CDC States H1N1 Vaccine May Maim and Kill 30,000 Americans
September 1, 2009
According to the CDC, parents need to stop listening to a large number of doctors and virologists who say the vaccines are dangerous and instead get their information exclusively from the corporate mainstream media.
I’ve been doing quite a bit of research on the swine flu, vaccines and what’s behind the move for mandatory vaccinations enforced by the military with a flu that really is a mild seasonal like flu. I’ve discovered many things and will try to put them together in a way that makes sense if I can in maybe two or three posts.
So here’s some news about the Swine flu vaccine that the UN controlled ” World Health Organization” wants to mandate for everyone, even though in the Southern hemisphere countries it’s proving to be a much more milder flu than we were led to believe.
Swine Flu is embarrassingly trivial, at least to the CDC and WHO, which actually had to change the definition of a pandemic to make this false plague fit the definition.
Here’s an interview from Swedish TV with Dr. Tom Jefferson, an epidemiologist who has worked for the Cochrane Institute for 15 years as well as with an international team of scientists, he evaluates all published flu- related studies and in the video explains even more.
Here’s some more disturbing news that only adds to the problem at hand:
The World Health Organization has issued a binding ‘recommendation’ to all member countries requiring them to institute mandatory vaccination programs. Under an existing multilateral agreement this formally invokes each state’s pandemic plan and puts coordination under control of WHO (In other words how the US handles the pandemic is UN controlled now). For some European states the pandemic plan includes setting aside government as normal and ruling the country by a special council under control of the EU and WHO. France, Greece and Switzerland have already announced that it will effect a move to military rule beginning in September. There are unconfirmed reports that Norway and Israel have done the same. The United States is preparing for military ‘assisted’ mandatory vaccination but has not explicitly declared its intentions to the public.
CDC States H1N1 Vaccine May Maim and Kill 30,000 Americans
August 30, 2009
By Herb Newborg YourSpine.com
CDC says to assume 1 in every 100,000 vaccine recipients will suffer serious side effects, FDA only requires vaccine be effective in 3 out of 10 recipients.
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has officially stated that there will be as many as 30,000 serious, potentially lethal adverse reactions to the novel H1N1 vaccine, while the FDA guidelines for the novel H1N1 vaccine only require that it work in 3 out of every 10 recipients.
Last Saturday, I attended one of 10 “public engagement” meetings the CDC is holding across the country, utilizing a new model of public engagement designed to provide a public viewpoint or societal perspective on the topic at hand (mass vaccination) to the sponsor (in this case, the CDC). (Since there is so much resistance to the vaccine.)
Part of the process entails the sponsor (CDC) providing the following: “Information on the many sides of an issue is provided to the participants in a fair and balanced manner so that all participants become well-informed, and the overall group process is convened and managed in a neutral, respectful fashion.”
This requirement is met by providing an oral presentation in easy to understand language, a booklet summarizing the key facts needed and a discussion guide summarizing the choices faced.
The assembled group of 80 participants was shown a video, given a brief oral presentation and a printed discussion guide. We were asked to accept several assumptions in considering the topic. We were asked to assume that the severity would be similar to what had already been observed in the spring of 2009; we were told to assume that the vaccination program would be voluntary, not mandatory; we were told to assume that initial vaccine supplies will be available in October but supply would be limited through February 2010.
The most disturbing assumption we were asked to accept dealt with the safety of the novel H1N1 vaccine. In the video, the CDC spokesperson explained that during the 1976 mass vaccination campaign, 1 in every 100,000 recipients of the vaccine developed Guillain Barré syndrome (GBS), a disorder in which the body’s immune system attacks the peripheral nervous system often leading to paralysis and death. There is no known cure for GBS. In 1976 roughly 40 million Americans received the vaccine and some 4,000 developed GBS.
The printed material that was distributed reiterated these horrific statistics and we were asked to accept the assumption that, “the estimated risk for more serious reactions (e.g. Guillain Barré syndrome) is between 1-10 per million persons vaccinated”.
This is a less direct way of stating that the risk is about the same as existed during the 1976 mass vaccination attempt and that as many as 1 in every 100,000 recipients will develop GBS or some other serious adverse reaction. The CDC is setting up a new intensive surveillance system with which to monitor and track GBS cases that result from the novel H1N1 vaccine.
