Why Are Things As They Are?

It is Not Just Bankers. It is Capitalism. The core issue of our time is the potential of a mass, activist, class conscious movement to transcend capitalism met by the reality of a corporate state, fascism, conducting perpetual war on workers world-wide.

We Say Fight Back!

Glen Ford from Black Agenda Report: (OWS) supposedly “apolitical” park occupiers are in some ways more advanced than a lot of folks that call themselves scientific socialists but have not come fully to grips with what it means when finance capital achieves absolute political hegemony – the reality that is central to how U.S. imperialism ultimately collapses. It is a class that produces nothing; that exists solely through rigging and armed coercion of markets and the destruction of all that cannot be monetized; that actively suppresses and makes war against human productive potential, worldwide; and that has now turned, like piranhas, against the state structures they themselves helped build in Europe and North America.

The political rule of finance capital is the end game. In the early stages of the Great Depression, banking baron Andrew Mellon urged President Herbert Hoover to “liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate farmers, liquidate real estate” in order to solve the crisis. Mellon didn’t get his wish because, even then, the finance capitalist class did not wield hegemonic power in U.S. society. They do now. With all the other capitalist sectors totally subservient to Wall Street – including mass communications – they are financializing the State, seeking to convert many of its components (Social Security, health care, public education, and much more) into profit centers, and discarding much of the rest. This is of necessity, because finance capital can no longer preserve itself in any other way.

Nothing is left standing in the capitalist sector to resist them. For that reason, there is no Hoover, much less a Roosevelt, to articulate an alternative capitalist vision, a new compact, an accommodating “reform.” Finance capital rushes forward, creating conditions in which its own imminent destruction can only be temporarily averted by frenzied predation on the real economy and the State, itself. Obama Democrats and the Republicans, alike, facilitate the pillaging, captives of the hegemon.

“They are financializing the State, seeking to convert many of its components (Social Security, health care, public education, and much more) into profit centers, and discarding much of the rest.”http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/wall-street-public-enemy-number-one

In Detroit’s case, it might be more appropriate to Re-occupy)

above, occupier youth maced in San Diego, when down.

India’s Workers on Strike: MUMBAI, India — A strike at the biggest Indian car company, Maruti Suzuki, idled one of its four major production plants for the fifth consecutive day on Tuesday. The dispute pits the aspirations of manufacturing workers against the economic realities of a national labor glut. …Other Indian auto companies have also been hit by labor unrest this year. In March, some workers at a General Motors factory in the western state of Gujarat went on strike for nearly three months. There is a growing dissatisfaction among Indian factory workers, particularly those in the auto industry, that they are not sharing in the financial success of their companies at a time when inflation in India is running at nearly 10 percent.
Union workers are also angry over the growing use of contract workers, who are paid far less than regular employees and — unlike permanent workers — can be laid off without government approval. In some auto factories, contract workers make up more than half the staff.
Monthly manufacturing wages in India range from 6,000 rupees, or about $120, for contract workers, to about 35,000 rupees (about $710) for highly skilled and experienced workers. While those wages are better than the  average income in India — about $81 a month — living on them at the lower end of that range can still be tough. www.nytimes.com/2011/10/12/business/global/strike-adds-to-problems-at-indian-auto-factory.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail0=y

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFLmDKs4MK4

Bogata Students on the March: Thousands of students have protested in the Colombian capital, Bogota, and other cities against government plans to reform higher education.
The demonstrations were mainly peaceful but Bogota police fired tear gas and used water cannon after some people threw stones, officials said.
Students say the proposed reforms will lead to partial privatisation of the public universities.
The government says the changes will bring more funding into the sector.
An estimated 20,000 to 30,000 people marched through Bogota on Wednesday.
Student demonstrations were also held in other town and cities. www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-15288505?cid=nlc-dailybrief-daily_news_brief-link21-20111013

