tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75999732024-03-07T03:40:08.473-05:00What in the world?This is a journal of sorts. A compilation of thoughts, dreams, ideas and misfortunes. This is a collection of experiences shared with people that I've met as well as a walk through this world of mine. This is also a collection of interesting things I've seen or read on this wonderful world we call the internet.
Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.comBlogger230125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-64804885795836960882018-02-17T16:36:00.003-05:002018-02-17T16:36:27.280-05:00I want to share this article...<br />
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https://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/world-war-i-pilot-ptsd-180967710/#pbX9gfQ1Sl8QDEUt.99<br />
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The Dark Side of Glory</h1>
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An early glimpse of PTSD in the letters of World War I aces.</h2>
<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "Open Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Read more at https://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/world-war-i-pilot-ptsd-180967710/#kBFDemasmMGYGQEY.99</span><br />
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "Open Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">The following is possibly the most true thing I've ever read, it's a man who is losing it, and he knows that he's losing his grip on himself...it's sad, it's poigniant and it's a glimpse into something that I hope none of us has to deal with:</span><br />
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "Open Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span style="background-color: white;">“It’s only a question of time until we all get it. I’m all shot to pieces. I only hope I can stick it out. I don’t want to quit. My nerves are all gone, and I can’t stop. I’ve lived beyond my time already. It’s not the fear of death that’s done it. It’s this eternal flinching from it that’s doing it, and has made a coward out of me. Few men live to know what real fear is. It’s something that grows on you, day by day, that eats into your constitution and undermines your sanity. I have never been serious about anything in my life, and now I know that I’ll never be otherwise again. Here I am, twenty four years old. I look forty and feel ninety. I’ve lost all interest in life beyond the next patrol.”</span></span></blockquote>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-16237687598937321102018-02-09T08:04:00.000-05:002018-02-09T12:23:10.731-05:00Rest in PeaceIn 2005 I received my Pharaoh Hound. I named him Xerxes. He was young, energetic and playful. Smart does not begin to describe him. His intelligence was uncanny, his ability to outsmart other dogs was only matched by his ability to out run and out "agility" other dogs as well.<br />
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Well, that was almost 13 years ago. Today I will be taking him to a veterinarian and watching him die. This is possibly the hardest thing I will ever have to do.<br />
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Up until late December, this dog was healthy. Then one day he suddenly started limping. We went to the vet, got Xrays and got some pain meds and went about our normal routine. The only indicator that he was in pain was the limping. He never whined or showed pain...Even if I was massaging his back legs...never even a slight flinch. Last night he spent the night screaming in pain, his hind legs were cold to the touch and he didn't even try to walk.<br />
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I wanted to take one more walk to the river with him. One more time watching him get excited on a car ride. One more of everything. I'm going to miss him so much. <br />
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Xerxes died at 11:10AM EST. The house seems so empty.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiugdoJRpNDVLt_tXjWzHOB_RlE-OJlygwoqHNmC9Mzlv2p0c8hJ-v74aGb4p7fi0C-cC7xJDDLxieQk7jmonU3CHjY_RAbeOfLMBiKuyMnaFvPaCaw6D8LugcKFGB16TOQunNr/s1600/20170409_134029.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiugdoJRpNDVLt_tXjWzHOB_RlE-OJlygwoqHNmC9Mzlv2p0c8hJ-v74aGb4p7fi0C-cC7xJDDLxieQk7jmonU3CHjY_RAbeOfLMBiKuyMnaFvPaCaw6D8LugcKFGB16TOQunNr/s320/20170409_134029.jpg" width="320" /></a>.<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzwPIDNKsXjMjd43EH7o1b5jWzM9Jl6XInDpwYAH7ueMlmezr07aIoEJgBQeVnYUSQMOcHwHFHnaIfP6LJvdhDavo9JZZ89pzT9jLDWBlonf7z6WjhCDhhqE5YAR4yHwI78fJN/s1600/pharoah+hound.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzwPIDNKsXjMjd43EH7o1b5jWzM9Jl6XInDpwYAH7ueMlmezr07aIoEJgBQeVnYUSQMOcHwHFHnaIfP6LJvdhDavo9JZZ89pzT9jLDWBlonf7z6WjhCDhhqE5YAR4yHwI78fJN/s320/pharoah+hound.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
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<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjM0A_8wHl_8iFwixGh0l1MxZ8aqltMnKVTe9OJrtSq3gbDfJae9EYUsUBKZGgSIehyphenhyphenwjIomHTGxU9FtiZtDMi77BBpyoTb70kTqHpD3yqlKd2xEgC3nKWs-u6PWtdsXaEMrG_/w612-h815-no/" /><br />
