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NURISTAN PROVINCE, Afghanistan, Dec. 1, 2009 – Nuristan Provincial Reconstruction Team servicemembers recently took to the airwaves to combat misinformation about the spread of the H1N1 flu virus here. Navy Lt. Jennifer Dreiling, a senior medical officer for the Nuristan Provincial Reconstruction Team, records a radio message on Radio Kalagush, a U.S.-funded Afghan radio station that broadcasts from Forward Operating Base Kalagush in eastern Afghanistan’s Nuristan province, educating locals about the H1N1 flu virus, Nov. 19, 2009. U.S. Air Force photo by 2nd Lt. Natassia Cherne  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Navy Lt. Jennifer Dreiling, team senior medical officer...

By American-statesman staff Thursday, November 5, 2009, 08:41 PM Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the suspect in the Fort Hood shootings, has not been killed and is in stable condition at a hospital, Lt. Gen. Bob Cone said at a press conference at Fort Hood. He is in custody at an undisclosed hospital, Cone said. Col. Ben Danner said that the gunman was shot four times. He said he didn’t know where the man was hit, nor whether all four shots were fired by the same officer. Cone had earlier said that Hasan was killed in the incident. Three soldiers taken...

Deconstructing Global Warming http://www.globalwarming.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/lindzen-talk-pdf.pdf Yesterday the Cooler Heads Coalition hosted Dr. Richard S. Lindzen, the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Video of Dr. Lindzen’s presentation, “Deconstructing Global Warming,” will be available shortly, but his power point presentation is online now. and Kerry Is Very Confused on Cap-and-Trade

Accusations are flying about misinformation in the health care reform debate. President Obama, Democrats, and the drive-by media accuse Republicans, talk radio hosts, and “ignorant” conservatives of spreading lies about the House Bill (HR 3200) and their efforts to “reform” the system. Who’s telling the truth? A quick examination of motives could easily answer the question, but doing so would not give the truth much more credibility as the argument would invariably turn back to baseless accusations. Instead, I’ll go point-by-point through the talking points and reveal the truth more concretely.

Over and over again President Obama has promised not to "mess with" private insurance for those who are happy with what they currently have. When challenged, he dismisses it as mere "scare tactics and fear-mongering." In an address to the American Medical Association in June, he accused his opponents: "let me also address a illegitimate concern that's being put forward by those who are claiming that a public option is somehow a Trojan horse for a single-payer system. . . . So when you hear the naysayers claim that I'm trying to bring about government-run health care, know this: They're...

It is rare to get an insider's perspective on the emergence of al-Qaeda. It is also rare to get a glimpse of the world of spies and agents. To provide both is incredibly unusual. Omar Nasiri - not his real name but one chosen to protect his identity - says he spent seven years working as an agent for European intelligence services and as an al-Qaeda operative, part of the time in the UK. He provides a unique insight into how al-Qaeda was far more organised, coherent and determined in the 1990s than was appreciated at the time. Jihad militants...

MOSSAD'S KILLING MACHINE COMES TO BRITAIN A killing war between Israel's Mossad and Islamic fanatics came closer this weekend in Britain. The Israeli intelligence agency has sent four members of its kidon assassination squad to this country, to join fifteen other handpicked katsas, its relentless field agents. Their brief is to "disable" any of the "close to 50" British Muslims that the extremist Islamic group, Al-Muhajiroun, last week boasted were ready to carry out suicide missions similar to the one in Tel Aviv. Al-Muhajiroun spokesman, Asif Butt, said the 50 were "primed and ready to go". The threat was sufficient...

BONN, Germany (AP) — Global warming is uprooting people from their homes and, left unchecked, could lead to the greatest human migration in history, said a report released Wednesday.

