think you’re “anti-cop,” they’re going to violate your rights and arrest you. Masic considered Emily Good’s iPhone recording a threatening act opposed to the authority of the police – as they searched a man for drugs outside of her home – and so he arrested her after demanding she go back insider her home and she refused, citing her property rights.
The fact is the cop trespassed on her property and threatened her. But then property rights in America are almost completely gone now. Cops no longer respect the law or the Constitution. They are not much different than cops in third world hell-holes like Mexico.
The only thing that stands between the people and total police control is the Second Amendment. Far too many of our so-called “representatives” are working to nullify that.
It’s only a matter of time before we descend into a total police state, that is unless people begin to stand up for the rights.
See the RT story on the incient here.
US Wants Data on European Passengers, June 23 2011
Lawyers for the European Commission claim a proposed deal between the U.S. and the EU allowing America to store the personal data of millions of transatlantic passengers is illegal. That’s according to a report in the UK’s Guardian newspaper. The U.S. wants access to credit card details, phone numbers and home addresses of European passengers as part of its anti-terror measures. But Member of the European Parliament Gerard Batten says only a joint international agreement will be able to protect the world from terror threats.
You: Body Scanned; Cargo: Not So Much, June 23 2011
AFP
Asking ports of departure to perform full screening of containers before they travel to the US was probably not the best decision, US Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano said Wednesday.
“We believe the so-called 100 percent requirement is probably not the best way to go,” Napolitano told reporters at a press briefing in Rotterdam, where she was visiting Europe’s largest port and the fourth-largest globally.
Napolitano is on a week-long tour of Britain and Europe to beef up security ties within the global supply chain between the US, Britain and Europe and met her British counterpart Theresa May earlier this week, her office said.
On Thursday she is to meet EU ministers and will participate in a conference of the World Customs Organisation in Brussels, where she said she would deliver a similar message.
Full article here
Asking ports of departure to perform full screening of containers before they travel to the US was probably not the best decision, US Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano said Wednesday.
“We believe the so-called 100 percent requirement is probably not the best way to go,” Napolitano told reporters at a press briefing in Rotterdam, where she was visiting Europe’s largest port and the fourth-largest globally.
Napolitano is on a week-long tour of Britain and Europe to beef up security ties within the global supply chain between the US, Britain and Europe and met her British counterpart Theresa May earlier this week, her office said.
On Thursday she is to meet EU ministers and will participate in a conference of the World Customs Organisation in Brussels, where she said she would deliver a similar message.
Full article here
U.S. Conducting Mass Surveillance, June 22 2011
David EdwardsRaw Story
The former self-appointed spokesman for the collective of hacktivists known as “Anonymous” revealed Tuesday what he called a massive U.S spying program against the Arab world.
In an email to about a dozen journalists, Barrett Brown said his Project PM had uncovered the nature of the U.S. spying operation known as Romas/COIN and its replacement called Odyssey.
“For at least two years, the U.S. has been conducting a secretive and immensely sophisticated campaign of mass surveillance and data mining against the Arab world, allowing the intelligence community to monitor the habits, conversations, and activity of millions of individuals at once,” Brown wrote.
Brown’s team made the discovery by analyzing 70,000 emails from data intelligence firm HBGary Federal. Anonymous stole the emails after HBGary CEO Aaron Barr told the Financial Times that his company had identified “core leaders” of the hacktivist group.
Full article here
The former self-appointed spokesman for the collective of hacktivists known as “Anonymous” revealed Tuesday what he called a massive U.S spying program against the Arab world.
In an email to about a dozen journalists, Barrett Brown said his Project PM had uncovered the nature of the U.S. spying operation known as Romas/COIN and its replacement called Odyssey.
“For at least two years, the U.S. has been conducting a secretive and immensely sophisticated campaign of mass surveillance and data mining against the Arab world, allowing the intelligence community to monitor the habits, conversations, and activity of millions of individuals at once,” Brown wrote.
Brown’s team made the discovery by analyzing 70,000 emails from data intelligence firm HBGary Federal. Anonymous stole the emails after HBGary CEO Aaron Barr told the Financial Times that his company had identified “core leaders” of the hacktivist group.
Full article here
Gore's Rolling Stone Denier Diatribe, June 23 2011
Watts Up With That?
This hasn’t hit the newstands yet, but thanks to the propaganda arm of Gore Inc. aka “Repower America” I’ve been given a link to the advance online copy which you too can read in full. First let’s start with the email. Like any good flock herder, there’s a big button where you can give to the cause:
=================================================================
Dear [name deleted],
Our Chairman Al Gore just published a major article in a special summer issue of Rolling Stone.
The magazine hits the stands on Friday, June 24, but you can read it here:
http://acp.repoweramerica.org/rollingstone
Turn on the news or look out the window: Every day, we see the impacts of climate change in the form of historic droughts, floods, storms and other extreme weather events. Yet despite what scientists have been telling us for decades and what we can see with our own eyes, powerful interests continue to deny this crisis is even happening.
Vice President Gore’s essay is important — and I know it will be discussed far and wide.
Take a minute and read this article, then leave a comment on the piece and share it with your friends.
http://acp.repoweramerica.org/rollingstone
Thanks,
Maggie L. Fox
President and CEO
Alliance for Climate Protection
P.S. As you read this email, lies and misinformation are being spread about the climate crisis. We need you to change the conversation and speak up for reality. Leave a comment on Rolling Stone’s website here. Share this article on Twitter, and when you do, use the hashtag #reality. You are our voice.
===================================================================
Gore has gone full bore on “deniers”, and starts off with comparisons to WWF (no not the NGO, yes, the wrestlers) with the piece entitled:
Photo Gallery: 11 extreme-weather signs the climate crisis is real
Gore wants to take the battle to the streets, mainly because he’s losing the battle, big time. For example, here’s his advice on how to harass your hometown media:
The study/survey paper is behind a pay wall but there is a comprehensive summary here.
On the plus side, he disses Obama on his non-existent (but sensible) climate policy:
This hasn’t hit the newstands yet, but thanks to the propaganda arm of Gore Inc. aka “Repower America” I’ve been given a link to the advance online copy which you too can read in full. First let’s start with the email. Like any good flock herder, there’s a big button where you can give to the cause:
=================================================================
Dear [name deleted],
Our Chairman Al Gore just published a major article in a special summer issue of Rolling Stone.
The magazine hits the stands on Friday, June 24, but you can read it here:
http://acp.repoweramerica.org/rollingstone
Turn on the news or look out the window: Every day, we see the impacts of climate change in the form of historic droughts, floods, storms and other extreme weather events. Yet despite what scientists have been telling us for decades and what we can see with our own eyes, powerful interests continue to deny this crisis is even happening.
Vice President Gore’s essay is important — and I know it will be discussed far and wide.
Take a minute and read this article, then leave a comment on the piece and share it with your friends.
http://acp.repoweramerica.org/rollingstone
Thanks,
Maggie L. Fox
President and CEO
Alliance for Climate Protection
P.S. As you read this email, lies and misinformation are being spread about the climate crisis. We need you to change the conversation and speak up for reality. Leave a comment on Rolling Stone’s website here. Share this article on Twitter, and when you do, use the hashtag #reality. You are our voice.
===================================================================
Gore has gone full bore on “deniers”, and starts off with comparisons to WWF (no not the NGO, yes, the wrestlers) with the piece entitled:
Photo Gallery: 11 extreme-weather signs the climate crisis is real
Gore wants to take the battle to the streets, mainly because he’s losing the battle, big time. For example, here’s his advice on how to harass your hometown media:
Fourth, contact your local newspapers and television stations when they put out claptrap on climate — and let them know you’re fed up with their stubborn and cowardly resistance to reporting the facts of this issue. One of the main reasons they are so wimpy and irresponsible about global warming is that they’re frightened of the reaction they get from the deniers when they report the science objectively. So let them know that deniers are not the only ones in town with game. Stay on them! Don’t let up! It’s true that some media outlets are getting instructions from their owners on this issue, and that others are influenced by big advertisers, but many of them are surprisingly responsive to a genuine outpouring of opinion from their viewers and readers. It is way past time for the ref to do his job.And there’s the other usual and expected talking points, like that oft cited “97% survey”.