<img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8HeGXGEZWKL7qK7RyGlKGq7i_NdLk_D4aqydAo9KiG_KnkYw5VxsA7IAzZqHybGPXsk5bm3-vhivUmoasnRM2vwlFomwdPLjfIBc4nD0XB4v29TCxv0dCnk2cvx4k9som4VsT/w653-h815-no/" /><br />
<br />Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-78621309844258347502017-12-10T11:01:00.000-05:002017-12-11T15:25:50.462-05:003 Important dates...<br />
3 dates in history...short summary of a larger paper I intend to write.<br />
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<b>In July of 1776</b> A document created a rogue country. This country was born with fire, rebellion and a search for the concept of freedom from oppression. The wording of that document was fussed over, fretted over, edited, rewritten and scrapped several times over. The words that were left are haunting, and should be familiar to every citizen of these United States.<br />
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"When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."<br />
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This opening is tantamount to treason of the highest order, and the wording is strong and succinct. It tells us that from this point in time, there is no return to the past. And from this moment a new nation was conceived, fought for and born, as it emerged it broke the boundaries of what a nation could be and what a nation was formed from.<br />
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<b>December 7, 1941 </b>was a day that lives on in infamy. The attack on Pearl Harbor wasn't just a call to war, it was a call to industrialization, to militarization and the end of the separate peace that had been tantamount to national policy.<br />
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Just days prior to December 7, there were many political factions with different ideas on how to best handle "the War in Europe" and "the War in the Pacific." But after the attack the consequences were certainly not what the Japanese rulership expected. The US became resolved, steeling themselves to the task of a war footing. Production of war materiel, combat vehicles and preparation of a massive armed forces followed. As Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy also declared war, the die was cast and the US was left no choice but to abandon any thoughts of isolationism.<br />
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The call to war by the USA also taught American industry that war, in and of itself, is profitable. As corporate profits throughout the country almost doubled during the years between 1941 and 1945.<br />
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The third impactful date is <b>September 11, 2001</b>. This date was the date of a well orchestrated attack by a terrorist group labeled "Al Qaeda" by the US government. The attack consisted of coordinated hijacked airliners crashing into the World Trade Center's building 1 and 2, as well as the Pentagon. The 4th hijacked plane crashed in Pennsylvania, with it's intended target possibly being the White House, or the US Capitol building.<br />
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The net result in this event was the creation of a worldwide electronic surveillance state, the voluntary and systematic loss of freedoms for the American public, and of course several wars in the middle east.<br />
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At the moment, this is a working thesis and will be researched and discussed in later posts.Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-14283170228500822702017-11-05T00:37:00.000-04:002017-11-05T00:37:19.575-04:00So this is how it starts...An early November night, cold rain and a chill in the air. The leaves have turned, almost painfully slow, from green to shades of yellow, gold, red, and purple in preparation for the browning of the landscape. It's this change from life to dormancy that marks a strong contrast from the spring and summer, when nature seems pure and new, playful and lively.<br />
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I feel lucky to see the seasons. There are so many in various parts of this world that never get the chance to see them, to understand them, to live through them. There are people that don't know the stillness fo a snowfall, the breathlessness of a windchill, or the short daylight hours of a winter's day. No matter how one tries to explain it, they will never understand. They will never be of the knowing.<br />
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It is chilly nights like these, when the darkness stays long and the drizzle falls steadily, that contemplation arises. The long nights give us reason to question ourselves, and our focus, and to think about the future and the past. We examine our weaknesses, our strengths and our very reason for being. We listen to old music and try to find some comfort in the familiar words...which we can only recall as the song is playing. We remember old parties, times we spent with friends and family. We seek comfort in our memories.<br />