360 Degree View of the NYC Occupation: photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/10/13/8303305-a-360-degree-view-of-the-occupy-wall-street-encampment-at-zuccotti-park

California Prisoners End 3 week Hunger Strike: Thousands of inmates at prisons across California had stopped eating over the past three weeks in renewed protest against conditions of prolonged isolation in security housing units, though the number of hunger strikers dwindled to fewer than 600 this week.  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/us/california-inmates-end-3-week-hunger-strike.html?_r=1&hp

The Little Red School House

U, Washington Dean of Ed Loves the Obamagogue School to War Program: I’m supporting U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s plan to increase accountability for teacher preparation programs. We need system-level improvement, and having the Education Department demanding use of multiple measures and providing additional tools to assess program effectiveness is a huge step in the right direction.
We can’t settle for simple answers. There are no silver bullets in improving teacher quality. Simply using student outcomes on standardized tests to evaluate teachers won’t solve all of our nation’s teacher quality issues. But we can use student performance as one key measure of effectiveness without stifling teacher creativity or innovation, .

Detroit Fed of Teachers Deepens the Unionite Farce. Don’t Layoff Teachers needed to run Big Tests! “The timing could not be worse,” he said about the layoffs. “You would have them changing teachers right in the middle of the MEAP test. Students would start off with one teacher and then have other another.”
Students in Detroit and across Michigan face a higher threshold this year for passing the MEAP. The state Board of Education last month raised “cut scores” for the test, meaning in some cases, students will have to answer twice as many questions correctly to be considered proficient.  http://www.detnews.com/article/20111010/SCHOOLS/110100338/1026/DPS-laying-off-87-teachers-during-MEAP-testing

With Detroit PS Losing 15,000 a Year, the bosses spent $1.5 BILLION on New Schools which now Sit Empty and Stripped but Broad’s Bobb has a Study that says that’s ok: An investigation says there’s no evidence of wrongdoing related to real estate deals under the Detroit Public Schools’ $1.5 billion capital improvement effort approved by voters in 1994.
The state’s largest district on Monday announced that its Inspector General Wilbert Marsh released a final report stemming from a series of investigative hearings held by Robert Bobb, the district’s former emergency financial manager.  The investigation found, however, that there was a lack of due diligence and managerial oversight.  http://www.detnews.com/article/20111011/SCHOOLS/110110399/1026/local/Probe-finds-no-wrongdoing-in-Detroit-school-deals

Detroit Schools $650 thousand Poorer Because of JerkOff Board Boss: Detroit Public Schools will pay $650,000 to former superintendent Teresa Gueyser, who lost her job days after she claimed the school board president repeatedly fondled himself in front of her during a private meeting.    http://www.detnews.com/article/20111013/SCHOOLS/110130457/Detroit-Public-Schools-to-pay-$650K-to-ex-superintendent-in-fondling-case (below, habitual self fondler Otis Mathis, the illiterate who was the Head of the Detroit Board of Ed)

San Diego Schools Headed for Insolvency and State Takeover? “Barely one month after school has opened we are at the edge of the cliff, looking over and down at insolvency,” Kowba told the school board Tuesday night. “We are facing the reality of midyear budget cuts that could be the starting point on the road to insolvency and state takeover.”   www.voiceofsandiego.org/education/article_0a8ed0e0-f5bf-11e0-b560-001cc4c03286.html

Read Marx. Make Class War 2!

(Marx) we say to the workers: ‘You will have to go through 15, 20, 50 years of civil wars and national struggles not only to bring about a change in society but also to change yourselves, and prepare yourselves for the exercise of political power’, you say on the contrary: ‘Either we seize power at once, or else we might as well just take to our beds.’ ” [Revelations concerning the Communist Trial at Cologne]