Merriam-Webster defines assumption as a fact or statement taken for granted and assumed to be true. If we accept the documented assumption presented by the CDC, we are to consider it a fact that 1 in every 100,000 vaccine recipients will suffer a serious adverse effect such as GBS.
This means that if the entire U.S. population is vaccinated (a stated goal of the CDC), we are to assume as a fact that 30,000 Americans will suffer debilitating or lethal side effects. Apparently the CDC considers this an acceptable level of collateral damage.
As unthinkable as this is (destroying or ending the lives of as many as 30,000 Americans), that is only part of the story.
The novel H1N1 vaccine being developed must adhere to guidelines set forth by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA has announced that a vaccine will be accepted if it creates antibodies in 4 out of 10 recipients (40%), with at least 70 percent of those 4 achieving an antibody level believed to provide benefit. This means that an acceptable vaccine candidate would provide “protection” for 28% of vaccine recipients (70% of the 40%), or less than 3 in 10 recipients. The requirement drops to 18% efficacy for those over 65 years of age (60% of 30%).
So here are the facts, as documented by the CDC and the FDA:
As many as 30,000 Americans will be harmed by the novel H1N1 vaccine.
The vaccine may be ineffective in more than 7 out of 10 recipients.
And in case you think I am alone in my concerns, here is what several vaccine experts associated with the CDC and the U.S. government say on the subject.
“I am very skeptical of finishing vaccine before we know the appropriate dose to be included in each inoculation, before immunogenicity studies are complete, or before safety assessments have been finished,” William Schaffner, MD, Chairman of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Vanderbilt University and a member of the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), wrote in an recent e-mail.
“We have assured both the profession and the public that the H1N1 vaccine will be evaluated with the same rigor that is applied to seasonal vaccine. We should NOT make vaccine available before the trials are complete and the results carefully assessed.”
Others are worried about a repeat of the last swine flu “pandemic,” now regarded as a public health and public relations debacle.
“I fear that a rush towards vaccinating the population without completing trials risks leading to the harmful outcome that we witnessed during the 1976 swine flu scare, where the government advocated rapid production and vaccination of the population without adequate safeguards, which led to an unexplained increase in cases of Guillain Barré syndrome (GBS), amongst other complications, and massive liability for the government,” wrote Amir Afkhami, MD, PhD, of George Washington University, an international expert on the 1918 Influenza pandemic and an advisor to the U.S. State Department, the U.S. military, and the World Bank on issues pertaining to infectious diseases, public health and, mental health.
“I think in this regard, we must learn from lessons of the past and be mindful of not jumping from the proverbial frying pan into the fire by putting people’s health at risk without adequate production and safety monitoring of the vaccines.”
Military demands details on soldiers’ private guns
May 20, 2009
Though this order was apparently rescinded, the fact that active duty soldiers are being asked to submit every detail of their private firearm collection maybe a telltale sign that the second amendment is in dire straights. Furthermore, other such directives are being issued all over the country it has been confirmed.
The memorandum was sent out publicly by a concerned 11B Infantryman based at Fort Campbell. In his e mail, the man expresses his shock at being ordered to comply with what amounts to a registration of privately-owned firearms. The man said he had been at Fort Campbell for almost 8 years and had never encountered anything like this directive before.
“I fear something really nasty is blowing in the wind here,” he warns.
Military demands details on soldiers’ private guns
Fort Campbell command reversed under pressure
A military commander at Fort Campbell in Kentucky demanded his soldiers give him the registration numbers of any guns they own privately and then reveal where they are stored.
The order was stopped, according to base officials, when it was discovered the commander was not “acting within his authority.”
The original order was issued on the letterhead of Charlie Company, 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment and said effective March 11, any soldier with a “privately owned weapon” was required to submit the information, along with any information about any concealed carry permit the soldier may have, and what state issued the permit.
Further, the rule warned, “If any soldier comes into possession of a Privately Owned Weapon following the effective date of this memorandum, he is required to inform the Chain of Command of the above information.”
One soldier who objected to the demands circulated the memo, commenting that he lives off post.
“It just seems a little coincidental to me that within 90 days the most anti-firearm president in history is inaugurated, some of the nastiest anti-firearm laws are put on the table in Washington, and then the Army comes around wanting what amounts to a registration on all firearms, even if they are off post, and doesn’t provide any reason or purpose as to why,” the soldier said.
