Roberto Abraham Scaruffi

Friday 5 December 2014


 Daily Headlines
Leaked Audio Shows Egypt's Coup Leaders as a Criminal Syndicate

The police murders of Earl Murray and Ronald Beasley in nearby Berkeley are a key to understanding the unrest in and around Ferguson. This article will also show how a grand jury can be manipulated by prosecutors
On Tuesday, it appears that Opednews was hacked. On Thursday, I met with an FBI agent to discuss it.

By Deena Stryker
A Worldwide Meme
The Gezi Park protesters have not given up. We need to be aware of them and other similar movements around the world.
Subsequent to a previous report from Lawrence O'Donnell the Missouri Attorney General has confirmed with Last Word that they instructions given the Michael Brown Grand Jury describing the Police "use of force" laws was incorrect and misleading.
The times we live in are so dangerous and so distorted in public perception that propaganda is no longer, as Edward Bernays called it, an "invisible government." It is the government. It rules directly without fear of contradiction and its principal aim is the conquest of us: our sense of the world, our ability to separate truth from lies.
Just as the title of this column states: Ferguson worked as intended, for the maintenance of white supremacy. A question for the reader is: is modern white police violence against people of color the modern version of lynching, with the same purpose? Except that it goes on all over the country, not just in the South.
By Thomas Farrell
Fighting Rape Culture: A Proposal for Action
Lately Senators Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, and Kirsten E. Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, have once again been calling attention to rape culture in the American military. Recently Sabrina Rubin Erdely published a graphic article about an alleged gang rape of a first-year student at the University of Virginia in 2012. The time has come for a concerted effort to fight rape culture.
very grim news

Ashton Carter is the typical Beltway apparatchik -- profiting from the revolving door between the military, heavy industry and academia. He was and remains a key actor in the ever evolving "policy" of demonization of Russia. And here's the icing on the weaponized cake: he advised Obama on the "pivoting to Asia." Run for cover, everybody.
Why Elon Musk's Batteries Scare the Hell Out of the Electric Company - Yahoo Finance
"The mortal threat that ever cheaper on-site renewables pose" comes from systems that include storage, said Amory Lovins, co-founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute, a Snowmass, Colorado-based energy consultant. "That is an unregulated product you can buy at Home Depot that leaves the old business model with no place to hide."
You'll Love When This Chimpanzee Sees the Blue Sky for the Very First Time"
The Humane Society of the United States rescued 111 chimpanzees from horrendous conditions in testing facilities, and gave them -- for the first time, or for the first time in a long time -- their natural right to a peaceful habitat. [Note: Hope springs eternal, and for good reason, as this video demonstrates. I haven't looked at other videos yet, but this looks like an amazing site. DG]
Why Readers, Scientifically, Are The Best People To Fall In Love With
Readers, like voicemail leavers and card writers, are now a dying breed, their numbers decreasing with every GIF list and online tabloid. Like falling in love with a stranger you will never see again, you ache with the yearning and sadness of an ended affair, but at the same time, feel satisfied. Full from the experience, the connection, the richness that comes after digesting another soul. You feel fed, if only for a little while.
With the recent release of Phillip Nelson's latest book, the mystery of the JFK assassination may be getting closer and closer to resolution. In this two part series Greg Maybury takes a closer look at the man who succeeded JFK, and the possibility the real conspiracy theorists all this time are the ones still clinging to the official narrative.

Prof Stephen Hawking, one of Britain's pre-eminent scientists, has said that efforts to create thinking machines pose a threat to our very existence.
Katie Singer, author, most recently of An Electronic Silent Spring, spoke at the Techno-Utopianism and the Fate of the Earth Teach-In at Cooper Union in New York City on October 25, 2014. Here is the audio recording of Singer's talk.
By proceeding as if journalists reported stories relying on a single source, the government facilitates witch hunts against single individuals, all while dismissing other possible sources and presenting the illusion that the trade in secrets is not widespread in government.
More than 550 law-enforcement killings were not included in FBI statistics between 2007 and 2012, according to an analysis by the Wall Street Journal, which concluded it is nearly impossible to tally how many people are killed by police officers in any given year.