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In a few short weeks, real winter will be here...and after that Spring and Summer will follow. But until that time has passed, we need to be happy to have the experience to be cold, to be wet, to experience the snow. Life is too short and we are too fortunate to be alive.<br />
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<a href="http://www.itrees.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/f/i/file_19_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.itrees.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/f/i/file_19_1.jpg" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="513" height="320" width="213" /></a></div>
<br />Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-44729751717465218632017-05-12T02:58:00.001-04:002017-05-12T02:58:25.717-04:00Flight 19 a mystery? Not so much...<div style="color: #222222;">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The discussion of this particular missing flight actually piqued my curiosity enough to do just a tad bit of research, and once one wades through all the "woo" and can get down to some basic information, the only thing mysterious about the disappearance of Flight 19 is that it happened in an area known as the Bermuda Triangle.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">First and foremost on the list one must investigate the flight commander; Lieutenant Charles Taylor, the flight commander on this training flight, and as ranking officer he would have had the final say in any navigational course changes. By all reports Taylor was unorganized, very poor at navigation and had already "ditched" two airplanes due to being lost. Given Taylor's history, it is a wonder why he was assigned a supervisory role on this mission, but overall it must have been his flying hours compared to the other pilot's hours in planes of this type. It is even reputed that Taylor arrived late for this training evolution.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The aircraft themselves were Grumman TBM1C Avengers. http://www.collingsfoundation.org/aircrafts/grumman-tbm-avenger/ Not quite an advanced aircraft by today's standards, but very serviceable in the day and time it flew. Flight 19's Avengers had no clocks, which raises a red flag to me, due to the type of mission which they were flying...a mission that was meant to teach "dead reckoning" in which one of the most important factors is calculating time. Dead Reckoning (per wikipedia)" is the process of calculating one's current position by using a previously determined position, or fix, and advancing that position based upon known or estimated speeds over elapsed time and course." Also from the same Wiki: "Dead reckoning is subject to cumulative errors." Meaning that if time is measured in a haphazard way, or variations in speed or heading are not accounted correctly, one's plotted course and one's actual position may have nothing in common.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Why is this important? It's important due to communication that another flight received from Taylor stating that "he was sure he was in the Keys" and was attempting to find Ft. Lauderdale. Even one of the members of Flight 19 was heard on the radio to say "Dammit, if we could just fly west we would get home; head west, dammit."<span style="white-space: nowrap;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This leads me to believe that even Taylor's subordinates did not trust his judgement, but in keeping with decorum and chain of command, they followed orders.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Even after the location of Flight 19 was triangulated and broadcast to Taylor, he refused to believe the land based radio operators and did not adjust his course as requested by them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">To me, the only mystery is where the 5 Avengers ditched, and where they are to this day. Yes, the weather rolled in during the last hour or so of their flight, and obscured attempts to locate the wreckage, and rescue the pilots. Had there been no weather, it's possible that all of the crews would have been found. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">While there is some room for conjecture and speculation in the matter of Flight 19, I don't think there is enough room to label it a "mystery" or to include it in the lore of the "Bermuda Triangle." I think we have a case of a flight commander who was disorganized, a poor navigator and who refused to listen to subordinate officers who may have understood navigation principles much better than he did. Call it pride or bravado or genuine panic, but I blame Taylor for the loss of those planes and the loss of those men.</span></div>
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<a href="http://www.expandedperspectives.com/tag/missing-flight-19/" target="_blank">http://www.expandedperspectives.com/tag/missing-flight-19/</a></div>
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<a href="http://www.history.com/news/the-mysterious-disappearance-of-flight-19" target="_blank">http://www.history.com/news/the-mysterious-disappearance-of-flight-19</a></div>