ROCKVILLE, MD--(MARKET WIRE)--Mar 23, 2009 -- MarketResearch.com has announced the addition of Unit Economics' new report "The New Global Ice Age," to their collection of Energy/Environment market reports. For more information, visit http://www.marketresearch.com/redirect.asp?progid=67618&productid=2069052. Abstract of Unit Economics' Report: "New Global Ice Age""At first glance, a research piece predicting significantly colder weather seems rather bold. In reality, we're very confident about this report. That's because we are not so much predicting colder weather, but are instead observing it. More important, we're attempting to coax our readers to view recent weather data and trends with a neutral perspective -- unbiased by the...

It has been interesting following the American politics. API feared that the new president would easily impose leaders on  the Kenyan people. That fear has now gone after listening to the president’s inauguration address a number of times.The man is inclusive and he has demonstrated that when making appointments selecting even some politicians who were his critics.API has written a personal letter today to President Obama congratulating him for having demonstrated inclusiveness as soon as he took office.During the campaign, API was one of the media outlets that criticised the President and that brought many Americans to API site because...

"Premarital Abstinence Pledges Ineffective, Study Finds," heralds the Washington Post. "Virginity Pledges Fail to Trump Teen Lust in Look at Older Data," reports Bloomberg. And on it goes. In other words, teens will be teens, and moms or dads who believe that concepts such as restraint or morality have any application today are living in a dream world. Typical was the lead for the CBS News story: "Teenagers who take virginity pledges are no less sexually active than other teens, according to a new study." Here's the rub: It just isn't true. In fact, the only way the study's author,...

A recent mission to Iraq headed by top archaeologists ... found that, contrary to received wisdom, southern Iraq's most important historic sites ... had neither been seriously damaged nor looted after the American invasion. This, according to a report by staff writer Martin Bailey in the July issue of the Art Newspaper. The article has caused confusion, not to say consternation, among archaeologists and has been largely ignored by the mainstream press. Not surprising perhaps, since reports by experts blaming the U.S. for the postinvasion destruction of Iraq's heritage have been regular fixtures of the news. Up to now ......

Grilled cheese, World War II and fiduciary have one thing in common: if you “Google” them, each prompts a Wikipedia entry as the No. 1 result. Wikipedia is all too convenient, but of what value is it? What good is a stockpile of information if it’s unreliable and often incorrect, as many have said Wikipedia is? Since its launch in 2001, the “The Free Encyclopedia” has grown exponentially, offering a definition (or more) for almost every topic. Last spring the resource reached the 10 million article mark over a spectrum of 20 different languages in its attempt to “summarize all...

For years, Texas has been planning a privately financed super turnpike from Mexico to the Oklahoma border. But like rush-hour traffic, the plan for a Trans-Texas Corridor is only inching along. "It ran into a firestorm of controversy in Texas,� said Neal McCaleb, a former Oklahoma transportation secretary. Critics have a wide range of concerns about the corridor, which has a key stretch that would parallel Interstate 35. (Another stretch would extend from the Texarkana/Shreveport area to Mexico.) Particularly upset are landowners who may be in the corridor's path. The Texas Transportation Department calls many concerns myths. The department says,...

Iran's first home-built nuclear power plant is scheduled to come online in around nine years, a top MP said on Monday, citing a report by the Iranian atomic energy organization. A Russian contractor is building Iran's first atomic power plant in the southern city of Bushehr but the 360 megawatt plant in Darkhoyen in the western Khuzestan province would be its first using domestic technology. Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the head of parliament's foreign affairs and security commission, said the conceptual design of the plant was finished last year and now the technical design had started which would finish next year. "According...

<p>No where will you ever find Al-Qaeda, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah described as terror organizations by Wikipedia. Wikipedia will quote the US State Department or the United Nations Security Council as saying that they are terror groups, but Wikipedia itself will only describe these organizations as "militants."</p>

Okay, my friends. For the last week or so, the media have gotten Americans all worked up into a froth about this "deadly new bacteria" called MRSA. My ER is now inundated with frantic phone calls from people who have no idea what they are looking at, or what the disease really is. One charming woman (who clearly smoked wayyyyyyyy too much) called amid the throes of a panic attack because she found a pimple and was convinced beyond all attempts to reason with her that she was "gonna die of Melissa." "Ah, you mean MRSA." I corrected the hyperventilating...

