Fair Use Note

WARNING for European visitors: European Union laws require you to give European Union visitors information about cookies used on your blog. In many cases, these laws also require you to obtain consent. As a courtesy, we have added a notice on your blog to explain Google's use of certain Blogger and Google cookies, including use of Google Analytics and AdSense cookies. You are responsible for confirming this notice actually works for your blog, and that it displays. If you employ other cookies, for example by adding third party features, this notice may not work for you. Learn more about this notice and your responsibilities.

Thomas Paine

To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.
Showing posts with label alternative media activism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label alternative media activism. Show all posts

Sunday, September 5, 2010

5 Sept - Water and Schemes : Planned 'Natural' Disaster

We Clear The Way World War II poster for the U...Image via Wikipedia


Levees.org

FEATURED NEWS:

Published by Homeland Security, sent to Insurance Journal’s 43,000 subscribers and to the American Society of Civil Engineers’ 150,000 members:

New data released by Levees.Org shows that the majority of U.S. population lives in counties protected by levees, and that those counties are wealthier.
Click here for complete research paper.
U.S. Counties with levees (click to enlarge)

The 8/29 Investigation

man-with-signLouisiana and the nation deserve a truly independent investigation of the flood protection failures – and the decision making that led to those failures – during Hurricane Katrina.

The Facts

Fact 1
The flooding of New Orleans and nearby St. Bernard parish was a civil engineering disaster, not a weather event. According to a 2007 study by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), the majority of the damage from the flooding is due to the levees failing (page 39). “The failure of the levees was the worst engineering disaster in the world since Chernobyl” says Dr. Ray Seed, Geotechnical Engineering, University of California Berkeley.
Fact 2
Responsibility for the design and construction of the flood protection in metro New Orleans belongs solely to the US Army Corps of Engineers as mandated in the Flood Control of 1965.
Fact 3
To look to Congress and the Army Corps to fix what it broke does not reflect on the last administration. The failure of the federally engineered levees was 40 years in the making. The Army Corps squandered hundreds of millions of dollars on a levee system they knew by their own calculations was inadequate.
Fact 4
More than 98% (ninety-eight percent) of the US Army Corps of Engineers are civilian employees. Thus to look to the Army Corps and Congress to fix what it broke does not disparage our young soldiers fighting in foreign wars.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)


Radio show caller confirms New Orleans pumps probably won’t work in high water event

Wednesday, September 1, 2010
H.J. Bosworth Jr. lead researcher for Levees.org
Yesterday, an unidentified caller phoned in while Kaare Johnson of WIST Radio was interviewing Levees.org’s lead researcher H.J. Bosworth Jr. What the caller added was bone-chilling.
Bosworth was explaining why the Corps of Engineers’ expensive pumps installed at the mouths of the 17th Street, Orleans and London Avenue Canals might not work if needed. Mr. Bosworth was explaining testimony from a Corps whistleblower featured in Harry Shearer’s new documentary, The Big Uneasy.
The caller added some first hand testimony. Here is a short excerpt from Karre’s interview with ‘Dave.’
DAVE: I was involved with another company trying to sell these pumps to the Army Corps of Engineers. In doing some research, the gentleman is correct (H.J. Bosworth Jr.). The specs were not met. No way, no how, no shape, no form. They (the pumps) were supposed to be witness tested. The pumps themselves are great pumps, they do work. But not under the conditions that they ran in the canals right now. There’s not enough water in the canals to be able to run those pumps properly. They’re hydraulicly driven, which means there’s fluid in these motors, and fluid gets hot and the seals break.
KAARE: Well that’s the key, Dave. How long has the Corps run these? How long can they run?
DAVE: They really haven’t done a lot of testing on them.
Click here for the entire interview. Begin at approximately the mid point.
http://www.webwiseforradio.com/site_files/244/File/KJ_083110_H2.mp3
Leave a comment

