Brain Cramps

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admin — Fri, 24 May 2013 14:58:40 +0000

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IRS, FBI and ATF were all used to harass a patriot group

admin — Fri, 24 May 2013 11:55:01 +0000

But the most important IRS story came not from the hearings but from Mike Huckabee’s program on Fox News Channel. He interviewed and told the story of Catherine Engelbrecht—a nice woman, a citizen, an American. She and her husband live in Richmond, Texas. They have a small manufacturing business. In the past few years she became interested in public policy and founded two groups, King Street Patriots, and True the Vote.

In July 2010 she sent applications to the IRS for tax-exempt status. What followed was not the harassment, intrusiveness and delay we’re now used to hearing of. The US government came down on her with full force.

Peggy Noonan’s Blog

Daily declarations from the Wall Street Journal columnist.

In December 2010 the FBI came to ask about a person who’d attended a King Street Patriots function. In January 2011 the FBI had more questions. The same month the IRS audited her business tax returns. In May 2011 the FBI called again for a general inquiry about King Street Patriots. In June 2011 Engelbrecht’s personal tax returns were audited and the FBI called again. In October 2011 a round of questions on True the Vote. In November 2011 another call from the FBI. The next month, more questions from the FBI. In February 2012 a third round of IRS questions on True the Vote. In February 2012 a first round of questions on King Street Patriots. The same month the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms did an unscheduled audit of her business. (It had a license to make firearms but didn’t make them.) In July 2012 the Occupational Safety and Health Administration did an unscheduled audit. In November 2012 more IRS questions on True the Vote. In March 2013, more questions. In April 2013 a second ATF audit.

All this because she requested tax-exempt status for a local conservative group and for one that registers voters and tries to get dead people off the rolls. Her attorney, Cleta Mitchell, who provided the timeline above, told me: “These people, they are just regular Americans. They try to get dead people off the voter rolls, you would think that they are serial killers.”

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Global warming debunked: NASA report verifies carbon dioxide actually cools atmosphere

admin — Thu, 23 May 2013 17:24:45 +0000

(NaturalNews) Practically everything you have been told by the mainstream scientific community and the media about the alleged detriments of greenhouse gases, and particularly carbon dioxide, appears to be false, according to new data compiled by NASA’s Langley Research Center. As it turns out, all those atmospheric greenhouse gases that Al Gore and all the other global warming hoaxers have long claimed are overheating and destroying our planet are actually cooling it, based on the latest evidence.

As reported by Principia Scientific International (PSI), Martin Mlynczak and his colleagues over at NASA tracked infrared emissions from the earth’s upper atmosphere during and following a recent solar storm that took place between March 8-10. What they found was that the vast majority of energy released from the sun during this immense coronal mass ejection (CME) was reflected back up into space rather than deposited into earth’s lower atmosphere.

The result was an overall cooling effect that completely contradicts claims made by NASA’s own climatology division that greenhouse gases are a cause of global warming. As illustrated by data collected using Sounding of the Atmosphere using Broadband Emission Radiometry (SABER), both carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitric oxide (NO), which are abundant in the earth’s upper atmosphere, greenhouse gases reflect heating energy rather than absorb it.

“Carbon dioxide and nitric oxide are natural thermostats,” says James Russell from Hampton University, who was one of the lead investigators for the groundbreaking SABER study. “When the upper atmosphere (or ‘thermosphere’) heats up, these molecules try as hard as they can to shed that heat back into space.”

Almost all ‘heating’ radiation generated by sun is blocked from entering lower atmosphere by CO2

According to the data, up to 95 percent of solar radiation is literally bounced back into space by both CO2 and NO in the upper atmosphere. Without these necessary elements, in other words, the earth would be capable of absorbing potentially devastating amounts of solar energy that would truly melt the polar ice caps and destroy the planet.

“The shock revelation starkly contradicts the core proposition of the so-called greenhouse gas theory which claims that more CO2 means more warming for our planet,” write H. Schreuder and J. O’Sullivan for PSI. “[T]his compelling new NASA data disproves that notion and is a huge embarrassment for NASA’s chief climatologist, Dr. James Hansen and his team over at NASA’s GISS.”

Dr. Hansen, of course, is an outspoken global warming activist who helped spark man-made climate change hysteria in the U.S. back in 1988. Just after the release of the new SABER study, however, Dr. Hansen conveniently retired from his career as a climatologist at NASA, and reportedly now plans to spend his time “on science,” and on “drawing attention to [its] implications for young people.”

You can read more details of the new NASA SABER study by visiting:
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2012/22mar_saber/

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Bitcoin – The Tyranny Test

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 11:01:52 +0000

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 05/20/2013 21:40 -0400

Via Paul Rosenberg of Free-Man’s Perspective blog (via Jim Quinn’s Burning Platform blog),

An increasing number of people have complained about governments and central banks in recent years, even using the word “tyranny” to describe them. They are, of course, called names in the establishment press:conspiracy theorists, mainly.

