TransCanada worker welds section of Keystone XL pipeline near Winnsboro.Texas Observer – Priscila Mosqueda

On a Wednesday in late June, Evan Vokes packed his only pair of shorts in a suitcase and boarded a plane to Dallas, happy to trade the chill of Calgary, Canada, for a Texas summer. Over the next four days, he’d travel by car and a low-flying Cessna from Paris south to Beaumont, following the route of the Keystone XL pipeline, slated to bring oil from the Canadian tar sands to refineries on the Gulf Coast. Armed with an encyclopedic knowledge of arcane pipeline regulations, Vokes came to check out claims from landowners that his former employer—Canadian company TransCanada—was botching the job on the pipeline.   Continue reading “Whistleblower, Landowners: TransCanada is Botching the Job on Keystone XL Pipeline”

March brings together gun rights proponents News Journal – by Angela Ward

Carrying rifles and shotguns, proponents of open carry laws marched through downtown Longview on Saturday morning.

About 130 people participated in the march, which ended on the Gregg County Courthouse lawn.

“Our rights have been respected, and we’re going to exercise them as free men,” said organizer Stephen Lee.

While middle-aged men made up the bulk of the group, there also were young families with small children, as well as women and elderly residents.   Continue reading “Longview, Texas march brings together gun rights proponents”

Anti-War – by Rep. Ron Paul

President Obama announced this weekend that he has decided to use military force against Syria and would seek authorization from Congress when it returned from its August break. Every Member ought to vote against this reckless and immoral use of the US military. But even if every single Member and Senator votes for another war, it will not make this terrible idea any better because some sort of nod is given to the Constitution along the way.   Continue reading “Will Congress Endorse Obama’s War Plans? Does it Matter?”

Lew Rockwell – by Laurence M. Vance

If and when the United States government intervenes militarily in some way in Syria, there is no question that U.S. military personnel will take the lives and destroy the property of people that had never harmed an American or threatened the United States in any way.

And most Americans won’t even care.   Continue reading “Hands off Syria – An Asinine Proposition”

The Independent – by Rob Williams

Six British soldiers have been arrested in New York after an off-duty police officer was allegedly beaten up and robbed outside a bar.

A court in Manhattan heard that the Royal Regiment of Scotland soldiers allegedly punched an NYPD officer to the floor and continued hitting him as a friend attempted to stop them.   Continue reading “British soldiers held for ‘attack’ on New York police officer after alleged racial slur”

The Daily Beast – by Abby Haglage

In the wake of 9/11, the NYPD launched a huge surveillance program. In the new book Enemies Within, Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman detail the radical counterterrorism plan that destroyed the city’s privacy.

While peering out onto the burning rubble at Ground Zero in the days after September 11, Ray Kelly (then an executive at Bear Stearns) had an epiphany: “The NYPD needs its own intelligence unit.” If the federal government continued to hold a monopoly on nationwide intelligence information, he theorized, the NYPD would simply be “waiting to respond to the next [terrorist] attack” and “helpless to prevent it.” Sworn in as New York City police commissioner just four months later in January 2002, the former Wall Streeter made it his mission to ensure that the NYPD would have the power—and intelligence—to stop something like this from happening on NYC soil again.   Continue reading “9 Secrets of the NYPD’s Spy Unit Revealed in ‘Enemies Within’”

MassPrivateI

For at least six years, law enforcement officials working on a counternarcotics program have had routine access, using subpoenas, to an enormous AT&T database that contains the records of decades of Americans’ phone calls — parallel to but covering a far longer time than the National Security Agency’s hotly disputed collection of phone call logs.    Continue reading “DEA circumvents the Fourth Amendment by spying on Americans phone calls without a warrant”

The Kansas City Star – by Karen Dillon

A vast underground lake beneath western Kansas and parts of seven other states could be mostly depleted by 2060, turning productive farmland back to semi-arid ground, a new study says.

The life of the Ogallala Aquifer could be extended several decades, but only if water usage is reduced, a four-year study by researchers from Kansas State University found.