Debut of Harry Shearer’s ‘The Big Uneasy’ got long standing ovation

Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Producer director Harry Shearer extended an invitation to H.J. Bosworth Jr, lead researcher for Levees.org, and I, to the debut of his new documentary, The Big Uneasy, last night at the Prytania theater.
Also in the theater, that I could see, was Garland Robinette, Garret Graves and Ivor van Heerden, all of whom were featured in the film.
As Mr. Shearer has said before, his goal in creating The Big Uneasy was to present the findings of experts – in a accessible format – on exactly why metro New Orleans flooded five years ago.
Judging by the sold out shows, standing ovations and extended movie-house showings this week, we believe Mr. Shearer has succeeded greatly.
H.J and I were both also pleased when Mr. Shearer gave us a special shout out. If it were not for the yard signs, he said, that Levees.org had placed in the ground all over New Orleans and St. Bernard Parish that said “hold the corps accountable,” he may never have seriously looked into the issues nor made the documentary.
Sandy Rosenthal
Founder, Levees.org
www.levees.org
Click here for movie showings.

Our mission is education and we encourage dialog. Please join us on one of these social networks, or contact us directly.

Tweets

follow - reply

Levees.Org on Facebook

Bookmarks

view all - archive




05 August 2010

Ted McLaughlin : Access to Water Is a Human Right


http://theragblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/ted-mclaughlin-access-to-water-is-human.html
 

David MacBryde said...
A recent round table on Water in Austin, Texas, was held at Jim Hightower's office. See http://www.edibleaustin.com/content/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=206&Itemid=1 For some helpful insights do recall that Elinor Ostrom received the Nobel memorial economics prize -- for her work on why the "tragedy of the commons" can but need not prevail, and the "drama of the commons" is important.
Aug 6, 2010 8:13:00 AM 
 
New Orleans May Still Be Vulnerable To Major Storm  Aug 27  2010 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129466743
The future of print in a digital age
 
Pamphleteers
Aug 21 ,Admissions : maybe a public inquiry will light a fire under the police's ass to try to find out what happened to all of the other missing women they've been ignoring for years. 
American Revolution's Pamphleteers, Today's Bloggers and Twitterers for Change http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/cali-yost/worklife-fit-not-balance/american-revolutionrsquos-pamphleteers-todayrsquos-bloggers-
Y FC Expert Blogger Cali Williams YostFri Jul 10, 2009 More than 230 years ago, ordinary citizens across the colonies printed and distributed the passionate words of “amateur” writers to shape public opinion and galvanize the independence movement virally. Like the Iranians, these colonial social media pioneers faced violent suppression from a powerful ruling class.  But their simple pamphlets proved to be even more powerful.  They offer hope not only to the courageous Iranians, but to anyone interested in harnessing the collective for change.   
 
( Everybody remembers SoTT's article on the Iranian 'Green Revolution' being a Twitter Revolution experiment subsidized by $400 nillion from the CIA, I trust. So what does it mean when this stuff is online ? Media....is media. )

