Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Thursday, 6 February 2014

The European Union Times


Posted: 05 Feb 2014 02:42 PM PST

Surveillance drones haven’t started hovering outside and above the homes of Americans en masse just yet, but former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura claims he’s left the United States just in case.
Ventura, a 62-year-old professional wrestler-turned-politician, says his new Ora TV program ‘Off the Grid’ is being filmed in secret somewhere in Mexico where the all-seeing eye of American unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, don’t have a chance of finding him.
Speaking to CNBC on Tuesday from an “undisclosed location” south of the border, Ventura said there was a reason he doesn’t reveal his each and every movement.
“I’m off the grid. I move about with my TV show so that the drones can’t find me and you won’t know exactly where I am,” Ventura said.
According to Ventura, his Ora TV program will continue to broadcast “as long as we have solar power and we can reach the satellite.”
“I view the United States, today, much like East Berlin. And I’m off the grid. I’ve tried for 20 years to warn the country about the Democrats and Republicans, and nobody’s listening,” he said
“I now view the United States from the outside, and I don’t like what I see,” added Ventura, who won Minnesota’s gubernatorial election back in 1998. “You know what the favorite T-shirt was off the grid down here a couple years ago? A picture of [former President] George Bush, and it said weapon of mass destruction. Is that the way we want the United States portrayed throughout the world? I don’t think so.”
Ventura’s remarks on CNBC came only days after he made a similar comment to veteran broadcaster Larry King on the newsman’s own Ora TV production, Politicking.
“I can’t do this show and talk about what I want to talk about in the United States,” Ventura said of ‘Off the Grid.’ “They are locked down up there,” he said, again from an undisclosed location.
Ventura equated his online-only program as being a twenty-first century version of Radio Free Europe, the US-sanctioned network that shared a western take on the news of the world among the people of communist countries after the second World War.
“Remember Radio Free Europe? This is Internet Free America with Jesse Ventura,” he told King. “Broadcasting across the grid, off the grid, back to the United States, Jesse is allowed speak freely without drones hovering over his head and tracking him down,” the ex-governor insisted.
And according to Ventura, his new endeavor is also helping to employ Mexicans who might otherwise attempt to permeate the jobs market in America, much to the chagrin of the perpetually unemployed.
“I’m a job creator,” Ventura said during the CNBC segment on Tuesday. “And I’m not only creating jobs, putting Mexicans to work, I’m stopping them from running across the border now and taking our jobs, because my whole staff said that if I wasn’t down here, and I didn’t have them, they’d be coming up to America, looking for jobs.”
The US Federal Aviation Administration has projected that upwards of 30,00 drones will be deployed in American airspace by the end of the decade, and law enforcement agencies including the Federal Bureau of Investigation are already relying on unmanned aerial vehicles to track down dangerous criminals. Should Ventura decide to return, though, then he may want to consider crossing back into the US at Mexico’s border with California: lawmakers there advanced a measure last week that would outlaw warrantless drone surveillance in most instances. The US Department of Homeland Security will likely nevertheless continue to use drones to patrol that very same international crossing, but a mishap off of California’s Pacific Coast last last month lowered the number of DHS drones to only nine: a tenth UAV was crashed a few miles from San Diego after an onboard malfunction was detected, destroying the multi-million-dollar aircraft.
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Posted: 05 Feb 2014 02:32 PM PST

Rescue operations are underway in different parts of Iran as the heaviest snowstorm in five decades has blanketed the country’s northern provinces, leaving many people without power and running water.
The Iranian Red Crescent Society says teams have rescued over 10,000 people caught in the heavy snow in 18 different provinces.
Rescue operations are also underway in the northern provinces of Gilan and Mazandaran. Thousands of people are reportedly trapped on the roads of the two provinces.
The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) and army troops have been sent to help people.
Water and power supplies were cut off in the remote regions, but reports say electricity is mostly restored.
Schools and universities have been shut down because of the heavy snow. There have been no official reports of casualties.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has formed an emergency ministerial team to supervise relief assistance to provinces.
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Posted: 05 Feb 2014 02:28 PM PST