Base spokeswoman Cathy Gramling told WND the letter apparently was a mistake. She said the base requires anyone bringing a privately owned weapon onto the installation to register it.( It has been confirmed that bases all over the nation, including in Texas, are directing active duty personnel to provide the same information about their private gun collections, but it was a mistake?)
“As a response to a number of negligent discharges of privately owned weapons, the command decided to explore how to implement a training program for soldiers with privately owned weapons. Their goal is to identify soldiers with firearms and provide additional safety training to them, much like our motorcycle and driver safety classes,” she said.
“Our soldiers train and operate in combat with M-4 carbines and various other military weapons, but not all who purchase their own weapons are properly trained to handle them. Determining which soldiers possess weapons will allow the command to identify the soldiers who may require additional training on them,” she said.
Learn here why it’s your right – and duty – to be armed.
Gramling said the memo was “from a subordinate unit commander who, at the time, believed he was acting within his authority.” She said requiring the information was halted when it was discovered the commander was not within his authority. (Not to mention national attention had been drawn to the memo.)
The process has been suspended pending a full review, she said.
“This is not an effort to infringe on soldiers’ rights to own firearms,” Gramling told WND.
Mistake or not, the commander’s order comes on the heels of a Department of Defense policy that limited the supply of ammunition available to the private gun owners by requiring destruction of fired military cartridge brass.
That policy already had been implemented and had taken a bite out of the nation’s stressed ammunition supply before it was reversed this week.If you would like to sound off on this issue, participate in today’s WND Poll.
The Hardeman County, Tennessee, Bulletin Times announcing a seat belt checkpoint to be conducted on April 4 “in conjunction with a Homeland Security training exercise by the 251st Military Police in Bolivar who recently returned from Iraq” (see a PDF version of the announcement here, on page two).
The operation in Hardeman county is similar to one held last December in San Bernardino County, California. The California operation was a collaboration between the California Highway Patrol and the Marine Corps Air and Ground Combat Center. It did not include Homeland Security.
“Dispatching Marines on California highways is an obvious violation of the Posse Comitatus Act (18 U.S.C. § 1385) passed on June 16, 1878. The Act prohibits members of the federal uniformed services, including military police, from working with state and local police and law enforcement,” reported in December. The seat belt checkpoint in Tennessee with the participation of military police is also a direct violation of the Posse Comitatus Act.
The collaboration between Homeland Security, the military, and local law enforcement in Tennessee sets a dangerous new precedent. In the case U.S. v. Martinez-Fuerte, the Supreme Court ruled that DHS checkpoints could be set up to search for illegal immigrants and smugglers and so long as the checkpoints and searches were brief and for that purpose only they could be done anywhere within 100 miles of a US border. It appears DHS is now moving beyond U.S. v. Martinez-Fuerte and expanding operations beyond the 100 mile limit.
DHS will likely argue they are not conducting the checkpoints in Tennessee and are there only as monitors. However, this point will be lost on the victims of the checkpoints when they see uniformed military police and DHS personnel.
In California, the attention of the media put the CHP and the Marines on the defensive. Last month, the coverage of the MIAC documents in Missouri by alternative media resulted in wide coverage of the issue in the corporate media. In response to the attention, the Missouri State Police and the governor of the state were obliged to repudiate the document and order an investigation into the Missouri Information Analysis Center’s practice of designating followers of political candidates Ron Paul, Bob Barr, and Chuck Baldwin as “militia” terrorists.
Attention placed on the operation in Tennessee will produce similar results.
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| A clipping taken from the Hardeman County, Tennessee, Bulletin Times announcing seat belt checkpoint to be conducted on April 4 |
See at eclassifiedsnetwork.com
Simple Solution to Solving the Border Problem
March 29, 2009
Simple Solution for Mexico Border Violence: Send in the Military, Tancredo Says
By Penny Starr, Senior Staff Writer
Former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) (AP Photo)
(CNSNews.com) – Former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) said the solution to ending the violence along the U.S.-Mexico border would require only one order from the new commander-in-chief, President Barack Obama: send in the troops.
“You can absolutely secure the border with the military,” Tancredo said in a conference call on Thursday with reporters and Roy Beck, president of the immigrant reduction advocacy group, NumbersUSA.
Tancredo said he observed a two-week operation a few years ago along the Canadian border with Idaho where 100 U.S. Marines were stationed along the 100-mile stretch of rugged wilderness, along with the use of three unmanned aerial vehicles and three radar stations. The operation was a joint effort among the Marines, the U.S. Border Patrol and the U.S. Forest Service.