Check Out Greg Myerson on Rethinking Black Marxism: Reflections on Cedric Robinson and Others — The point of my essay, quite bluntly, is to show that Robinson is wrong about Marxism and that Robinson is not alone, the errors he makes being fundamental not only to current theorizing about race and class, my two principal concerns, but also to current theorizing about gender, culture, “relative autonomy” and causal explanations of oppression and exploitation. So while this essay focuses on Black Marxism, it will, by way of contextualizing it for the present, discuss as well and in some detail the work of Kelley–especially his foreword–and labor historian David Roediger. In my conclusion, I will suggest further affinities between Robinson’s work and a wide range of contemporary theorists who in their various ways recapitulate many of Robinson’s premises.
3. The “relative autonomy” of “race” has been enabled by a reduction and distortion of class analysis. The essence of the reduction and distortion involves equating class analysis with some version of economic determinism. The key move in the critique of economic determinist Marxism depends upon the view that the economic is the base, the cultural/political/ideological the superstructure. It is then relatively easy to show that the (presumably non-political) economic base does not cause the political/cultural/ideological superstructure, that the latter is/are not epiphenomenal but relatively autonomous or autonomous causal categories in their own right–though such causal pluralism often results in the deconstruction of the category of cause. It might be said, at least with regard to the “class struggle in theory,” that most critics of Marxism zero in on the perceived conceptual inadequacies of base and superstructure. So I’d like to state my position on this at some length before turning to Robinson. clogic.eserver.org/3-1&2/meyerson.html

The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor

The Obamagogue’s Secret Murder Memo: The Obama administration’s secret legal memorandum that opened the door to the killing of Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born radical Muslim cleric hiding in Yemen, found that it would be lawful only if it were not feasible to take him alive, according to people who have read the document.  The memo, written last year, followed months of extensive interagency deliberations and offers a glimpse into the legal debate that led to one of the most significant decisions made by President Obama — to move ahead with the killing of an American citizen without a trial.
The secret document provided the justification for acting despite an executive order banning assassinations, a federal law against murder, protections in the Bill of Rights and various strictures of the international laws of war, www.nytimes.com/2011/10/09/world/middleeast/secret-us-memo-made-legal-case-to-kill-a-citizen.html?hp

Hey US Troops! Hillbillary is Trying to Cut a Deal with the People who are Shooting at YOU! US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Tuesday signalled that the United States remains open to exploring a peace deal including the Haqqani network, the militant group that US officials blame for a campaign of high-profile violence that could jeopardise Washington’s plans for withdrawing smoothly from Afghanistan.
“Where we are right now is that we view the Haqqanis and other of their ilk as, you know, being adversaries and being very dangerous to Americans, Afghans and coalition members inside Afghanistan, but we are not shutting the door on trying to determine whether there is some path forward,” Clinton said when asked whether she believed members of the Haqqani network might reconcile with the Afghan government.  http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/12/us-open-to-afghan-peace-deal-clinton.html?cid=nlc-dailybrief-daily_news_brief-link16-20111012

US drone strike kills 78 in Somalia: An attack by a US unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has killed at least 78 people and injured 64 others in southern Somalia, Press TV reports.
The Friday attack took place near Qooqani town located in southern Somalia, a Press TV correspondent reported.
In a different incident on Friday, another US drone attack killed 11 civilians and wounded 34 more in Hoosingow district in the south of the country.
Somalia is the sixth country where the US military has conducted drone strikes.
The US has employed drones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Iraq and Yemen to launch aerial bombings. presstv.com/detail/204501.html

Hellbound Drones were invented and are made in lovely San Diego. When will they be used in the US?