Calling someone a name, however, does not erase their argument (at least not among rational people) and both the governments and the big banks stand accused.

Up till now, however, these accusations were never accepted by the general public. The average guy really didn’t want to hear about the evils of government money. After all, that was the only thing he had ever used to buy food, clothes, gasoline, cars, and so on. He didn’t want to acknowledge the accusations because he feared what might happen to him without his usual money.

Now, however, we have a brand new currency (called Bitcoin) available to us: something radically different. This gives us a new way to directly address the subject of monetary tyranny, providing a clear test for the governments and money masters of the world:

If they are truly NOT tyrannical, they will leave this new currency alone.

If they ARE tyrannical, they will attack the new currency because it eats into their scam.

In other words, Bitcoin is a test for “the powers that be.” The way they deal with this new method of exchange will reveal their true nature.

If they ignore Bitcoin, they refute the charges of tyranny. If they attack it, they verify those charges.

After all, what honest reason could there be to attack an inherently peaceful tool for transferring value?

Prospective Reasons

Reasons to attack Bitcoin have recently appeared in the “public square.” Here are the three most popular ones, each followed with some analysis:

It can be used for money laundering.

Of course it can be used for money laundering — ANY currency can be used for money laundering. Currencies are neutral — that is their purpose! Currencies are valuable precisely because they can be exchanged for anything else — that’s why we use them!

Moreover, dollars and Euros and Pounds are used for money launderingevery day. Consider the recent money laundering crimes of HSBC andWachovia/Wells Fargo. These banks laundered hundreds of billions of dollars for violent drug cartels. And consider that this amount of laundered money is several hundred times the value of every Bitcoin in existence.

No one from either bank went to jail. Neither bank was shut down. Neither bank suffered more than a minor fine. So, how much of a concern can money laundering really be to governments and banks? Clearly not much.

But, since they accuse Bitcoin of being used for bad things, let’s be clear about the situation:

Every mafioso uses government money.

Every drug smuggler uses government money.

Every terrorist uses government money.

Every pornographer uses government money.

Every criminal of every type uses government money.

They also use the telephone system and the mail and banks and a wide variety of government services. But government money is good and Bitcoin is bad?

The argument fails.

It could destabilize the current system.

A tiny, new currency is a threat to the long-established king of the hill? Comparing Bitcoin to dollars, Euros and Yen is like comparing an ant to a dinosaur. This is a threat?

Please understand also that no one is forcing anyone to use Bitcoin. If you don’t think it’s a great idea, you don’t have to use it. If its price movements (relative to dollars) bother you, you don’t have to use it. How is that destabilizing to the current system? It is entirely separate.

And what of the current system? It was falling apart on its own before the Bitcoin program was ever written. And I could go on at length on the insane levels of government debt, hundreds of trillions in derivatives,rehypothecation, and innocent people being forced to bail-out failed banks.

The current system has massive problems, but none of them can be blamed on Bitcoin.

This argument fails also.

Bitcoin provides no customer protection.

Well, no, it doesn’t. Bitcoin is a currency, not a legal system.

What is implied by this argument is that the government banking systemdoes protect customers. That is an outright lie. People are ripped-off via the banking system every day. And more than that, consider what happened just a month ago in Cyprus: Thousands of innocent people were ripped-off BY the banking system — purposely — all at once and without recourse. This argument is, really, an insult to one’s intelligence.

And I should add something else: If Bitcoin is used properly, the crime of identity theft (a big problem with government money) vanishes – there is no identity available to be stolen.

So, again, the argument fails. Only those people who believe anything a government says will buy it.

In the End

In the end, it is said, we judge ourselves. Bitcoin has now put governments and banks in the position of judging themselves. They will write their own verdicts.

It should be interesting to watch.

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The Emperor has no clothes: Lumber Enters Bear Market while Govt says “it’s all good”

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 10:27:43 +0000

Despite the incessant belief that this must be too-much-new-supply-driven (as opposed to a lack of demand for new home construction), Lumber futures (after hitting limit down once again today) have now officially entered bear-market territory. Front-month lumber prices are down 23% from their highs in mid-March and given the 2-month lead that correlates so well to the market, it seems things are a little ahead of themselves in ‘housing recovery’ land.

It seems lumber futures are the best proxy for trading the real economy…

We wonder when the broad equity market will wake up to that?

not like we haven’t seen this hysteria before… (can this really go on for another year before reality hits?)

Of course, a plunge in lumber prices will not help all those new mills that are apparently coming back on line now…?

Or is simply that Lumber prices reflect a reality no one is quite comfortable with yet?

