Saturday, October 31, 2009

Clinton: U.S. ready to do business with "good Taliban"

The "good Taliban", of course, are the ones that bow down and lick the boot of the occupation. The "bad Taliban" are the "terrorists", many of whom are the families of victims of Predator hellfire attacks, most of whom aren't even "Taliban" but are merely Pashtun tribesman fighting a vicious foreign invasion. And the occupation forces, slaughtering civilians indiscriminately, are part of "a peaceful and democratic process," while the resisters are a "syndicate of extremists and terrorists." It's almost funny, like it's a spoof from The Onion, but it's unfortunately serious.

    Xinhuanet.com -

    U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Wednesday said the United States is ready to do business with what she called good Taliban who agree to join "a peaceful and democratic process."

    "We view extremists and terrorists as a syndicate. But not everyone who picks up a gun is a terrorist. We are determined to root out their leadership. But we are also open to those who change their mind and agree to a view, which is peaceful and democratic in manner," she told a joint press conference with her Pakistani counterpart, Shah Mahmud Qureshi, in Islamabad.

    Her remarks came amidst reports that in a new approach to the war in Afghanistan, the Obama administration has indicated that it will offer to pay Taliban fighters who renounce insurgency.

    President Barack Obama signed a defense bill, which includes a program to win over the loyalties of those Taliban militants, who are ready to join the side of the Afghan government and give up militancy.

    It is similar to the Commanders' Emergency Response Program, which is running in Iraq for several years.

    The Iraqi model is basically a pool of money that lets commander on ground to response urgent humanitarian request to clear roads, dig wells, and provide other urgent humanitarian assistance to the people.

    However, the fund has been used to pay insurgents to basically switch side to join with the Americans by forming local militias to protect their town and villages from hostile people.

    Under the program, thousands of fighters were reintegrated into the Iraqi society.

    Reports in Western media indicate that now the U.S. administration wants to initiate the same program in Afghanistan.

    "Good Taliban? I don't know about good. But people have been caught up in these activities. Let us root out the hard core and look at the people who renounce violence, we should be open and see them case by case," Clinton said.

    Clinton visited Pakistan from Oct. 28 to 30.

    "Let them come forward and join the political process with their agenda of keeping women back and not allowing girls to schools. Let them make their case. They are losing and are on the wrong side of history," added Clinton.

    The United States had tried several years back to test Iraq's Al-Anbar model - under which local tribes in Iraq's Anbar province were provided weapons to guard against insurgents - in Afghanistan.

    The program was also copied in the militancy-riddled northwestern Pakistan, where local tribes constituted armed Lashkars (voluntary tribal force) to fight away insurgents. Such Lashkars are still functioning successfully in Swat, Dir, and Mohmand region close to the Afghan border.

    Response to the program in Afghanistan has, however, remained poor.

    In his latest strategy review, the U.S. and NATO-led ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) commander, General Stanley McChrystal calls for the international forces to concentrate more on protecting Afghan civilians than targeting and killing Taliban and al-Qaida fighters.

    Media reports indicate that Washington is also poised to involve Pakistan more hectically in Afghanistan affairs.

    Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmud Qureshi told the news conference that "in coming days a new era of Pak-U.S. relationship will dawn." He added that "a policy shift has occurred in U.S. approach towards Pakistan."

    However, he reminded that both countries have reservations about situation in Afghanistan.

    Radio Tehran reported the other day that the United States has approached some Pakistani Islamic clerics to use their good books with the Afghan Taliban insurgents to convince them on renouncing insurgency.

    The radio quoted Pakistani officials as saying that a U.S. intelligence agency, in collaboration with a Middle East intelligence network, is in contact with five pro-Taliban Pakistani clerics to use their influence with the Afghan Taliban.

    It said U.S. intelligence officials will hold talks with these clerics in the United Arab Emirates in the near future.

N.J. Court Says Americans Have No Right To Buy Handguns

The article states that "the exact contours of (the right to bear arms) have not been mapped," oblivious to the definitive meaning of shall not be infringed. War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. Two plus two equals five. Shall not be infringed means the State will decide the limits to your rights.

    CBS News -

    A New Jersey appeals court has concluded that Americans have no Second Amendment right to buy a handgun.

    In a case decided last week, the superior court upheld a state law saying that nobody may possess "any handgun" without obtaining law enforcement approval and permission in advance.

    That outcome might seem like something of a surprise, especially after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year in the D.C. v. Heller case that the Second Amendment guarantees "the individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation."

    But New Jersey Appellate Division Judge Stephen Skillman wrote on behalf of a unanimous three-judge panel that Heller "has no impact upon the constitutionality of" the state law.

    That's because, Skillman said, the Supreme Court did not strike down the District of Columbia's de facto handgun ban but instead simply ordered the city to issue a permit. In other words, while Americans may have the right in general to possess arms, the exact contours of that right have not been mapped, especially as the Second Amendment applies to state laws. (The court's majority opinion last year said: "We therefore assume that petitioners' issuance of a license will satisfy respondent's prayer for relief and do not address the licensing requirement.")

    Look for the Supreme Court to revisit this question in a few months when it hears a case called McDonald v. Chicago. It's a constitutional challenge to Chicago's restrictive gun laws, which prohibit anyone from possessing firearms -- even in their homes -- "unless such person is the holder of a valid registration certificate for such firearm."

    New Jersey's laws are similar. They say: "No person shall sell, give, transfer, assign or otherwise dispose of, nor receive, purchase, or otherwise acquire a handgun unless the purchaser, assignee, donee, receiver or holder... has first secured a permit to purchase a handgun as provided by this section."

    Another section dealing with licensing says: "No person of good character and good repute in the community in which he lives, and who is not subject to any of the disabilities set forth in this section or other sections of this chapter, shall be denied a permit to purchase a handgun or a firearms purchaser identification card, except as hereinafter set forth." Some of the exceptions involve criminal records, for instance.

    What prompted the current lawsuit was a request for a handgun purchase permit that Anthony Dubov submitted to the East Windsor Chief of Police. The police chief denied Dubov's request without giving any reason, in what the appeals court later ruled was a violation of state law. The current East Windsor police chief is William Spain.

    Oddly, the trial judge upheld that denial, without asking the police chief to testify to explain himself (another violation of state law) and after taking the unusual step of contacting Dubov's previous employers to ask about his background.

    Dubov's attorney, Michael Nieschmidt, argued that the state licensing scheme was unconstitutionally vague and therefore violated the Second Amendment.

    Skillman concluded that while the Second Amendment doesn't apply, state law and precedent nevertheless required that Dubov receive more due process than he did. The appeals court wrote: "Accordingly, the trial court's affirmance of the police chief's denial of appellant's application for a firearms purchase permit is reversed, and the case is remanded for an evidentiary hearing in conformity with this opinion."

Friday, October 30, 2009

Are You Really Prepared for the Coming Crisis?

SurvivalBlog.com -

Introduction

Imagine this situation: All of the media outlets have gone to commercial-free coverage. They are reporting that the Dow has dropped 2,000 points and trading has been suspended on Wall Street. The Chinese, along with other countries have transferred their reserves from the US Dollar. Oil futures climb $50 a barrel in hours. A national bank holiday shuts down the financial system on Main Street. Within 24 hours the grocery stores are cleared out of all food stocks. The gas pumps dry up in 12 hours. Trucks delivering goods are stuck at truck stops waiting on fuel that may not be available in days; 18-wheelers that have enough fuel to get back home are doing so, with the trailer left on the side of the road. Inner city areas are turning into war zones with looting and random acts of violence occurring between rival gangs. The Interstate System becomes a parking lot with the suburbanites trying to “get out of Dodge” (G.O.O.D.). With no more fuel supplies people become stranded and forced to flee on foot, with panicked people who are usually rational and moral, now acting immorally and irrationally; doing what it takes to get their family to perceived safety.