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_19" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_19</a></div>
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_reckoning" target="_blank">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_reckoning</a></div>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-15805866801500827892016-11-14T10:59:00.001-05:002016-11-14T10:59:03.359-05:00Donald Trump will now control drone assassinations and mass surveillance — still love them, Democrats?<a href="http://www.salon.com/2016/11/14/donald-trump-will-now-control-drone-assassinations-and-mass-surveillance-still-love-them-democrats/">Donald Trump will now control drone assassinations and mass surveillance — still love them, Democrats?</a>Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-5166606423052271812016-11-12T13:30:00.001-05:002016-11-12T13:30:27.277-05:00<span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">In this latest election we have seen fact free politics from both sides. We have seen the worst of both candidates. But what I find the most appalling is that we have seen the worst sides of the very people that are supporting one candidate over another.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">This divide cannot continue. There has to be a way to unite the people to a common cause. To forge ahead in ways that allow the USA to once again push to the forefront of the world in terms of democacy, in terms of health and welfare of it's citizenry, and in terms of real peace both within and without our borders.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">There comes a point in time in which two warring factions must put aside their swords and rather than face each other in combat, walk side by side and truly understand each other. It seems impossible now, but making the impossible a reality has always been something Americans have done.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">This country has enough wealth in it's citizens, enough food in it's cupboard and enough water in it's jar for everyone to exist peacefully. It's time we cast away our swords and get to work. Pushing forward in such a way that we don't just benefit the ruling class, but we benefit ourselves. Pushing forward in a way that we don't alienate ourselves from the world at large, nor the smallest village within our borders.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We need to stop our foreign policy of threatening anyone that disagrees with us. We need to put away our ideals that every country should be like us. We need to find a healthy middle ground where our healthcare is affordable, our borders are more secure, and our minorities feel a measure of safety. And we need to do this while still allowing our working class a measure of income security.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Sorry for this ramble. But I am sick of the vitriol of right vs left vs everyone else. I may not agree with everyone about how things are to be done, but I will agree that things must be done.</span>Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-79151459893249621942014-10-27T11:01:00.005-04:002014-10-27T11:01:39.155-04:00The Police are Still Out of ControlWritten by Frank Serpico<br />
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<a href="http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/10/the-police-are-still-out-of-control-112160.html#.VE5dxSLF8jE" target="_blank">http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/10/the-police-are-still-out-of-control-112160.html#.VE5dxSLF8jE</a><br />
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n the opening scene of the 1973 movie “Serpico,” I am shot in the face—or to be more accurate, the character of Frank Serpico, played by Al Pacino, is shot in the face. Even today it’s very difficult for me to watch those scenes, which depict in a very realistic and terrifying way what actually happened to me on Feb. 3, 1971. I had recently been transferred to the Narcotics division of the New York City Police Department, and we were moving in on a drug dealer on the fourth floor of a walk-up tenement in a Hispanic section of Brooklyn. The police officer backing me up instructed me (since I spoke Spanish) to just get the apartment door open “and leave the rest to us.”<br />
One officer was standing to my left on the landing no more than eight feet away, with his gun drawn; the other officer was to my right rear on the stairwell, also with his gun drawn. When the door opened, I pushed my way in and snapped the chain. The suspect slammed the door closed on me, wedging in my head and right shoulder and arm. I couldn’t move, but I aimed my snub-nose Smith & Wesson revolver at the perp (the movie version unfortunately goes a little Hollywood here, and has Pacino struggling and failing to raise a much-larger 9-millimeter automatic). From behind me no help came. At that moment my anger got the better of me. I made the almost fatal mistake of taking my eye off the perp and screaming to the officer on my left: “What the hell you waiting for? Give me a hand!” I turned back to face a gun blast in my face. I had cocked my weapon and fired back at him almost in the same instant, probably as reflex action, striking him. (He was later captured.)<br />