America is on a "Hot War Footing": House Legislation Paves the Way for War with Russia? | Global Research
Columbia Pike has long been the most neglected corridor in Arlington, Virginia, despite -- or perhaps because of -- its historic role as the freedom trail for thousands of African-Americans fleeing the Confederacy and slavery. That neglect now has a new chapter as a planned Streetcar is killed, reports Robert Parry.
Russia still gets to build a pipeline under the Black Sea -- but now redirected to Turkey and, crucially, pumping the same amount of gas South Stream would. Not to mention Russia gets to build a new LNG (liquefied natural gas) central hub in the Mediterranean. The redirection makes total business sense. Turkey is Gazprom's second biggest customer after Germany.
Unless that end to coal and oil and gas comes swiftly, the damage from global warming will overwhelm us. Winning too slowly is the same as losing, so we have a crucial series of fights ahead: divestment, fracking, Keystone, and many others that we don't yet know about.
By Bob Burnett
What Democrats Stand For: Four Messages for 2016
In the aftermath of the disastrous 2014 midterm election, former Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean observed, "You've got to stand for something if you want to win." Before 2016, Democrats must figure out what they stand for and develop coherent messages. Here are four suggestions.
By Kathy Malloy
Not So Grand
I have no idea how black men can bear to live in this society anymore. It must be like Winston Smith, living in Oceania, knowing that he could be killed by the thought police at any time, for any reason.

By Dave Lefcourt
Absolute Insanity
It's absolute insanity for the US to provoke war with Russia. Yet this morning the US House passed a resolution, H.Res 758 which former congressman Dennis Kucinich describes as a "Green Light" to war w/ Russia. The rational mind wouldn't contemplate a potential nuclear war w/ Russia. But apparently to the irrational mind threatening & provoking a nuclear armed Russia is on the table; never mind that it's absolute insanity.

 Latest Articles
After Claiming to be a democracy that respects the people's right to assemble, speak, and protest, the government has deployed dozens of police, spies, and military organizations that have been planning for months about how to contain and suppress expected protests. They've arrested more than 500 people in the area since August, and have conducted widespread surveillance on political activists, organizers, and journalists.

The grand jury, dating from 1215, is no longer needed. It is now just a device to let DA's hide from responsibility, and to hammer witnesses in secret, writes TCBH! journalist Dave Lindorff. It should be abolished in the US, one of the last nations to still employ it.
Broken Words
"Indifference to evil is more insidious than evil itself," wrote Abraham Joshua Heschel. In recent Grand Jury actions, we see how true that is. All of us are responsible to change it.
The 21st century American courts have established that those in the executive branch are above the law. American judges are sworn to uphold the US Constitution, but this has not stopped them from subverting it in the interest of executive power in order to make us "safe."

A critique of the criminal justice system.
Some perspectives on the issue arising in Ferguson, Missouri, envisioning an end of global racism as well as inequality of human rights.... along with the potential defeat of the evils of capitalism.
The circumstances of struggle will be more difficult than any other that Black people and their allies have faced since Reconstruction was sold out by northern capital in 1877. However, the alternative is continuation of the Black Mass Incarceration State. In this vortex of struggle, the newborn movement will name itself, and choose its own leaders.
Has Modi-led BJP Made AAP Irrelevant ?
An opinion piece on political developments post-Modi win in the federal elections. Aam Admi Party was a sentimental outgrowth of the failures of last Congress-led dispensation in India. However Modi-in real came out entirely a different individual than what media and Congress-led politicians made out of him.
DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON--A Sonnet Plagiarized for Truth*
A satire based on the actual transcript of the tragic events, that led to the death of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old, at the hands of Cleveland police who claim they mistook his actions as threatening their lives and later discovered he had a toy gun in his waistband.
There is an "awareness gap" amongst the global public of the link between eating meat and climate change, and that presents a real obstacle to keeping global warming under the 2-degree threshold, a new study finds.

There is such a gap between Perdue's slick marketing and the reality, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof devoted a whole column today to the video,
Engelhardt: War to the Horizon
2016 is already shaping up as a War Party election all the way. It goes without saying that whichever Republican candidate emerges from the pack will be a war-firster, while the leading Democratic candidate of the moment, Hillary Clinton, is another war-fightin' liberal of the first order.
Nazism Is Back
These videos explain what's happening.

