“Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood, let alone believed, by the masses.” - Plato
Seeking Truth in a World of Propaganda. Links do not necessarily indicate agreement with stories or perspectives.
Almost universally overlooked congressional testimony from then-FBI director Robert Mueller directly contradicts a deliberately-propagated misconception: that the Boston Marathon bombers were unknown to the US government until the Russians issued a vague warning that was dismissed as inconsequential. This revelation calls into question the precise nature of the FBI’s relationship with the bombers—before they became bombers.
The post Missing Evidence of Prior FBI Relationship with Boston Bomber appeared first on WhoWhatWhy.
David B. Gleason (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Via Crooks and Liars:
Yahoo Money’ The Daily Ticker is reporting that is has discovered a Reuters investigation that reveals$8.5 trillion – that’s trillion with a “T” – in taxpayer money doled out by Congress to the Pentagon since 1996 that has never been accounted for.
You read that right. While Republican politicians rush to slash food stamps for the 47 million Americans living in poverty – the highest amount in nearly two decades – Republican U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel has the audacity to complain that $20 billion dollars in automatic sequester cuts to the massive and secretive $565.8 billion Defense Department budget are ” too steep, too deep, and too abrupt,” all while the Pentagon and the Defense Department are overseeing massive fraud, waste, and abuse.
For anyone wondering, Reuters reports that the D.O.D.’s 2012 budget totaled $565.8 billion, more than the annual defense budgets of the 10 next largest military spenders combined, including Russia and China.
The post Report Reveals $8.5 Trillion Missing From Pentagon Budget appeared first on disinformation.
Investigative reporter Trevor Aaronson- executive director of the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting, author of The Terror Factory: Inside the FBI’s Manufactured War on Terrorism – has spent years researching and writing about FBI terrorism “stings” on mentally retarded and destitute … Continue reading →
Video: “The FBI is Responsible for More Terrorism Plots In the United States Than Any Other Organization. More Than Al Qaeda, More Than Al Shabaab, More Than the Islamic State, More Than All Of Them Combined” was originally published on Washington's Blog
https://bananas.liberty.me/youre-a-criminal-in-a-mass-surveillance-world-how-to-not-get-caught/
To apologists of mass surveillance, what did Anne Frank have to hide? I ask because the person credited with popularizing the nothing-to-hide argument is none other than Joseph Goebbles, Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda for the Third Reich. (Back then the word propaganda didn’t have a negative connotation. It meant public relations.)
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People censor what they share with friends on social networks. They increasingly limit posts to selfies, photos of food, and opinions about approved topics like sports and movies, rather than information or opinions that can land them on a terror suspect list.
They shy away from protesting and see the often brutal treatment of those who do. They hear about domestic black sites. Signing a petition opposing a government program is like handing the government a suspect list.
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Obeying authority is what we’re taught to do from childhood. You don’t want trouble, do you? Then don’t complain and abide by the laws. Next time somebody wonders how things got so bad, there’s your answer. We’re raised to follow orders and pledge allegiance to authority. “Just following orders” and “Just doing my job” often precede the most atrocious acts perpetrated against other human beings.
The realization that mass surveillance makes you a perpetual suspect and non-compliance with any government rule makes you a criminal silences meaningful discourse. It doesn’t take many horror stories to roll a fog of fear over an entire population. Especially when people know they’re being continually watched and recorded.
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Most people prefer to feel rather than think. I know I’d feel much better pretending all this is much ado about nothing. Even if you’re not the fact-resistant type, the temptation to abdicate responsibility and hope politicians will “fix the system” is as tempting as it is delusional. The system we live under was built by people who want it to work this way. To those in control, it’s not broken. It may not work for you, but it works for them. And you work for them. The only hope we have for change is to do it ourselves.
Royal Australian College of General Practitioners says pharmacists should not stock such products because there is no evidence they are effective in any way
The official body for Australian GPs has asked pharmacists to strip their shelves of homeopathic products and warned doctors not to prescribe them because they do nothing.
The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) has formally recommended GPs stop prescribing homeopathic remedies and says pharmacists must also stop stocking such products because there is no evidence they are effective in any way.
Related: Homeopathy not effective for treating any condition, Australian report finds
Continue reading...The war on terror, that campaign without end launched 14 years ago by George Bush, is tying itself up in ever more grotesque contortions. On Monday the trial in London of a Swedish man, Bherlin Gildo, accused of terrorism in Syria, collapsed after it became clear British intelligence had been arming the same rebel groups the defendant was charged with supporting.
The prosecution abandoned the case, apparently to avoid embarrassing the intelligence services. The defence argued that going ahead withthe trial would have been an “affront to justice” when there was plenty of evidence the British state was itself providing “extensive support” to the armed Syrian opposition.
Continue reading...Sometimes their faces pop up in my mind and I shudder. I don’t want to recall their suffering but I also can’t pretend it never happened. They were tormented, day after day, and for extended periods. I can only hope and pray that they recovered. I am torn over using their names; I wouldn’t want […]
The post At Eight Years Old We Learned to Torture appeared first on Freeman's Perspective - .
Preface: It’s been less than a month since we last posted on this topic … but, sadly, we’ve got many more examples. The Cop Is On the Take Government corruption has become rampant: Senior SEC employees spent up to 8 … Continue reading →
Systemic Corruption Has Destroyed America was originally published on Washington's Blog
Bulk collection of Americans’ phone records to end as US Senate passes USA Freedom Act
Europe's largest arms manufacturer, BAE Systems, has applied to sponsor the failing Furness Academy. The reason is profit.