This time, the scientific consensus is even stronger. It has been endorsed by every National Academy of science of every major country on the planet, every major professional scientific society related to the study of global warming and 98 percent of climate scientists throughout the world. In the latest and most authoritative study by 3,000 of the very best scientific experts in the world, the evidence was judged “unequivocal.”Of course Gore never tells readers that only 5% of the original sample responses were climate scientists. See why here.
The study/survey paper is behind a pay wall but there is a comprehensive summary here.
We find that they originally contacted 10,257 scientists, of whom 3,146 responded, less than a 31% response rate. “Impending Planetary Doom” was obviously not uppermost in the minds of over two thirds of their target population. Of that number, only 5% described themselves as climate scientists, numbering 157. The authors reduce that by half by only counting those who they classed as “specialists”.
“In our survey, the most specialized and knowledgeable respondents (with regard to climate change) are those who listed climate science as their area of expertise and who also have published more than 50% of their recent peer-reviewed papers on the subject of climate change (79 individuals in total). Of these specialists, 96.2% (76 of 79) answered “risen” to question 1 and 97.4% (75 of 77) answered yes to question 2.”So just 75 climate scientists out of people 3000 surveyed, that works out to 2.5%. No mention of the OSI survey with 30,000 people that responded of course.
On the plus side, he disses Obama on his non-existent (but sensible) climate policy:
Yet President Obama has never presented to the American people the magnitude of the climate crisis,…Here’s what Gore says about Climategate:
…
He has simply not made the case for action. He has not defended the science against the ongoing, withering and dishonest attacks. Nor has he provided a presidential venue for the scientific community — including our own National Academy — to bring the reality of the science before the public.
But wait! The good guys transgressed the rules of decorum, as evidenced in their private e-mails that were stolen and put on the Internet. The referee is all over it: Penalty! Go to your corner! And in their 3,000-page report, the scientists made some mistakes! Another penalty!An alternate title for Gore’s piece might be Perp Fiction.
Deniers of Climate Change Are 'Evil', June 23 2011
Matt Schneider
Mediaite
Chris Matthews was somewhat surprised with Al Gore’s harsh critique of President Obama in Rolling Stone regarding his inaction on climate policy. Instead Matthews argued that even if Obama has not been perfect, Gore should really be angry at the “corrupt media on the right” who refuse to believe in climate change, not because they are stupid, but because in Matthews’ opinion they are “evil.”
Watch the clip from MSNBC below:
Full article here
Mediaite
Chris Matthews was somewhat surprised with Al Gore’s harsh critique of President Obama in Rolling Stone regarding his inaction on climate policy. Instead Matthews argued that even if Obama has not been perfect, Gore should really be angry at the “corrupt media on the right” who refuse to believe in climate change, not because they are stupid, but because in Matthews’ opinion they are “evil.”
Watch the clip from MSNBC below:
Full article here
Rasmussen: NATO Will Continue Slaughter (Graphic), June 22 2011
Protecting civilians by killing civilians, but don’t call it a war
Paul Joseph WatsonPrison Planet.com
Even as Italy calls for an immediate cease fire, NATO Secretary-General Anders Rasmussen made it clear today that the slaughter in Libya will continue unabated, seemingly unmoved by images showing dead babies murdered as a result of a campaign sold on the justification of “protecting civilians”.
“NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen says the alliance will continue its bombing campaign in Libya, amid calls from Italy for a halt to hostilities to allow humanitarian assistance to civilians,” reports Radio Free Europe.
As we reported from Jim Tucker’s inside sources at Bilderberg 2011 earlier this month, the power elite are determined to intensify, elongate, and turn the Libyan intervention into a “big bloody war”.
In the aftermath of two separate NATO bombardments that killed 24 civilians, including five toddlers, Rasmussen stated that NATO’s bombing campaign was necessary because if it were to stop, “countless more civilians could lose their lives.” George Orwell rolled in his grave.
Justifying the murder of civilians in the name of “protecting civilians,” the same reasoning argued by Obama in his March 19 authorization of military action, Rasmussen once again failed to provide any evidence that anyone other than NATO forces were responsible for killing innocents.
After months of claiming that reports of civilian casualties were myths put out by Gaddafi loyalists, both the establishment media and NATO were forced to admit that “collateral damage” had occurred this past weekend, after a “rogue missile” destroyed a family home killing nine including two toddlers and then just 24 hours later another missile hit four buildings in a rural area west of Tripoli, killing three children.
Fearful of Congress passing legislation that would render the campaign unconstitutional (a mere reinforcement of the War Powers resolution), the Obama administration has pathetically tried to argue that bombing cities and maiming people does not characterize the Libyan intervention as a “war,” because no Americans have been killed.
The administration issued a 32-page report claiming the bombardment of Libya was not a war because, “U.S. operations do not involve sustained fighting or active exchanges of fire with hostile forces, nor do they involve the presence of U.S. ground troops, U.S. casualties or a serious threat thereof, or any significant chance of escalation into a conflict characterized by those factors.”
“In other words, the balance of forces is so lopsided in favor of the United States that no Americans are dying or are threatened with dying,” writes Jonathan Schell. “War is only war, it seems, when Americans are dying, when we die. When only they, the Libyans, die, it is something else for which there is as yet apparently no name. When they attack, it is war. When we attack, it is not.”
Barack Obama, the Nobel Peace Laureate, committed U.S. forces to the bombardment promising it would “last days not weeks.” Three months and a billion dollars later and Obama is now preparing to do the one thing he explicitly promised not to – send in ground troops – because the NATO and US-backed Al-Qaeda terrorists just aren’t getting the job done properly.
Having ignored his own constitutional lawyers on the legality of the conquest, Obama then set about doing something else he promised was not on the agenda – targeting Gaddafi directly for assassination and regime change. NATO bombs have thus far failed to accomplish that feat, but killing Gaddafi’s three grandchildren on May 1st was at least a consolation.
Thanks to Rasmussen, the Nobel Peace Laureate and the rest of the murderers overseeing the onslaught in Libya, we can expect to see many more harrowing scenes like the one below.
*********************
Image: Wikipedia Commons
Paul Joseph WatsonPrison Planet.comEven as Italy calls for an immediate cease fire, NATO Secretary-General Anders Rasmussen made it clear today that the slaughter in Libya will continue unabated, seemingly unmoved by images showing dead babies murdered as a result of a campaign sold on the justification of “protecting civilians”.
“NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen says the alliance will continue its bombing campaign in Libya, amid calls from Italy for a halt to hostilities to allow humanitarian assistance to civilians,” reports Radio Free Europe.
As we reported from Jim Tucker’s inside sources at Bilderberg 2011 earlier this month, the power elite are determined to intensify, elongate, and turn the Libyan intervention into a “big bloody war”.
In the aftermath of two separate NATO bombardments that killed 24 civilians, including five toddlers, Rasmussen stated that NATO’s bombing campaign was necessary because if it were to stop, “countless more civilians could lose their lives.” George Orwell rolled in his grave.
Justifying the murder of civilians in the name of “protecting civilians,” the same reasoning argued by Obama in his March 19 authorization of military action, Rasmussen once again failed to provide any evidence that anyone other than NATO forces were responsible for killing innocents.
After months of claiming that reports of civilian casualties were myths put out by Gaddafi loyalists, both the establishment media and NATO were forced to admit that “collateral damage” had occurred this past weekend, after a “rogue missile” destroyed a family home killing nine including two toddlers and then just 24 hours later another missile hit four buildings in a rural area west of Tripoli, killing three children.