The U.S. Postal Service is currently seeking companies that can provide “assorted small arms ammunition” in the near future.
On Jan. 31, the USPS Supplies and Services Purchasing Office posted a notice on the Federal Business Opportunities website asking contractors to register with USPS as potential ammunition suppliers for a variety of cartridges.
“The United States Postal Service intends to solicit proposals for assorted small arms ammunition,” the notice reads, which also mentioned a deadline of Feb. 10.
The Post Office published the notice just two days after Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) announced his proposal to remove a federal gun ban that prevents lawful concealed carry holders from carrying handguns inside post offices across the country.
Ironically the Postal Service isn’t the first non-law enforcement agency seeking firearms and ammunition.
Since 2001, the U.S. Dept. of Education has been building a massive arsenal through purchases orchestrated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
The Education Dept. has spent over $80,000 so far on Glock pistols and over $17,000 on Remington shotguns.
Back in July, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration also purchased 72,000 rounds of .40 Smith & Wesson, following a 2012 purchase for 46,000 rounds of .40 S&W jacketed hollow point by the National Weather Service.
NOAA spokesperson Scott Smullen responded to concerns over the weather service purchase by stating that it was meant for the NOAA Fisheries Office of Law Enforcement for its bi-annual “target qualifications and training.”
That seems excessive considering that JHP ammunition is typically several times more expensive than practice rounds, which can usually be found in equivalent power loadings and thus offer similar recoil characteristics as duty rounds.
Including mass purchases by the Dept. of Homeland Security, non-military federal agencies combined have purchased an estimated amount of over two billion rounds of ammunition in the past two years.
Additionally, the U.S. Army bought almost 600,000 Soviet AK-47 magazines last fall, enough to hold nearly 18,000,000 rounds of 7.62x39mm ammo which is not standard-issue for either the U.S. military or even NATO.
It would take a Lockheed Martin C-5 Galaxy, one of the largest cargo aircraft in the world, two trips to haul that many magazines.
A month prior, the army purchased nearly 3,000,000 rounds of 7.62x39mm ammo, a huge amount but still only 1/6th of what the magazines purchased can hold in total.
The Feds have also spent millions on riot control measures in addition to the ammo acquisitions.
Earlier this month, Homeland Security spent over $58 million on hiring security details for just two Social Security offices in Maryland.
DHS also spent $80 million on armed guards to protect government buildings in New York and sought even more guards for federal facilities in Wisconsin and Minnesota.
While the government gears up for civil unrest and stockpiles ammo without limit, private gun owners on the other hand are finding ammunition shelves empty at gun stores across America, including shortages of once-common cartridges such as .22 Long Rifle.
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Posted: 05 Feb 2014 02:02 PM PST

German media outlets say that the US National Security Agency (NSA) spied on former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder over his opposition to the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq.
In 2002, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s predecessor was placed on the NSA’s list of the people who were under surveillance, Munich’s daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung and public broadcaster NDR reported on Tuesday, based on the leaks by Edward Snowden, the NSA former contractor.
In 2002, Schroeder’s Social Democratic party stated at the beginning of its election campaign that Germany would not provide troops or money for an invasion of Iraq.
Schroeder was not surprised by the report, Sueddeutsche Zeitung wrote on its website.
Global outrage over US government’s surveillance spiked after a confidential memo obtained from Snowden revealed that the NSA had illegally eavesdropped on the phone conversations of dozens of world leaders, including Merkel.
The German weekly Der Spiegel said in a report published on October 26 last year that the magazine had seen secret documents from the NSA, which show that Merkel’s mobile phone had been listed by the agency’s Special Collection Service since 2002.
The report added that Merkel’s mobile number was still on a surveillance list in June 2013.
On October 24, 2013, The Guardian said in a report that the NSA had monitored the telephone conversations of 35 world leaders.
“A US official provided NSA with 200 phone numbers to 35 world leaders… Despite the fact that the majority is probably available via open source, the PCs [intelligence production centers] have noted 43 previously unknown phone numbers. These numbers plus several others have been tasked,” according to a classified document provided by Snowden.
“These numbers have provided lead information to other numbers that have subsequently been tasked,” it added.
In October 2013, Snowden leaked two top secret US government spying programs under which the NSA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) are eavesdropping on millions of American and European phone records and the Internet data from major Internet companies such as Facebook, Yahoo, Google, Apple, and Microsoft.
The NSA scandal took even broader dimensions when Snowden revealed information about its espionage activities targeting friendly countries.
Documents leaked by Snowden showed Britain has also been operating a covert listening post within a stone’s throw of Germany’s parliament, and Merkel’s offices in the Chancellery, using hi-tech equipment housed on the embassy roof.
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Posted: 05 Feb 2014 01:37 PM PST