 Best News Links from the Web
While America stumbles, third-world nations rise in economic and infrastructure stability. Bolivian President Evo Morales inaugurated the third line of the "Mi Teleferico" urban cable system in La Paz Thursday, the final installment of the first phase of the project. At the inauguration ceremony, President Morales spoke of new cable car system as a major modernization project that was made possible due to Bolivia's recent period of economic and political stability. The cable car system which lifts commuters up over the Andes is the longest in the world.

WATCH: 'I Can't Breathe'--Congressman's Incredible Tribute to Eric Garner on House Floor
If Rep. Hank Johnson's performance does not move you, you may be made of stone. Some in Congress have already expressed their solidarity with Garner and other victims of police brutality. Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA), the sponsor of legislation to curb police militarization, made a moving tribute to Garner, speaking about police militarization and including the phrase, "I can't breathe" between each statement -- the phrase Garner said as his life was choked away, and which has since become a rallying cry for protesters.
'Worst' Israel Ecological Lesson: Humans Shouldn't Live in the Desert
Black rivers of crude oil could be seen flowing across the desert sands in the eastern part of Israel Thursday morning and people on both sides of the border with neighboring Jordan were rushed to hospitals after inhaling toxic fumes from the massive spill that occurred after a major pipeline ruptured, possibly by a maintenace crew.
Russian News reader can't keep a straight face while breaking the news of the death of Fred Phelps - YouTube
Russian News reader can't help but laugh as she breaks the news of Fred Phelps death. You may remember Fred advising the world that "God hates fags." While of course we progressives mourn for the death of fellow humans, we do our best to speak the truth about them. I personally mourn Fred's demise and delight in spreading the word of his unfortunate passing--by posting this video is absolutely a MUST WATCH!
Lacking any especially attractive alternative, powerful Republicans are pushing Bush to run in 2016. And he seems to be on the cusp of a decision. Besides, more than a few Democrats agree that Bush, however damaged his family brand, would be the most formidable candidate available to the GOP. They, too, whisper about him as "the only one who could beat Hillary Clinton." If Bush runs, extremism and corruption in the Sunshine State during his tenure will provide ample fodder for investigative reporters and primary opponents, as will many episodes in his long business career.

Former New York Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson said Wednesday that she regrets how she handled two high-profile cases where the paper was pushed not to publish national security secrets by the federal government. "Rather than be too aggressive about publishing these stories, I think we have been too meek. I frankly regret my decision back in 2003 to withhold from publication a story by Jim Risen about Iran's nuclear program," she said, speaking at Columbia Journalism School.
How Close Are You to a Superfund Site?
How Close Are You to a Superfund Site? Of more than 47,000 waste sites, the EPA has put over 1,700 on the National Priorities List (NPL) since 1982. When polluters can't be made to pay to clean them up, the Superfund pays.At first the Superfund was flush from taxes on oil and chemicals, but Congress let those expire in 1995. It's now financed by the general fund--that is, by all taxpayers.
Whistleblower Edward Snowden received several standing ovations in the Swedish parliament after being given the Right Livelihood award for his revelations of the scale of state surveillance. Snowden, who is in exile in Russia, addressed the parliament by video from Moscow. In a symbolic gesture, his family and supporters said no one picked up the award on his behalf in the hope that one day he might be free to travel to Sweden to receive it in person.

A police officer who shot a 12-year-old dead in a Cleveland park late last month had been judged unfit for police service two years earlier by a small suburban force where he worked for six months, according to records released on Wednesday. Officer Timothy Loehmann, who killed Tamir Rice on 22 November, was specifically faulted for breaking down emotionally while handling a live gun. During a training episode at a firing range, Loehmann was reported to be "distracted and weepy" and incommunicative. "His handgun performance was dismal," deputy chief Jim Polak of the Independence, Ohio, police department wrote in an internal memo.
A NASA official recently confirmed that one of the agency's aircraft had been spotted on an American military airstrip in eastern Africa a few weeks ago, but like a series of U.S. military officials, declined to say what the space agency's high-tech bird was doing there. "I really can't give you any of the details," Jim Alexander, a NASA official with the WB-57 High Altitude Research Program, told ABC News. "You know, the airplane was there, you see it in the picture. But I really can't tell you what it was for."
Posted by Roberto Abraham Scaruffi at 20:34