All describe the bizarro-world contrast between what most Americans seem to think is happening in Iraq versus what is really happening in Iraq. Knowing this disconnect exists and experiencing it directly are two separate matters. It’s like the difference between holding the remote control during the telecast of a volcanic eruption on some distant island (and then flipping the channel), versus running for survival from a wretch of molten lava that just engulfed your car. I was at home in the United States just one day before the magnitude hit me like vertigo: America seems to be under a glass...

WHAT THE MEDIA SOMEHOW MISSED .... CAN'T FIGURE OUT WHY Retired Army General Ricardo Sanchez made a speech to the military reporters and editors in Washington DC last Friday. The media was quick to quote General Sanchez .. but only selectively. You can read the text of General Sanchez' speech right here. http://www.militaryreporters.org/sanchez_101207.html I urge you to do so. After Sanchez finished the speech the reporters couldn't wait to share with the American people his assessment of the war in Iraq. To put it gently, his assessment wasn't mild. Try this quote: "There has been a glaring, unfortunate, display of...

Asterisk Free Libertarianism (The Solution Ron Paul Missed) http://www.libertyreborn.com/2007/08/24/asterisk-free-libertarianism-the-solution-ron-paul-missed/ Well, it was predictable.   The talking points used by supporters of Ron Paul (i.e. Paulbots, Paulites, etc.) have now changed.You can always tell when the marching orders are given to a group by the sudden shift in the common language they use to refer to a certain situation.  It’s like when Rush Limbaugh compiles montages of several media types from different organizations all using the exact same (and often obscure) term or description for an event.  You know there was a memo sent out somewhere.Well the same thing has happened...

NEW YORK - A magazine gets a hot story straight from a soldier in Iraq and publishes his writing, complete with gory details, under a pseudonym. The stories are chilling: An Iraqi boy befriends American troops and later has his tongue cut out by insurgents. Soldiers mock a disfigured woman sitting near them in a dining hall. As a diversion, soldiers run over dogs with armored personnel carriers. Compelling stuff, and, according to the Army, not true. Three articles by the soldier have run since January in The New Republic, a liberal magazine with a small circulation owned by Canadian...

Today, Michigan Republican Pete Hoesktra sent a scathing letter to NYT executive editor Bill Keller, detailing what Hoekstra called the Times' "...recklessness in repeatedly disclosing highly classified intelligence programs to enemies who seek to attack our nation," and the Times' coverage of the Foreign Intelligence Act amendments. Hoekstra said of the Times' editorial titled, "The Fear of Fear Itself," "The only real basis for "fear" here is the scare tactics being perpetuated by the Times, which has knowingly and willfully misrepresented the new law to scare the American people." READ THE WHOLE LETTER HERE Mr. Bill Keller Executive Editor The...

Al Gore alleges climate change misinformation By agencies Last Updated: 5:01pm BST 07/08/2007 A huge public misinformation campaign funded by some of the world's largest carbon polluters is aimed at disputing the scientific consensus on global warming, former US Vice President Al Gore has claimed. Gore said the world is approaching a tipping point that will see an acceleration in efforts to fight climate change "There has been an organized campaign, financed to the tune of about $10m a year from some of the largest carbon polluters, to create the impression that there is disagreement in the scientific community," Gore...

Dear Patriots Many of us are not fighting the islamic terrorists on the battlefields of Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere but for sure we can fight them on the internet. We should seek the shut down of any known terrorist website and forum to deliver a shocking and devastating psychological blow to the islamic terrorists and more importantly to destroy a major tool if not the major tool of their communications. As regular folks we have less legal challenges facing us to force a terrorist website shut down than if a government law enforcement agency tries to do it, so this...