Ghadaffi Fights On (and the bogus Historians Vs War stays shut up), and the CIA’s Gang Destroys Cities, What of Nato and Syria? The endorsement of the Security Council proved essential to the legitimisation of the Nato-led intervention in Libya’s civil war. However, several countries openly violated the resolutions, adopting a much more active role and presence in the conflict by arming the rebels, providing military training and placing forward air controllers on the ground to call in air support.
Furthermore, although Nato repeatedly claimed to be an impartial actor in the conflict, its actions – allowing the rebel forces to smuggle weapons into the country and fly aircraft in the no-fly zone and coordinating its air strikes with their military operations, for instance – proved otherwise.
As a result of these blatant violations, the UN has been unwilling to endorse intervention in Syria to stop the government-sanctioned violence against peaceful protesters. In June, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev delayed a Security Council resolution condemning Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, stating he would not support “a dead ringer for Resolution 1973,” which he believed had been “turned into a scrap of paper to cover up a pointless military operation.” On October 4 Russia and China vetoed a sanctions resolution.  http://www.cfr.org/nato/overreaching-libya-nato-has-left-syria-fend-alone/p26153?cid=nlc-dailybrief-daily_news_brief-link12-20111014

The Council on Foreign Relations IRAN CRISIS GUIDE: www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-foreclosures-20111013,0,6869773.story

The International Economic War of the Rich on the Poor

If the Recession Ended, How Come We are Broke, Hungry, and Homeless? In a grim sign of the enduring nature of the economic slump, household income declined more in the two years after the recession ended than it did during the recession itself, new research has found. Between June 2009, when the recession officially ended, and June 2011, inflation-adjusted median household income fell 6.7 percent, to $49,909, according to a study by two former Census Bureau officials. During the recession — from December 2007 to June 2009 — household income fell 3.2 percent.
The finding helps explain why Americans’ attitudes toward the economy, the country’s direction and its political leaders have continued to sour even as the economy has been growing. Unhappiness and anger have come to dominate the political scene, including the early stages of the 2012 presidential campaign. www.nytimes.com/2011/10/10/us/recession-officially-over-us-incomes-kept-falling.html?_r=1&hp

The Fundraiser-in-Chief Will Spend a Billion to Keep his Job and Protect Wall Street. And you!

Who is CNN’s New Strumpet for Capital? Erin Burnett……

She is the youngest daughter of corporate attorney K. King Burnett, and his wife Esther.[4] She attended St. Andrew’s School in Middletown, Delaware, graduating in 1994.[5] Burnett later attended Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts.
At Williams College she studied political science and economics, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in political economy. …. began her career as a financial analyst for Goldman Sachs[8] in their investment banking division, where she worked on mergers and acquisitions and corporate finance.
While working as an investment-banking analyst, Burnett was offered a position at CNN as a writer and booker for CNN’s Moneyline with Stuart Varney, Willow Bay, and Lou Dobbs.[9]
From CNN, she moved to Citigroup, where she served as vice president for Citigroup/CitiMedia, and was responsible for all anchoring of the Citigroup online financial news network.[9]  During an August 10, 2007 appearance on the MSNBC program Hardball with Chris Matthews, Burnett commented on recalls of Chinese-made goods, stating that “people should be careful what they wish for on China” and that the production of “toys that don’t have lead in them or food that isn’t poisonous” would lead to higher prices in the United States.[

And What of the Newspimp Anderson Cooper? Anderson Hays Cooper was born on June 3, 1967,[1] the younger son of the writer Wyatt Emory Cooper and the artist, designer, writer, and heiress Gloria Vanderbilt, and is a great-great-great-grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt of the prominent Vanderbilt shipping and railroad fortune.[2]  Cooper was educated at the Dalton School, a co-educational independent school in New York City. …During college, Cooper spent two summers as an intern at the Central Intelligence Agency. Although he technically has no formal journalistic education, he opted to pursue a career in journalism rather than stay with the agency after school en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anderson_Cooper

Pennsylvania State Capital Goes Bankrupt: The capital city of the Keystone State has run out of money. Lawmakers in Harrisburg, PA today voted to file for municipal bankruptcy protection as the state capital of Pennsylvania has accumulated hundreds of millions of dollars in debt.
The Harrisburg council narrowly voted 4-3 today to file for bankruptcy, a decision that both attorneys and residents warned against.
“This was a last resort,” Mark D. Schwartz, lawyer for the city council, tells Bloomberg. “They’re at their wits’ end.”
While some attorneys are questioning if the file adheres to legal loopholes set in place to avoid Harrisburg from going bankrupt, others say that in the meantime it will keep the city temporarily afloat while the legalities are examines. To Reuters, Schwartz says the move will try to give the city “bargaining power” with Harrisburg’s slew of creditors and the state itself.  That is, of course, if the filing is approved. rt.com/usa/news/pennsylvania-harrisburg-capital-bankruptcy-731/