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Russia moves closer to jail terms for offending religion

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:42:52 +0000

A lone picketer holds a placard outside the State Duma, the lower house of Parliament, in Moscow May 21, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Mikhail Voskresensky

By Maria Tsvetkova

MOSCOW | Tue May 21, 2013 4:59pm EDT

(Reuters) – Russian lawmakers on Tuesday took a step toward imposing jail terms for offending religious feelings, approving legislation proposed after punk band Pussy Riot performed a raucous protest song in Moscow’s main Orthodox Christian cathedral.

Critics say the bill will give government-approved religious groups protection others lack and blur the line between church and state under President Vladimir Putin, who has advocated a strong societal role for the Russian Orthodox Church.

Lawmakers in the State Duma approved the bill by a vote of 304-4 after the second of three required readings in the 450-seat lower parliament house.

Approval in the second reading, which is when most changes are made to legislation, means Putin is likely to sign it after it gets through the Duma and a vote in the upper house.

The bill would introduce jail terms of up to one year and fines of up to 300,000 roubles ($9,600) for “public actions expressing clear disrespect for society and committed with intent to offend the religious feelings of the faithful.”

If committed in a house of worship the maximum punishment would be three years in prison and a fine of 500,000 roubles.

Kremlin critics fear that despite changes in the second reading that made the wording more specific, it will allow for selective application and use of the law as part of a growing Kremlin arsenal of tools to suppress dissent.

“This is another repressive law,” veteran human rights activist Lyudmila Alexeyeva told the Interfax news agency.

Putin has not spoken publicly of the bill, but he has suggested the jailing of Pussy Riot members was justified – despite Western criticism – because the state needed to protect the faithful.

Three members of Pussy Riot were sentenced to years in prison last August for the February 2012 protest in which they burst into Christ the Saviour Cathedral and belted out a “punk prayer” urging the Virgin Mary to rid Russia of Putin.

They were convicted of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred, while the bill imposing jail terms for offences against religious feelings may be used to prosecute for less overt actions.

One of the three, Yekaterina Samutsevich, was freed when a judge suspended her sentence on appeal. Maria Alyokhina has a parole hearing on Wednesday, and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova was been denied parole last month.

($1 = 31.2820 Russian roubles)

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Rand Paul: My colleagues just voted to arm the allies of al Qaeda

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:41:41 +0000

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) blasted members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday, which voted overwhelmingly to arm elements of the Syrian opposition in a bill co-sponsored by Sen.Robert Menendez (D-NJ) and Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN). “This is an important moment,” Paul said, addressing his Senate colleagues. “You will be funding, today, the allies of al Qaeda. It’s an irony you cannot overcome.”

The legislation, which would authorize the shipment of arms and military training to rebels “that have gone through a thorough vetting process,” passed in a bipartisan 15-3 vote. Paul offered an amendment that would strike the bill’s weapons provision, but it was rejected along with another Paul amendment ruling out the authorization of the use of military force in Syria. (Connecticut Democrat Chris Murphy was the only senator to join Paul in support of the weapons amendment.

Jesus vs. Muhammad …. funny spoof

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:40:16 +0000

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Unions break ranks on ObamaCare

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:12:07 +0000

Labor unions are breaking with President Obama on ObamaCare.

Months after the president’s reelection, a variety of unions are publicly balking at how the administration plans to implement the landmark law. They warn that unless there are changes, the results could be catastrophic.

The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) — a 1.3 million-member labor group that twice endorsed Obama for president — is very worried about how the reform law will affect its members’ healthcare plans.

Last month, the president of the United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers and Allied Workers released a statement calling “for repeal or complete reform of the Affordable Care Act.”

UNITE HERE, a prominent hotel workers’ union, and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters are also pushing for changes.

In a new op-ed published in The Hill, UFCW President Joe Hansen homed in on the president’s speech at the 2009 AFL-CIO convention. Obama at the time said union members could keep their insurance under the law, but Hansen writes “that the president’s statement to labor in 2009 is simply not true for millions of workers.”

Republicans have long attacked Obama’s promise that “nothing in this plan will require you to change your coverage or your doctor.” But the fact that unions are now noting it as well is a clear sign that supporters of the law are growing anxious about the law’s implementation. http://goo.gl/z5kPd

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Accused Fort Hood Shooter Paid $278,000 While Awaiting Trial

admin — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:06:52 +0000

Scott Friedman, NBC 5 Investigates

The Department of Defense confirms to NBC 5 Investigates that accused Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Hasan has been paid more than $278,000 since the Nov. 5, 2009 shooting that left 13 dead 32 injured.

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The Department of Defense confirms to NBC 5 Investigates that accused Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Hasan has now been paid more than $278,000 since the Nov. 5, 2009 shooting that left 13 dead and 32 injured. The Army said under the Military Code of Justice, Hasan’s salary cannot be suspended unless he is proven guilty.