13 February 2008

Thirty Years of Cults and Comets

http://laura-knight-jadczyk.blogspot.com/2008/02/thirty-years-of-cults-and-comets.html
the end of the Hundred Years' War. In the previous installments of this series of articles we have looked at how the Black Death was probably a period of cometary fragment bombardment leading to mass death on an unimaginable scale. In today's world, the equivalent would be the deaths of two, possibly three billion people planet-wide and many animals as well. Just contemplating what humanity would do with that many bodies to be disposed of is daunting, not to mention considering how society would continue. The Black Death was no respecter of rank, either: the elites died in proportionate numbers to the masses of ordinary people. This has some interesting implications in terms of how the elites are looking at the matter now, but again, that is something we will come back to once we have a look at the evidence. In our discussion of the Hundred Years' War, we learned that a great cover-up was effected at the end of it all and this was mainly to reestablish the religious control of the masses because, of course, religious control has always been the right arm of princes and governments.
Inasmuch as it was popularly believed that the continued sterility of many years was caused by witches through the malice of the Devil, the whole country rose to exterminate the witches. This movement was promoted by many in office, who hoped wealth from the persecution. And so, from court to court throughout the towns and villages of all the diocese, scurried special accusers, inquisitors, notaries, jurors, judges, constables, dragging to trial and torture human beings of both sexes and burning them in great numbers. Scarcely any of those who were accused escaped punishment. Nor were there spared even the leading men in the city of Trier. For the Judge, with two Burgomasters, several Councilors and Associate Judges, canons of sundry collegiate churches, parish priests, rural deans, were swept away in this ruin. So far, at length, did the madness of the furious populace and of the courts go in this thirst for blood and booty that there was scarcely anybody who was not smirched by some suspicion of this crime.* Meanwhile notaries, copyists, and innkeepers grew rich. The executioner rode a blooded horse, like a noble of the court, and went clad in gold and silver; his wife vied with noble dames in the richness of her array. The children of those convicted and punished were sent into exile; their goods were confiscated; plowman and vintner failed hence came sterility. A direr pestilence or a more ruthless invader could hardly have ravaged the territory of Trier than this inquisition and persecution without bounds: many were the reasons for doubting that all were really guilty. This persecution lasted for several years; and some of those who presided over the administration of justice gloried in the multitude of the stakes, at each of which a human being had been given to the flames. At last, though the flames were still unsated, the people grew impoverished, rules were made and enforced restricting the fees and costs of examinations and examiners, and suddenly, as when in war funds fail, the zeal of the persecutors died out. (Burr: Linden, Gesta Trevirorum (from his manuscript in the City Library of Trier.) Latin. Printed in Hontheim's Historia Trevirensis diplomatica (iii, p. 170, note) and in Wyttenbach and Muller's ed. of the Gesta Trevirorum See this LINK for many first hand accounts and details of the witch persecutions.)
 * McCarthism and the 'Communist' witch hunts had many predecessors. The tactic is an established War of Terror mechanism of the state.
Related articles by Zemanta
Enhanced by Zemanta
Posted by opit at 7:46 AM 0 comments
Labels: , , , , ,

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

10 Feb - News Pulse


PULSE


The Zanj Revolt

Working in intolerably humid conditions clearing the salt marshes of southern Mesopotamia, fed on a poor diet of dates and semolina, frequently racially abused, the ‘Zanj’ - east African slaves in 9th Century Iraq - rose in their hundreds of thousands in a revolt which lasted for 15 years. They conquered large parts of Iraq, Iran and Bahrain, held the city of Basra for a decade, established their own capital, and even minted their own currency.
As labour intensive activities such as mining and plantation agriculture had expanded in the Muslim empires, so the slave trade had developed, especially the commerce in African slaves. Simultaneously, cultural justifications for the enslavement of Africans multiplied, with many classical writers depicting blacks as slow-witted and bestial.

Cubans attempt to resolve Venezuelan electricity shortage despite living in constant blackout

The latest complaint among the Venezuelan opposition to President Hugo Chávez revolves around his decision to bring Cuban Minister of Information Technology and Communications Ramiro Valdés to Venezuela to help rectify the current electrical crisis, intensified by diminishing water levels at the country’s primary hydroelectric dam. According to a front-page warning in a recent edition of Venezuelan opposition daily El Nacional, “electrical experts and Cubans in exile” have come to the conclusion that Valdés does not possess the requisite skills to evaluate electrical crises and that his expertise is instead in internet censorship; no conclusion is offered as to how Cubans in exile spontaneously acquire expertise in whatever subject is currently being used to discredit the Castro regime.
In addition to explaining that Ramiro Valdés is not the only person being imported to assess the Venezuelan electrical situation and that there are Argentine and Brazilian contingents, as well—plus offers of help from U.S., among a handful of other countries—Venezuelan Energy Minister Alí Rodríguez has argued that the Cubans’ history of electrical difficulties is precisely what has endowed them with expertise in the area of energy efficiency. 

Graphic History of the Honduran Coup, final part


America’s new right: Racist and proud of it

America’s nightly news: Watching us watching you

When the journalist David Barsamian asked Indian writer and political activist Arundhati Roy about her travels in the United States, she admitted that she was amazed how insular a nation America really was. “When you live outside it, and you come here, it’s almost shocking how insular it is. And how puzzled people are — and how curious, now I realize, about what other people think, because its just been blocked out.”
As insular as America may be, the paradox of an increasingly connected world and an increasingly narrow-minded news media is an obvious one.