When I regained consciousness, I was on my back in a pool of blood trying to assess the damage from the gunshot wound in my cheek. Was this a case of small entry, big exit, as often happens with bullets? Was the back of my head missing? I heard a voice saying, “Don’ worry, you be all right, you be all right,” and when I opened my eyes I saw an old Hispanic man looking down at me like Carlos Castaneda’s Don Juan. My “backup” was nowhere in sight. They hadn’t even called for assistance—I never heard the famed “Code 1013,” meaning “Officer Down.” They didn’t call an ambulance either, I later learned; the old man did. One patrol car responded to investigate, and realizing I was a narcotics officer rushed me to a nearby hospital (one of the officers who drove me that night said, “If I knew it was him, I would have left him there to bleed to death,” I learned later).<br />
The next time I saw my “back-up” officers was when one of them came to the hospital to bring me my watch. I said, “What the hell am I going to do with a watch? What I needed was a back-up. Where were you?” He said, “Fuck you,” and left. Both my “back-ups” were later awarded medals for saving my life.<br />
I still don’t know exactly what happened on that day. There was never any real investigation. But years later, Patrick Murphy, who was police commissioner at the time, was giving a speech at one of my alma maters, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and I confronted him. I said, “My name is Frank Serpico, and I’ve been carrying a bullet in my head for over 35 years, and you, Mr. Murphy, are the man I hold responsible. You were the man who was brought as commissioner to take up the cause that I began — rooting out corruption. You could have protected me; instead you put me in harm’s way. What have you got to say?” He hung his head, and had no answer.<br />
Even now, I do not know for certain why I was left trapped in that door by my fellow police officers. But the Narcotics division was rotten to the core, with many guys taking money from the very drug dealers they were supposed to bust. I had refused to take bribes and had testified against my fellow officers. Police make up a peculiar subculture in society. More often than not they have their own moral code of behavior, an “us against them” attitude, enforced by a Blue Wall of Silence. It’s their version of the Mafia’s omerta. Speak out, and you’re no longer “one of us.” You’re one of “them.” And as James Fyfe, a nationally recognized expert on the use of force, wrote in his 1993 book about this issue, Above The Law, officers who break the code sometimes won’t be helped in emergency situations, as I wasn’t.<br />
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On the left, Al Pacino plays Serpico in the 1973 movie. On the right, Frank Serpico leaves the Bronx County Courthouse after testifying on police corruption in 1973. | Getty Images<br />
Forty-odd years on, my story probably seems like ancient history to most people, layered over with Hollywood legend. For me it’s not, since at the age of 78 I’m still deaf in one ear and I walk with a limp and I carry fragments of the bullet near my brain. I am also, all these years later, still persona non grata in the NYPD. Never mind that, thanks to Sidney Lumet’s direction and Al Pacino’s brilliant acting, “Serpico” ranks No. 40 on the American Film Institute’s list of all-time movie heroes, or that as I travel around the country and the world, police officers often tell me they were inspired to join the force after seeing the movie at an early age.<br />
In the NYPD that means little next to my 40-year-old heresy, as they see it. I still get hate mail from active and retired police officers. A couple of years ago after the death of David Durk — the police officer who was one of my few allies inside the department in my efforts to expose graft — the Internet message board “NYPD Rant” featured some choice messages directed at me. “Join your mentor, Rat scum!” said one. An ex-con recently related to me that a precinct captain had once said to him, “If it wasn’t for that fuckin’ Serpico, I coulda been a millionaire today.” My informer went on to say, “Frank, you don’t seem to understand, they had a well-oiled money making machine going and you came along and threw a handful of sand in the gears.”<br />
In 1971 I was awarded the Medal of Honor, the NYPD’s highest award for bravery in action, but it wasn’t for taking on an army of corrupt cops. It was most likely due to the insistence of Police Chief Sid Cooper, a rare good guy who was well aware of the murky side of the NYPD that I’d try to expose. But they handed the medal to me like an afterthought, like tossing me a pack of cigarettes. After all this time, I’ve never been given a proper certificate with my medal. And although living Medal of Honor winners are typically invited to yearly award ceremonies, I’ve only been invited once — and it was by Bernard Kerick, who ironically was the only NYPD commissioner to later serve time in prison. A few years ago, after the New York Police Museum refused my guns and other memorabilia, I loaned them to the Italian-American museum right down street from police headquarters, and they invited me to their annual dinner. I didn’t know it was planned, but the chief of police from Rome, Italy, was there, and he gave me a plaque. The New York City police officers who were there wouldn’t even look at me.<br />
