News stories for Thursday, November 18, 2010 Part 2

America - the view from the rest of the world

My Favorite Intrusive Body Scanner Cartoons compiled by Dayrl Cagle

US panel lashes out at China

n a much-anticipated report, the US-China Economic and Security Review commission has accused Beijing of deceptive economic practises, effectively reigniting the two countries' spat over currency and trade issues. Presenting its findings to the US Congress, the congressional advisory panel has recommended the Obama administration to take tougher actions against what it calls China's policy of keeping its currency undervalued. On Wednesday, the commission said that China is creating global imbalances and using "market access-limiting practises" that fall outside its World Trade Organisation commitments. Webmaster's Commentary:

This a petulant President's revenge for not getting what he wanted out of the G20 conference.

China is not to blame for the US's financial woes: our current domestic, foreign, and banking policies have brought us to the place we are now. China has an enviable surplus: the US government may well collapse, choking under the weight its own deficit. Jobs have been allowed by this government to be offshored, creating a huge unemployment problem in this country.

Those people who, legitimately, qualified for a mortgage when they got it, but are now without work, cannot keep up the payments, so houses are foreclosed on, and these people are now both jobless and homeless. You have a situation where he banks have deliberately oversold those mortgages to the point where no one really knows exactly who holds the title. Obama has continued an endless cycle of costly wars, with the situations in Afghanistan and Iraq going horrendously badly; yet, we are also at war in Pakistan, and soon, Yemen.

The only people actually "winning" in these situations are the defense contractors, who provide mercenaries, supplies and logistics, and the drug lords. Did the Chinese government do anything to cause any of the above to happen?!? Not at all. The US government is desperately attempting to deflect blame from the fact that it is US governmental policies which have wreaked havoc on the lives of the American people, not the Chinese government.

China Telecom rejects US hijack claims

A leading Chinese telecommunication company has rejected the US claims implicating the firm for some temporary redirecting of sensitive Internet traffic on US websites. China Telecom, one of the country's major telecommunications operators, rejected US claims that its servers "hijacked" highly sensitive Internet traffic for 18 minutes on April 8 on American government and military websites, AFP reported on Thursday.

Webmaster's Commentary:

More gratuitous China-bashing and rather lame since there is no reason for such sensitive US traffic to even leave the US networks let alone route through Chinese servers. Since the "great revolt" that transformed the ARPAnet into the Internet, the military has set up a parallel network of their own, which for obvious reasons is not connected to the global internet. So this story was a non-starter, to begin with

ARIZONA FURY OVER CONSTRUCTION OF MOSQUE!!!!!!!!

Webmaster's Commentary:

The fact that is is actually a Christian church apparently did not get through the thick skulls of the Islamophobes. A good hate is a terrible thing to waste!

China unveils jet to rival Boeing and Airbus

China has unveiled its first large domestically produced passenger jet, which aims to compete with Airbus and Boeing in the global aviation market, state media reported Tuesday. The C919 prototype made its debut at an aviation exhibition in the southern province of Guangdong, and three major state-owned airlines were due to sign deals to buy the planes on Tuesday, the official China Daily said.

Passengers Upset With New Airport Security

With the holiday travel season fast approaching, recent stepped-up security screening at the nation’s airports has provoked an outcry from passengers and airline pilots alike, with some of the latter group even threatening to boycott intrusive new checks during the Thanksgiving rush.

Webmaster's Commentary: These scanning machines can cost between 150,000 to 170,000 dollars. And they are planning on adding another 1000 of them..just here in USA... Look also to add thousands around the world... Very profitable business, Mr. Chertoff!

Israel US Settlement Freeze Deal Waits On U.S. Document

Israel insisted Thursday it would keep building homes in disputed east Jerusalem, threatening to hold up a U.S.-proposed settlement construction moratorium designed to renew deadlocked Mideast peacemaking.Washington, they said, had agreed to exclude the eastern sector of the holy city from the 90-day moratorium and there would be no further demands for construction curbs in the West Bank when the latest moratorium expired. To entice the Israelis to sign on to the deal, the U.S. has proposed a package of incentives including a gift of 20 next-generation stealth fighter planes and U.S. pledges to veto anti-Israel resolutions at the United Nations, Israeli officials have said. Webmaster's Commentary: Should this deal go through, it will bring Israel and the Palestinians no closer to a true peace deal than when it started: the only thing it is guaranteed to do is to make
We the Taxpayers (whose forced largesse makes such a deal possible) poorer by the costs of these 20 stealth fighter planes.

UC Students Clash With Police Over 32% Fee Hike

I guess they need the money for all the illegals the California courts say they have to admit.

No Plans In Senate For A Vote On Unemployment Benefits

Congress has until the end of the month to reauthorize federally-funded unemployment benefits currently supporting five million long-term jobless (practically, they have just until Friday because of a Thanksgiving break next week). If the federal benefits are allowed to lapse, waves of people will prematurely stop receiving them, with two million people facing a cutoff by the end of the year. "The unemployed in this country face a grim holiday season if we don't act quickly," said Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), who co-introduced the bill with House Ways and Means Chairman Sander Levin (D-Mich.). "In 75 years we have never cut federal unemployment benefits when the unemployment rate has been this high."

Webmaster's Commentary: Were I a betting person, I would not necessarily bet that these benefits will be extended.