Fearful of Congress passing legislation that would render the campaign unconstitutional (a mere reinforcement of the War Powers resolution), the Obama administration has pathetically tried to argue that bombing cities and maiming people does not characterize the Libyan intervention as a “war,” because no Americans have been killed.
The administration issued a 32-page report claiming the bombardment of Libya was not a war because, “U.S. operations do not involve sustained fighting or active exchanges of fire with hostile forces, nor do they involve the presence of U.S. ground troops, U.S. casualties or a serious threat thereof, or any significant chance of escalation into a conflict characterized by those factors.”
“In other words, the balance of forces is so lopsided in favor of the United States that no Americans are dying or are threatened with dying,” writes Jonathan Schell. “War is only war, it seems, when Americans are dying, when we die. When only they, the Libyans, die, it is something else for which there is as yet apparently no name. When they attack, it is war. When we attack, it is not.”
Barack Obama, the Nobel Peace Laureate, committed U.S. forces to the bombardment promising it would “last days not weeks.” Three months and a billion dollars later and Obama is now preparing to do the one thing he explicitly promised not to – send in ground troops – because the NATO and US-backed Al-Qaeda terrorists just aren’t getting the job done properly.
Having ignored his own constitutional lawyers on the legality of the conquest, Obama then set about doing something else he promised was not on the agenda – targeting Gaddafi directly for assassination and regime change. NATO bombs have thus far failed to accomplish that feat, but killing Gaddafi’s three grandchildren on May 1st was at least a consolation.
Thanks to Rasmussen, the Nobel Peace Laureate and the rest of the murderers overseeing the onslaught in Libya, we can expect to see many more harrowing scenes like the one below.
*********************
PNAC Cabal Warns Congress to Back Off, June 22 2011
Neocon group calls for increase in military action against Qaddafi
Image: Wikimedia Commons
Steve WatsonPrisonplanet.com
The chicken hawk neoconservatives that make up the Project For A New American Century cabal have written on open letter to House Republicans warning them not to reduce or cut funding for U.S. involvement in the military aggression against Libya or face becoming an ” irresolute” nation.
The group, now re-named The Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI), also claims that though it shares with Congress “concerns” over the conduct and justification of the military mission, “The problem is not that the President has done too much… but that he has done too little to achieve the goal of removing Qaddafi from power.”
Last week, the House voted to prohibit the use of funds for American military operations in Libya, following an amendment, introduced by Democratic representative Brad Sherman from California, invoking the War Powers Resolution, a 1973 law that limits presidential powers on sending troops abroad into combat zones without the consent of Congress.
The amendment was part of a military appropriations bill that is still to be approved as a whole. The measure is also still to be approved by the Senate.
In response, earlier this week, forty-one PNAC alumni, including Paul Wolfowitz, James Woolsey, Karl Rove, William Kristol, Liz Cheney and Robert Kagan, signed the letter (PDF) stating:
“The United States should be leading in this effort, not trailing behind our allies. We should be doing more to help the Libyan opposition, which deserves our support. We should not be allowing ourselves to be held hostage to U.N. Security Council resolutions and irresolute allies.”
In what is clearly a veiled threat, the group called on the United States to “see this effort in Libya through to its conclusion,” adding: ” For the United States and NATO to be defeated by Muammar al-Qaddafi would suggest that American leadership and resolution were now gravely in doubt—a conclusion that would undermine American influence and embolden our nation’s enemies.”
They urged Members of Congress to fully support U.S. military involvement in Libya and exhibit “moral leadership despite political pressures to do otherwise.”
The full text of the letter and list of signatories appears at the foot of this article.
Almost all signatories of the PNAC letter are also members of the Council on Foreign Relations, still effectively the steering committee on U.S. foreign policy.
PNAC/FPI has been pushing for regime change in Libya since the beginning, before military operations even started. The group wrote a similar letter to the president in late February, calling for immediate military action to help bring down the Libyan government.
Bill Kristol said at the time that he wished the U.S. would send in ground troops “sooner rather than later.” adding, “we cannot leave Gaddafi in power, and we won’t leave Gaddafi in power.”
As we have recently documented, Infowars has received alarming reports from within the ranks of military stationed at Ft. Hood, Texas confirming plans to initiate a full-scale U.S.-led ground invasion in Libya and deploy troops by October.
In pursuing a continued military assault on Libya, Obama is following orders just like Bush did before him from the same neocons that called for domination of the Middle East and North Africa on the back of “a new Pearl Harbor,” just one year before 9/11.
Everything that has transpired since 9/11 has been an ongoing fulfillment of the PNAC Statement of Principles.
——————————————————————
An Open Letter to House Republicans
We thank you for your leadership as Congress exercises its Constitutional responsibilities on the issue of America’s military actions in Libya. We are gravely concerned, however, by news reports that Congress may consider reducing or cutting funding for U.S. involvement in the NATO-led military operations against the oppressive regime of Libyan dictator Muammar al-Qaddafi. Such a decision would be an abdication of our responsibilities as an ally and as the leader of the Western alliance. It would result in the perpetuation in power of a ruthless dictator who has ordered terrorist attacks on the United States in the past, has pursued nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, and who can be expected to return to these activities should he survive. To cut off funding for current efforts would, in short, be profoundly contrary to American interests.
We share the concerns of many in Congress about the way in which the Obama administration has conducted and justified this operation. The problem is not that the President has done too much, however, but that he has done too little to achieve the goal of removing Qaddafi from power. The United States should be leading in this effort, not trailing behind our allies. We should be doing more to help the Libyan opposition, which deserves our support. We should not be allowing ourselves to be held hostage to U.N. Security Council resolutions and irresolute allies.
What would be even worse, however, would be for the United States to become one of those irresolute allies. The United States must see this effort in Libya through to its conclusion. Success is profoundly in our interests and in keeping with our principles as a nation. The success of NATO’s operations will influence how other Middle Eastern regimes respond to the demands of their people for more political rights and freedoms. For the United States and NATO to be defeated by Muammar al-Qaddafi would suggest that American leadership and resolution were now gravely in doubt—a conclusion that would undermine American influence and embolden our nation’s enemies.
In Speaker Boehner’s June 14, 2011, letter to President Obama, he wrote that he believes “in the moral leadership our country can and should exhibit, especially during such a transformational time in the Middle East.” We share that belief, and feel that now is the time for Congress to exhibit that moral leadership despite political pressures to do otherwise.
Sincerely,
——————————————————————
Image: Wikimedia Commons
Steve WatsonPrisonplanet.com
The chicken hawk neoconservatives that make up the Project For A New American Century cabal have written on open letter to House Republicans warning them not to reduce or cut funding for U.S. involvement in the military aggression against Libya or face becoming an ” irresolute” nation.
The group, now re-named The Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI), also claims that though it shares with Congress “concerns” over the conduct and justification of the military mission, “The problem is not that the President has done too much… but that he has done too little to achieve the goal of removing Qaddafi from power.”
Last week, the House voted to prohibit the use of funds for American military operations in Libya, following an amendment, introduced by Democratic representative Brad Sherman from California, invoking the War Powers Resolution, a 1973 law that limits presidential powers on sending troops abroad into combat zones without the consent of Congress.
The amendment was part of a military appropriations bill that is still to be approved as a whole. The measure is also still to be approved by the Senate.
In response, earlier this week, forty-one PNAC alumni, including Paul Wolfowitz, James Woolsey, Karl Rove, William Kristol, Liz Cheney and Robert Kagan, signed the letter (PDF) stating:
“The United States should be leading in this effort, not trailing behind our allies. We should be doing more to help the Libyan opposition, which deserves our support. We should not be allowing ourselves to be held hostage to U.N. Security Council resolutions and irresolute allies.”