China, a country rich in coal, but with few petroleum or gas resources, might scrap efforts to produce petroleum by liquefying coal, an official with the country's top economic planning agency has said. The possibility of such a move was raised after an evaluation of the nation's limited energy resources and environment, a deputy director of the industry department of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) told a seminar on the development of China's ethanol industry. The event took place in Beijing on Saturday. "Liquefied coal projects consume a lot of energy, though the successful industrialization of liquefied coal...

The current US presidential debates are almost certain to see the candidates asked to comment on spiritual issues, but some Americans are worried about the trend towards religiosity in public life. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton will be challenged on their beliefs At my twins' annual school camp in West Virginia, you are meant to leave your troubles behind. It is an idyllic couple of days - a communing with nature which my wife gallantly insists is simply too enjoyable for her to take part in - it has to be a dad's experience. Actually it is not that...

This publication shows how the median income family's income tax dollars are spent for every state and 200 cities, towns and counties. This is an example. You can look up your own city: Just follow this link.

China is not a strategic adversary of the United States, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said during a news roundtable yesterday. “I do not see China at this point as a strategic adversary of the United States,” Gates said. “It's a partner in some respects. It's a competitor in other respects. And so we are simply watching to see what they're doing.” Chinese government officials announced last week that the Chinese military budget would increase 17 percent. This would be the 19th year of double-digit growth in defense spending, DoD officials said. China will budget roughly $45 billion for defense....

SUNDAY Age columnist Terry Lane has been caught out again quoting unreliable Internet sources, despite a similar "almighty stuff-up" last year leading him to offer his resignation. It is the second time Lane has used spurious Internet claims to back anti-George W. Bush attacks in the paper – and this time to criticise Federal Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd. In his latest piece deriding the US Bush administration as a "self-evident force for stupidity", Lane claimed rangers at the world-famous Grand Canyon were banned from answering questions about the age of the park "because the truth will upset Bush's fundamentalist supporters".....

For more than a century and a half, men and women of The Associated Press have had the privilege of bringing truth to the world. They have gone to great lengths, overcome great obstacles – and, too often, made great and horrific sacrifices – to ensure that the news was reported quickly, accurately and honestly. Our efforts have been rewarded with trust: More people in more places get their news from the AP than from any other source. In the 21st century, that news is transmitted in more ways than ever before – in print, on the air and on...

Oct. 1, 2006 — A Republican staff member warned Congressional pages five years ago to "watch out" for Congressman Mark Foley, according to a former page. Matthew Loraditch, a page in the 2001-2002 class, told ABC News he and other pages were warned about Foley by a supervisor. Loraditch, the president of the Page Alumni Association, said the pages were told "don't get too wrapped up in him being too nice to you and all that kind of stuff." Staff members at the House clerk's office did not return phone calls seeking comment. Some of the sexually explicit instant messages...

AMMAN, Jordan — On the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, Abu Omar received the call to jihad. Literally. “There’s a present for you,” a voice on the other end of the phone said that morning, he recalled. It was a common code whenever his friends and colleagues wanted to share a new broadcast or communiqué from Al Qaeda over the Internet, he said. Abu Omar, speaking on the condition that only his nickname be used, said he soon went to one of the Internet cafes he frequents in Amman and began distributing the latest video by Al Qaeda,...

DELHI -- The discovery of a backpack stuffed with three loaded guns and an assault rifle prompted a lockdown at Delhi High School and Delhi Middle School on Monday. A man searching for aluminum cans found the backpack at 9 a.m. near a trash can on the western edge of the Delhi Educational Park, the campus that houses the middle school and high school. Inside the backpack was a loaded .357 magnum, a 40-caliber automatic pistol, a 380 semi-automatic pistol and an SKS assault rifle with a 30-round banana clip stocked with ammunition, said Sheriff Mark Pazin. "There's nothing more...

In a startling report revealing a tale of transatlantic espionage not witnessed since the glory days of 007, the London-based Financial Times recently detailed how Britain, supposedly America’s closest European ally, has been leading a multi-year European undercover ('back-door') effort within the United States to undermine U.S. climate change policy. While this is not surprising, it does smack of interference with another nation's policies. It also happens to confirm prior ITSSD research, readily accessible on its website.