Moral of the story is simple – given an emergency where you will be cut off from the comfort of the complex supply chain, utility grid, and police protection, could you take care of you and your family? Could you do it for a week, for a month, or even a year?

I know this has more than likely unnerved you. Do not panic! Simple planning can help you get where you can take care of yourself and your family. We are going to try to guide you step-by-step in your path to peace of mind. Look at this plan as purchasing an insurance plan. You pay hundreds per month to insure yourself and your belongings, and investing in preparations may be the best policy you ever purchase. This will be covered in several areas:

  • Money
  • Food Storage
  • Security
  • Self-Sustaining Lifestyle

It may be advised to keep your preparations confidential. Use discretion as much as possible when you make your acquisitions. Also note that there will be some sacrifice in making your targets. The items we are suggesting to buy in this document are costly, but remember what we said earlier about this being an insurance policy for the safety and security of your household. Try to think of others that may join you if they are displaced by a disaster. We will cover this in detail throughout this work.

Money/Finances

Most of the families in this country are trying to figure out how to make ends meet in these troubled times. The first thing you need to do is do a household budget with your family. You should put a total of what is coming in and the fixed bills that have to be paid out monthly. Write out your variable expenses for six months and see what you can cut to contribute to your monthly “insurance” expenses. There are many plans out there to help you with this. There are many ways to cut corners; you just have to be creative. 25-50% of the “insurance” fund should be used to pay down debt, with the remainder directed at your preparations. Use one month’s “insurance” allotment to purchase 90% pre-65 silver coins, which have intrinsic value with the silver content in them, or 1 oz. silver rounds from a recognized mint.

Water

Water is crucial for healthy living and survival. 80+% of the human body is water and must be replenished regularly. I human being can go on weeks without food, but without water, a person will perish in days. Each person will need three gallons of water per day to stay cleaned, fed, and hydrated. Invest in a high-quality gravity water filter. The British Berkefeld or Berkey Light (starting around $200) is recommended for its timeless design and filtration level. Rain collection and other sources of water must also be considered.

Food

In today’s just-in-time society, our logistics system is so finely tuned that the slightest hiccup in the system could cause massive trauma to the supply system. 3 days of delivery delays could interrupt the system for a month. How much food should be stored in reserve? Well, as much as space in your house and your pocket book will allow. 60 days will be your starting point. Remember to eat the elephant one bite at a time. Allocate an extra $30 per week to your grocery budget. Sit down with your family and make a list of what foods they enjoy to eat. Make a menu and look at the ingredients needed to make the dishes. Create a special storage area in a closet or basement for food storage. When you go to the grocery store by double the ingredients and put the excess in your storage closet. Keep an inventory and check off items when you meet your goal level for that particular ingredient. A starter list is included in this work.

If you have the funds, try to stock your shelf with freeze-dried foods designed for long-term storage. These are items are pricey, but worth it on that rainy day. If you have a Mormon contact, you can go to the Provident Living centers to can food at a reduced cost compared to other commercial sources.

Two Month Supply for Two People of Shelf Stable Grocery Store-Purchased Foods:

Starches (daily: 6 servings, 2 people/60 days: 720 servings)
12 boxes (10 packets ea.) instant oatmeal (120 servings)
6 lbs. rice (120 servings)
8 lbs. pasta (120 servings)
3 boxes instant potatoes (60 servings)
60 cans starchy vegetables (beets, carrots, corn, lima beans, sweet peas) (180 servings)
15 lbs flour (for baking bread) (120 servings)

Vegetables (daily: 4 servings, 2 people/60 days: 480 servings)
160 cans non-starchy vegetables (or 120 cans veggies & 20 jars spaghetti sauce)
(artichokes, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, green beans, yellow beans, wax beans, mushrooms, okra, spinach, tomatoes)

Fruit (daily: 3 servings, 2 people/60 days: 360 servings)
120 cans fruit (no sugar added)

Meats/Legumes (daily: 4 servings, 2 people/60 days: 480 servings)
30 (6 oz) cans tuna (90 servings)
12 (15 oz) cans salmon (90 servings)
15 (12 oz) cans chicken (90 servings)
15 (12 oz) cans turkey (90 servings)
15 (5 oz) cans ham (30 servings)
30 cans (or 7 lbs. dry) beans (90 servings) (kidney, navy, great northern)

Dairy (daily: 3 servings, 2 people/60 days: 360 servings)
6 (25 oz) boxes non-fat dry milk (enough to make 12 gallons)
or 16 (12.6 oz) cans NIDO brand dry whole milk (can be found in ethnic foods section)
6 lbs. Velveeta cheese
12 (12 ounce) cans evaporated milk

Other:
10 lbs. sugar
20 packages active dry yeast
4 (26 oz) containers salt
2 lbs. popcorn
4 jars peanut butter (40oz)
4 (32 oz) bottles vegetable oil
shortening
syrup/molasses/honey
jam/jelly
nuts
dried onions, garlic & other spices
large bottle of Multi-vitamins

Security

This is where people tend to get a little uneasy. Except for the sociopath and serial killer, humans instinctively do not want to harm their fellow man. However, in times where there are challenges, people will be likely divided into two categories:

  1. Good guys that work with their neighbors and others survive
  2. Bad guys that will do anything it takes to survive.

You must be prepared to handle the second group, either though evasion, repulsion, or attack. The only way to do this effectively meet this task is to arm yourself with knowledge and of course – the hardware needed for the job.

Firearms

First and foremost, firearms need to be looked at as tools. They can hurt you if you are not safe! Just as a chainsaw, ladder, or tractor, like all dangerous tools, firearms must be handled with respect, with all the safety guidelines followed. Firearm selection can be complicated, so here are some easy guidelines in selecting a firearm.

Calibers

Caliber refers to what round the firearm is chambered to shoot. It is recommended that you purchase firearms listed in the primary category:

  • Rifle – .223; .308
  • Handgun – 9mm; 45ACP
  • Shotgun/Survival – 12 gauge;.22L

Secondary Calibers:

  • Rifle – .30-06; 7.62x39mm
  • Handgun – .40S&W; .357 Magnum(also shoots .38 Special)
  • Shotgun/Survival – 20 gauge;.17 HMR

A lot of people who are new to firearms, or who have never thought of needing defensive firearms can get confused with all of the choices out there in the gun market. We will use the primary caliber list above as a starting point. If you own firearms, make a list of the caliber and type you have. Then inventory the ammo you have on hand for each firearm. Sell excess firearms that are not in the primary caliber list to create some extra funds to get what you really need in your defensive toolbox. Keep firearms chambered in Secondary Calibers as barter items or handouts to extra “help.”s

For those on a budget and new to firearms, purchase a used 12 gauge pump shotgun and a used .357 Magnum revolver from an individual if possible. Guns have service lives measured in tens of thousands of rounds, so it makes sense to buy used guns, to save money. Also, by buying used guns from private parties, in most states you can avoid creating a "paper trail".) Find a friend or coworker that is knowledgeable in firearms, do your homework, and get these guns first. The 12 gauge has quite a recoil (“kicks”) with heavy loads, but can be used on any critter with wings or legs (2 or 4); make sure to get a model of shotgun that can have an extended magazine tube installed on it. As for handguns, the .357 revolver is a formidable self-defense pistol and can also shoot the [less powerful and slightly less expensive] .38 Special cartridge. Make sure you also have a holster and some speed loaders. Along with 100 rounds each of Buckshot and .357 hollow points, purchase low-cost clay load 12 gauge shells for the shotgun and bulk packs of .38 and to inexpensively learn how to use your firearms. Practice safe use and handling of all firearms, and make sure all chambers are clear or cylinders empty while stored in a secured safe or metal gun cabinet. Always make sure a firearm is clear before handling, and not in the physical grasp of untrained/young children.