A 12 foot effigy of the BAE chairman at the 'people's jury' protest outside the BAE AGM. Credit: Demotix/Peter Marshall.
Corporations have already established a growing foothold in many UK schools, but the idea of Europe's biggest arms company running a school still seems like something out of an Orwellian nightmare.
However, it may be about to happen in Barrow, Cumbria, where BAE Systemsis on the verge of taking overthe faltering Furness Academy. The proposal is currently going through due diligence before being opened to a consultation with stakeholders, parents and staff, where it is expected to be supported. If it is agreed, BAE will become the school's sole sponsor later this year. They will also take responsibility for the 'strategic direction' of the school.
Education isn't just about grades, it's also about promoting values, informing perspectives and expanding minds. Could a weapons manufacturer ever act in the best interests of school children? How can a company that profits from international hostility ever be trusted to teach about areas like conflict resolution or the human cost of war?
BAE has a shameful, inglorious history of corruption and deals with dictators. It has been the subject of investigations across a number of countries and was fined $400 million in the US for bribery. It has also sold weapons to human rights abusers and dubious regimes across the world, including Saudi Arabia, Libya, Bahrain and Egypt.
Despite all of the ramifications for education, the move has been welcomed by local MP John Woodcock, who greeted it as a “really exciting” development. Furness Academy's acting head called it “a fantastic opportunity.”
Arms companies and schools
If education is a public good, should it be given away to big business? Arms companies already spend a lot of time and resources on infiltrating schools and trying to influence the curriculum.
One way they are doing this is through their marketing and promotional materials. Raytheon, an arms company that has been linked to the production of bombs used against Gaza last summer, hosts competitions for science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) students. Similarly, fighter jet manufacturer Boeing works with schools to design mock military planes and BAE runs a schools “ambassador” program, with the stated objective of improving its “corporate reputation at both a local and national level.”
Things will get worse this September, with the opening of a number of institutions that are directly tied to arms companies. These include South Wiltshire University Technical College, which will teach science and engineering to 14-18 year olds “in the context of the defence industries.” Its 'sponsors' include Chemring, which has been linked to the use of tear gas in Hong Kong and Egypt, and QinetiQ, which has applied for arms export licences to sell weapons to countries including Bahrain, Pakistan, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Israel.
Although these arms companies are described as 'sponsors', their roleswill include "helping to construct the curriculum”, allowing them to build “close links with students who will be potential future employees.”
The end goal for these companies is not to help produce an educated, questioning cohort of young people, it is to normalise their business practices and influence potentially impressionable young minds, while making a profit.
The militarisation of classrooms
All of this represents a worrying expansion of militarism into our schools, but it's not the first sign of it. Forces Watch estimates that around 900,000 young people come into contact with the armed forces every year through their schools.
A disproportionate numberof these students are those from disadvantaged backgrounds, which is where many of the resources are targeted. Some of this is done through recruitment fairs, and some through the government's own 'military ethos' programme, which brings military veterans into schools to “build character, resilience and grit in their pupils.”
The military also provides free 'support and resources'for schools; these include promotional materials for classrooms and Armed Forces Day assembly plans for children as young as seven.
In simple terms the military wants to transform our schools into a recruitment ground. This is acknowledged by the head of army recruitment, who described army careers advisers as “skilled salesmen”, saying: “It starts with a seven-year-old boy seeing a parachutist at an air show and thinking, 'That looks great.' From then the army is trying to build interest by drip, drip, drip.”
As Turkish academic Serdar M. Değirmencioğlu has said: “Schools provide fertile ground for militarism: there is a captive audience, a comprehensive mandate, a hierarchical structure and a clear power differential between students and professionals.”
Groups such as Veterans for Peace and the Peace Education Network do crucial and invaluable work in promoting peace and non-violence in schools and countering the growth of youth militarisation by offering an alternative to the army's pro-military messages. But neither has anywhere near the same level of access and support that is enjoyed by the armed forces or the arms industry.
What kind of education do we want?
Central to the debate is the wider question of what kind of values we want in our education system and what kind of future we want for young people.
Arms manufacturers would not commit to these kinds of programmes if it wasn't profitable to do so. These companies may pay lip-service to encouraging critical thinking and promoting positive learning outcomes, but their shareholders will always be the main beneficiaries of any arrangement.
This kind of involvement gives them a chance to gloss over the human rights abuses they facilitate and to present themselves as legitimate businesses. It also gives them direct access to potential future employees and allows them to influence young people's decisions and direction.
Schools are fundamental to our society. They are meant to be safer places for learning and should not be sold hotbeds for militarism and corporations. They exist to educate children and young people and to develop their ideas and understanding of the world. They should not be allowed to become training grounds for arms companies and those that profit from war.
Trade is a good thing. But enabling companies to move $30/hour jobs to countries with $.60/hour wages so a few billionaires can pocket the difference is not trade. Continue reading
The post Stop Calling the TPP a Trade Agreement – It Isn’t. appeared first on BillMoyers.com.
General Mills Cheerios may now be "non-GMO" but it is virtually guaranteed to contain Roundup herbicide residues, as disclosed by North America's largest oat supplier.
While there are no genetically modified oats on the marketplace today, non-organic oats might as well be labeled Roundup Ready (RR). This is because it is common practice to spray them with Roundup's active ingredient glyphosate, putting them in the same category of glyphosate contaminated crops which includes RR GM soy, corn and canola.