If Hasan had been a civilian defense department employee, NBC 5 Investigates has learned, the Army could have suspended his pay after just seven days.

Personnel rules for most civilian government workers allow for “indefinite suspensions” in cases “when the agency has reasonable cause to believe that the employee has committed a crime for which a sentence of imprisonment may be imposed.”

Meanwhile, more than three years later soldiers wounded in the mass shooting are fighting to receive the same pay and medical benefits given to those wounded in combat.

Retired Army Spc. Logan Burnett, a reservist who, in 2009, was soon to be deployed to Iraq, was shot three times when a gunman opened fire inside the Army Deployment Center.

“I honestly thought I was going to die in that building,” said Burnett. “Just blood everywhere and then the thought of — that’s my blood everywhere.”

Burnett nearly died. He’s had more than a dozen surgeries since the shooting, and says post-traumatic stress still keeps him up at night.

Burnett is now fighting a new battle; only this one is against the U.S. Army.

The Army has not classified the wounds of the Ft. Hood victims as “combat related” and declines to label the shooting a “terrorist attack”,

The “combat related” designation is an important one, for without it Burnett and other shooting victims are not given combat-related pay, they are not eligible for Purple Heart retirement or medical benefits given to other soldiers wounded either at war or during the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the Pentagon.

As a result, Burnett, his wife Torey, and the families of other Fort Hood victims miss out on thousands of dollars of potential benefits and pay every year.

To Burnett the shooting felt like combat.

“You take three rounds and lose five good friends and watch seven other people get killed in front of you. Do you have another term that we can classify that as?” asked Burnett.

The Army has categorized the shooting as a case of “workplace violence.”

“Sickens me. Absolutely sickens me. Workplace violence? I don’t even know if I have the words to say,” said Burnett.

“They don’t need to be treated like this. They don’t need to sit and fight every day for this benefit or that,” said Torey Burnett.

As that fight continues, Burnett was stunned to see a letter detailing the more $278,000 Hasan has been paid since his arrest. NBC 5 Investigates received the letter from the Department of Defense in response to a request under the Freedom of Information Act.

“There have been times when my wife and I cannot afford groceries. We cannot afford gas in our car,” Burnett said. “Literally, times where we ate Ramen noodles for weeks on end. This [that Hasan is still earning a paycheck] makes me sick to my stomach,” said Burnett.

Burnett isn’t alone in his outrage.

“We’re giving the defendant in this case every benefit of the doubt. But yet we’re not giving the benefits to the victims,” said Rep. Thomas Rooney (R) Florida

Rooney, a former prosecutor at Fort Hood, recently signed a bi-partisan letter urging defense secretary Chuck Hagel to “…reclassify the victims’ deaths and injuries as ‘combat related’…”

The letter said the current situation has “…resulted in an embarrassing lack of care and treatment for the victims and their families.”

“What happened here is not a case of workplace violence. What happened here was an attack on our military by a terrorist element specifically targeting our military, which just so happened to be in the United States of America,” said Rooney.

Reports from the Federal Bureau of Investigation showed Hasan was communicating with a member of Al Qaida prior to the shooting. Additionally, the government’s National Counterterrorism Center lists the shooting at Fort Hood as a “high fatality terrorist attack.”

Rooney said he’s also willing to consider whether Congress should change the rules, so the Army could suspend the pay of soldiers arrested for crimes against fellow soldiers.

NBC 5 Investigates wanted to ask Pentagon officials about Hasan’s pay and the decision to classify the shooting as workplace violence, but the Army turned down requests for an interview. However, the Army’s Chief of Media Relations told NBC 5 Investigates: “The Department of Defense is committed to the integrity of the ongoing court martial proceedings of Major Nidal Hasan and for that reason will not further characterize, at this time, the incident that occurred at Fort Hood on Nov. 5, 2009.”

Burnett, who recently retired from the Army and moved to Arkansas to live with family and save some money, has joined dozens of other Fort Hood victims in a lawsuit against the Army demanding the benefits they believe they’ve been unfairly denied.

“I refuse to continue letting Nidal Hasan win. And I leave the “Major” part out, because even though, unfortunately, he’s still being paid better than I am, he doesn’t deserve that rank,” said Burnett.

A lawyer who once represented Hasan previously claimed his client couldn’t find a bank that would deposit his Army paychecks, but a spokesman at Fort Hood told NBC 5 Investigates that that issue has since been resolved; meaning Hasan or his family can access the money.

The Army could get some money back from Hasan by demanding re-payment for the cost of treating the wounds he sustained when a police officer shot him during the incident. However, military officials would not tell NBC 5 Investigates if they plan to do that.

With the trial expected to begin this summer, Hasan’s lawyer declined to comment on this story.

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