Home Foreclosures on the Rise, Again: After months of a foreclosure slowdown caused by investigations into improper practices, the nation’s home-repossession machinery is beginning to move again — particularly in states such as California where courts don’t oversee the process.
The number of homes entering the foreclosure process surged 19% in the third quarter compared with the previous quarter in states where foreclosures take place largely outside of the courtroom, according to RealtyTrac, an Irvine information firm. These nonjudicial states include California, Nevada, Arizona, Oregon and Washington.
That increase was higher than in the so-called judicial states, which include New York and Florida, where the number of homes entering foreclosure increased 9%.
“[The banks] are generally working through more of these loans, but the places where they can file the most quickly are going to be the nonjudicial states,” said Celia Chen, a housing economist with Moody’s Analytics.
The increase in new foreclosure proceedings comes as talks over a broad foreclosure settlement by state attorneys general with the nation’s five largest mortgage servicers have experienced setbacks. California recently stepped out of those discussions, declaring it would pursue its own path. www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-foreclosures-20111013,0,6869773.story

Banks closed in Ga, NC, NJ, Ill; 80 failed in ’11: Regulators have closed small banks in Georgia, North Carolina, New Jersey and Illinois, boosting to 80 the number of U.S. bank failures this year.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on Friday seized Piedmont Community Bank of Gray, Ga., with $201.7 million in assets and $181.4 million in deposits. It also shuttered Blue Ridge Savings Bank, based in Asheville, N.C., with $161 million in assets and $158.7 million in deposits.
Also closed was First State Bank in Cranford, N.J., with $204.4 million in assets and $201.2 million in deposits, and Country Bank in Aledo, Ill., with $190.6 million in assets and $167.5 million in deposits.  http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Banks-closed-in-Ga-NC-NJ-Ill-apf-411993996.html?x=0

Still Proundly Numero Uno, Detroit is the Most Dangerous CIty in the USA: Detroit came in at No. 1, with 345 murders last year (almost one a day), and 1,111 violent crimes per 100,000 residents. www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/10/08/126591/most-dangerous-cities-in-america.html

But Chicago, home of the Cubs, Still Leads Nation in Foreclosures: RealtyTrac placed Chicago first among the country’s 20 largest metropolitan areas for foreclosures.
Real estate experts attribute the high concentration of foreclosures to numerous factors including the strong protections built into Illinois law to protect borrowers, the impact of the “robo-signing” investigation by the Illinois Attorney General, and the reluctance of banks to dump properties at prices far below the value of mortgage loans on their books.
Much like indigestion, this most likely means that it is just going to take that much longer for the distress to be worked out of the Chicago area housing markets.
In speaking with Bardan Azari, Chief of Operations for Cherry Picker, www.cherrypickerinvestments.com, “We have seen an increasing number of properties come to auction that our clients are bidding on and there is very little, if any, sign of prices increases due to the volume not declining.”    http://www.trulia.com/blog/michael_hobbs/2011/07/chicago_foreclosures_lead_the_nation

Above, The Obamagogue Parties on With State Dinner for S. Korean Puppet While Wars and Poverty Bloom

Solidarity Fornever

From the Same People who Nearly destroyed the 2011 Student Movement— AFL-CIO Goons Endorse Wall Street Occupations in order to Demolish them: Richard Trumka: We support the protesters in their determination to hold Wall Street accountable and create good jobs.

