As of today, I am not responsible for additional blogs on this venue

My wife and I are now engaged in a long two week journey in Alaska! I will return after my journey ends!!

Marjorie Cohn: Death is Preferable to Life at Obamas Guantanamo!

More than 100 of the 166 detainees at Guantanamo are starving themselves to death. Twenty three of them are being force fed. They strap you to a chair, tie up your wrists, your legs, your forehead and tightly around the waist, Fayiz Al Kandari told his lawyer, Lt. Col. Barry Wingard. Al Kandari, a Kuwaiti held at Guantanamo for 11 years, has never been charged with a crime. The tube maked his eyes water excessively and blood begins to trickle from the nose. Once the tube passes his throat, the gag reflex kicks in. Warm liquid is poured into his body for 45 minutes to two hours. He feels as though his body is going to convulse and often vomits, Wingard added. the United Nations Human Rights Council concluded that force feeding amounts to torture. The American Medical Association says that force feeding violates medical ethics. Every competent patient has the right to refuse medical intervention, including life sustaining interventions, AMA President Jeremy Lazarus wrote to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. Yet President Barack Obama continues the tortuous Bush policy of force feeding hunger strikers. Although a few days after his first inauguration, Obama promised to shutter Guantanamo, it remains open. I continue to believe that we have got to close Guantanamo, Obama declared in his April 30 press conference. But, he added, Congress determined that they would not let us close it. Obama signed a bill that Congress passed, which erected barriers to closure. According to a Los Angeles Times editorial, Obama has refused to expend political capital on closing Guantanamo. Rather than veto the defense authorization bills that have limited his ability to transfer inmates, he has signed them while raising questions about whether they intruded on his constitutional authority. I don't want these individuals to die, Obama told reporters. In fact, Obama has the power to save the hunger strikers lives without torturing them. Section 1028 (d) of the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act, empowers the Secretary of Defense to approve transfers of detainees, when it is in the national security interest of the United States. Fifty six of the 86 cleared detainees are from Yemen. Yet Obama imposed a ban on releasing any of them, following the foiled 2009 Christmas bomb plot by a Nigerian man who was recruited in Yemen. Obama must begin signing these certifications and waivers at once. 

Colon Todhunter: Psychopathy, Politics and The New World Order.

When attempting to analyse what is happening in the world, it is important to appreciate past economic social and political processes that led us to where we are today. Understanding the tectonic plates of history, that led certain countries towards fascism, communism or capitalist liberal democracy, for example, is essential. At the same time, however, it can become easy for us to push aside the individual as we focus on theoretical perspectives that refer to the underlying logic of capitalism, or some other notion that draws heavily on theory. It can get to the point, where individual
motive or intent is airbrushed from the narrative, because human action is deemed to have been shaped by the dead weight of history or forces beyond our control. While not wishing to understate the role that such constraints have on human action, I wish to draw attention to researcher Stefan Verstappen, who provides valuable insight into how individual agency has shaped and continues to shape society. While 'Machianellianism' has long been associated with politics and public conduct, Verstappen shifts focus somewhat, by arguing that people with psychopathic personalities, have for thousands of years, tended to grasp power and impose their views and deeds on the rest of us. In order to get power, he concludes that people cheat, kill or lie their way to the top. Whether it has been due to the butchery or lies of royalty, religious leaders, politicians or corporate oligarchs, nice guys have tended to finish last. What leads him to conclude this? Psychopathy is a personality disorder identified by characteristics such as lack of empathy and remorse, criminality, anti social behavior, egocentricity, superficial charm, manipulativeness, irresponsibility, impulsivity and a parasitic lifestyle. With that definition in mind, look around: the criminal, parasitic activities by bankers that have plunged millions into poverty, the destruction, war and death brought to countries in order that corporations profit by stealing resources, the dropping of atom bombs on innocent civilians in 1945, or the use of depleted uranium which again impacts innocent civilians, and the many other acts, from the use of death squads to false flag terror, that have brought untold misery to countless others, just because power-holders wanted to hold onto power or to gain more power, or the wealthy wanted to hold onto their wealth or gain even more. Based on these terrible deeds, it becomes easy to argue that the people ultimately responsible for them do not adhere to the same values as ordinary people. It may be even easier to conclude that its not the cream that rises to the top, but, in many cases, the scum! 

Gordon Duff: Was Syria 'nuked'?