After you have your “starter” guns, make sure you have plenty of food for a couple months and water filtration, then start adding to your defensive tool box. Acquire firearms that are more suited for defending your perimeter and neighborhood. This can be pricey, but remember, you do not want to skimp on an item that might save your hide!

  • Rifle – a rifle should be a magazine fed, self-loading weapon that can be easily handled and maintained by the individual.
    • AR-15 Lightweight Carbine with M4 or Magpul stock
      • 10-to-20 magazines per weapon
      • Minimum 1,500 rounds of M193 ball per weapon
    • Springfield M1A
      • magazines per weapon
      • Minimum 1,000 rounds of ball
  • Handgun – Remember that a handgun is just to get you back to your rifle and to defend yourself in situations where a rifle is not appropriate.
    • “Safe-acton" style in 9mm or .45ACP
      • Glock
      • Springfield XD
      • Smith and Wesson M&P
    • 1911 Variant in .45ACP
      • Kimber
      • Springfield Armory
    • 50 magazine loads worth of ammo and 6-8 extra magazines per weapon
  • Specialty – If you have the skills and the funds, it is wise to have a Varmint rifle handy for long range targets. There are many excellent choices out there, and is this is a custom weapon to the person; however, the author recommends .308 (7.62mm NATO) or .300 Winchester Magnum for the caliber

Equipment

You must have adequate gear to carry your extra magazines and survival gear. A plastic grocery bag just won't fit the bill. This is called load-bearing equipment (LBE). Purchase gear that fits you and your environment. Some manufacturers of high-quality gear include: Tactical Tailor, Spec-Ops Brand, and Maxpedition

24 Hour Kit – this is the equipment that is your base equipment you will wear while doing security patrols. It should sustain you for up to 24 hours in the field.

  • Load Bearing Vest with appropriate pouches for your gear
    • Rifle and 6-12 magazines
    • Sidearms and 2-3 magazines
    • Camelback hydration carrier – 2 liter
    • FRS/GMRS Radio
    • Survival Gear Pouch
      • Gloves – Cold Weather and Heavy-Duty Leather
      • Small Bible
      • 24-hour food supply
      • Water purification tablets/Water filter
      • Mosquito net
      • Poncho
      • Gun cleaning kit (Otis Universal Recommended)
      • 2 pairs of socks
      • Camouflage bandanna
      • Signal mirror
      • Emergency blanket
      • Small fishing kit
      • Sewing kit
      • Batteries
      • Fire Starting Kit
        • Matches in waterproof case
        • Magnesium starter
        • Starting Tender (dryer lint or cotton balls soaked in petroleum jelly)
      • Camouflage face paint kit
      • Knife Sharpener
  • Quality surplus USGI pistol belt (usually attached to vest)
    • Tactical Pistol Holster (optional)
    • USGI Canteen (empty), with cover and cup
    • Quality Fighting/Utility knife
    • Quality LED flashlight with colored filters
    • First Aid Kit
72 Hour Kit (Also known as the Bug Out Bag) – This is in addition to your 24 hour kit. As with the vest, his should be ready to go at all times. Rotate times that need to be rotated and do a gear check on a monthly basis.
  • Small or Medium Daypack or Rucksack
    • 3 MREs or similar trail-type food
    • Spare ammo
    • 1 – Set of clothes (camouflage for your area)
    • 2 – Black, Drab Green, or Brown T-shirts
    • 6 – Pairs of Socks
    • Toiletries
    • Mess Kit
    • Sleeping bag – Winter
    • Poncho liner – Summer
    • Entrenching Tool
    • Plastic Bags
  • Scenario Specific Equipment
      • Advanced Medical Supplies
      • Bolt Cutters
      • Long Distance Two-way Radios
      • Entry Tools
      • Heavy Wire Ties
      • Large Wire Cutters
      • Rappelling Line and accessories
      • Barter/Charity Goods
      • Hatchet/Machete of some type

Make sure first off the pack you select fits you well, is durable (no Chi-com knockoffs), Drab in color (florescent colors and reflective stripes are a no-no). Make sure the straps are of modern ergonomic design and you have a chest and belly band the fits you will over clothing. The better the fit of the bag, the less fatigue you will endure.

Put your gear on and make sure it fits well. Go to a private location and test your gear out. Try to simulate being in the field. 99% of your activity in a disaster is gathering food and keeping yourself going, however you will need to periodically do a scouting patrol around your property to see what is happening, check on distant neighbors, etc. You need to make sure you can haul on your person every item you need to operate in the field for 72 hours.

Wearing this kind of gear around is very fatiguing. If you are not in shape now, you will get in shape when the time comes. Make sure you can eliminate weight at every opportunity. Examples include carrying hotel size soap bars or slices of soap instead of a whole bar; a lightweight one-man tent instead of a three-man tent; sawing a toothbrush in half; etc. Anything to lighten the load, do it.

Self-Sustaining Lifestyle

If you made it through this work so far without throwing it in the trash or deleting it from your computers, thank you. I bet the wheels are turning in your head. Do not panic or get overwhelmed. The point of this work from the first letter is to give a broad overview of what steps you need to take to become a more self-sufficient American. I know that the cost of items freak you out. Think about it as spending your money while it is worth something. A simple breakdown in the monetary system could invalidate years of savings. Make it where you are comfortable in the future and do not become a casualty. The biggest issue faced in a disaster situation is comfort. However, if you have a comfortable place to sleep, food to eat, and water to drink you will thrive in hard times.

Shelter

A survivalist thinks they will hit the woods and live off the land. A good majority of these people will not make it due to exposure and lack of clean food and water. A thrivalist makes plan A to go to the well-stocked retreat (which may be home) and ride out the storm. The thrivalist can also live in the woods, but it is strictly plan B. The best place to remain is in what you know intimately – your home and surrounding area.

Bug Out or Stay In?

This will be a difficult choice for you to make. This is strictly the opinion of the author, but you should plan to avoid major cities during this time of crisis. In other words, if you live in an urban/suburban area become good friends with someone like mind and a tank of gas away or if you live in the country, plan to stay in and make room to have extra permanent guests if a catastrophic event happens to our nation. Whatever choice you make, you will need more people than just yourself. You will need a team of folks to sustain your Area of Operation (AO). This is where the purpose of this document ends. You have to use the gifts God gave us – intuition, critical thinking, gut feeling, etc. – to plan out exactly what you are going to do.

Obama's H1N1 national emergency declaration could invoke FEMA response to pandemic

The government spent billions on vaccines that nobody really wants. We don't know what's really behind the hype of this benign virus. Do they still have greater designs for us in this current outbreak, or was this a trial balloon to gauge our response to coercive government tactics regarding vaccination? Was it all just a ploy to rake in mega-profits for the pharmaceutical industrial complex? One thing we do know is that swine flu is not a particularly exceptional killer. It's not particularly contagious. Yet to believe the government hysteria you'd think this is an extinction level pandemic.