Chrysler Sellout Even Worse than Ford/Gm: The tentative agreement reached Wednesday between the United Auto Workers and Chrysler Group LLC is substantially less generous than the ones the union won from General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co., but analysts say it was the best deal the union could get….Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne also wrested important concessions from the UAW, including an agreement to substantially reduce the number of skilled trades job classifications at Chrysler — something Ford also wanted, but failed to win in its own negotiations with the union.
While the final language evolved over the course of the past four weeks, a source close to the negotiations said the bottom-line numbers are the same ones that were on the table on Sept. 14, when talks between Chrysler and the union broke down. Over the next month, UAW President Bob King tried to push Marchionne for terms that were closer to the ones he negotiated with GM and Ford. But Marchionne refused to budge, threatening to force the UAW into arbitration — a dangerous gamble that King was committed to avoiding.  http://www.detnews.com/article/20111013/AUTO01/110130338/

UAW Bosses to Ford Workers: The World Will End of you do Not vote For Our Sellout Contract: “None of this is to tell people how to vote, but it’s our job to explain clearly what the possible consequences of a no vote really are. Too many lives are counting on the outcome. House payments. Car payments. Christmas presents.
“A no vote will lead to a strike. How long will it last ? How will it be resolved ? Will the next contract be better or worse ? Nobody knows.” www.freep.com/article/20111012/BUSINESS0102/111012056/UAW-posting-sends-warning-Rejecting-Ford-contract-could-risky?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE

Throw Out MoveOn!

Make Wall Street Pay:
Jobs Not Cuts Monday in San Diego

Host: Wayne C., MoveOn member

Where: University Avenue & College Avenue (in San Diego)

When: Monday, Oct. 10, at 12:00 PM

Can you come?
Click below for more details and to RSVP:

I can come.

Sorry, I can’t make it this time, but keep me updated on the campaign.

What: The media is finally starting to pay attention to the tens of thousands of people demanding Wall Street pay to create jobs, not cuts. This is our chance to push for policies that work for the 99% of us who can’t afford lobbyists. Whether protesting banks not paying their fair share, rallying for jobs, or standing in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, we’ll amplify our message for politicians: jobs now–make Wall Street pay!

And don’t worry, this email was sent through the MoveOn system, so your personal contact info is kept private.

Unionite Fakers Spending Millions on Obamagogue’s Bogus Jobs Bill (he can bomb Libya, but no jobs for you) : Other unions have gotten behind the bill as well — the National Education Association launched ads last month in support of the bill. thehill.com/news-by-subject/labor/187383-public-sector-union-launches-ads-for-obama-jobs-bill

The Emergence of Fascism as a Popular Mass Movement:

Judge Judy, America’s Last Moral Compass, Says, “If it doesn’t make sense, it is just Not True!” But Eric, Fast and Furious, Holder has a Whale of a Tale for You! Mexican Cartels! DEA! Saudi Ambassador! US Citizens Kablooey! Scarrry! Just in Time for Halloween! The United States on Tuesday accused Iranian officials of plotting to murder Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United States in a bizarre scheme involving an Iranian-American used-car salesman who believed he was hiring assassins from a Mexican drug cartel for $1.5 million.    The alleged plot also included plans to pay the cartel, Los Zetas, to bomb the Israeli Embassy in Washington and the Saudi and Israeli Embassies in Argentina, according to a law enforcement official.
The plotters also discussed a side deal between the Quds Force, part of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, and Los Zetas to funnel tons of opium from the Middle East to Mexico, the official said. The plans never progressed, though, because the two suspects — the Iranian-American and an Iranian Quds Force officer — unwittingly were dealing with an informant for the Drug Enforcement Administration, officials said. www.nytimes.com/2011/10/12/us/us-accuses-iranians-of-plotting-to-kill-saudi-envoy.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2