“I assure you that for the two weeks that that was in operation, nothing came across that northern border that we did not see,” Tancredo said. “You can secure the border.”
But, he said, the Bush administration abandoned the idea of using the military to secure the nation’s borders, an idea Tancredo said is necessary now not only to stop the flow of drugs, humans, and weapons but for the safety and security of the American people – especially if the Mexican government fails and millions of people flee north to escape the violence.
The conference call was held to respond to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s trip to Mexico and her claim that the United States is culpable for the violence along the country’s border with Mexico. Clinton largely blamed high drug consumption by Americans and American weapons smuggled south to arm drug cartels as the culprits.
“I have no doubt that there are firearms that make their way into Mexico, but the extent to which that is happening is really a debatable point,” Tancredo said. “The huge caches of arms that have been found – the AK-47s and some of the grenade launchers – have not come from the United States.”
“We’ve asked Mexico for the serial numbers, and they’ve refused to give them to us because, in fact, they are not from the United States,” Tancredo said.
“This issue of ‘It’s our fault just as much as their fault’ is a lot of crap, to tell you the truth,” he said. “It’s just another way to go after guns by this administration and also to let Mexico save some face.”
Tancredo said that in addition to securing the border, Congress needs to mandate the E-Verify legislation that requires employers to confirm the legal status of potential employees.
E-Verify “has worked better than anything we’ve ever come up with, which is why the Democrats are a little leery about continuing it,” Tancredo said.
Rather than granting a five-year extension of the program, Congress okayed a five-month extension “with the hope of using it as a hook and get some sort of leverage to get Republicans to back off of their opposition – especially in the Senate – to any sort of amnesty.”
Using the military to secure the border and extending E-Verify for five years are what’s called for, Tancredo said, to solve not only the violence of the drug cartels but the flow of illegal aliens into the United States.
Read at CNSnews.com
I was reading another blog here on WordPress called Big Bear Observation Post and saw this article about Veterans for Peace opposing stationing the Marines or any US military being assigned to the US for civil unrest. In another article we posted here entitled Military on the Streets? Michelle makes a great comment as to why we should all oppose this. Here’s the article from Big Bear Observation Post:
Veterans for Peace (VFP) Opposes Combat Brigade’s Permanent U.S. Assignment
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A national veterans organization sent a letter to the House and Senate leadership Monday, October 6 expressing “grave concern” that an active duty combat brigade has been permanently assigned to a post on U.S. soil.
Citing a little-noticed article posted September 30 on the Army Times website, Veterans For Peace said the Pentagon’s unprecedented move assigned the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team to NorthCom, a joint command established in 2002, for a 12-month assignment.
See also:
The Pentagon is muscling in everywhere. It’s time to stop the mission creep
Domestic Militarization Comes to San Bernardino County
Washington Post: 20,000 More U.S. Troops To Be Deployed For “Domestic Security”
A Cover for Illegal Domestic Operations?
Homeland Security Now Spying on Americans
The Army Times article stated the brigade may be called upon to help with “civil unrest and crowd control.”
 Michael McPhearson |
“Just who are these unruly crowds and dangerous individuals this unit will be using its ‘nonlethal’ weapons on…American citizens?” asked Michael McPhearson, VFP Executive Director. “After the overwhelming display of police force I witnessed at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, this news is extremely disturbing. It is a sad day for America when our government is preparing to protect itself by using the military on its own citizens.”
McPhearson added, “Make no doubt about it, these so-called ‘non-lethal’ weapons will kill and injure people when used on crowds.” (I might add here that when I read this I thought of the Air Force secretary that in Sept. 2006 said they were going to test their “non-lethal” weapons on US citizens first.
“If we’re not willing to use it [non-lethal weapons] here against our fellow citizens, then we should not be willing to use it in a wartime situation”
Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne
Funny isn’t it? All the original sources of this article are no longer on the internet, even the article at CNN.com is gone? So I used another source, but you can google it and see it all over the web.)
Download press release
This is the letter
October 6, 2008
Dear Representative:
On September 30th, an Army Times article reported that the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has been given a 12 month assignment to NorthCom, a joint command established in 2002, beginning October 1, 2008. The unit is an on-call federal response force for natural or manmade emergencies and disasters, including terrorist attacks. According to the article, “They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack.”