We also know that the government has the laws - well, not laws, executive orders - in place to declare just such an emergency and implement martial law. For what purpose? Any excuse to implement total tyranny will do. Why not a fake pandemic?

    NaturalNews -

    President Obama's declaration of a national pandemic emergency is "no cause for alarm," reported the mainstream media throughout the weekend. The declaration is nothing more than a "precaution," they say. "It's really more a continuation of our preparedness steps," said Anne Schuchat, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, in a USA Today story.

    In other words, there's not really any emergency at all. So why declare a national emergency in the first place? The media reports this was done to allow hospitals to bypass federal regulations concerning the setting up of large-scale triage sites -- emergency medical camps quickly constructed to deal with large numbers of sick people.

    But at the same time, H1N1 isn't causing large-scale sickness. As USA Today reported, an expert on infectious disease, P.J. Brennan (the chief medical officer for the Penn Health System at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia) said, "The public ought to take some solace, some relief in this. It's not a suggestion that things have deteriorated in any way. In no way is the virus more severe or more difficult to manage."

    So let me get this straight. The H1N1 virus remains mild. The CDC reports that swine flu infections already peaked out in mid-October. There have been no new developments in swine flu that would be cause for alarm and no reason to suspect huge numbers of sick people flooding into the hospitals. And yet, for some reason, the Obama administration has declared a national pandemic emergency specifically for the purpose of speeding the ability of hospitals to process large masses of sick people through emergency medical triage tents?

    What are these people not telling us?

    Something doesn't add up here. Why would the U.S. government need to declare a national emergency to enable hospitals to handle a flood of sick people when there is no flood of sick people (and the pandemic seems to be fizzling out)?

    This is more like the kind of preparation you might expect in advance of a biological terrorism attack, not for a flu that appears no more dangerous than the seasonal sniffles.

    The National Emergencies Act and FEMA

    Meanwhile, the media ignores the rest of the story about what dangerous powers a declaration of a national emergency puts into play. As reported here on NaturalNews, this declaration effectively ends many civil liberties in America and, at least on paper, puts the U.S. government in the position of having the legal authority to force vaccinations on the entire population at gunpoint (if they wanted to).

    The National Emergencies Act passed in 1976 has some peculiar realities attached to it. In particular, as Wikipedia reports:

    A federal emergency declaration allows the United States Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to exercise its power to deal with emergency situations ... Typically, a state of emergency empowers the executive to name coordinating officials to deal with the emergency and to override normal administrative processes regarding the passage of administrative rules.

    Got that yet? By declaring a national emergency, Obama invokes a set of laws that not only override important sections of the U.S. Constitution, but that also activate FEMA to take charge of "responding" to the emergency.

    Now we know why they need all those emergency medical tent camps near the hospitals. FEMA's in charge! And if FEMA handles the swine flu pandemic in the same way the agency handled the Hurricane Katrina disaster, we may indeed need all those emergency triage tents after all.

    Those of you who have been following the ongoing march to destroy the freedoms of the American People already know about FEMA camps. These aren't Boy Scout field trip camps; they're detention centers designed to hold large numbers of people for "emergency" purposes. Many theories abound on what these FEMA camps might be used for (www.campFEMA.com) (http://www.globalresearch.ca/index....).

    They could conceivably be used to quarantine people who are infected with a dangerous pandemic virus. On the other hand, they might also be used to isolated and detain people who refuse to be vaccinated against any declared pandemic. Under the National Emergencies Act and related U.S. law, FEMA would have two years of near-total control over the civilian population, during which people could be subjected to forced vaccinations, mandatory searches of their homes, gunpoint detainment and "involuntary transportation" to a FEMA detainment facility, and so on.

    I'm not saying they're going to do all this, but they could if they wanted to!

    And that's not freedom. Real freedom means you have the guaranteed right to be safe from being detained, or arrested without cause, or injected with a government-mandated chemical. Under a declaration of a national emergency, your "freedom" is at the whim of those who maintain police state powers over you. You're only "free" if they decide to refrain from exercising the power they have over you. It's the same kind of freedom you might get as a peasant in some Medieval kingdom where the king says, "You're free to go."

    Now, some of these freedom-restricting actions might conceivably be justifiable if a truly dangerous pandemic virus were sweeping through the population killing millions, causing huge disruptions in the national infrastructure and threatening the nation with a partial or total shutdown of essential services. But that is not happening here. H1N1 is a mild virus that rates astonishingly low on the severity scale. If H1N1 were a hurricane, it would be little more than a "tropical depression." It is not a category five hurricane, nor a phase six pandemic. Virtually everyone who is exposed to H1N1 generates their own antibodies and cures themselves naturally. According to hospital reports, those who have died from the H1N1 virus are almost exclusively people who were already suffering from preexisting conditions that compromised their health such as asthma or extreme obesity.

    By any measure, H1N1 as currently configured appears to present no extraordinary threat to the health of the population. So once again, we must ask: Why declare a national emergency and initiate a FEMA response to something that's not really an emergency?
Read all of it...

Federal Reserve Policy Audit Legislation ‘Gutted,’ Paul Says

No, slave, you may not look at the Fed's books and see how much money you've been robbed of. You may not know the inner workings of an institution that creates your money out of thin air and then loans it to you at interest. The Fed is the shadow government. Most of the representatives and senators, as well as the president, are its puppets. They are not going to allow an audit so that the American people will have laid bare before them the theft and enslavement they've endured since the Fed's inception. This is all FYOG. Go back to sleep. Everything is OK. Your government is in and under control. Here's 56 channels of NFL football. You are free...to do what they tell you to.

Get this through your heads, all you fake patriots who think your tea party movement will save this country, and that all you have to do is vote the current bums out to reclaim your country: nothing will ever change so long as the Federal Reserve exists. If you want peaceful revolution, and you're not behind the End the Fed movement, you are barking up the wrong tree.

    Bloomberg -

    Representative Ron Paul, the Texas Republican who has called for an end to the Federal Reserve, said legislation he introduced to audit monetary policy has been “gutted” while moving toward a possible vote in the Democratic-controlled House.

    The bill, with 308 co-sponsors, has been stripped of provisions that would remove Fed exemptions from audits of transactions with foreign central banks, monetary policy deliberations, transactions made under the direction of the Federal Open Market Committee and communications between the Board, the reserve banks and staff, Paul said today.

    “There’s nothing left, it’s been gutted,” he said in a telephone interview. “This is not a partisan issue. People all over the country want to know what the Fed is up to, and this legislation was supposed to help them do that.”

    The Fed, led by Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, has come under greater congressional scrutiny while attempting to end the financial crisis by bailing out financial firms and more than doubling its balance sheet to $2.16 trillion in the past year. The central bank is also buying $1.25 trillion of securities tied to home loans.

    Paul, a member of the House Financial Services Committee, said Mel Watt, a Democrat from North Carolina, has eliminated “just about everything” while preparing the legislation for formal consideration. Watt is chairman of the panel’s domestic monetary policy and technology subcommittee.

    Keith Kelly, a spokesman for Watt, declined to comment and said Watt wasn’t immediately available for an interview. Watt’s district includes Charlotte, headquarters of Bank of America Corp., the biggest U.S. lender.

    Original Language

    Paul said he intends to introduce an amendment to the bill when it comes to the House floor for a vote restoring the legislation’s original language.