Citing worries about foreign surveillance efforts, the government of Switzerland has ordered tighter control methods on its own computer and phone technology systems in order to prevent Swiss communications from being monitored.
The Swiss Federal Council, a seven-member committee that serves as the head of the Swiss government and is responsible for enacting federal policy, admitted concern about other governments spying on official communications within Switzerland.
A government statement as quoted by the Associated Press indicated that future contracts for IT infrastructure will “where possible, only be given to companies that act exclusively according to Swiss law, where a majority of the ownership is in Switzerland and which provides all of its services within Switzerland’s borders.”
The legislation covers contracts with the military, along with mobile phones and computers.
Wednesday’s announcement comes after the Swiss Federal Prosecutor’s office launched a criminal investigation based on the “genuine suspicion” that foreign entities conducted surveillance in Switzerland. The Swiss News Agency reported in December that article 271 of the Swiss penal code, which includes punishable acts by a foreign state, had been broken.
“Various clarifications are under way, and will be later examined,” one official said at the time.
That probe was ordered after NSA revelations emerged from whistleblower Edward Snowden. Along with documents detailing major American covert surveillance operations conducted throughout the world, Snowden told the Guardian newspaper that he had worked in Geneva, Switzerland in 2007.
Working for the Central Intelligence Agency under the guise of a US diplomat, Snowden said that it was in Geneva where he first encountered the vast scope of the American intelligence apparatus. Snowden said it was a “formative” moment and the first time he questioned the “rightness” of the US intelligence effort.
He also claimed that, as part of gathering intelligence on secret financial information, CIA agents would get Swiss bankers drunk and “encourage” the individuals to drive home. When that person would inevitably be arrested, the CIA would offer to spring him loose in exchange for his cooperation. US officials have since maintained that American officials stationed in Switzerland respect the country’s laws.
“Much of what I saw in Geneva really disillusioned me about how my government functions and what its impact is in the world,” Snowden said. “I realized that I was part of something that was doing far more harm than good.”
Switzerland’s Federal Department of Foreign Affairs told ABC News last year they had “taken note” of Snowden’s comments and requested “clarification” from the US State Department’s office in Bern.
“In accordance with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, Switzerland expects the members of the diplomatic missions in Bern and members of the permanent mission in Geneva to comply with the laws and rules of the country of residence,” the statement said.
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Posted: 04 Feb 2014 02:24 PM PST