Frank Serpico is a former New York City police detective.<br />
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Read more: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/10/the-police-are-still-out-of-control-112160.html#ixzz3HMF8K780Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-76484859184343342692014-08-27T11:56:00.003-04:002014-08-27T11:56:46.949-04:00Artifacts of the Great War<h1 class="headline" itemprop="name" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #2d2d2d; font-family: 'Bureau Grot Cond Book', sans-serif; font-size: 3em; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; margin-bottom: 0em; margin-top: 0em;">
Artifacts of the Great War</h1>
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A collection of World War I objects, from the mundane to the extraordinary</h2>
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By <span class="author-name" itemprop="author" style="box-sizing: border-box;">John Hughes-Wilson and Nigel Steel</span></div>
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<span class="pub-edition" style="box-sizing: border-box;">airspacemag.com </span><time class="pub-date" itemprop="published" style="box-sizing: border-box;">August 20, 2014</time></div>
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<span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Open Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Read more: <a href="http://www.airspacemag.com/articles/world-war-i-objects-180952307/#ixzz3Bbms9jnQ" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #003399; text-decoration: none;">http://www.airspacemag.com/articles/world-war-i-objects-180952307/#ixzz3Bbms9jnQ</a></span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Open Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Read more: http://www.airspacemag.com/articles/world-war-i-objects-180952307/#IbkiUO2MSqD1hMhg.99<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Save 47% when you subscribe to Air & Space magazine http://bit.ly/NaSX4X<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Follow us: @AirSpaceMag on Twitter</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; font-family: 'Open Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">This aluminum ammunition box belonged to the airship designated L.31, commanded by probably the best-known and most effective German airship raider, Kapitanleutnant Heinrich Mathy. He and his machine met their end in the early hours of October 1, 1916, northwest of London, when caught by 2nd Lieutenant Wulfstan Tempest of 39 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps. Boldly flying through anti-aircraft fire, Tempest made three sweeps along L.31, pumping in incendiary ammunition. “As I was firing,” he remembered, “I noticed her begin to go red inside like an enormous Chinese lantern.” L.31 and her crew plummeted to earth from almost 15,000 feet, the impact on hitting the ground visible in the way the ammunition box’s bullets perforated its soft skin. It was the fourth airship brought down in as many weeks; after months of attack, Londoners were no longer defenseless. As the burning airships lit up the night sky, thousands cheered. But at least one observer, Sybil Morrison, was more reflective.<b><i> “I was appalled to see the kind, good-hearted British people dancing round in the streets at the sight of 60 people being burnt alive, clapping, singing and cheering. It was like a flash to me that this is what war did. It created this utter inhumanity in perfectly decent people.</i></b>”</span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Open Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Read more: <a href="http://www.airspacemag.com/articles/world-war-i-objects-180952307/#ixzz3BbmRMEAI" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #003399; text-decoration: none;">http://www.airspacemag.com/articles/world-war-i-objects-180952307/#ixzz3BbmRMEAI</a></span><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-family: 'Open Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Read more: http://www.airspacemag.com/articles/world-war-i-objects-180952307/#IbkiUO2MSqD1hMhg.99<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Save 47% when you subscribe to Air & Space magazine http://bit.ly/NaSX4X<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Follow us: @AirSpaceMag on Twitter</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Open Sans, sans-serif;">Emphasis is mind on the last part. </span>Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-51546992553578372852014-08-08T13:40:00.005-04:002014-08-08T13:40:44.400-04:00Who’s Funding the Anti-Marijuana Movement?<a href="http://www.allgov.com/news/where-is-the-money-going/whos-funding-the-anti-marijuana-movement-private-prisons-prison-guards-police-and-alcohol-beer-and-pharmaceutical-companies-140807?news=85390">http://www.allgov.com/news/where-is-the-money-going/whos-funding-the-anti-marijuana-movement-private-prisons-prison-guards-police-and-alcohol-beer-and-pharmaceutical-companies-140807?news=85390</a>8<br />