    Representative Barney Frank, a Democrat from Massachusetts and chairman of the committee, said in interview that he intends to ensure legislation would provide a time lag between FOMC actions and the reporting of them.

    Such a provision would “lessen the market impact,” he said on Oct. 20. “The importance is to see that there are no abuses and to judge what they did.”

    The legislation will probably be included in a broader Democratic package of financial-regulation changes in the House, Frank said.

FBI Demands Tattoo Shops Rat On Customers

Kurt Nimmo
Infowars
October 30, 2009

Are you in the market for a patriotic tattoo, maybe the Gadsden flag? Forget about it. Unless you want the local tattoo artist to inform on you.

The FBI, in league with the Bureau of Justice Assistance (part of the Department of Justice), has launched a program that harks back to East Germany’s Stasi.

In Philadelphia, the FBI has instructed tattoo shops to rat out their customers if they demand privacy, insist on paying with cash, engage in “suspicious behavior,” make “anti-US” comments, or request tattoos that are “extremist symbols.”

According to the MIAC report, the Gadsden flag is a “militia symbol.” The Department of Homeland Security’s Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment report characterizes militias as “white supremacists,” domestic terrorists and a threat to the president. MIAC is part of the federal “fusion” effort now underway around the country.

It is not merely “extremist symbols.” In addition, the FBI literature instructs tattoo shops to be on the look-out for people who change hair color, style of dress, or shave beards between visits. Suspicious people also include those with missing fingers or hands, chemical burns, strange orders or bright colored stains on clothing.

Read the handout below for more absurd “extremist” indicators according to the FBI.

featured stories   FBI Demands Tattoo Shops Rat On Customers

Without Vaccine, Australia Shrugs Off Swine Flu

With a one-half of one percent fatality rate, thank God the government (one entity) has been scaring the crap out of everybody and pushing its quacked vaccines on us. We'd all be...uhhh...completely fine without them.

    Age of Autism -

    With no vaccine available for H1N1 flu, Australia recently ended its 2009 "Flu Season" (their Winter in our Summer), with 186 flu-associated fatalities of 36,991 Aussies confirmed having H1N1.

    The Australia 2009 stats for regular 'seasonal flu' are not final yet, but their Health Dept literature cites annual flu-associated mortality historically has been between 2,500 and 3,000 in spite of universal vaccination programs for regular flu long being established. A logical review of these results strongly suggests next year Australia should initiate a "flu vaccination holiday," promote vitamin D supplements, long known to be effective for preventing Wintertime flu disease, and then compare the outcomes.

    Pertinently, experts have also stated that H1N1 was probably already in Australia for their 2008 flu season, but not tested for (which is the nature of the testing world; a great percentage of "flu" cases being presumptive, never tested). In light of Australia clearly showing the pussycat nature of H1N1, can somebody explain why America's media willfully ignores the news from Australia? However, despite the derelict media, I would think U.S. Health Generals would certainly be up on Flu news from Down Under, and certainly from Canada right next door.

    Canadian front page news on flu vaccinations has transfixed Canada health authorities, prompting official suspension of regular flu vaccination programs until further notice. This comes from a sweeping study of Canada by research Doctors Danuta Skowronski of the British Columbia Centre of Disease Control and Gaston De Serres of Laval University in Quebec concluding Canadians receiving flu vaccinations have twice the risk of coming down with the flu, compared to those who do not take the shot.

    In a bizarre five-hour worldwide teleconference held by the World Health Organization October 4 on the Skowronski/De Serres Study, U.S. doctors offered the opinion that the Canadian doctors' flu vaccination study was certainly wrong and must have used flawed study parameters, though the U.S. doctors admittedly could not identify anything specific. To paraphrase the U.S. attitude: 'Damn the vaccination studies, flu speed ahead!'

    In view of all this, America wakes up Sunday, Oct. 25 to headlines of President Obama proclaiming Saturday that H1N1 Flu is now under a National Health Emergency. Perhaps, Obama's rhetoric is no coincidence as it is well known most Americans have been rejecting their invitations to show up for their shots. And maybe, American mothers and fathers realize there are indeed catastrophic risks associated with vaccinations, particularly since CDC says their kids should be marched in for shots, regardless of CDC admitting the shots contain full amounts of mercury preservative. And, I am not making this up: CDC astonishingly insists that the mercury in vaccines brings no risk whatsoever to kids.

City to Pay for Informing on Tax Cheats

People are already hard-wired for this type of job, it seems. Don't walk around naked in your own home, someone walking by might see you and call the cops. Big city police forces are calling for a new system of “citizen watch” programs, allegedly to help combat turrism. Now Chicago is calling on its citizens, already under siege amidst exploding gang violence, to rat their neighbors out for tax evasion. One has to wonder how a neighbor discovers a tax cheat. Does he rummage through their garbage? Break into their house? Hide a microphone in their office? As the emphasized text illustrates, the government is encouraging businesses to rat out their competitors. You stay classy, Chicago.

    MSNBC -

    You dirty rat.

    Chicago and Cook County residents aren’t the only ones about to get shocking tax news; the city is debuting a “tax whistle-blower” plan that could turn neighbor against neighbor in Chicago’s business community.

    The folks at city hall will pay cash bounties to informants who turn in business tax cheats around the city. The reward would amount to some sort of percentage of the tax money that the city recovers.

    "It's just another way of bringing people into compliance," Revenue Department spokesman Ed Walsh told the Sun-Times.

    "It would probably be ... a business knowing that a competitor is not remitting a tax. An employee [of the tax-dodging business] could know that, too. Typically, you need to provide some type of incentive."

Druglord, Brother of Afghan President a C.I.A. Agent

The US government specializes in duplicity, and they apparently have great fun at our expense. The Federal Reserve creates our own money out of thin air, loans it back to us, and charges us interest on it. Meanwhile, the CIA runs drugs into America, and then the government busts people dumb enough to use them, takes everything they own, throws them into jail and tosses the key.

If there were any doubt what we're doing in Afghanistan - our own troops don't know why they fight - this article should go a long way towards dispelling those doubts. War is a racket, first and foremost to rake in grotesque profits for the Fed, who loans the government your money to finance these wars, and the military industrial complex, which needs war to justify its own existence. But in Afghanistan, we kill two birds with one stone - the aforementioned war profiteering, and second the monstrous prospects for drug proliferation - opium - Afghanistan presents us. Before the war, practically no heroin came from Afghanistan. Now 80% of the world's opium originates from there. Is it a coincidence that the drug trade exploded since we arrived? You be the judge.

    New York Times -

    KABUL, AfghanistanAhmed Wali Karzai, the brother of the Afghan president and a suspected player in the country’s booming illegal opium trade, gets regular payments from the Central Intelligence Agency, and has for much of the past eight years, according to current and former American officials.

    RELATED: America's Drug Crisis: Brought to You by the CIA

    The agency pays Mr. Karzai for a variety of services, including helping to recruit an Afghan paramilitary force that operates at the C.I.A.’s direction in and around the southern city of Kandahar, Mr. Karzai’s home.

    The financial ties and close working relationship between the intelligence agency and Mr. Karzai raise significant questions about America’s war strategy, which is currently under review at the White House.

    The ties to Mr. Karzai have created deep divisions within the Obama administration. The critics say the ties complicate America’s increasingly tense relationship with President Hamid Karzai, who has struggled to build sustained popularity among Afghans and has long been portrayed by the Taliban as an American puppet. The C.I.A.’s practices also suggest that the United States is not doing everything in its power to stamp out the lucrative Afghan drug trade, a major source of revenue for the Taliban.