In what is clearly a veiled threat, the group called on the United States to “see this effort in Libya through to its conclusion,” adding: ” For the United States and NATO to be defeated by Muammar al-Qaddafi would suggest that American leadership and resolution were now gravely in doubt—a conclusion that would undermine American influence and embolden our nation’s enemies.”
They urged Members of Congress to fully support U.S. military involvement in Libya and exhibit “moral leadership despite political pressures to do otherwise.”
The full text of the letter and list of signatories appears at the foot of this article.
Almost all signatories of the PNAC letter are also members of the Council on Foreign Relations, still effectively the steering committee on U.S. foreign policy.
PNAC/FPI has been pushing for regime change in Libya since the beginning, before military operations even started. The group wrote a similar letter to the president in late February, calling for immediate military action to help bring down the Libyan government.
Bill Kristol said at the time that he wished the U.S. would send in ground troops “sooner rather than later.” adding, “we cannot leave Gaddafi in power, and we won’t leave Gaddafi in power.”
As we have recently documented, Infowars has received alarming reports from within the ranks of military stationed at Ft. Hood, Texas confirming plans to initiate a full-scale U.S.-led ground invasion in Libya and deploy troops by October.
In pursuing a continued military assault on Libya, Obama is following orders just like Bush did before him from the same neocons that called for domination of the Middle East and North Africa on the back of “a new Pearl Harbor,” just one year before 9/11.
Everything that has transpired since 9/11 has been an ongoing fulfillment of the PNAC Statement of Principles.
——————————————————————
An Open Letter to House Republicans
We thank you for your leadership as Congress exercises its Constitutional responsibilities on the issue of America’s military actions in Libya. We are gravely concerned, however, by news reports that Congress may consider reducing or cutting funding for U.S. involvement in the NATO-led military operations against the oppressive regime of Libyan dictator Muammar al-Qaddafi. Such a decision would be an abdication of our responsibilities as an ally and as the leader of the Western alliance. It would result in the perpetuation in power of a ruthless dictator who has ordered terrorist attacks on the United States in the past, has pursued nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction, and who can be expected to return to these activities should he survive. To cut off funding for current efforts would, in short, be profoundly contrary to American interests.
We share the concerns of many in Congress about the way in which the Obama administration has conducted and justified this operation. The problem is not that the President has done too much, however, but that he has done too little to achieve the goal of removing Qaddafi from power. The United States should be leading in this effort, not trailing behind our allies. We should be doing more to help the Libyan opposition, which deserves our support. We should not be allowing ourselves to be held hostage to U.N. Security Council resolutions and irresolute allies.
What would be even worse, however, would be for the United States to become one of those irresolute allies. The United States must see this effort in Libya through to its conclusion. Success is profoundly in our interests and in keeping with our principles as a nation. The success of NATO’s operations will influence how other Middle Eastern regimes respond to the demands of their people for more political rights and freedoms. For the United States and NATO to be defeated by Muammar al-Qaddafi would suggest that American leadership and resolution were now gravely in doubt—a conclusion that would undermine American influence and embolden our nation’s enemies.
In Speaker Boehner’s June 14, 2011, letter to President Obama, he wrote that he believes “in the moral leadership our country can and should exhibit, especially during such a transformational time in the Middle East.” We share that belief, and feel that now is the time for Congress to exhibit that moral leadership despite political pressures to do otherwise.
Sincerely,
| Elliott Abrams | Bruce Pitcairn Jackson | Danielle Pletka | |
| Gary Bauer | Ash Jain | John Podhoretz | |
| Max Boot | Frederick Kagan | Stephen G. Rademaker | |
| Ellen Bork | Robert Kagan | Karl Rove | |
| Scott Carpenter | Lawrence Kaplan | Randy Scheunemann | |
| Liz Cheney | William Kristol | Gary Schmitt | |
| Seth Cropsey | Robert Lieber | Dan Senor | |
| Thomas Donnelly | Tod Lindberg | Michael Singh | |
| Eric Edelman | Michael Makovsky | Henry D. Sokolski | |
| Jamie Fly | Ann Marlowe | Marc Thiessen | |
| Reuel Marc Gerecht | Clifford D. May | Kenneth Weinstein | |
| John Hannah | Joshua Muravchik | Paul Wolfowitz | |
| William Inboden | Martin Peretz | R. James Woolsey |
——————————————————————
Fareed Zakaria: Dump the Constitution, June 22 2011
Kurt NimmoPrison Planet.com
CNN contributor Fareed Zakaria argues that the Constitution is outdated and its principles should be “debated and fixed” to conform with the modern era. He suggests “a set of amendments to modernize the Constitution for the 21st Century.”
Fareed Zakaria with arch globalist and notorious war criminal Henry Kissinger.
This is not the first time Zakaria has talked about ditching the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. He recently told Charlie Rose that America is “parochial” and there are countries around the world that do things better than we do. See the video below.
Zakaria is a smart fellow. He knows the Constitution established bedrock principles that led to previously unimagined wealth and prosperity.
He also understands the average American knows almost nothing about the Constitution and certainly nothing about republicanism, liberty and inalienable rights. Far too many Americans know virtually nothing about classical liberalism, the ideal of limited government, and the unbridled liberty of individuals including freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and free markets.
Zakaria points to the current social, political, economic breakdown in America. He attributes it to an outmoded system of government. In fact, the system no longer works because America is no longer a constitutionally limited republic and has allowed a secretive cabal of globalists, bankers, and one-worlders to chip our liberty away.
America is in decline precisely because we have allowed the government to replace classical liberalism with a corrupt modern liberalism. It is now widely believed that rights are parceled out, guaranteed and taken away by the state. Our problems arise from the fact we are now vassals of the state and are no longer sovereign citizens.
For Zakaria, the Constitution represents crass parochialism. Small and antiquated minds worship the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the Declaration of Independence. He would have an ignorant and uneducated mob debate and eventually vote our heritage out of existence.
It should come as no surprise Fareed Zakaria wants to do away with the Constitution. He is a darling of the Council On Foreign Relations and a Bilderberg member. He also sits on the board of the Trilateral Commission. He is a serious globalist and as such an avowed enemy of the Constitution and especially the Bill of Rights.
The CFR consensus – and that of its international units, specifically the Trilateral Commission, Club of Rome, and Bilderbergers – is to surrender national identity and constitutional authority to a world government.
“The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries,” said David Rockefeller at a Trilateral meeting in 1991.
Zakaria’s rants about the Constitution have little to do with updating an old document perceived to now be irrelevant and dysfunctional. Zakaria and his globalist coconspirators are determined to destroy the Constitution and the Bill of Rights because the document stands in the way of establishing a one-world supranational government.
The trick is to get the mob to go along and sell themselves into slavery.
CNN contributor Fareed Zakaria argues that the Constitution is outdated and its principles should be “debated and fixed” to conform with the modern era. He suggests “a set of amendments to modernize the Constitution for the 21st Century.”
Fareed Zakaria with arch globalist and notorious war criminal Henry Kissinger.
This is not the first time Zakaria has talked about ditching the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. He recently told Charlie Rose that America is “parochial” and there are countries around the world that do things better than we do. See the video below.
Zakaria is a smart fellow. He knows the Constitution established bedrock principles that led to previously unimagined wealth and prosperity.
He also understands the average American knows almost nothing about the Constitution and certainly nothing about republicanism, liberty and inalienable rights. Far too many Americans know virtually nothing about classical liberalism, the ideal of limited government, and the unbridled liberty of individuals including freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and free markets.
Zakaria points to the current social, political, economic breakdown in America. He attributes it to an outmoded system of government. In fact, the system no longer works because America is no longer a constitutionally limited republic and has allowed a secretive cabal of globalists, bankers, and one-worlders to chip our liberty away.