The article goes on to quote 1st BCT’s commander COL Roger Cloutier, “soldiers also will learn how to use ‘the first ever nonlethal package that the Army has fielded… It’s a new modular package of nonlethal capabilities that they’re fielding. They’ve been using pieces of it in Iraq, but this is the first time that these modules were consolidated and this package fielded, and because of this mission we’re undertaking we were the first to get it,’ referring to crowd and traffic control equipment and nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them.”
This is of great concern to my organization. After participating for several days in Saint Paul, MN during the Republican National Convention and witnessing the overwhelming show of police force, this news is disturbing. Who are these unruly crowds and dangerous individuals? It is a sad day for America when our government is preparing to protect itself by using the military on its own citizens.
Soldiers should not be used as police. Infantry units train to engage with other armies, not with civilian populations. The police are trained to use adequate force to meet the needs of a situation. The military is trained to use overwhelming force. These are fundamentally different philosophies on the use of force.
You will find military leaders who believe our Armed Services can fulfill both missions. Such an answer is to be expected from “can do” commanders and is greatly appreciated, as the military will try its best to accomplish any mission it is given. However, we must be clear that no one can turn on and off the training and mentality needed to survive and dominate in combat so that they can then protect and serve in a civilian environment. This is one of the reason Iraqis want U.S. troops off their streets due to the high number of civilian casualties inflicted by U.S. soldiers.
In addition, the Bush Administration is planning to place soldiers on the street with weapons that have just fought in combat. This is unwise. There are a number of them who have post traumatic stress and possibly undiagnosed brain injury. There recent experiences have heightened their senses for combat not police work.
We also question the legal status of this mission. If the preparation is followed to its logical conclusion it seems the Executive Branch is prepared to ignore the Posse Comitatus and Insurrection Acts. It also appears that the Administration believes it has legal grounds to do so. President Bush signed into law H.R. 4986, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008. As you know he also stated that, “Provisions of the Act, including sections 841, 846, 1079, and 1222, purport to impose requirements that could inhibit the President’s ability to carry out his constitutional obligations to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, to protect national security, to supervise the executive branch, and to execute his authority as Commander in Chief. The executive branch shall construe such provisions in a manner consistent with the constitutional authority of the President.”
We believe it is imperative Congress act to keep the President in check. This is a slippery slope that contains more disregards for the ideals of our nation than any other grab for unitary executive authority the President has attempted to date.
Veterans For Peace is monitoring this matter and will join with others to ensure the Executive Branch’s power is controlled. Please let us know what steps Congress is taking to guarantee the President is held in check.
Sincerely, Michael T. McPhearson
Veterans For Peace
Executive Director
Before I post this article I’m going to paste in a couple of comments made at the bottom of the article. We have just lost our minds asking the military to play a domestic police role? Doesn’t anyone know history anymore? Dictators and tyrannts take over this way…I don’t care if this is the United States of America, it can happen here also. I remember what I heard Adrian Rogers say many times.“All it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing” and this desire to put military on our streets for law enforcement has got to stop. It may sound like a good gesture,but it’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. History shows this…..Here’s the two comments I spoke of:
Usher in the New Year with solders in the streets of America. What a fine little fascist paradise we have become. Get use to seeing machingun toting skin head jackbooted Nazi’s on your corners. Your papers pleeze.
Happy New Year, One and ALL
John Galt
December 31, 12:26 PM
Thank you again Jay for speaking truth to power in such a comendable way.
December 31, 12:18 PM
A couple months ago, the Department of Defense announced it was assigning a full-time Army unit to be on call to facilitate military cooperation with the Department of Homeland Security in the event of another terrorist attack.
A report in the Army Times last month first brought the domestic deployment to light. The Army’s 3rd Infantry Division 1st Brigade Combat Team became the first unit assigned permanently to Northern Command.
According to the Army Times report, the Team would be on-call to respond in the event of a natural disaster or terror attack anywhere in the country, or they could be used to “help with civil unrest and crowd control.” (Link)
This clearly raises issues with respect to the Posse Comitatus Act, but even more troubling are recent reports a U.S. Army War College professor has written a report asserting military intervention would be required in a number of domestic scenarios.
The author warns potential causes for such civil unrest could include another terrorist attack, “unforeseen economic collapse, loss of functioning political and legal order, purposeful domestic resistance or insurgency, pervasive public health emergencies, and catastrophic natural and human disasters.” The situation could deteriorate to the point where military intervention was required, he argues.