    More broadly, some American officials argue that the reliance on Ahmed Wali Karzai, the most powerful figure in a large area of southern Afghanistan where the Taliban insurgency is strongest, undermines the American push to develop an effective central government that can maintain law and order and eventually allow the United States to withdraw.

    “If we are going to conduct a population-centric strategy in Afghanistan, and we are perceived as backing thugs, then we are just undermining ourselves,” said Maj. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, the senior American military intelligence official in Afghanistan.

    Ahmed Wali Karzai said in an interview that he cooperated with American civilian and military officials, but did not engage in the drug trade and did not receive payments from the C.I.A.

    The relationship between Mr. Karzai and the C.I.A. is wide ranging, several American officials said. He helps the C.I.A. operate a paramilitary group, the Kandahar Strike Force, that is used for raids against suspected insurgents and terrorists. On at least one occasion, the strike force has been accused of mounting an unauthorized operation against an official of the Afghan government, the officials said.

    Mr. Karzai is also paid for allowing the C.I.A. and American Special Operations troops to rent a large compound outside the city — the former home of Mullah Mohammed Omar, the Taliban’s founder. The same compound is also the base of the Kandahar Strike Force. “He’s our landlord,” a senior American official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

    Mr. Karzai also helps the C.I.A. communicate with and sometimes meet with Afghans loyal to the Taliban. Mr. Karzai’s role as a go-between between the Americans and the Taliban is now regarded as valuable by those who support working with Mr. Karzai, as the Obama administration is placing a greater focus on encouraging Taliban leaders to change sides.

    A C.I.A. spokesman declined to comment for this article.

    “No intelligence organization worth the name would ever entertain these kind of allegations,” said Paul Gimigliano, the spokesman.

    Some American officials said that the allegations of Mr. Karzai’s role in the drug trade were not conclusive.

    “There’s no proof of Ahmed Wali Karzai’s involvement in drug trafficking, certainly nothing that would stand up in court,” said one American official familiar with the intelligence. “And you can’t ignore what the Afghan government has done for American counterterrorism efforts.”

    At the start of the Afghan war, just after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States, American officials paid warlords with questionable backgrounds to help topple the Taliban and maintain order with relatively few American troops committed to fight in the country. But as the Taliban has become resurgent and the war has intensified, Americans have increasingly viewed a strong and credible central government as crucial to turning back the Taliban’s advances.

    Now, with more American lives on the line, the relationship with Mr. Karzai is setting off anger and frustration among American military officers and other officials in the Obama administration. They say that Mr. Karzai’s suspected role in the drug trade, as well as what they describe as the mafialike way that he lords over southern Afghanistan, makes him a malevolent force.

    These military and political officials say the evidence, though largely circumstantial, suggests strongly that Mr. Karzai has enriched himself by helping the illegal trade in poppy and opium to flourish. The assessment of these military and senior officials in the Obama administration dovetails with that of senior officials in the Bush administration.

    “Hundreds of millions of dollars in drug money are flowing through the southern region, and nothing happens in southern Afghanistan without the regional leadership knowing about it,” a senior American military officer in Kabul said. Like most of the officials in this article, he spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the secrecy of the information.

    “If it looks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck,” the American officer said of Mr. Karzai. “Our assumption is that he’s benefiting from the drug trade.”

    American officials say that Afghanistan’s opium trade, the largest in the world, directly threatens the stability of the Afghan state, by providing a large percentage of the money the Taliban needs for its operations, and also by corrupting Afghan public officials to help the trade flourish.

    The Obama administration has repeatedly vowed to crack down on the drug lords who are believed to permeate the highest levels of President Karzai’s administration. They have pressed him to move his brother out of southern Afghanistan, but he has so far refused to do so.

    Other Western officials pointed to evidence that Ahmed Wali Karzai orchestrated the manufacture of hundreds of thousands of phony ballots for his brother’s re-election effort in August. He is also believed to have been responsible for setting up dozens of so-called ghost polling stations — existing only on paper — that were used to manufacture tens of thousands of phony ballots.

    “The only way to clean up Chicago is to get rid of Capone,” General Flynn said.

    In the interview in which he denied a role in the drug trade or taking money from the C.I.A., Ahmed Wali Karzai said he received regular payments from his brother, the president, for “expenses,” but said he did not know where the money came from. He has, among other things, introduced Americans to insurgents considering changing sides. And he has given the Americans intelligence, he said. But he said he was not compensated for that assistance.

    “I don’t know anyone under the name of the C.I.A.,” Mr. Karzai said. “I have never received any money from any organization. I help, definitely. I help other Americans wherever I can. This is my duty as an Afghan.”

    Mr. Karzai acknowledged that the C.I.A. and Special Operations troops stayed at Mullah Omar’s old compound. And he acknowledged that the Kandahar Strike Force was based there. But he said he had no involvement with them.

    A former C.I.A. officer with experience in Afghanistan said the agency relied heavily on Ahmed Wali Karzai, and often based covert operatives at compounds he owned. Any connections Mr. Karzai might have had to the drug trade mattered little to C.I.A. officers focused on counterterrorism missions, the officer said.

    “Virtually every significant Afghan figure has had brushes with the drug trade,” he said. “If you are looking for Mother Teresa, she doesn’t live in Afghanistan.”

    The debate over Ahmed Wali Karzai, which began when President Obama took office in January, intensified in June, when the C.I.A.’s local paramilitary group, the Kandahar Strike Force, shot and killed Kandahar’s provincial police chief, Matiullah Qati, in a still-unexplained shootout at the office of a local prosecutor.

    The circumstances surrounding Mr. Qati’s death remain shrouded in mystery. It is unclear, for instance, if any agency operatives were present — but officials say the firefight broke out when Mr. Qati tried to block the strike force from freeing the brother of a task force member who was being held in custody.

    “Matiullah was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Mr. Karzai said in the interview.

    Counternarcotics officials have repeatedly expressed frustration over the unwillingness of senior policy makers in Washington to take action against Mr. Karzai — or even begin a serious investigation of the allegations against him. In fact, they say that while other Afghans accused of drug involvement are investigated and singled out for raids or even rendition to the United States, Mr. Karzai has seemed immune from similar scrutiny.

    For years, first the Bush administration and then the Obama administration have said that the Taliban benefits from the drug trade, and the United States military has recently expanded its target list to include drug traffickers with ties to the insurgency. The military has generated a list of 50 top drug traffickers tied to the Taliban who can now be killed or captured.

    Senior Afghan investigators say they know plenty about Mr. Karzai’s involvement in the drug business. In an interview in Kabul this year, a top former Afghan Interior Ministry official familiar with Afghan counternarcotics operations said that a major source of Mr. Karzai’s influence over the drug trade was his control over key bridges crossing the Helmand River on the route between the opium growing regions of Helmand Province and Kandahar.

    The former Interior Ministry official said that Mr. Karzai was able to charge huge fees to drug traffickers to allow their drug-laden trucks to cross the bridges.

    But the former officials said it was impossible for Afghan counternarcotics officials to investigate Mr. Karzai. “This government has become a factory for the production of Talibs because of corruption and injustice,” the former official said.

    Some American counternarcotics officials have said they believe that Mr. Karzai has expanded his influence over the drug trade, thanks in part to American efforts to single out other drug lords.

    In debriefing notes from Drug Enforcement Administration interviews in 2006 of Afghan informants obtained by The New York Times, one key informant said that Ahmed Wali Karzai had benefited from the American operation that lured Hajji Bashir Noorzai, a major Afghan drug lord during the time that the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, to New York in 2005. Mr. Noorzai was convicted on drug and conspiracy charges in New York in 2008, and was sentenced to life in prison this year.