Even the CFR Doubts the Obamagogues’ Lies About Zetas/Saudis and Iran: ter Attorney General Eric Holder announced the arrest of Iranian-American Manssor Arbabsiar in connection with an alleged Iran-directed plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United States, administration officials had harsh words for Iran, but many experts voiced skepticism (NYT). Kenneth Katzman, an Iran expert at the Congressional Research Service, says he and many of his peers believe that elements of the plan–such as the alleged intent to use a Mexican drug cartel to carry out the killing–simply don’t comport with what they know “about the way Iranians conduct terrorist attacks” and “the way they implement them.” Katzman also notes that the attack, if it had succeeded, would have drawn a strong retaliatory U.S. response, which is something Iran “does not want.”  http://www.cfr.org/iran/mounting-questions-iran-terror-plot/p26185?cid=nlc-dailybrief-daily_news_brief-link8-20111014

US to Google and Sonic, “Hand over Wikileaks Supporter’s Email: The U.S. government obtained secret court orders to force Google Inc and a small Internet provider to hand over information from email accounts of a WikiLeaks volunteer, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.
The U.S. request included email addresses of people that Jacob Appelbaum, a volunteer for the campaigning website, had corresponded with in the past two years, but not the full emails, the newspaper said, citing documents it had reviewed.
Internet provider Sonic said it fought the government order legally and lost, and was forced to turn over information, the company’s chief executive, Dane Jasper, told the newspaper.
Appelbaum, 28, has not been charged with any wrongdoing, the daily said.d www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/10/us-google-wikileaks-idUSTRE79918F20111010

Afghans Trained By US, Tortured Prisoners!  Americans Aghast! Prisoners handed over by international forces to Afghan custody are being subjected to “systematic’’ torture by Afghan interrogators seeking intelligence in the war against the Taliban, according to a United Nations report released Monday.
The report portrays prisoner abuse by Afghan authorities on a scale far wider than previously known. It is bound to complicate American efforts to hand over increasing responsibilities to Afghan forces as U.S. troops begin a steady drawdown from Afghanistan.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/war-zones/afghan-detainees-tortured-in-prison-un-says/2011/10/10/gIQAr3K6ZL_story.html?hpid=z1

30 jailers punished for inmate beatings, report says: In the last two years, Los Angeles County sheriff’s officials have disciplined more than 30 jail employees for beating inmates or covering up the abuse, according to a report from the agency’s watchdog obtained by The Times.
Other deputies “get away” with unnecessary force against inmates because “they craft a story of justification … which may be impossible to disprove,” according to the report by the Office of Independent Review, which monitors discipline in the Sheriff’s Department. www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-jails-brutality-report-20111013,0,6775615.story

NYC Coppers Sill Fabricating Evidence: A corrupt ex-undercover cop says NYPD supervisors paid detectives extra overtime for hard-drug busts, creating a covert reward system for cocaine and heroin arrests.
Undercovers taking down smack or crack suspects routinely got two or three hours of overtime as payback, ex-cop Stephen Anderson testified in a Brooklyn courtroom.
“So giving you overtime for a crack cocaine arrest is a reward for the nature of the crime … would that be a fair statement?” asked Justice Gustin Reichbach.
“Yes, that’s fair to say,” Anderson testified last week at the corruption trial of Brooklyn South narcotics Detective Jason Arbeeny.The defendant is accused of conspiring with others in “flaking” suspects – cop talk for planting cocaine on innocent victims.  http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2011/10/14/2011-10-14_excop_ot_rewarded_in_drug_raps_added_incentive_to_fabricate_charges.html

Spy Versus Spy

Who Lost the Anthrax Evidence? If the authors of the new paper are correct about the silicon-tin coating, it appears likely that Dr. Ivins could not have made the anthrax powder alone with the equipment he possessed, as the F.B.I. maintains. That would mean either that he got the powder from elsewhere or that he was not the perpetrator.
If Dr. Ivins did not make the powder, one conceivable source might be classified government research on anthrax, carried out for years by the military and the Central Intelligence Agency. Dr. Ivins had ties to several researchers who did such secret work.  http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/10/science/10anthrax.html?pagewanted=2&hp