Production of crude oil in western Canada emits more harmful carcinogens into the environment than official estimates let on, according to a new study. The Keystone XL pipeline would, if approved, move tar sands oil from Alberta through the US to Texas.
A new study by the University of Toronto-Scarborough published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reported that Canadian officials may have underestimated emissions of harmful carcinogens known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from Alberta tar sands.
Specifically, the report cited the emission levels of PAHs as being one hundred to one thousand times greater than previously believed. High levels of PAHs are not imminently dangerous, though they are quite higher than reported by the mining industry’s environmental impact assessments and Canada’s own National Pollutant Release Inventory. The Canadian government has used these favorable assessments to boost new tar sands development in Alberta’s Athabasca oil sand region.
PAHs are not associated with greenhouse gases, thus do not directly impact climate change. Much of the discussion surrounding the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline – currently pending approval in the US – has centered around its effects on increased greenhouse gas emissions connected with crude tar sands development. This requires a more energy-intensive process than the production of plain crude oil since a substance known as bitumen must be extracted from the Alberta tar sands, for instance, through means such as surface mining or injecting steam into the ground.
Either way, the operation already uses an excessive amount of water, releases toxic metals into the local environment, and unleashes an estimated 14 to 17 percent more greenhouse gas emissions than regular crude.
Yet PAHs include phenanthrene, pyrene and benzo(a)pyrene, which “are among the most toxic hydrocarbons,” said Jules M. Blais, a University of Ottawa chemical and toxicology professor, according to Climate Central. “They’re some of the worst things out there.”
PAHs should be of concern to anyone living along the Keystone XL route, and those in the nearby vicinity of the Alberta tar sands region are especially at risk.
“From the standpoint of Keystone, the concerns are regarding potential breaches that could contaminate soils,” Blais said. “The same kinds of things that are getting into the Athabasca River could be relevant to Keystone.”
The University of Toronto study – conducted by environmental scientists Frank Wania and Abha Parajulee – used computer models to analyze the plausibility of how many PAHs Canadian officials have estimated are in the Athabasca tar sands region as opposed to the actual measurements of PAH concentrations found there.
“We found that these estimates are insufficient to explain what’s being measured in the environment,” Wania said, according to Smithsonian.com. “The concentrations of PAHs that should be out there, based on these assumptions, are far too low.”
When trying to discern why previous estimates had been so low, the research team found that tar sands tailings ponds – storage ponds used for dumping toxic mining waste – may very well be the culprit.
“In our second set of model calculations, we included tailings ponds and allowed evaporation of PAHs to occur,” Wania said. “The concentration we calculated was closer to what is being measured, so it indicates that quite possibly tailings pond emissions are part of the explanation of why the emissions are too low.”
And since these kinds of emission sources may not have been included in official assessments, the PAHs’ risk to environmental and human health may have been underestimated, Wania said.
“The implication of these results is that the emissions from tailing ponds are being underreported,” said Blais, who is not associated with the study. “We can explain this a number of ways. These emissions from tailing ponds can be very difficult to estimate. They could be occurring below the surface of the ground. They could be below surface, below grade. They could be following fissures or fractures in the rock.”
The US State Department released on Friday a report on the environmental impact of Keystone XL, raising few objections to the prospective ecological damage and harm to human health caused by the pipeline and its functions.
The report said that the $7 billion project will not impact the pace of Canadian oil sands development or its contribution to climate change. It also suggested that it would be safer to transport 830,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude by pipeline than by rail.
“Adding 830,000 bpd to the yearly transport mode volume would result in an estimated 49 additional injuries and six additional fatalities for the No Action rail scenarios compared to one additional injury and no fatalities for the proposed Project on an annual basis,” the report reads. ‘No Action’ scenarios here refer to the possibility of President Barack Obama not approving the pipeline project.
While the State Department took no position on the project and stopped short of recommending if the line should be built, it did claim the pipeline is more environmentally sound than other options. Obama is expected to make a final decision on the pipeline by mid-2014.
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Posted: 04 Feb 2014 01:49 PM PST

A new wave of protest has swept across France. Thousands of people were outraged with the introduction of “ABC of equality ” in educational programs for elementary schools. According to the protesters, the new book causes damage to children’s psyche. The innovation teaches young students that there are practically no differences between men and women. Why does the Elysee Palace downgrade traditional family values?
The French are fed up. Organizers of protests say that there are about 500,000 participating. The police corrects the number to about one hundred thousand in Paris and up to 40,000 – in Lyon. The destructive policy of socialists made tens of thousands of people take to the streets in different parts of the country. They are not so much concerned about the deplorable state of economic affairs in their native land, but about the destruction of the basic foundations of the French society – family institution.
Children now attend gender lessons at schools, where teachers explain to them that there is no difference between a man and a woman, that they can wear the same clothes and makeup, as they like.
Already 85 percent of the French are opposed to the policies of their President, Francois Hollande. People complain that there is no more democracy in France, whereas Hollande applies double standards to everything.
“Hollande is boycotting the Olympic Games in Sochi because of the homophobic law and then he goes to Saudi Arabia to shake hands with sheikhs and take money from them, although they behead people there for homosexuality,” a protester said.
Interior Minister Manuel Valls promised in response to demonstrations that the government would oppose any amendments that would allow in vitro fertilization and the use of surrogate mothers for same-sex couples. However, nine of ten people interviewed by journalists of Le Figaro newspaper said that they did not believe the minister.
“In six months, Hollande has destroyed the very essence of humanity. Same-sex marriage, adoption, now also he wants to legalize euthanasia. Opposition does not do anything, they hold on to their offices, and the government does not hear the people. The French starving and going bankrupt – financially and spiritually,” Beatrice Bourges, the leader of the French Spring movement said.
The press secretary of the movement against gay marriage, the French Spring, Beatrice Bourges, has become one of the symbols of the current protests in France. The woman went on a hunger strike demanding Hollande should step down and early elections be held in the country.
The woman has been living for nine days without food. She only drinks water and tea. She can hardly stand on her feet. The mother of two sits in front of the National Assembly and waits when someone brings up the issue of impeachment to the president.
Another man has joined the hunger strike. The two are ready to fight until the end and become symbolic victims of the struggle, as it happened to historian Dominique Venner, who committed suicide in the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris to express his protest.
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Posted: 04 Feb 2014 12:51 PM PST