The author of the report notes the proposals are his alone and don’t represent U.S. policy, but it’s also certain the report has been read throughout the Defense Department. But economic collapse? Loss of functioning political order? Purposeful domestic resistance? That’s one terrifying slippery slope. And not in keeping with American values.
Military Presence in California Beginning to be Understood?
December 24, 2008
Even tho I know the military presence and assistance in civil unrest violates Posse Comitatus this trouble in Orange County,Calif. and the trouble in Iceland and Russia along with China may tell us what the government is expecting here in the US also as unemployment rises and the economy keeps going south.
Angry Government Employees Protest Lay Offs
Stuart Pfeifer
Los Angeles Times
December 24, 2008
Faced with a gaping budget deficit, Orange County officials disclosed plans Tuesday to lay off nearly 60 Probation Department employees and to start releasing some juvenile criminal suspects rather than holding them in juvenile hall.
Word of the cutbacks came the same day that 1,000 angry workers stormed the Orange County Hall of Administration to protest previously announced plans to lay off 210 social services employees.
The social services cuts stem from a steep reduction in state funding that county officials said left them with no option but to eliminate jobs. In addition to the layoffs, the county has disclosed plans to require 4,000 social services employees to take two weeks off without pay next year.
Read the entire article @ latimes.com
| Icelanders Protest Economic Crisis | |
01 December 2008 |
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| Demonstrators crowd into a city square in Reykjavik, Iceland, 01 Dec 2008 |
Thousands of Icelanders marked the 90th anniversary of sovereignty from Denmark Monday by demanding the government resign over the country’s economic crisis.
Hundreds of marchers tried to storm central bank headquarters in Reykjavik. They left after a tense hour-long standoff with riot police.
The global financial crisis has left Iceland’s economy in shambles. Three major banks have collapsed, unemployment has soared, and the value of the krona has plunged.
Russian Riot Police Detain 100 At Economic Crisis Protest
Riot police face off against protesters in Vladivostok.
VLADIVOSTOK (Reuters) — Russian riot police have detained at least 100 people protesting against government measures linked to the economic crisis, a crackdown that highlighted official sensitivity to growing hardship.
Riot police broke up an unsanctioned rally organized against import duties on new and used cars, kicked a protester as he was being held, and hurled a cameraman’s gear to the ground.
Police used a bullhorn to order demonstrators to go home as they gathered near the city center, and the OMON riot police started snatching people after an uneasy 30-minute standoff.
Local media said 100 to 200 of the 500 participants were detained, but authorities declined to confirm this figure.
Further protests were due to take place across Russia against car import tariffs, which are being raised to prop up struggling domestic car producers and discourage Russians from buying second-hand vehicles.
In China, anger rises as economy falls
The crisis in global capitalism has spelled trouble for the Chinese Communist Party, confronted by public unrest as factories shed workers and investments collapse.
Reporting from Beijing — The signs of discontent are small but unnerving in an authoritarian country where public demonstrations are not permitted.
Laid-off toy company workers smash windows and computers and overturn police cars in Guangdong province. Employees of a liquor company in Harbin travel to their company’s Beijing headquarters to demand back wages. Taxi drivers, as many as 20,000 of them, scuffle with police in protests that have spread into seven provinces.
Even the police have gotten into the act. Auxiliary officers surrounded a Communist Party office last week in Hunan province to demand higher wages, said the Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy.
As China’s economy hits the skids, such protests have been sporadic and usually involved fewer than 100 people. But in recent weeks, they have cropped up across the country like brush fires.
Singapore’s newest air force base being built in Idaho
December 5, 2008
Just heard this news article read on the radio this morning and I thought I was hearing the host wrong. So when I got home just now I googled it and nope I didn’t hear him wrong. The country of Singapore is building a air force base in Twin Falls Idaho.
“Why are we letting planes of a dictatorship pollute our airspace, startle and stress out bighorn sheep and sage grouse, mar our clean desert skies with contrails and pollutants?” Katie Fite, a representative of Western Watersheds Project, wrote in a 2006 letter in the environmental impact statement.
So read it for yourself:
Singapore military aiming for Idaho air space
The Republic of Singapore’s newest air force base will be 80 miles west of Twin Falls.
In October, the Mountain Home Air Force Base will welcome the initial elements of a 10-jet Singaporean training squadron under terms of a 5- to 20-year deal that will bring hundreds of Singaporean military personnel and their families to southern Idaho.