File photo shows damage caused by an Israeli airstrike near Damascus on May 5, 2013. Analysis shows Syria came under attack by Israel using, not just nuclear weapons, but an American nuclear bunker buster bomb, one of several supplied to Israel to use against Iran, one of the last acts of the Bush Cheney administration. Striking evidence of the use of American EPW, Earth Penetrating Weapons, nuclear weapons in Syria has come to light. Experts say the proof is irrefutable. Dramatic video footage from Syria has revealed startling evidence that counters Israel's claims of surgical strikes on weapons headed to Lebanon. What were said to be air strikes, is now proven to have actually been artillery, something easily discernible to even an untrained observer. What happens next is shocking. While artillery shells rain down on Syrian army positions, mobile Israeli artillery in direct support and even accompanying rebel forces inside Syria, a huge explosion occurs. After analysis, it had become clear, Syria had come under attack by Israel using, not just nuclear weapons, but an American nuclear bunker buster bomb, one of several supplied to Israel to use against Iran, one of the last acts of the Bush Cheney administration. Submitted for analysis, the footage was compared with tests of the 37,000 pound MOP Massive Ordnance Penetrator, designed by Boeing to be uses against Iran's underground facilities. There was no similarity whatsoever noted between the Syrian event, and a conventional bunker buster including the GBU 57, the largest conventional weapon every to be used. Colonel James Hanke, former Defense Attache and Liaison between the Pentagon and Netanyahu's government, reviewed the footage. He indicated that the GBU 57 is considered too high a risk for use, because of its danger to the earth's crust. The Syrian African fault line spreads into Israel. Were it to be subjected to this kind of explosive power, the threat of an earthquake doing significant damage to Israel is a reality. The nuclear bunker busters have far less penetrating power and, I am not saying that this was a nuclear device, not until more evidence is in, but the event profile shows striking similarities. The other problem with the GBU 57 is delivery. Only two aircraft are capable of delivering this weapon, the B-52 and the B-2 Stealth Bomber. Israel does not have these aircraft. Collapse of US Air Force Command Structure: Again Thus, if a MOP where used, it could have only been delivered by the United States Air Force, an organization reeling from recent disasters within its own ranks after a second lapse in nuclear weapons security in a five year period was discovered at Minot Air Force Base in South Dakota.

Allen L Roland: The Nine Stages of Civilization, We're Entering the Eighth!

Dependence: The United States is now firmly entering the eighth stage of all civilizations, Dependence with only Bondage ahead of it. Apathy has allowed our constitution to be shredded in stage seven, which led to our current state of Dependence on the state, but soon an IRS monitored Obama-care program of shared responsibility, or else will usher in the Orwellian ninth stage of militarized Bondage: Last year I wrote that the average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been two hundred years, and that the average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been two hundred years, and that these nations have progressed through a nine stage sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependency back again into bondage. As Ramsey Clark, former US Attorney General once correctly said: We are not a democracy. It is a terrible misunderstanding and a slander to the idea of democracy to call us that. In reality , we are a plutocracy, a government by the wealthy. In our present Plutocracy, we made the transition last year from complacency to national apathy, but with the passage and implementation of Obamacare, along with an increasingly militarized surveillance state, we have now entered stage eight, Dependence on the state, which will soon be followed with militarized Bondage by the state. John Adamsonce correctly defined the perils of dependence: The nature of the encroachment upon the American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour. The revenue creates pensioners, and the pensioners urge for more revenue. The people grow less steady, spirited and virtuous, the seekers more numerous and corrupt, and every day increases the circles of their dependents and expectants, until virtue, integrity, public spirit, simplicity and frugality become the objects of ridicule and scorn, and vanity, luxury, foppery, selfishness, meanness, and downright venality swallow up the whole of society. Obama-care or shared responsibility or else  is the most visible evidence of the plutocracy's leveraged buyout of Democracy as we officially enter stage eight of our rapidly crumbling civilization or empire, and no one nails this truth better than Bill Moyers. Huxley correctly predicted in Brave New World, that the truth would eventually be drowned in a sea of irrelevance, which is precisely the case now, as we transition from Apathy to Dependence.   

Roi Tov: Is Iran anti-Semitic? The Mechanics of Hatred and the Right to Self Defense!

