Month: March 2015

Common Dreams – by Alex Main

On January 29, the White House announced that $1 billion in assistance to Central America would be included in its budget request for fiscal year 2016. The goal of this aid, as Vice President Joe Biden described it in a New York Times op-ed, is to help the governments of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras “change the climate of endemic violence and poverty” that has led to a “dangerous surge in migration,” as exemplified by last summer’s influx of unaccompanied child migrants. Explicitly modeled on Plan Colombia, the aid package would help make the region “overwhelmingly middle class, democratic and secure.”   Continue reading “Will Biden’s Billion Dollar Plan Help Central America?”

Blacklisted News

KILLING THEIR OWN … FOR POLITICAL GAIN

A CIA “psychological operations” manual prepared by a CIA contractor for the Nicaraguan Contra rebels noted the value of assassinating someone on your own side to create a “martyr” for the cause.

The manual was authenticated by the U.S. government.   Continue reading “CIA Urged Rebels to Assassinate Their Own in Order to Create “Martyrs””

Fuel Fix – by Jennifer A. Dlouhy

WASHINGTON — The slumping oil prices that have prompted energy companies to lay down rigs and lay off workers hit domestic producers harder than their international counterparts because of the U.S. crude export ban, Pioneer Natural Resources CEO Scott Sheffield is expected to tell a House panel on Tuesday.

“Price cycles come with the territory, and we will navigate this downturn as we have in the past,” Sheffield says in prepared testimony filed with the House Energy and Power Subcommittee, ahead of a Tuesday afternoon hearing on “world energy markets.” “Producers of domestic oil are especially disadvantaged compared to foreign producers, however, because they cannot receive global prices.”   Continue reading “Oil, gas industry urges lawmakers to lift crude exports ban”

MassPrivateI

The picture to the left is one of many examples of how security guards are being transformed into a DHS run ‘police force’. Some states even have police patrolling libraries.

In Portland, Maine it’s not uncommon for security guard Marko Petrovich to uncover suspicious materials, like hypodermic needles and beer cans. Then the gumshoe work begins: Whodunnit? And sometimes whoever done it is still doing it. Long occupancy is call for suspicion. Spend too much time in the john and Petrovich will wind up in there with you, asserting in broken and unabashed English that “you not take shit forty-five minutes.”    Continue reading “Library ‘security guards’ are acting like police, searching for suspicious people”

The Newspaper

An Air Force major detained at a suspicionless roadblock five years ago will not be able to sue for damages. A sharply divided Fifth Circuit US Court of Appeals panel concluded on Thursday that Border Patrol agents could hold Major Richard Rynearson indefinitely simply because they did not care for his attitude.

Rynearson was driving to work on March 18, 2010 along Highway 90 in Uvalde, Texas, when he was stopped at an immigration roadblock set up 67 miles from the border with Mexico. Rynearson recorded the incident and posted in on YouTube (view video).   Continue reading “Federal Appeals Court Endorses Suspicionless Detention Of Air Force Officer”

Yahoo News

More than 200 bodies were recently unearthed in several mass burials beneath a Paris supermarket.

The bodies, which were lined up head to feet, were found at the site of an ancient cemetery attached to the Trinity Hospital, which was founded in the 13th century.

Though it’s not clear exactly how these ancient people died, the trove of bodies could reveal insights into how people in the Middle Ages buried their dead during epidemics or famine, the researchers involved said.   Continue reading “Hundreds of Medieval Bodies Found Under Paris Supermarket”

The Atlantic – by ALANA SEMUELS

LAS VEGAS—There’s been a lot of hubbub about the effort tech whiz Tony Hsieh and his crack team of acolytes have put into revitalizing downtown Las Vegas.

In case you missed it, Hsieh, the CEO of Zappos, in January 2012 announced that he was putting $350 million into the Downtown Project, which would fund new businesses in an economically depressed part of the city seven miles north of the Las Vegas Strip. He also wanted to create a tech hub in a city better known for gambling and tourism, which some journalists dubbed the newest “techtopia.”   Continue reading “$350 Million Might Not Be Enough to Save Las Vegas”

Sputnik

Big money has long had a major part in politics, and the 2016 presidential race is no different.

No one has formally announced their intentions to run for the nation’s highest elected office, but the presumed front-runners for the two major political parties are already following the money and shaking the trees over at Goldman Sachs in New York, the wealthiest and most successful financial institution in Wall Street history.   Continue reading “The 2016 Money Race: Jeb & Hillary Fight for Goldman Sachs Cash”

Press TV

Israel has ordered several Palestinian families in the occupied East  al-Quds (Jerusalem) to destroy their houses as part of the regime’s settlement expansion policies.

The Israeli Civil Administration has told Palestinian families in the Khillet al-Raheb area to demolish their homes immediately or the Tel Aviv regime will do it at its own expense.   Continue reading “Israel orders demolition of over a dozen Palestinian houses”

Counter Punch – by Barry Lando

It’s astonishing that in the breathless run-up to Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s appearance before a joint session of the U.S. Congress to warn of a nuclear-armed Iran, no one—politicians, editorial writers, media pundits—point out that there already is a nuclear power in the Middle East—Netanyahu’s Israel.

Estimates are that Israel has about 80 nukes, roughly the same number as Pakistan and India.   Continue reading “Netanyahu’s Arsenal of Nukes – The Israeli Elephant in the US Congress”

Wall Street Journal – by Miriam Jordan

LOS ANGELES—Federal agents Tuesday executed search warrants at several Southern California sites they say are connected to three multimillion-dollar birth-tourism businesses that enabled thousands of Chinese women to travel here and return home with infants born as U.S. citizens.

The investigations are likely to culminate in the biggest federal criminal case ever against the booming “anchor baby” industry, according to U.S. authorities. The search warrants cite suspected visa fraud, tax evasion and harboring illegal immigrants, among other charges.   Continue reading “Federal Agents Raid Alleged ‘Maternity Tourism’ Businesses Catering to Chinese”

CBS LA

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Three masked suspects were in custody Tuesday after allegedly opening fire on police officers in South Los Angeles.

The incident began around 6:15 a.m. on W. Florence Avenue between Van Ness and Normandy, officials said.   Continue reading “3 Masked Suspects In Custody After Allegedly Firing At LAPD Officers In South LA”

So why is the price of gas still going up?

Yahoo News – by JONATHAN FAHEY

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. has so much crude that it is running out of places to put it, and that could drive oil and gasoline prices even lower in the coming months.

For the past seven weeks, the United States has been producing and importing an average of 1 million more barrels of oil every day than it is consuming. That extra crude is flowing into storage tanks, especially at the country’s main trading hub in Cushing, Oklahoma, pushing U.S. supplies to their highest point in at least 80 years, the Energy Department reported last week.   Continue reading “US running out of room to store oil; price collapse next?”