Schwarzenegger Squashes Religious Freedom Thomasson: “Arnold Schwarzenegger has two faces. He speaks at churches and says he believes in religious freedom and family values, yet he’s stabbing pro-family Californians in the back.” Sacramento, California – Campaign for Children and Families is shocked and dismayed that California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed SB 1441 (Kuehl). Today’s disastrous action by Schwarzenegger means Christian and other faith-based colleges in California will be forced to promote transsexuality, bisexuality, and homosexuality if they accept students with Cal Grants. “People of conscience are appalled that Arnold Schwarzenegger has trampled religious freedom to satisfy hyperactive sexual activists,”...

6 April 2005   http://www.lapl.org/catalog/ Leary, Timothy Francis, 1920- Title(s) Politics of psycho-pharmacology / Timothy Leary. Publisher Berkeley, CA : Ronin Pub. : Distributed by Publishers Group West, c2002. Paging 127 p. : ill. ; 22 cm. Series Leary library [ This from Los Angeles Library, it did not show up at the University of California, nor at the New York Public Library. My question : was this written by Timothy Leary (1920-1997). ] Leary, Timothy Francis, 1920- Title(s) Your brain [!] is god / Timothy Leary. Publisher Berkeley, Calif. : Ronin : Distributed by Publishers Group West, c2001. Paging...

On Sunday, the Australian government issued the following alert to its citizens: "We advise you to exercise a high degree of caution in the United Arab Emirates because of the high threat of terrorist attack. We continue to receive reports that terrorists are planning attacks against Western interests in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Commercial and public areas frequented by foreigners are possible terrorist targets." The United States has approved a business deal that would turn over the operation of six major American ports to a company that is owned by the UAE, the very country Australians are to be...

LONDON — The French government tried to blame the 1985 sinking of Greenpeace ship the Rainbow Warrior on British spy agency MI6, according to official documents released under freedom of information. The campaign of misinformation and smears - suggesting MI6 bombed the ship in New Zealand and framed French secret agents, or that MI6 knew in advance of the French mission — infuriated Margaret Thatcher's government. The documents, released under Britain's Freedom of Information Act to The Guardian newspaper, show how Malcolm Rifkind, then a Foreign Office minister, told British diplomats in Paris to demand an end to the "campaign of misinformation"....

School officials thumb their noses at California parents who object to a highly controversial musical being performed by students. You might expect to find musicals containing depictions of rape, incest and bestiality somewhere off-Broadway—not in a high school production. But at La Canada High School in La Canada Flintridge, Calif., this year's spring musical is the highly controversial "Bat Boy." The main character is a pointy-eared half-human boy with fangs who's discovered living in a cave in Hope Falls, W.V. While exploring the world, Bat Boy and the rest of the cast use drugs, alcohol and sex as tools for...

"It started with (hurricane) Katrina," he said to the early morning NBC anchor. Then, according to Tim, there were the problems with the CIA agent leak. Added to the truthfulness problems about WMD which Bush used to justify our attack on Iraq, it explains why the Bush White House is in trouble, with job disapproval/trust ratings in the negative sixty percent range! Before he left office -- in fact, if memory serves, on the day he was impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives -- Bill Clinton sent missles to bomb Baghdad. Of late, those who recall that sort of...

It's hard to imagine that The New York Times' editorial page could misconstrue an issue involving guns, seeing as how the writers of the Gray Lady's editorials are so open-minded about the Second Amendment. (That, dear readers, would be sarcasm.) An offering last week about legislation before the U.S. House that would protect gun manufacturers from nuisance lawsuits posited: "This extraordinary shield, written to the diktat of the National Rifle Association, is so sweeping that it would have barred the D.C. sniper settlement and other valid negligence claims." Hmm. Sounds like an editorial written to the diktat of the Brady...