“There is going to be agriculture production in Kansas and corn production and cattle production really for the foreseeable future,” David Steward, lead author of the study, said in an interview last week.  Continue reading “The Ogallala Aquifer, an important water resource, is in trouble”

Mahdi TrojanTech 2 – by Anujeet Majumdar

Anew surveillance progamme has now come to light that is far greater in size than NSA’s PRISM programme, according to the New York Times. Law enforcement officers, as part of a counter-narcotics programme, have routinely been able to access a huge AT&T database containing decades of American phone calls records for the past six years.   Continue reading “US drug agent-run surveillance programme surfaces, reportedly bigger than PRISM”

Right Wing Watch – by Brian Tashman

Two of our favorite Religious Right broadcasters got together yesterday, and as you probably already guessed, the conversation was quite educational and informative. For example, we learned from Kevin Swanson, the Colorado pastor and host of Generations Radio, that Mark Twain was controlled by Satan.

Swanson explained his theory about the demonic possession of Twain, among others, while appearing on TruNews with host Rick Wiles.   Continue reading “Swanson: Mark Twain Was ‘Demon-Possessed’”

Wake Up America – by Susan Duclos

According to Raw Story and the video details of the footage you will see below, Iraq war veteran Emily Yates was arrested on Friday after a dispute with police about where she could stand while playing her banjo during a protest against U.S. military action in Syria.

Yates was asking the Federal Parks Police why they were demanding she move from a shady area at Independence Mall in Philadelphia.   Continue reading “Female War Veteran Violently Arrested For Playing Banjo In The Wrong Place At Syria War Protest”

The USS Nimitz, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier which is currently supplemented by biofuel, sails about 150 miles north of the island of Oahu during the RIMPAC Naval exercises off Hawaii July 18,2012. REUTERS/Hugh GentryReuters – by Andrea Shalal-Esa

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and other ships in its strike group are heading west toward the Red Sea to help support a limited U.S. strike on Syria, if needed, defense officials said on Sunday.

The Nimitz carrier strike group, which includes four destroyers and a cruiser, has no specific orders to move to the eastern Mediterranean at this point, but is moving west in the Arabian Sea so it can do so if asked. It was not immediately clear when the ships would enter the Red Sea, but they had not arrived by Sunday evening, said one official.   Continue reading “USS Nimitz carrier group rerouted for possible help with Syria”

obama-foot-on-desk-e1378073890735.jpgRed Flag News

(THE BLAZE) — Lots of folks have seen the photo of President Obama with his foot on the Oval Office desk, which hit the front page of the Drudge Report Sunday.   Continue reading “Does Seeing President Obama’s Foot On The Oval Office Desk Make Your Blood Boil?”

IMRA

CAIRO (Ma’an) — Egyptian forces deployed along the Suez Canal on Saturday
after an alleged terrorist attack was thwarted, Egyptian military sources
said.

Forces supported by armored vehicles and Apache helicopters deployed on both
sides of the canal, military officials told Ma’an.   Continue reading “Egyptian forces deploy around Suez Canal”

Brzezinski-global-awakening-newsStory Leak – by Mikael Thalen

During a short interview with Germany’s DW News last Monday, former US National Security Adviser and Trilateral Commission co-founder Zbigniew Brzezinski commented on the growing inefficiency of war due to the increased political knowledge of the public.

“Given the contemporary reality of what I have called in my writings ‘Global Political Awakening,’ a policy of force based primarily on Western and in some cases former colonial powers does not seem to me a very promising avenue to an eventual solution to the regional problem,” said Brzezinski, referring to the situation in Syria.   Continue reading “Brzezinski: ‘Global Political Awakening’ Making Syrian War Difficult”

Farming Without Water? It’s Possible and TastyCare 2 – by Kevin Matthews

Everyone knows water and sunlight are essential to gardening, but what’s a farmer in a drought-struck area to do? Amazingly, some farmers have found a way to grow crops without the H2O and the results are remarkably tasty.

As NPR reports, the technique is known as dry farming. Dry farmers intentionally limit the amount of water they provide to their crops. Though some water is needed in the first few weeks to get the plants going, after that, the farmers cut the supply off entirely.   Continue reading “Farming Without Water? It’s Possible and Tasty”

Gobsmacked: Jamie O'Connell had to look twice after spotting the obscene hand gesture in the skyDaily Mail – by STUART WOLEDGE

The National Lottery’s ‘It Could Be You’ advertising campaign was one of the most recognizable of its time, where a cloud formed the shape of a hand and pointed to an unsuspecting winner.

The cloud’s over Fort William in Scotland came up with their own take on the idea, when they formed the shape of a hand and made the sort of gesture that suggested its photographer, Jamie O’Connell, probably need not bother buying a ticket this week.   Continue reading “There’s a message in there somewhere! Dog-walker snaps amazing photo of cloud formation giving him the FINGER”