America is in decline precisely because we have allowed the government to replace classical liberalism with a corrupt modern liberalism. It is now widely believed that rights are parceled out, guaranteed and taken away by the state. Our problems arise from the fact we are now vassals of the state and are no longer sovereign citizens.
For Zakaria, the Constitution represents crass parochialism. Small and antiquated minds worship the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the Declaration of Independence. He would have an ignorant and uneducated mob debate and eventually vote our heritage out of existence.
It should come as no surprise Fareed Zakaria wants to do away with the Constitution. He is a darling of the Council On Foreign Relations and a Bilderberg member. He also sits on the board of the Trilateral Commission. He is a serious globalist and as such an avowed enemy of the Constitution and especially the Bill of Rights.
The CFR consensus – and that of its international units, specifically the Trilateral Commission, Club of Rome, and Bilderbergers – is to surrender national identity and constitutional authority to a world government.
“The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries,” said David Rockefeller at a Trilateral meeting in 1991.
Zakaria’s rants about the Constitution have little to do with updating an old document perceived to now be irrelevant and dysfunctional. Zakaria and his globalist coconspirators are determined to destroy the Constitution and the Bill of Rights because the document stands in the way of establishing a one-world supranational government.
The trick is to get the mob to go along and sell themselves into slavery.
Turkish Actions to Trigger NATO Confrontation?, June 22 2011
Rick Rozoff
Scoop
Last week, a feature by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton excoriating the political leadership of Syria appeared in the London-based Arabic-language daily Asharq Al-Awsat. Saudi-supported and printed in twelve locations, it is considered to be among the most influential newspapers in the Arab world.
As such, her comments (in English and Arabic) were intended to signal to Arab readers and the world at large that the American position toward Damascus is becoming more stringent and confrontational, evoking Clinton’s statements toward the leadership of Ivory Coast and Libya earlier in the year.
Her characteristically imperious, contemptuous and inflammatory comments, indeed threats, included:
“In his May 19 speech, President Obama echoed demonstrators’ basic and legitimate demands…President Assad, he said, could either lead that transition or get out of the way.
“It is increasingly clear that President Assad has made his choice.”
FULL STORY
Scoop
Last week, a feature by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton excoriating the political leadership of Syria appeared in the London-based Arabic-language daily Asharq Al-Awsat. Saudi-supported and printed in twelve locations, it is considered to be among the most influential newspapers in the Arab world.
As such, her comments (in English and Arabic) were intended to signal to Arab readers and the world at large that the American position toward Damascus is becoming more stringent and confrontational, evoking Clinton’s statements toward the leadership of Ivory Coast and Libya earlier in the year.
Her characteristically imperious, contemptuous and inflammatory comments, indeed threats, included:
“In his May 19 speech, President Obama echoed demonstrators’ basic and legitimate demands…President Assad, he said, could either lead that transition or get out of the way.
“It is increasingly clear that President Assad has made his choice.”
FULL STORY
America's Latest Proposal, June 22 2011
Zero Hedge
A few months ago we reported on Goldman’s proposal to change the definition of GDP to make the US economy appear to be growing faster than it really is. So far, it has not caught on, as even the revised definition will soon confirm a contraction. But that proposal appears to have given Joe Biden some ideas, who now has taken the Fukushima approach to (sur)reality, whereby one merely changes the terms of data measurement when the data does not cooperate. Enter the revised CPI: “Lawmakers are considering changing how the Consumer Price Index is calculated, a move that could save perhaps $220 billion and represent significant progress in the ongoing federal debt ceiling and deficit reduction talks.”
And because nobody has an issue with the current artificial hedonic and otherwise adjustments to the CPI which always reflect a far lower increase in prices than what is actually happening, here comes the government with another idea to make inflation appear to be rising even slower: “According to congressional aides familiar with the discussions, the proposal would shift how the Consumer Price Index is calculated to reflect how people tend to change spending patterns when prices increase. For example, consumers tend to drive less when gas prices increase dramatically. Such a move is widely seen by economists as resulting in a slower rise in inflation. That would impact an array of federal programs that are linked to CPI including the Social Security program and income tax brackets set by the federal government. The proposal could lower federal spending by around $220 billion over the next decade, based on calculations by last year’s White House deficit commission, which recommended the change as part of its final report.”
What does this mean practically? SImply said, the worst of all worlds for the US middle class: “[the proposal] would likely lead to both lower benefits paid to seniors and higher taxes paid by most people who pay federal income tax.” We expect this last-ditch accounting gimmick will be implemented shortly, and the broader American population will not care one bit that it’s purchasing power will see a step function drop yet again in the ongoing crusade to destroy the dollar.
More on this surreal idea which is actually being very seriously discussed in DC:
A few months ago we reported on Goldman’s proposal to change the definition of GDP to make the US economy appear to be growing faster than it really is. So far, it has not caught on, as even the revised definition will soon confirm a contraction. But that proposal appears to have given Joe Biden some ideas, who now has taken the Fukushima approach to (sur)reality, whereby one merely changes the terms of data measurement when the data does not cooperate. Enter the revised CPI: “Lawmakers are considering changing how the Consumer Price Index is calculated, a move that could save perhaps $220 billion and represent significant progress in the ongoing federal debt ceiling and deficit reduction talks.”
And because nobody has an issue with the current artificial hedonic and otherwise adjustments to the CPI which always reflect a far lower increase in prices than what is actually happening, here comes the government with another idea to make inflation appear to be rising even slower: “According to congressional aides familiar with the discussions, the proposal would shift how the Consumer Price Index is calculated to reflect how people tend to change spending patterns when prices increase. For example, consumers tend to drive less when gas prices increase dramatically. Such a move is widely seen by economists as resulting in a slower rise in inflation. That would impact an array of federal programs that are linked to CPI including the Social Security program and income tax brackets set by the federal government. The proposal could lower federal spending by around $220 billion over the next decade, based on calculations by last year’s White House deficit commission, which recommended the change as part of its final report.”
What does this mean practically? SImply said, the worst of all worlds for the US middle class: “[the proposal] would likely lead to both lower benefits paid to seniors and higher taxes paid by most people who pay federal income tax.” We expect this last-ditch accounting gimmick will be implemented shortly, and the broader American population will not care one bit that it’s purchasing power will see a step function drop yet again in the ongoing crusade to destroy the dollar.
More on this surreal idea which is actually being very seriously discussed in DC:
According to two congressional aides familiar with the budget negotiations, the shift is being “seriously discussed” as part of the ongoing talks to strike a budget deal, that would be used to ease the passage of a required increase in the country’s debt limit.
Those talks involve Democratic and Republican lawmakers from both chambers and are led by Vice President Joe Biden. The group held its latest meeting Tuesday as they strive to reach the broad outlines of a compromise on federal spending by the end of the month.
In a press conference that took place before the meeting, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R., Va.) declined to comment on the specific proposal, other than to say that “a lot of things are on the table.” But asked whether the proposal would be interpreted as a tax increase and therefore a non-starter for Republicans, Cantor said it could be seen as both impacting tax rates and benefits paid out by the federal government.
When asked about the idea after the meeting, Rep. Jim Clyburn (D., S.C.) said everything is being discussed.
It could be easier for both parties to agree on than a significant overhaul to the Medicare proposal or an increase of taxes on wealthier Americans.
“It’s certainly something that is going to be considered,” said James Horney, director of federal fiscal policy at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal think tank. “There are questions whether it would be politically easy.”
Several senators that are not party to the Biden-led talks voiced support for the proposal including Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D., N.D.), while Sen. John Thune (R., S.D.), a member of the Republican leadership team, said it should be looked at as part of the negotiations.Washington just took extend and pretend to a whole new level.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Obama: the Baby Silencer, June 22 2011
Dead toddlers cannot be dismissed as another Gaddafi propaganda stunt
Paul Joseph WatsonPrison Planet.com
Obamanoids (yes they’re still out there) are eagerly circulating the following You Tube clip of the President silencing a crying baby by holding it in his arms. It’s just a shame that Obama has also proven adept at silencing babies in north Africa, by murdering them as part of his unconstitutional onslaught against Libya.