Writing on certain topics demands visiting unpleasantly racist websites. Yet, even such an event has a positive side: It re-vindicates our understanding of goodness. Israeli and Jewish media love to portray Iran as anti-Semitic. The Anti-Defamation League even has a hate page dedicated to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The page claims. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's anti Semitic and anti-Israel views place him and the Iranian regime among the foremost threats to Jews and the State of Israel. Ahmadinejad repeatedly demonizes the state of Israel, and openly calls for its destruction at every opportunity. Most notoriously, he described Israel as a fake regime, that must be wiped off the map. Expectedly, the eminent ADL chose not to mention a few facts. UN Secretary General and Rita Yahan Farouz My Joys: OK, but how is that related to the woman in the picture? Rita Yahan Farou is an Iranian born Israeli singer. In the local context, she is a superstar, having won practically every award given to Israeli singers. Most recently, she was mentioned by international media on March 5, 2013, when she gave a concert entitled Tunes for Peace, at the UN General Assembly. She sang in Hebrew, English and Farsi. In her Facebook page, she published the expected pleasantries. Yet, Hebrew is a multi-layered language Saying Peace, Meaning War, an additional message was to be expected in her words. She said: There is a story about a boy, who walked into a synagogue, and didn't know how to pray like everyone else, so he just whistled with all his might. I have no knowledge of the language of politics, but I will be there, whistle my prayer, and hope that it reaches as far as Iran. Let me confess that I have no idea how a native English reader would react to her words. However, to a Hebrew reader, a whistle is a sharply negative. The mark of street thugs. Was Rita crossing her fingers while writing this? Rita is only one member of the large Jewish Iranian community living in Israel. There are at least two other prominent members. Former IDF Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Shaul Mofaz and former Member Of the Knesset Michael Ben Ari. Shaul Mofaz became the recipient of one of the first pictures taken by the Israeli Ofeq reconnaissance satellites made public. The image showed his former house in Tehran. Another testimony of his links with the Farsi culture is his regular talk shows in Farsi, broadcast by Israeli Radio. Finally, Michael Ben Ari is notorious for his extremist views, which are of relevance to rest of the article. While in the former Knesset, he was denied a visa by the USA, due to his former membership in a terror organization.  

Dr. Kevin Barrett: Making mayhem in Boston: The CIA links!

CIA fingerprints are all over the Boston Marathon bombings. In this article, Jerry Mazza notes that the likely perpetrator of the bombings, Craft International, is a CIA spin off. The patsies' Uncle Tsarny is part of the family of rogue CIA spook Graham Fuller. And the patsies were set up with the help of another rogue CIA spin off, the Mujahedin e Khalk (MEK), which uses American tax dollars to murder innocent civilians by the thousands in Iran. This shouldn't be surprising. After all, the radical Muslim terrorists in Chechnya are heavily supported by the CIA, their job is to attack Russia, not the US. The whole idea of a self radicalized Chechen attacking the US is preposterous. Bottom line: It looks as though the CIA is split by the same bifurcated command structure that afflicts the US military. The making of mayhem: By Jerry Mazza: First, you find two or more young, disgruntled immigrants and/or US citizens, preferably from countries that have been violated by the US, or another superpower, like Russia. They might have been taken to the US by parents who were refugees, looking for asylum from some part of the world like Chechnya, split by civil war, brutal repression of the larger power, seeming to breed terrorists who had already been creating attacks against civilians, including schools, movie theaters, public events, within that larger power. Two of these young immigrants were the Tsarnaev Brothers, Tamerlan, the elder, 26, and Dzokhar, 19, the younger. A third immigrant was the bellicose Uncle Tsarny, who changed his name from Tsaraev to Tsarny to distance himself from the family. In this case, the two, would be Chechan guerillas were supported by a terrorist organization called MEK, People's Mujahedin e Khalq, which was also supported by the CIA. Take note. Now, mix in the national intelligence agency of a rival country to that larger, more powerful one that was willing to provide support to terrorists that were attacking it, and add our Brothers and their bellicose Uncle Tsarny, who coincidentally had been married to the daughter Samantha Fuller of a top member of the CIA, Graham Fuller. Fuller had a substantial history of active participation in that agency's major clandestine operations. Is anyone suspicious about the connections between the brothers, Uncle Tsarni, and the CIA so far? The real Chechen terrorists, it turns out, were useful to the US in keeping the heat up on the Russians, just as the Afghan mujahedeen was used in the anti Soviet war in Afghanistan, from 1980 to 1989, to sap Russia's military strength and financial resources. Chechnya even drew neocons who signed up as Chechnya's friends, including former CIA Director James Woolsey. The acting principle is the enemy of my enemy is my friend.