New York Times: No conflict of interest — with the conventional wisdom

The problems with the coverage of the Israel-Palestine conflict in the Times, and virtually every other corporate-commercial news outlet in the United States, are not the result of biases of specific reporters, though individual reporters may indeed have allegiances to one side of an issue. The mainstream media have a conflict of interest at a deeper level — they are unwilling to break with the conventional wisdom about the conflict that dominates in the United States, especially among U.S. policymakers. U.S. news coverage of the conflict relentlessly presents the news within this Israeli narrative, primarily because powerful forces in this country find that narrative useful for U.S. strategic interests in the region, and U.S. journalists tend to fall in line with that view.
As one well-known mainstream reporter once grudgingly admitted to students at my university, American journalism tends to “follow the flag.” In this case the U.S. flag is planted firmly on the Israeli side of the conflict.
n January, Canada stopped contributing to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). It is the latest in a series of decisions that have seen Ottawa ‘out-Israeling’ Washington. It had previously stopped funding KAIROS (Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives), an NGO that had been supporting human rights groups in Israel and the Occupied Territories. In each case, the government of Stephen Harper seemed to be responding to, or rather pandering to, rabidly pro-Israeli Jewish groups in Canada. Israel itself has certainly never encouraged an end to the funding of UNRWA, an institution that for decades has, in effect, been paying some of the bills for the occupation.
Although camouflaged internationally by a similar drift in British and Australian policy, Ottawa has moved far from its own earlier positions, and possibly farther than either London or Canberra. Indeed, the Obama administration’s muted criticisms of Israeli policy sound relatively ferocious compared with Canada’s gestures towards the administration of Binyamin Netanyahu.
Once upon a time, Canada was a paragon of international virtue: supportive of the UN and happily putting distance between itself and its southern neighbour on the Middle East. Then came Stephen Harper. Ottawa did not join the Iraq war, but that was more a function of strong Canadian public opinion and Harper’s parlous electoral position than any considered choice.
Canada led the walk-out at the Durban conference on racism and was the first to cut aid to the Palestinian Authority when Hamas won the Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006. It applauded Israel’s right to “defend itself” against Hizbullah (a “measured response”, according to Harper), and against Hamas in Operation Cast Lead.
The move in the Conservative Party has also pulled the Liberal Party a significant distance from the principles of Pierre Trudeau, leaving only the New Democrats and the Bloc Québécois to uphold international law. Indeed, the first turns in policy came under the previous Liberal government, ironically with human rights stalwarts in its ranks like Irwin Cotler and Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff, who, in 2006, suggested correctly that Israel’s shelling of the UN post at Qana in southern Lebanon (in which a Canadian officer was killed) was a war crime.

CSIS goes to mat to block release of spying file on Tommy Douglas

"Secrecy is intrinsic to security intelligence matters," Nicole Jalbert, the agency's access to information and privacy co-ordinator, says in the affidavit filed late last month.
"The requirement for secrecy with respect to past and current activities of a security intelligence agency is essential; the origin of information, its extent and the methods by which it was obtained must remain a secret."
In an apparent reference to the precedent CSIS fears might be set if the Douglas files were released, Jalbert adds: "The routine, full disclosure of security intelligence information would, in certain circumstances, prevent or severely hamper the service's ability to discharge its statutory mandate."
The lawyer for The Canadian Press reporter who initiated the battle over disclosure of the Douglas dossier said CSIS's argument would essentially mean all intelligence files must remain secret in perpetuity.
"The suggestion that anything that intelligence agencies do must be secret for all time I think is contrary to basic democratic principles," Paul Champ said in an interview.
He said it's ironic that former Soviet Bloc countries have opened up their old intelligence files to public scrutiny while "the security intelligence file on Tommy Douglas, one of Canada's most loved political icons, remains closed."
"It's pretty unbelievable."

Russia on Wednesday said sanctions against Iran were more "relevant" after Tehran made moves towards enriching higher-grade nuclear fuel, a deputy foreign minister told Interfax news agency.
Ryabkov also said sanctions were not the answer to the problem and complained that Western powers were trying to press Russia into supporting them.
( Iran announced a higher enrichment level for fuel - still not a weaponry application )
Posted by opit at 12:46 PM 0 comments
Labels:
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)