“So glad I voted for him. Finally a president of which I can be proud,” wrote one commenter in response to the clip.
“Suck on that gop douche bags. He is also the comforter-in-chief. 4 more years and we’ll turn things around so you c**ts can ruin everything in 2016,” added another.
“Sooooooo adorable!! This was wonderful and that’s my President,” remarked another.
I wonder what those same individuals would make of the following clip, graphic and disturbing, which brings home the repulsive hypocrisy of the “humanitarian” hoax behind the bombardment of Libya that Obama ignored his own constitutional lawyers to oversee without congressional approval, a campaign we were told would last “days, not weeks” that is now approaching its third month, and an intervention that was launched to “protect Libyan civilians”.
After months of reporting that every claim of civilian casualties was a Gaddafi propaganda stunt, the establishment media was forced to concede that dropping bombs on apartment blocks isn’t a very proficient way of liberating people, unless you’re seeking to liberate their limbs from their body.
NATO had to admit that a “rogue missile” destroyed a family home, killing nine civilians including two children, but not to be discouraged they followed it up 24 hours later with another bombardment that killed 15 people including three more dead kids, having bombed Tripoli’s Nasser University the week before.
Recall that the May 1st slaughter of Gaddafi’s three grandchildren was also met with a collective shrug of the shoulders from the establishment press, even as Obama deceitfully claimed that the mission had nothing to do with targeting Gaddafi himself directly.
Watching this video stirs harrowing feelings of senselessness, but taken from a wider perspective, the act of killing toddlers could actually benefit the NATO powers in the long run.
With efforts to label the bombardment of Libya as a “no fly zone” and then a “kinetic military action,” anything basically to avoid what it really represents, a war absent congressional approval or any kind of moral legitimacy, Obama and NATO are desperately scrambling for any justification on which to base the inevitable ground invasion set to be launched in early October.
If images of dead babies stir terrorists loyal to Gaddafi into action, expect western powers and the corporate media to rapaciously welcome any reprisal attacks that can be exploited to sell the necessity of the campaign.
Meanwhile, Obama and NATO will continue to work with their own Al-Qaeda terrorists to achieve regime change at any cost – so expect many more babies to be “silenced” as part of the Nobel Peace Laureate’s quest to “protect Libyan civilians” and “stop violence”.
In reality, this war has nothing to do with humanitarian protection and everything to do with violent and bloody conquest. As Louis Farrakhan spelled out during a recent speech, we have yet another “murderer in the White House.”
*********************
Paul Joseph WatsonPrison Planet.com
Obamanoids (yes they’re still out there) are eagerly circulating the following You Tube clip of the President silencing a crying baby by holding it in his arms. It’s just a shame that Obama has also proven adept at silencing babies in north Africa, by murdering them as part of his unconstitutional onslaught against Libya.
“So glad I voted for him. Finally a president of which I can be proud,” wrote one commenter in response to the clip.
“Suck on that gop douche bags. He is also the comforter-in-chief. 4 more years and we’ll turn things around so you c**ts can ruin everything in 2016,” added another.
“Sooooooo adorable!! This was wonderful and that’s my President,” remarked another.
I wonder what those same individuals would make of the following clip, graphic and disturbing, which brings home the repulsive hypocrisy of the “humanitarian” hoax behind the bombardment of Libya that Obama ignored his own constitutional lawyers to oversee without congressional approval, a campaign we were told would last “days, not weeks” that is now approaching its third month, and an intervention that was launched to “protect Libyan civilians”.
After months of reporting that every claim of civilian casualties was a Gaddafi propaganda stunt, the establishment media was forced to concede that dropping bombs on apartment blocks isn’t a very proficient way of liberating people, unless you’re seeking to liberate their limbs from their body.
NATO had to admit that a “rogue missile” destroyed a family home, killing nine civilians including two children, but not to be discouraged they followed it up 24 hours later with another bombardment that killed 15 people including three more dead kids, having bombed Tripoli’s Nasser University the week before.
Recall that the May 1st slaughter of Gaddafi’s three grandchildren was also met with a collective shrug of the shoulders from the establishment press, even as Obama deceitfully claimed that the mission had nothing to do with targeting Gaddafi himself directly.
Watching this video stirs harrowing feelings of senselessness, but taken from a wider perspective, the act of killing toddlers could actually benefit the NATO powers in the long run.
With efforts to label the bombardment of Libya as a “no fly zone” and then a “kinetic military action,” anything basically to avoid what it really represents, a war absent congressional approval or any kind of moral legitimacy, Obama and NATO are desperately scrambling for any justification on which to base the inevitable ground invasion set to be launched in early October.
If images of dead babies stir terrorists loyal to Gaddafi into action, expect western powers and the corporate media to rapaciously welcome any reprisal attacks that can be exploited to sell the necessity of the campaign.
Meanwhile, Obama and NATO will continue to work with their own Al-Qaeda terrorists to achieve regime change at any cost – so expect many more babies to be “silenced” as part of the Nobel Peace Laureate’s quest to “protect Libyan civilians” and “stop violence”.
In reality, this war has nothing to do with humanitarian protection and everything to do with violent and bloody conquest. As Louis Farrakhan spelled out during a recent speech, we have yet another “murderer in the White House.”
*********************
FBI Seizes Server, Knocks Sites Offline, June 22 2011
VERNE G. KOPYTOFF
New York Times
The F.B.I. seized Web servers in a raid on a data center early Tuesday, causing several Web sites, including those run by the New York publisher Curbed Network, to go offline.
The raid happened at 1:15 a.m. at a hosting facility in Reston, Va., used by DigitalOne, which is based in Switzerland, the company said. The F.B.I. did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the raid.
In an e-mail to one of its clients on Tuesday afternoon, a DigitalOne employee, Sergej Ostroumow, said: “This problem is caused by the F.B.I., not our company. In the night F.B.I. has taken 3 enclosures with equipment plugged into them, possibly including your server — we can not check it.”
Mr. Ostroumow said that the F.B.I. was only interested in one of the company’s clients but had taken servers used by “tens of clients.” He wrote: “After F.B.I.’s unprofessional ‘work’ we can not restart our own servers, that’s why our website is offline and support doesn’t work.” The company’s staff had been working to solve the problem for the previous 15 hours, he said.
Full story here.
New York Times
The F.B.I. seized Web servers in a raid on a data center early Tuesday, causing several Web sites, including those run by the New York publisher Curbed Network, to go offline.
The raid happened at 1:15 a.m. at a hosting facility in Reston, Va., used by DigitalOne, which is based in Switzerland, the company said. The F.B.I. did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the raid.
In an e-mail to one of its clients on Tuesday afternoon, a DigitalOne employee, Sergej Ostroumow, said: “This problem is caused by the F.B.I., not our company. In the night F.B.I. has taken 3 enclosures with equipment plugged into them, possibly including your server — we can not check it.”
Mr. Ostroumow said that the F.B.I. was only interested in one of the company’s clients but had taken servers used by “tens of clients.” He wrote: “After F.B.I.’s unprofessional ‘work’ we can not restart our own servers, that’s why our website is offline and support doesn’t work.” The company’s staff had been working to solve the problem for the previous 15 hours, he said.
Full story here.
3 in 10 Will Vote for Obama, June 22 2011
Julianna Goldman
Bloomberg
Americans are growing more dissatisfied with President Barack Obama’s handling of the economy and say it will be hard to vote to re-elect him without seeing significant progress over the next year and a half.
By a margin of 61 percent to 37 percent, a Bloomberg National Poll conducted June 17-20 shows Americans say they believe that Obama will have had his chance to make the economy “substantially better” by the end of 2012.