The Magical Mystery Tour

Above, Bad Bishop William Montgomery Brown’s Good Book

KC Bishop Indicted for Child Rape Coverups: The Roman Catholic bishop of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Robert Finn, and the diocese he leads have been indicted by a county grand jury on a charge of failure to report suspected child abuse in the case of a priest who had been accused of taking lewd photographs of young girls.  The indictment is the first ever of a Catholic bishop in the 25 years since the scandal over sexual abuse by priests first became public in the United States.
Bishop Finn is accused of neglecting to report abuse that occurred as recently as last year — almost 10 years since the nation’s Catholic bishops passed a charter pledging to report suspected abusers to law enforcement authorities.
The bishop has acknowledged that he knew of the existence of the photos last December but did not turn them over to the police until May. www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/us/kansas-city-bishop-indicted-in-reporting-of-abuse-by-priest.html?_r=1&hp

Egypt, Partly Ruled by Muslim Bros (on behalf of USA), goes to Work on Coptics: At least 24 people have been killed and scores more injured when clashes erupted between mostly Coptic demonstrators and military police outside the state television building in central Cairo.
A curfew was imposed on Cairo’s Tahrir Square and downtown area, state media said on Sunday as clashes were also reported from Alexandria, Egypt’s second largest city.
Egypt’s leadership also held an emergency meeting late on Sunday to discuss the situation. More such meetings are scheduled for Monday.
The Copts say they were marching peacefully when thugs attacked them, drawing in the military police who used what activists described as unnecessary force.english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/10/2011109155853144870.html

Best thing in the History of the World

Dude, are You That Happy to see Me or are Your Underpants on Fire? Flight 253 passenger to Abdulmutallab: ‘Dude, your pants are on fire’ According to Tukel, as the plane approached Detroit, Abdulmutallab spent increasing amounts of time in the lavatory praying and purifying himself. Then he returned to his seat, pulled a blanket over his head, and pressed the plunger on the bomb. First came a loud pop, then smoke, then the fireball in the suspect’s lap, he said.“After that, all hell broke loose,” Tukel said, noting that several passengers tried to put the fire out, but nothing worked until flight attendants doused it with fire extinguishers. Abdulmutallab was eventually escorted to the business class section, where he sat naked from the waist down for the rest of the flight, he said.

Witnessing it all was Wisconsin passenger Michael Zantow, the first government witness to testify in the case. Today, he testified that after he heard a loud pop that sounded like firecrackers, he heard the passenger seated next to Abdulmutallab say: “Dude, your pants are on fire.” He said the passenger repeated the phrase several times, but that Abdulmutallab never responded. …A flight attendant came up to see what was happening, Zantow said. When she learned that Abdulmutallab’s pants were on fire, things started happening quickly  http://www.freep.com/article/20111011/NEWS01/111011057/Flight-253-passenger-Abdulmutallab-Dude-your-pants-fire-?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE

Holy Crap! Was the Underwear Dude A Patsy?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgEJIlQClAU

Do Not Miss the Christian Declaring Their God the Winner vs the Underwear Bomber–Video!

www.detnews.com/article/20111012/METRO/110120401/Abdulmutallab-pleads-guilty–warns-U.S.-of-‘day-of-judgment’

Kurt Haskell’s “Patsy Underwear Bomber” Web Site: haskellfamily.blogspot.com/2010/01/latest-story-by-kurt-haskell.html

What was the conversation between Underwear Bomber and His Fundamentalist Handlers before the flight? Revealed!

“Abdulmutallab, this will be your big chance. You will get on that angel of vengeance, the plane, with this bomb in your underwear. You will be a martyr. You will get a thousand virgins. Well, of course, your member will be gone, but that is why you will be a hero.”

Oh, OK. Good plan, AQ. But will I be, ha, Restored?

Hmm. Well, ah, probably. Come to think of it, You will Get Two Thousand Virgins! And you will be a double Martyr either way!