<p>Much of what was reported as fact by government officials and the media during the chaotic first week afterward turned out to be fiction.</p> <p>Myths and misinformation multiplied, from how many people died to what conditions were really like inside the Louisiana Superdome.</p>

Israel And Freedom For Jonathan Pollard By Caroline Glick The Jerusalem Post - With INA Publisher's Note Below Jerusalem ---- April 28......Jonathan Pollard is one of the most polarizing figures of our times. Pollard, a former intelligence analyst in US naval intelligence, has now served 20 years of a life imprisonment sentence following his conviction for transferring classified US intelligence materials relating to Arab ballistic missile and nonconventional weapons programs to Israel from May 1984 until his arrest in November 1985. For his contribution to Israel's security and for his long suffering in prison, Israel considers Pollard a national hero....

St. Petersburg police officers have added the Colt AR-15 rifle to their inventory to counter the expiration of the assault weapons ban and the appearance of more heavily armed criminals. ST. PETERSBURG - (AP) -- The expiration of the nation's ban on the sale of assault rifles and the appearance of more heavily armed criminals have pushed more than 100 St. Petersburg police officers to order assault rifles of their own for official duty. The first group of officers completed the required 16 hours of instruction for using Colt AR-15s in January. The semiautomatic weapons fire bullets that travel up...

I'm yielding the floor to Dafydd ab Hugh for his dissection of a story by WLS in Chicago about their interview with retiring Congressman Henry Hyde: A transcript of a video report that appeared on an ABC affilliate makes a rather startling claim Upon careful parsing, however, there appears to be an awful lot of gravy for so little pot roast. Here is the screaming headline: Clinton impeachment was retaliation for Nixon, says retiring congressman by Andy Shaw. Rep. Hyde reflects on 30 years of office (New headline) By the time we get all the way to the lede, an...

An outbreak of the killer Marburg virus beyond northern Angola is being successfully controlled thanks to a combination of frontline assistance by international health agencies and "social mobilization," says Angola's top health official. ... ... the disease has been mainly confined to the northern province of Uige, where 277 people have died, ...

When some members of Congress violate the Constitution, how can we have any confidence in their leadership? Yet that is precisely the effect these unlawful filibusters of judicial nominees are having -- undermining confidence in the Senate. Instead of voting yes or no on President Bush's picks for certain federal judgeships, Democrats are refusing to allow a vote to even take place, using a Senate rule that no motion may come to a vote while still under discussion. The filibuster, as it's called, has been used by both sides for over a century and a half to delay votes while...

'Crazy' Iraqi spy was full of misinformation, says report An alcoholic cousin of an aide to Ahmed Chalabi has emerged as the key source in the US rationale for going to war in Iraq. According to a US presidential commission looking into pre-war intelligence failures, the basis for pivotal intelligence on Iraq's alleged biological weapons programmes and fleet of mobile labs was a spy described as 'crazy' by his intelligence handlers and a 'congenital liar' by his friends. The defector, given the code-name Curveball by the CIA, has emerged as the central figure in the corruption of US intelligence...

There's an old saying that a lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth puts its boots on. Let it be known that mistakes can travel just as fast and just as far. Take the case of Rep. Ellen Tauscher, D-California, who at a hearing on Capitol Hill last week spoke about a 1962 nuclear test in the Nevada desert. The test was code named "Project Sedan." Tauscher's remarks were little noticed, until they were transcribed incorrectly in an unofficial transcript of the hearing. One letter was changed. The "Sedan" nuclear test became the "Sudan" nuclear test. And...

1946 Document on Jewish Children Tells a Different Story Undercuts Tale That Vatican Tried to Keep Them From Their Families ROME, JAN. 12, 2005 (Zenit.org).- The latest in a series of accusations about Pope Pius XII's behavior vis-à-vis the Jews and Nazi persecution seems to have little basis in fact. The latest round began Dec. 28 when an Italian newspaper published passages of an alleged 1946 Vatican document that supposedly aimed to keep baptized Jewish children from being returned to their families. The text, as stated in Il Corriere della Sera by Alberto Melloni, director of the G. Dossetti Library...