    Habibullah Jan, a local military commander and later a member of Parliament from Kandahar, told the D.E.A. in 2006 that Mr. Karzai had teamed with Haji Juma Khan to take over a portion of the Noorzai drug business after Mr. Noorzai’s arrest.

An Opportunity for the Oath Keepers: End the Occupation of the United States

William N Grigg -

One Nation, under Occupation: Police departments nation-wide are acting as if this were a conquered country, and as if citizens were "enemy combatants."

A thin blanket of early evening darkness had draped itself across Alex Locklear's home in Maxton, North Carolina when the armed intruders arrived.

Brandishing firearms, the invaders forced several people – including wheelchair-bound Nicholas Locklear and a pregnant woman – to the ground and then barged in through the rear door, threatening to "blow the brains" out of anyone who put up a struggle. One woman was so terrified that she fled, tripped over an unseen obstruction, and broke her arm.

The arrival of an unmarked police car with its blue running lights flashing must have provided the victims of the home invasion with a moment's relief. But that relief would have quickly turned to a different flavor of alarm when the victims realized that their assailants were the police.

Under the pretext of a drug search, the five-man robbery crew ransacked the Locklear home in search of large amounts of cash that could be "forfeited" – that is, stolen – as alleged drug proceeds. The robbers had to be content with the $200 they found in Alex Locklear's bedroom, which is all they could put their hands on before piling into the police car and pulling away with such reckless haste that the vehicle shed one of its front hubcaps.

Locklear, who returned shortly after the robbery, reported the crime to the Robeson County Sheriff's Office, giving descriptions of the assailants and their vehicle. Not surprisingly, the Sheriff didn't follow up on that solid lead, because the robbery had been spearheaded by Robeson County Deputy Sheriff Vincent Sinclair, a member of the department's drug enforcement unit.

The March 14, 2004 robbery most likely came about because the Sheriff's Department discovered that Locklear had cashed a large check to pay workers on his 400-acre farm before heading for a motorcycle rally in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. And that assault differed only in detail from similar outrages taking place every single day in the purported Land of the Free.

The chances are pretty good that as you read these words, paramilitary attacks – commonly described as "no-knock raids" – are either being planned or executed somewhere in the U.S. Typically carried out by the military units called SWAT or tactical teams, those raids are generally triggered by a tip from a "confidential informant" – a paid snitch – and subsidized with federal funds, often through the "Justice" Department's Byrne Grant program.

Ironically, those on the receiving end of such "authorized" assaults are often treated even worse than the victims of the raid on the Locklear home.


No recourse: Last August, a SWAT team in Anderson, Indiana destroyed Barbara Williams' home in a mistaken armed raid. According to the city attorney, since the assault was "legal," the city is not liable for the damages, and the now-homeless Mrs. Williams is just S.O.L.

When property is damaged or innocent people are injured or killed in the course of an "authorized" home invasion, police can generally expect to be held blameless, since any action they perceive as a potential threat supposedly justifies the use of deadly force.

Witness the case of 22-year-old Houston resident Pedro Oregon Navarro, who was murdered by police who invaded his family's home in a mistaken "no-knock" raid. Navarro, who had armed himself with a handgun to deal with belligerent intruders he didn't know were police, was shot twelve times.

According to Harris County District Attorney John B. Holmes, Jr., the violent death of Navarro at the hands of the police was not a crime, because "the law does not allow anyone to resist arrest, even an illegal one" – and that therefore Navarro's murderers "had a right to use deadly force ... if he threatened them."


A common scene in an occupied land: Just your friendly neighborhood JBT, chillin' outside a really tricked-out armored vehicle.

Holmes is a prosecutor, so it's not surprising that he lied about the right to resist an illegal arrest. But his assumption that police have the "right" to kill anyone who resists is almost universally shared within both law enforcement and the "Justice" system.

Apparently, Deputy Sinclair and his gang didn't realize the extent of their official impunity: Had they known that they had the "right" to kill anyone who resisted their illegal invasion, it's likely that someone would have died at the Locklear home.


Like many corrupt police in such circumstances, however, the raiders left a relatively light footprint, most likely out of concern that leaving a corpse or two behind would lead to compromising questions. If their paperwork had been in order, they wouldn't have had to display such restraint.

The attack on Alex Locklear's home was just one of scores or hundreds of violent crimes committed by police in Robeson County, North Carolina over nearly a decade beginning in 1995. A federal investigation calling itself "Operation Tarnished Badge" eventually produced the conviction of some 22 police officers and Sheriff's Department personnel, including former Sheriff Glenn Maynor.

Deputies assigned to narcotics duty committed a string of crimes, some of them acts of state-sponsored terrorism – such as fire-bombing homes of suspected drug dealers, or hiring arsonists to burn down the homes of personal enemies. On one occasion, a deputy doused a recalcitrant suspect with lighter fluid and set him on fire. Drug dealers who cooperated were protected from prosecution; one was even given a gun and a police uniform and permitted to take part in a raid.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars were stolen from people under the pretext of drug asset "forfeiture," with much of it skimmed away for personal use without being reported. District Attorney Johnson Britt noticed a bloc of deputies who were living beyond what he assumed to be their means: They bought boats or other expensive recreational vehicles, took cruise ship vacations together, even went in as a group for Lasik eye surgery.

If things were running smoothly in the courtroom, all of this might have been acceptable. But Britt was really rankled over having hundreds of drug cases dismissed because of the incompetence and corruption of drug enforcement officers in Robeson County. After all, how could a prosecutor make a name for himself if his drug cases – the bread-and-butter of his profession – kept being dismissed?

Britt contacted the Feds, and soon enough the Feds discovered that the Robeson drug cops were skimming from the profits of the local forfeiture racket. Presumably, if the cops had been faithfully reporting their haul and content with the kickback the Feds provided, or even if their corruption had been contained and relatively modest, the Feds wouldn't have intervened. As it happens, however, dozens of Robeson cops and deputies were put on trial for stealing "federal funds" – meaning the cash that was seized at gunpoint from people suspected, but not convicted, of drug-related offenses.

What happened in Robeson County in the years between 1995 and 2002 (when "Operation Tarnished Badge" began) was hardly exceptional. There are many other jurisdictions in which, thanks to the federal "War on Drugs," local Police and Sheriff's Departments have mutated into robber gangs.

For several years, Brian Gilbert, Sheriff of Iowa's Dallas County, ran a very lucrative theft ring. Dallas County sits astride a very well-traveled stretch of I-80, the country's major east-west interstate. Gilbert and his deputies preyed heavily on people driving late-model SUVs with out-of-state license plates – particularly drivers who appeared to be of Latino extraction.

Stopped for alleged traffic infractions, the drivers would be threatened with prosecution for drug-related offenses – such as "money laundering" – if they were found to be in possession of significant amounts of cash. That trouble could be avoided if the drivers simply surrendered their vehicles and money to the county.

This little scam netted millions of dollars, and might still be in operation today had Gilbert not gotten a bit too greedy: He was caught taking home several paper sacks filled with money that had been stolen during a traffic stop. For this act of felonious grand larceny, Gilbert lost his job and was given a suspended ten-year prison sentence, along with five years' probation.