Amateur video shot in Austin, Texas this weekend destroys the establishment lie that police can and will protect you whenever needed, and also highlights the depths to which American society has degraded.
Watch as a group of at least six macho thugs aggressively assaults three defenseless hippies, instigating an unnecessary confrontation in which one man is kicked in the head while he is on the ground.
Though the Austin Police Department is mere blocks away, the outnumbered hippies have no officers come to their rescue.
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Posted: 04 Feb 2014 12:40 PM PST

The World Health Organization (WHO) has predicted that the number of different cases of cancer across the globe would soar to 24 million a year by 2035.
The urgent priority is to identify and tackle the causes of cancer, which are mainly linked to people’s lifestyle, WHO emphasized.
While fourteen million people a year are currently diagnosed with cancer, it is estimated the number will increase to 19 million by 2025, 22 million by 2030 and 24 million by 2035.
As there is an alarming level of naivety about diet’s role in cancer, half the estimated number of cases is preventable.
There is a real need to focus on cancer prevention by tackling some popular causes such as smoking, obesity, infections, drinking and Air pollution and other environmental factors, the UN experts say.
“The global cancer burden is increasing and quite markedly, due predominately to the ageing of the populations and population growth,” said the director of the WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer Chris Wild.
“If we look at the cost of treatment of cancers, it is spiraling out of control, even for the high-income countries. Prevention is absolutely critical and it’s been somewhat neglected,” Wild also stated.
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Posted: 04 Feb 2014 11:59 AM PST

A new photo from the Mars Curiosity rover shows it on the edge of a sand dune and US engineers have decided to risk driving Curiosity over the dune so it can continue to an area of fresh bedrock known as KMS-9 to do some drilling.
In order to get to the area engineers have called KMS-9, Curiosity will have to enter a small valley known as the Dingo Gap and navigate a one meter high sand dune.
The dune is about one meter high in the middle and tapers to the south and north on either side of the Dingo Gap.
The mission control team “operating Curiosity has chosen this valley as a likely route toward mid-term and long-term science destinations,” writes NASA in a brief press release beneath one of the recent photos from curiosity.
Earlier NASA officials had written that there was some uncertainly over Curiosity’s future route.
“The rover team is evaluating possible driving routes on the other side before [making] a decision [about] whether [to] cross the gap,” NASA officials wrote in a description of the image.
However, engineers cannot predict what is going to happen when curiosity begins the ascent of the dune. Mission planners will be concerned about rocks hidden just below the surface, or the possibility of Curiosity getting beached in a sand trap.
Curiosity weighs about one ton, so there’s also the risk that she might sink into the sand and get stuck.

NASA will be taking the climb cautiously and Curiosity will climb just part of the way up the dune as a test, Curiosity has already pressed an inquisitive wheel into the base of the dune.
NASA’s Spirit Rover was lost to a sand trap in 2009 and Opportunity Rover, which has just celebrated its 10th anniversary on the Red Planet, almost went the same way when it got stuck for several weeks in a pile of Martian dirt, which controllers dubbed the “Purgatory Dune.”
Engineers are also concerned about the effect of the tough Martian terrain on Curiosity’s aluminum wheels, which have taken a battering. Recent pictures show multiple punctures, dents and dimples in the 50cm-diameter wheels.
Once over the sand dune, Curiosity will proceed through the two scarps called the Dingo Gap and then head towards KMS-9, where scientists will try and drill into freshly exposed bedrock to try and find any traces of carbon which may signify microscopic traces of life, which existed billions of years ago.
Her ultimate goal is to reach the foothills of a huge mountain, Mount Sharp, but this is still several kilometers away to the south west.
Curiosity landed on Mars in August 2012 and has so far clocked up 5 kilometers.
The foreground dune, at a location called “Dingo Gap,” is about 3 feet (1 meter) high in the middle and tapered at south and north ends onto low scarps on either side of the gap.
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Posted by Roberto Abraham Scaruffi at 14:02