“It’s more than a possibility,” said Mayor Tom Rist, responding to a base spokesman who cautioned against assuming the deal will happen. “It’s coming.”
The Singaporean military currently has two detachments at other U.S. air bases, but this will be its first long-term residency in North America, according to the Ministry of Defense Singapore’s Web site.
The environmental impact of the 10 – and perhaps as many as 20 – Singaporean F-15SG fighters whizzing through the skies should be relatively small, according to an environ-mental impact statement published last year.
However, it could mean a 25 percent annual increase in sorties from the base and jet noise over a 15 percent larger area.
Mountain Home aircraft routinely use bombing ranges that border on Twin Falls County, and often practice touch-and-go landings at Joslin Field, Magic Valley Regional Airport.
The impact of the new international training base includes a $60 million construction plan and building spree that will add 112,567 square-feet of new on-base facilities to handle everything from aircraft engine repair to munitions storage and office space.
The move will add 307 foreign military personnel and American contractors – including 179 RSAF active-duty personnel and about 128 support workers. They would boost the base population by about 25 percent if no personnel currently stationed there are moved elsewhere. The Air Force anticipates moving an unspecified number of personnel and planes to other bases in the near term, however.
The first RSAF personnel, responsible for general set-up operations, will arrive in October. The first F-15SG aircraft is expected in April 2009.
The United States has routinely trained military forces from allied countries since World War II. Singapore, a former British colony not much larger than Twin Falls County, has several training bases in Australia as well as two in others in the U.S. because it lacks room to make training flights, according to the RSAF Web site.
Mountain Home in recent years has had shorter-term training missions involving Israeli, German, British and Australian personnel who have used the base’s top-flight electronic training range, said Mountain Home’s economic development director, Ron Swearingen.
But never before has the base been used for housing and training foreign troops on a “semi-permanent-ongoing basis,” Swearingen said.
Swearingen said the move will benefit his town of 14,000, adding cultural and social diversity. He said he’s now busy coordinating how the city will accommodate it.
It’s unclear how Mountain Home schools will cope with a large influx of children who may speak English but who could be limited to Malay or Chinese dialects, Rist said.(I’m sure we’ll do them like the illegals coming here…accommodate them with translators…it would be so terrible for them to have to learn English you know.)
Not everyone considers the RSAF a plus.
“Why are we letting planes of a dictatorship pollute our airspace, startle and stress out bighorn sheep and sage grouse, mar our clean desert skies with contrails and pollutants?” Katie Fite, a representative of Western Watersheds Project, wrote in a 2006 letter in the environmental impact statement.
Fite’s environmental group generally opposes expansion of the base or bombing ranges.
“We are alarmed that the citizens of Idaho, Oregon and Nevada get new and added air and visual pollution, range fires from flares, litter from chaff, noise, sonic booms, testing and use of devices of unknown kinds … with unknown effects on human health and wellbeing – to benefit the Singapore Air Force!”
Mountain Home was selected over Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N.C., which was also studied by the Air Force.
“A combination of factors, including the base’s flying training range, F-15E squadron and existing infrastructure, helped determine Mountain Home’s selection to host the unit,” said 1st Lt. Matthew Stines, a Mountain Home deputy chief of public affairs.
According to the environmental study, the Singaporean personnel will be under American operational control while they train at Mountain Home. Their commander will be an American, said Bill Richey, a Mountain Home-based specialist in military affairs.
The planes will bear a Singapore flag and RSAF insignia, but the markings likely won’t be visible from the ground on most flights, reducing the chances of alarming Idahoans, said an air combat spokeswoman in Langley, Va.
A Singapore military defense attache based in Washington, D.C. did not return a phone call Tuesday evening.
The RSAF recently bought 12 F-15SG aircraft – an advanced version of the F-15E Strike Eagle currently flown from Mountain Home, Stines said. Defense Industry Daily reported that Boeing anticipates delivering the planes in stages beginning this year. Singapore retains the option for eight more planes, Stines wrote.
“Amounts were not disclosed, but previous reports have placed the contract value at around $1 billion exclusive of options,” the daily reported. “An associated weapons and services request could be worth another $741 million if all options are exercised.”
Richey said the RSAF will pay for its training under a contract that spans 20 years.
“That’s pretty permanent,” he said. “It’s an outstanding strategic partnership. For the United States it’s a real positive, plus for the overall strategy of the whole world. For Idaho, it’s an economic boon.”