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Who’s Funding the Anti-Marijuana Movement? Private Prisons, Prison Guards, Police and Alcohol, Beer and Pharmaceutical Companies</h3>
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Legalized marijuana may have taken root in Colorado and Washington, but that doesn’t mean it has to spread to other parts of the country, as far as a bevy of special interests are concerned.</div>
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Some of the most lucrative and powerful industries in America oppose marijuana decriminalization because it threatens their financial bottom-line or jobs for their workers. Five different interest groups form the backbone of the anti-pot campaign, according to OpenSecrets.org, which tracks political spending.</div>
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First, there’s the spirits, wine and beer companies. Legalized marijuana represents a direct threat to this industry’s business model. The more people can legally smoke a bud, the less need they’ll have to buy a Bud. Four years ago, the California Beer and Beverage Distributors contributed $10,000 to help defeat California’s Proposition 19, which sought to legalize recreational marijuana in the state.</div>
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Law enforcement groups also want to maintain criminal penalties for pot possession. If the country stops waging its war on drugs, including marijuana, fewer government dollars will flow to police efforts to address this public policy issue. Municipalities will also receive less money from property seized in drug raids.</div>
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Others in the criminal justice world that want to keep the status quo of locking up marijuana offenders are private prison operators and prison guard unions. States that legalize marijuana use are likely to experience a decline in prison populations—and that will reduce the need for government to hire private prison companies and correctional officers.</div>
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The nation’s largest for-profit prison business, Corrections Corporation of America, once stated in a regulatory filing that: “[A]ny changes with respect to drugs and controlled substances or illegal immigration could affect the number of persons arrested, convicted, and sentenced, thereby potentially reducing demand for correctional facilities to house them,” according to OpenSecrets.org.</div>
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Another example is the Golden State’s mighty prison guards union, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA), a major player in state politics for decades. CCPOA contributed $1 million in 2008 to defeat Proposition 5, which sought more drug treatment and rehabilitation programs for inmates.</div>
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Finally, there’s the legal drug industry: Big Pharma. It opposes marijuana decriminalization because it could mean people spend less money on painkillers and anti-inflammatory remedies like ibuprofen. Its primary lobbying group, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), has loads of money to spend. Two years ago, it dropped nearly $22 million on congressional races, demonstrating how big a war chest it can muster.</div>
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-Noel Brinkerhoff</div>
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To Learn More:</div>
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Money, Not Morals, Drives Marijuana Prohibition Movement (by Kendall Bentsen, OpenSecrets.org)</div>
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There's Money in Marijuana (by Kendall Bentsen and Clare Gunton, OpenSecrets.org)</div>
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Only Conservative Republicans Still Oppose Legalizing Marijuana (by David Wallechinsky and Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)</div>
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DEA Tries to Strongarm Physicians Connected to Marijuana Dispensaries (by Steve Straehley, AllGov)</div>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-4497502753883459562014-06-04T16:30:00.000-04:002014-06-04T16:30:15.335-04:0093-year-old WWII vet to parachute into Normandy -- again<a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/93-year-old-wwii-vet-to-parachute-into-normandy-again/" target="_blank">SOURCE ARTICLE</a><br />
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93-year-old WWII vet to parachute into Normandy -- again</h1>
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<strong>XENIA, Ohio -- </strong>On a winding road, past a stand of sycamores outside his Ohio home, CBS News found Jim Martin, 70 years after his first trip to France.</div>
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Jim was one of the first Americans in combat in Europe.</div>