Only 30 percent of respondents said they are certain to vote for the president and 36 percent said they definitely won’t. Among likely independent voters, only 23 percent said they will back his re-election, while 36 percent said they definitely will look for another candidate.
“As far as the economy goes, I don’t see that he has delivered on the change that he promised,” said Sharon Ortiz, a 38-year-old independent voter from Hampton, Virginia, who supported Obama in 2008. “The jobs that he promised — I haven’t seen it.”
Full story here.
Bloomberg
Americans are growing more dissatisfied with President Barack Obama’s handling of the economy and say it will be hard to vote to re-elect him without seeing significant progress over the next year and a half.
By a margin of 61 percent to 37 percent, a Bloomberg National Poll conducted June 17-20 shows Americans say they believe that Obama will have had his chance to make the economy “substantially better” by the end of 2012.
Only 30 percent of respondents said they are certain to vote for the president and 36 percent said they definitely won’t. Among likely independent voters, only 23 percent said they will back his re-election, while 36 percent said they definitely will look for another candidate.
“As far as the economy goes, I don’t see that he has delivered on the change that he promised,” said Sharon Ortiz, a 38-year-old independent voter from Hampton, Virginia, who supported Obama in 2008. “The jobs that he promised — I haven’t seen it.”
Full story here.
Al Gore & Population Control, June 22 2011
Watts Up With That?
Not content to make a fool of himself confusing weather and climate, Al has now decided tolecture empower women on how to reduce the population for the benefit of the planet. Watch the video below, now we know why he doesn’t allow recordings of his lectures. Darn those Flip Video Cameras.
And here is his wisdom of weather and climate
Recorded June 20th by Brian Merchant, hat tip to Chris Horner.
UPDATE: Tom Nelson on his blog points out the bottled water next to Gore.
Flashback: Pour the bottled-water trend down the drain
Following the radically liberal traditions of San Francisco, Mayor Gavin Newsom banned municipal departments from purchasing bottled water, even for water coolers.
Not content to make a fool of himself confusing weather and climate, Al has now decided to
Al Gore How Empowering Women Fights Climate Change
And here is his wisdom of weather and climate
Al Gore Talks Extreme Weather, Climate
Recorded June 20th by Brian Merchant, hat tip to Chris Horner.
UPDATE: Tom Nelson on his blog points out the bottled water next to Gore.
Flashback: Pour the bottled-water trend down the drain
it’s time for those of us who care about the environment and are concerned about global warming to stop buying and drinking bottled water.2007: Bottled Water Ban Not Enough
Following the radically liberal traditions of San Francisco, Mayor Gavin Newsom banned municipal departments from purchasing bottled water, even for water coolers.
Fukushima 'still a ticking time bomb', June 22 2011
CNN
Famed physicist Michio Kaku says Japanese officials still don’t have control of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.
Famed physicist Michio Kaku says Japanese officials still don’t have control of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.
the True Horror of National Debt, June 22 2011
Economic Collapse Blog
It really is hard to find the words to describe the true horror of the national debt. The U.S. government has been on the greatest debt binge in all of human history, and a day of reckoning is coming that is going to be so painful that it is going to shock America to the core. We have lived so far above our means for so long that none of us really has any concept of what “normal” is like anymore. The United States has enjoyed the greatest party in the history of the world, but now this decades-old party is ending and the bills are coming due. It was Dick Cheney who famously said that “deficits don’t matter”. Well, try telling that to the nation of Greece right about now. The horror that Greece is just beginning to experience is a preview of what is going to happen to us as well. Only when it happens to us it is going to be so much worse, because when we go down we are going to bring the entire global financial system down with us.
What we have done to future generations is beyond sickening. Previous generations entrusted to us the greatest economic machine in the history of the world and we destroyed it. Now we are leaving to our children and our grandchildren an economic future that has been totally wiped out and a national debt of more than 14 trillion dollars that we expect them to repay.
In Washington D.C. these days, there is a lot of talk about the debt ceiling. But whatever the politicians do, it is not going to solve our debt problems. If the debt ceiling does not get raised, we move the financial pain into the present. World financial markets would crash and that would be followed by a devastating economic nightmare.
If we do raise the debt ceiling, that will “kick the can down the road” a little bit farther. However, world financial markets will still crash eventually and our eventual economic nightmare will be even worse.
Well, can’t we just “inflate our way” out of debt?
FULL STORY
It really is hard to find the words to describe the true horror of the national debt. The U.S. government has been on the greatest debt binge in all of human history, and a day of reckoning is coming that is going to be so painful that it is going to shock America to the core. We have lived so far above our means for so long that none of us really has any concept of what “normal” is like anymore. The United States has enjoyed the greatest party in the history of the world, but now this decades-old party is ending and the bills are coming due. It was Dick Cheney who famously said that “deficits don’t matter”. Well, try telling that to the nation of Greece right about now. The horror that Greece is just beginning to experience is a preview of what is going to happen to us as well. Only when it happens to us it is going to be so much worse, because when we go down we are going to bring the entire global financial system down with us.
What we have done to future generations is beyond sickening. Previous generations entrusted to us the greatest economic machine in the history of the world and we destroyed it. Now we are leaving to our children and our grandchildren an economic future that has been totally wiped out and a national debt of more than 14 trillion dollars that we expect them to repay.
In Washington D.C. these days, there is a lot of talk about the debt ceiling. But whatever the politicians do, it is not going to solve our debt problems. If the debt ceiling does not get raised, we move the financial pain into the present. World financial markets would crash and that would be followed by a devastating economic nightmare.
If we do raise the debt ceiling, that will “kick the can down the road” a little bit farther. However, world financial markets will still crash eventually and our eventual economic nightmare will be even worse.
Well, can’t we just “inflate our way” out of debt?
FULL STORY
If Americans Dont Get Hurt..., June 22 2011
Jonathan SchellTom Dispatch
The Obama administration has come up with a remarkable justification for going to war against Libya without the congressional approval required by the Constitution and the War Powers Resolution of 1973.
American planes are taking off, they are entering Libyan air space, they are locating targets, they are dropping bombs, and the bombs are killing and injuring people and destroying things. It is war. Some say it is a good war and some say it is a bad war, but surely it is a war.
Nonetheless, the Obama administration insists it is not a war. Why? Because, according to “United States Activities in Libya,” a 32-page report that the administration released last week, “U.S. operations do not involve sustained fighting or active exchanges of fire with hostile forces, nor do they involve the presence of U.S. ground troops, U.S. casualties or a serious threat thereof, or any significant chance of escalation into a conflict characterized by those factors.”
In other words, the balance of forces is so lopsided in favor of the United States that no Americans are dying or are threatened with dying. War is only war, it seems, when Americans are dying, when we die. When only they, the Libyans, die, it is something else for which there is as yet apparently no name. When they attack, it is war. When we attack, it is not.
This cannot be classified as anything but strange thinking and it depends, in turn, on a strange fact: that, in our day, it is indeed possible for some countries (or maybe only our own), for the first time in history, to wage war without receiving a scratch in return. This was nearly accomplished in the bombing of Serbia in 1999, in which only one American plane was shot down (and the pilot rescued).
The epitome of this new warfare is the predator drone, which has become an emblem of the Obama administration. Its human operators can sit at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada or in Langley, Virginia, while the drone floats above Afghanistan or Pakistan or Yemen or Libya, pouring destruction down from the skies. War waged in this way is without casualties for the wager because none of its soldiers are near the scene of battle — if that is even the right word for what is going on.
Some strange conclusions follow from this strange thinking and these strange facts. In the old scheme of things, an attack on a country was an act of war, no matter who launched it or what happened next. Now, the Obama administration claims that if the adversary cannot fight back, there is no war.
It follows that adversaries of the United States have a new motive for, if not equaling us, then at least doing us some damage. Only then will they be accorded the legal protections (such as they are) of authorized war.