Just how big of a boon is unclear. Mountain Home contributed more than $455 million to the local economy in fiscal year 2007, base officials say.
“With the projected numbers of RSAF and support personnel at less than 200, we expect there will be some increase in Mountain Home AFB’s contribution to the local economy considering such factors as additional payrolls and initial construction contracts,” Stines wrote.
Richey said Singapore’s location in the Malaysian straights makes it a primary channel of commerce. The country has also shown willingness to strategically partner with the U.S., including a port built to accept American aircraft carriers
Read the entire article @ Times News
Federalizing the National Guard Away From the Governors
December 4, 2008
Here’s an amazing thing happening right before our very eyes and you don’t hear anything about it. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the Pentagon are obviously in the process of implementing the John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007. The act changed federal law so that the Governor of a state is no longer the sole commander in chief of their state’s National Guard during emergencies within the state, a direct violation of Article I, Section 10 and Clause 3 of the Constitution. As original envisioned by the founders, who rightfully feared standing armies, active and reserve military organizations were to be limited in size and scope and complemented by citizen-soldiers. The the John Warner Defense Authorization Act has finally put to rest the idea that these citizen-soldiers will not be federalized. Here’s the article:
Gates announces plan to make National Guard a Homeland “Operational Force”
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has ordered the Pentagon to conduct a “broad review” to determine if the military and the National Guard and Reserve can “adequately deal with domestic disasters,” including “a catastrophic attack on the country.”
Gates’ order falls on the heels of an earlier report released by the Commission on the National Guard and Reserves urging the Pentagon to “use the nation’s citizen soldiers to create an operational force that would be fully trained, equipped and ready to defend the nation.”
Gates and the Pentagon are obviously in the process of implementing the John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007. The act changed federal law so that the Governor of a state is no longer the sole commander in chief of their state’s National Guard during emergencies within the state, a direct violation of Article I, Section 10 and Clause 3 of the Constitution. As original envisioned by the founders, who rightfully feared standing armies, active and reserve military organizations were to be limited in size and scope and complemented by citizen-soldiers. The the John Warner Defense Authorization Act has finally put to rest the idea that these citizen-soldiers will not be federalized.
It can be argued that the Warner bill is simply a culmination of earlier piecemeal violations, including the Militia Act of 1792, the Insurrection Act of 1807, and in particular the Militia Act of 1903, the latter allowing for the creation of the National Guard of the United States as the primary organized reserve force for the U.S. armed forces. Gates is simply announcing a fiat accompli – the merging of the Department of Defense and the National Guard into one cohesive force that will be deployed domestically in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act which substantially limited the powers of the federal government to use the military for law enforcement. In the past, maintaining order during domestic disasters was the responsibility of local and state law enforcement, although the National Guard was on occasion called in cases of civil unrest.
Gates plan for a review of the National Guard’s role is especially troublesome in the wake of the Pentagon’s announcement in September that the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team would be deployed domestically by Northcom beginning October 1.
“Beginning Oct. 1 for 12 months, the 1st BCT will be under the day-to-day control of U.S. Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command, as an on-call federal response force for natural or manmade emergencies and disasters, including terrorist attacks,” the Army Times reported on September 30. The battle-hardened brigade, straight out combat duty in Iraq, will engage in “specialty tasks” usually reserved for local law enforcement. In addition, the brigade will use “the first ever nonlethal package that the Army has fielded… designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them,” an especially chilling prospect in light of growing predictions of civil unrest as the economy worsens.
If the Pentagon plan is realized, the National Guard will receive training for “homeland defense and civil support missions, as opposed to the warfighting now consuming them.” The Associated Press admits Gates’ effort is designed to “integrate reservists into the modern day military and consider treating them on a more equal basis to the active duty troops.”
Arnold L. Punaro, former chairman of the commission, welcomed Gates’ recommendations and declared that improving the military’s role in homeland defense and enhancing the clout of the reserves “represent a historic break with the past.” It also represents a “historic break ” with the Constitution of the United States.
Gates and the Pentagon realize the United States does not face a serious external terrorist threat. Instead, it faces in the not too distant future a reaction on the part of the citizenry of the deconstruction of the economy and the social and political chaos that will undoubtedly follow. The National Guard, along with the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team and other military troops, will use the “nonlethal package… designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals” mentioned by the Army Times.
Steve Hilton
babybttrfly
Mike