Police in Kingsville, Texas have been more disciplined than Gilbert and his gang in Iowa. Because that tiny town is located along Highway 77, a route often used by suspected drug couriers, police have been able to confiscate millions in putative drug proceeds, with eighty percent of what they steal going directly into the city budget. This is why the exceptionally well-paid police in that town of 25,000 have tricked-out high-performance cop cars and all the latest digital toys.

It's important to emphasize the fact that the people from whom this money is stolen have not been convicted of crimes – or even, in most cases, formally accused of crimes. All that is required is the presence of a large amount of cash coupled with an assertion by self-interested law enforcement officers that there is a suspected "nexus" to drug activity of some kind.

A recent federal court decision (entitled – I'm not kidding – United States of America v. $124,700, in U.S. Currency) held, in effect, that traveling with a large amount of currency offers sufficient probable cause to justify a narcotics-related forfeiture. Once the proper incantations are uttered and the requisite paperwork is filled out in the typical tax-feeder's sub-literate scrawl, the money itself is found "guilty" and taken into government custody.

Police and prosecutors in Tenaha, Texas – a town in Shelby County bordering Louisiana – have added some innovative wrinkles to the familiar forfeiture racket. A current federal lawsuit describes how Tenaha police have refined to a science the practice of targeting motorists – generally "racial and ethnic minorities, and those in their company" – for unjustified traffic stops, during which they are questioned as to "whether they have money or valuables" and then subjected to illegal searches.

Should money or items of value be found, the motorist and passengers are then placed under arrest for "money laundering" or drug-related charges, and then given an ultimatum: Sign away their property or face prosecution. This form of extortion-robbery is particularly effective when the victim is carrying an abnormal but relatively small amount of cash – say, less than $5,000 – that wouldn't be enough to compensate for the hassle and expense of mounting a legal defense.

In one of the cases described in the lawsuit, an individual named Danny Green who works as an investigator for the Shelby County Prosecutor's Office threatened to kidnap a couple's children if they didn't sign a document surrendering about $6,000 in cash.


Den of thieves: The Tenaha, Texas City Hall.

George Bowers, the superannuated mayor of Tenaha, insists that the seizures are justified not because of a compelling law enforcement need, but because his municipal government needs the money.

Oh. Well, then – why not?

Why bother trying to cultivate a local economy when there are innocent motorists to shake down?

To understand the depth of cynical corruption that exists in Shelby County, consider the reaction of District Attorney Lynda Russell to the lawsuit: She sought official permission to use forfeited funds to defend herself from charges that she had illegally confiscated those same funds.


Nope, that isn't David Allen Coe: This vision of feminine refinement is Shelby County District Attorney Lynda Russell (a Republican, natch), a Queenpin (as it were) of the county's forfeiture mob.

If this kind of thing were taking place only in isolated, one-stoplight, speed-trap towns like Tenaha – places where the local government is the malodorous residue at the bottom of a very shallow gene pool – it would be disgusting, but avoidable.

But this kind of outright larceny under color of "law" is underway wherever the Feds have fomented an official crime spree in the name of the "war on drugs."

We really shouldn't perceive the "war on drugs" in metaphorical terms. This is an actual war, albeit one that targets individual liberties, rather than illicit commerce.

Thanks to this war, innocent people are frequently terrorized by military assaults on their homes, and injured or even killed without legal consequence. It's because of this war that travelers have a fully justified fear of being illegally detained and robbed at gunpoint by people in government-issued costumes.

That home front war inspired "exceptions" to the posse comitatus law to permit the hands-on involvement of the military in domestic law enforcement. Even more alarming is the fact that it led directly to the federalization and militarization of law enforcement – which means that the police themselves are, in effect, an army of occupation right now.

This state of affairs suggests a vitally important mission for the movement called "Oath Keepers" – an association of retired and active-duty law enforcement and military personnel who define their allegiance in terms of fidelity to the Constitution, rather than loyalty or obedience to political officials.

As men committed to the Constitution, Oath Keepers have made it clear that there are at least ten specific kinds of orders they will not obey – orders to disarm American civilians, conduct warrantless searches, blockade or interdict American cities, invade and subjugate states that assert their reserved powers and constitutional sovereignty, subject citizens to military tribunals, enforce martial law decrees, or otherwise undermine or infringe upon the constitutionally guaranteed individual rights of Americans.

Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes explains that Oath Keepers will stand down rather than carry out such illegal orders, and be prepared to defend law-abiding citizens against the aggression of a lawless government. Predictably, Oath Keepers has been identified as a domestic enemy by Morris Dees' for-profit Stasi, the so-called Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).

According to the SPLC and its allies in the government-aligned media, the principled refusal of Oath Keepers to carry out criminal violence against innocent citizens is a variety of terrorism, or at least something akin to terrorism.

During a recent installment of Chris Matthews' cable television program, Matthews and SPLC apparatchik Mark Potok did their level best to contort comments made by Oath Keepers founder Rhodes into an endorsement of insurrectionary violence.


SPLC Commissar Mark Potok (whose name, appropriately, is very similar to a Klingon epithet describing a sleazy, cowardly wretch).

Matthews, who appears to be bucking for a Daytime Emmy, theatrically feigned incredulity that any responsible person could believe it possible that concentration camps could be erected on American soil – ignoring such trivial matters as the WWII-era detention of Japanese-Americans and the hideous treatment of American Indians during the 19th Century. For his part, Potok insisted that Oath Keepers were cultivating terrorism by spreading alarmist rhetoric about the possibility of martial law.

Bear in mind that the SPLC's core fund-raising activity consists of hitting up elderly donors with appeal letters that traffic in alarmist rhetoric that treats the tiny, inconsequential white supremacist movement as nothing less than the Fourth Reich on the March.

To judge from the SPLC's standard spiel, the most significant threat to individual rights comes from toothless cretins in Klan regalia and socially inept Nazi wanna-bes with man-boobs. Meanwhile, black Americans, Latinos, and other people for whom the SPLC displays such supposed solicitude are being terrorized by armed government officials who are carrying out a very literal war within our borders.

This presents Oath Keepers with a splendid PR opportunity that should become one of its most important ongoing campaigns: Why doesn't that organization reach out to another estimable group, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, in demanding an end to the "war on drugs"?

Most of the unconscionable acts and policies the Oath Keepers oppose – wholesale violation of individual rights, detentions, confiscations, civilian disarmament, militarization of domestic law enforcement – are not a vague future possibility, but rather a tangible reality right now because of the "war on drugs."

Most, but by no means all, of the victims of that war are non-white Americans. It would be entertaining to watching the SPLC try to explain how Oath Keepers could qualify as a "hate group" even as they took up the cause of black and Hispanic Americans suffering official abuse by way of the "war on drugs."

Valuable as it is for Oath Keepers to inoculate police and military personnel against the prospect of wholesale martial law, the group should be urging such personnel to stand down right now when it comes to carrying out manifestly unconstitutional and anti-American drug war policies.

The Oath Keepers should urge police and Sheriff's Departments to reject counter-narcotics grants and federal subsidies of any kind, including equipment transfers and other material support from the Pentagon. They should find the honest and principled law enforcement personnel who are mortified by the transformation of so many police and Sheriff's departments into criminal syndicates through the practice of "asset forfeiture." And they should take the point in reining in the ever-expanding use of SWAT teams (as a prelude to abolishing them outright, of course).

We're constantly reminded that "most" law enforcement officers are decent, public-spirited men who are disgusted and alarmed by corruption and the abuse of power. By urging that law enforcement stand down from the "war on drugs," Oath Keepers could help us learn whether this is actually the case.

October 30, 2009