After all, these unemployed (many of whom have had their jobs offshored) aren't the big corporations which have acquired most of those in Congress, so this unemployed portion of the electorate doesn't count. Congress, apparently, feels that they are sufficiently insulated from any blowback (read: "civil unrest") from the consequences of a decision to not to extend benefits. But I would almost be willing to bet on one thing; that the funding for these illegal and immoral wars of conquest will not only not be cut, but will also be expanded.

Professor who downplayed oil spill has federal government contracts

Professor Emeritus of Environmental Science at Louisiana State University, Overton, who has been criticized for downplaying the effects of the worst offshore oil spill in history, has also headed the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s chemical hazard assessment team for over 25 years.

Yet in nearly every media appearance, and even during congressional testimony, Overton, an environmental chemist, has omitted this long-term, high-level contracting position for the federal government through LSU, a Raw Story investigation has found. Webmaster's Commentary:

This is how lying to the public gets purchased by the Federal Government.

FBI pressuring Google, Facebook to allow ‘back doors’ for wiretapping

FBI Director Robert Mueller traveled to Silicon Valley this week to convince major Internet players to build "back doors" into their software that will allow law enforcement to wiretap data on their networks, says a news report. It's part of an effort to expand the FBI's wiretapping powers to include the latest communications technologies, including social networking sites, voice-over-Internet (VoIP) telephone services and BlackBerries. Webmaster's Commentary:

Memo to thinking people with skills (particularly those with kids): get out of this country NOW!!!

Agroterror Threat Aganda: Terror Fight Extends To Nebraska Farm Land

The FBI said it's actively watching Nebraska farmland and farm operations. Omaha FBI Assistant Special Agent Jim Langenberg said no immediate threats exist, but an attack could cause devastating losses. "We know that Osama bin Laden has looked into our agriculture industry, seen its vulnerabilities and seen what the economic loss could be," Langenberg said

Are they planning to have Osama Bin aZombie terrorize us into accepting S 510?

The Underwear Bomber: More to the story. Kurt Haskell describes The Well Dressed Man and the Man in Orange.

Mr. Haskel reports that he and his wife were sitting on the floor in a crowed room playing cards when he witnessed the so called "sharp dressed man." Haskel, who speaks carefully as an attorney, states that "While Mutallab was poorly dressed, his friend was dressed in an expensive suit". He says the suited "Indian" man asked ticket agents whether a supposed "Sudanese refugee" (the terrorist, Mutallab) could board without a passport". "The guy said, 'He's from Sudan and we do this all the time.'"

Take Your Plane and Shove It- I Aint Flyin No More

Obama's Bribe: Palestinians will be the Losers – Again

Barack Obama dangles a lavish package of incentives in the face of Benjamin Netanyahu in an attempt to lure the Israeli prime minister into renewing a three-month, partial freeze on Jewish settlement construction in the West Bank. The generosity of the US president's package, which includes 20 combat aircraft worth $3 billion and backing for Israel's continued military presence in the Jordan Valley after the declaration of a Palestinian state, has prompted even Thomas Friedman of The New York Times to compare it to a “bribe”.

Eric Cantor and the Provoking of American Antisemitism

On Wednesday, November 10th Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu was in Washington DC for a meeting with Secretary of State Hilary Clinton. But Cantor got to Netanyahu first and, according to the Congressman's boastful press release, he "stressed that the new Republican majority will serve as a check on the [Obama] Administration ….He [Cantor] made clear that the Republican majority understands the special relationship between Israel and the United States, and that the security of each nation is reliant upon the other." How do we translate this? Essentially what Cantor did was tell the leader of a foreign country that he will protect that country from the official policies of the President of the United States–the person charged by the Constitution to carry out the nation's foreign policy.

Chinese Take On TSA Molestation of Passengers

Will YOU consent to the naked body scans at airports still after learning that the Underwear Bomber incident was staged to bring the scanners in?

Witnesses saw both the allowance of this "bomber" to bypass security measures and he was also filmed during much of the flight. Experts suggest that he was told that his actions were part of a security test. Why do "terrorists" always get around the security measures and checks while us citizens have to be humiliated, exposed to foot fungus, and harassed at airports by glorified rent-a-cops?

DHS Head Chertoff Using His Position To Profit For Company He's Employed By

The scanners would not have stopped the Christmas Crotch Bomber because witnesses reported that the man was allowed to bypass security and was escorted onto the plane by an unnamed official. It should be recalled that the security at the gate in Schiphol was run by ICTS, the same Israeli security company at the gate in Paris where the "Shoe Bomber" boarded his plane, and the same Israeli company in charge of every gate used by the 9-11 hijackers.

A Bribe Too Good to Refuse

20 F-35s (America's most advanced fighter jet) will be added to an existing Israeli order under a $2.75 billion contract. "other gifts the US administration is willing to offer to Israel in exchange for three months of construction freeze in the settlements..." According to an unnamed senior Israeli defense source, "The Americans have put forth an excellent proposal," a gift. "It will be a big mistake not to take it..."

PHILIP GIRALDI: LIAR LIAR

Obama’s spin team made a heroic effort to turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.

Airport Body Cavity Searches Next?

Jim Rogers - forget Stocks buy Commodities

Why People Don't Buy Gold