Without that, they are at the mercy of the whim of the president.
The War Powers Resolution permits the president to initiate military operations only when the nation is directly attacked, when there is “a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.” The Obama administration, however, justifies its actions in the Libyan intervention precisely on the grounds that there is no threat to the invading forces, much less the territories of the United States.
There is a parallel here with the administration of George W. Bush on the issue of torture (though not, needless to say, a parallel between the Libyan war itself, which I oppose but whose merits can be reasonably debated, and torture, which was wholly reprehensible). President Bush wanted the torture he was ordering not to be considered torture, so he arranged to get lawyers in the Justice department to write legal-sounding opinions excluding certain forms of torture, such as waterboarding, from the definition of the word. Those practices were thenceforward called “enhanced interrogation techniques.”
Now, Obama wants his Libyan war not to be a war and so has arranged to define a certain kind of war — the American-casualty-free kind — as not war (though without even the full support of his own lawyers). Along with Libya, a good English word — war — is under attack.
In these semantic operations of power upon language, a word is separated from its commonly accepted meaning. The meanings of words are one of the few common grounds that communities naturally share.
When agreed meanings are challenged, no one can use the words in question without stirring up spurious “debates,” as happened with the word torture. For instance, mainstream news organizations, submissive to George Bush’s decisions on the meanings of words, stopped calling waterboarding torture and started calling it other things, including “enhanced interrogation techniques,” but also “harsh treatment,” “abusive practices,” and so on.
Will the news media now stop calling the war against Libya a war? No euphemism for war has yet caught on, though soon after launching its Libyan attacks, an administration official proposed the phrase “kinetic military action” and more recently, in that 32-page report, the term of choice was “limited military operations.” No doubt someone will come up with something catchier soon.
How did the administration twist itself into this pretzel? An interview that Charlie Savage and Mark Landler of the New York Times held with State Department legal advisor Harold Koh sheds at least some light on the matter. Many administrations and legislators have taken issue with the War Powers Resolution, claiming it challenges powers inherent in the presidency. Others, such as Bush administration Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, have argued that the Constitution’s plain declaration that Congress “shall declare war” does not mean what most readers think it means, and so leaves the president free to initiate all kinds of wars.
Koh has long opposed these interpretations — and in a way, even now, he remains consistent. Speaking for the administration, he still upholds Congress’s power to declare war and the constitutionality of the War Powers Resolution. “We are not saying the president can take the country into war on his own,” he told the Times. “We are not saying the War Powers Resolution is unconstitutional or should be scrapped or that we can refuse to consult Congress. We are saying the limited nature of this particular mission is not the kind of ‘hostilities’ envisioned by the War Powers Resolution.”
In a curious way, then, a desire to avoid challenge to existing law has forced assault on the dictionary. For the Obama administration to go ahead with a war lacking any form of Congressional authorization, it had to challenge either law or the common meaning of words. Either the law or language had to give.
It chose language.
The Obama administration has come up with a remarkable justification for going to war against Libya without the congressional approval required by the Constitution and the War Powers Resolution of 1973.
American planes are taking off, they are entering Libyan air space, they are locating targets, they are dropping bombs, and the bombs are killing and injuring people and destroying things. It is war. Some say it is a good war and some say it is a bad war, but surely it is a war.
Nonetheless, the Obama administration insists it is not a war. Why? Because, according to “United States Activities in Libya,” a 32-page report that the administration released last week, “U.S. operations do not involve sustained fighting or active exchanges of fire with hostile forces, nor do they involve the presence of U.S. ground troops, U.S. casualties or a serious threat thereof, or any significant chance of escalation into a conflict characterized by those factors.”
In other words, the balance of forces is so lopsided in favor of the United States that no Americans are dying or are threatened with dying. War is only war, it seems, when Americans are dying, when we die. When only they, the Libyans, die, it is something else for which there is as yet apparently no name. When they attack, it is war. When we attack, it is not.
This cannot be classified as anything but strange thinking and it depends, in turn, on a strange fact: that, in our day, it is indeed possible for some countries (or maybe only our own), for the first time in history, to wage war without receiving a scratch in return. This was nearly accomplished in the bombing of Serbia in 1999, in which only one American plane was shot down (and the pilot rescued).
The epitome of this new warfare is the predator drone, which has become an emblem of the Obama administration. Its human operators can sit at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada or in Langley, Virginia, while the drone floats above Afghanistan or Pakistan or Yemen or Libya, pouring destruction down from the skies. War waged in this way is without casualties for the wager because none of its soldiers are near the scene of battle — if that is even the right word for what is going on.
Some strange conclusions follow from this strange thinking and these strange facts. In the old scheme of things, an attack on a country was an act of war, no matter who launched it or what happened next. Now, the Obama administration claims that if the adversary cannot fight back, there is no war.
It follows that adversaries of the United States have a new motive for, if not equaling us, then at least doing us some damage. Only then will they be accorded the legal protections (such as they are) of authorized war.
Without that, they are at the mercy of the whim of the president.
The War Powers Resolution permits the president to initiate military operations only when the nation is directly attacked, when there is “a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.” The Obama administration, however, justifies its actions in the Libyan intervention precisely on the grounds that there is no threat to the invading forces, much less the territories of the United States.
There is a parallel here with the administration of George W. Bush on the issue of torture (though not, needless to say, a parallel between the Libyan war itself, which I oppose but whose merits can be reasonably debated, and torture, which was wholly reprehensible). President Bush wanted the torture he was ordering not to be considered torture, so he arranged to get lawyers in the Justice department to write legal-sounding opinions excluding certain forms of torture, such as waterboarding, from the definition of the word. Those practices were thenceforward called “enhanced interrogation techniques.”
Now, Obama wants his Libyan war not to be a war and so has arranged to define a certain kind of war — the American-casualty-free kind — as not war (though without even the full support of his own lawyers). Along with Libya, a good English word — war — is under attack.
In these semantic operations of power upon language, a word is separated from its commonly accepted meaning. The meanings of words are one of the few common grounds that communities naturally share.
When agreed meanings are challenged, no one can use the words in question without stirring up spurious “debates,” as happened with the word torture. For instance, mainstream news organizations, submissive to George Bush’s decisions on the meanings of words, stopped calling waterboarding torture and started calling it other things, including “enhanced interrogation techniques,” but also “harsh treatment,” “abusive practices,” and so on.
Will the news media now stop calling the war against Libya a war? No euphemism for war has yet caught on, though soon after launching its Libyan attacks, an administration official proposed the phrase “kinetic military action” and more recently, in that 32-page report, the term of choice was “limited military operations.” No doubt someone will come up with something catchier soon.
How did the administration twist itself into this pretzel? An interview that Charlie Savage and Mark Landler of the New York Times held with State Department legal advisor Harold Koh sheds at least some light on the matter. Many administrations and legislators have taken issue with the War Powers Resolution, claiming it challenges powers inherent in the presidency. Others, such as Bush administration Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, have argued that the Constitution’s plain declaration that Congress “shall declare war” does not mean what most readers think it means, and so leaves the president free to initiate all kinds of wars.
Koh has long opposed these interpretations — and in a way, even now, he remains consistent. Speaking for the administration, he still upholds Congress’s power to declare war and the constitutionality of the War Powers Resolution. “We are not saying the president can take the country into war on his own,” he told the Times. “We are not saying the War Powers Resolution is unconstitutional or should be scrapped or that we can refuse to consult Congress. We are saying the limited nature of this particular mission is not the kind of ‘hostilities’ envisioned by the War Powers Resolution.”
In a curious way, then, a desire to avoid challenge to existing law has forced assault on the dictionary. For the Obama administration to go ahead with a war lacking any form of Congressional authorization, it had to challenge either law or the common meaning of words. Either the law or language had to give.
It chose language.
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