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<figure class="image pull-left image-small" style="float: left; margin: 5px 0px 0px; padding-bottom: 20px; padding-right: 20px; width: 220px;"><span class="img " style="display: block; line-height: 0; overflow: hidden;"><img alt="martinnew.jpg" src="http://cbsnews1.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/2014/06/02/0cbfc26a-fc3d-4f9b-aeae-d610ad38cbf1/thumbnail/220x140/add55ea36f3214873193bfccc7edafbf/martinnew.jpg" style="border: 0px;" /></span><figcaption style="line-height: 0.95;"><div class="caption" style="color: #666666; display: inline; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin: 10px 0px; padding-top: 5px;">
Jim Martin</div>
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"They called us the tip of the spear," he says.</div>
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Jim was a private in the 101st Airborne, one of the paratroopers dropped behind German lines in the hours before the D-Day landings.</div>
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"We wanted to get out of the plane quickly, because it was hitting the plane," he says. "Planes were blowing up, and we wanted to get the hell out of there."</div>
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They were inviting targets as they drifted toward the ground and the enemy.</div>
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Asked what was going through his mind as he slowly descended through the clouds into hostile territory, Jim says, "Fascination, because of all of this fire coming up towards us."</div>
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"It was absolutely fascinating to see all these various colored tracers coming up there," he says.</div>
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Honoring the female pilots of WWII</h3>
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Their mission was to keep the Germans from reinforcing their troops on the dunes. Jim and his comrades landed right in the middle of those German reinforcements.</div>
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"That was a slaughter house," he recalls. "There was SS all over the place, and they just slaughtered us. My colonel was lost. My company commander was lost."</div>
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But what was supposed to be three days of fighting in Normandy went on for a month.</div>
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Jim Martin was one of the first Americans in combat in Europe.</div>
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"That's the way we were trained, we accepted that," Jim says. "And no matter how many people are there against you, what the odds are doesn't matter. We're going to win."</div>
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Jim went from Normandy to fight in Holland, where he was wounded; from Holland to the Battle of the Bulge in Belgium; and from Belgium to Berchtesgaden, Germany -- Adolf Hitler's retreat in the Bavarian Alps.</div>
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Jim says he thought he was going to die "every day."</div>
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"You just have to accept it," he says. "If you're going to worry about dying all the time, you can't fight."</div>
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Jim is 93 now, one of the few left who can talk firsthand of a time when he says right was right and wrong was wrong, and everyone knew the difference.</div>
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And here's the best part: This week, he's going back to Normandy, where he intends to parachute -- yes parachute -- onto the same soil he touched seven decades ago.</div>
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"I'm not usually looking for records or anything, but that would give me a great deal of satisfaction," he says.</div>
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Bon voyage, Jim.</div>
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<br />Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-55765259945136800712014-04-30T10:02:00.000-04:002014-04-30T10:02:04.624-04:00April 30, 1975<a href="http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/south-vietnam-surrenders" target="_blank">SOURCE</a><br />
<br />
<br />
By dawn, communist forces move into Saigon, where they meet only sporadic resistance. The South Vietnamese forces had collapsed under the rapid advancement of the North Vietnamese. The most recent fighting had begun in December 1974, when the North Vietnamese had launched a major attack against the lightly defended province of Phuoc Long, located due north of Saigon along the Cambodian border, overrunning the provincial capital at Phuoc Binh on January 6, 1975. Despite previous presidential promises to provide aid in such a scenario, the United States did nothing. By this time, Nixon had resigned from office and his successor, Gerald Ford, was unable to convince a hostile Congress to make good on Nixon's earlier promises to rescue Saigon from communist takeover.<br />
<br />
This situation emboldened the North Vietnamese, who launched a new campaign in March 1975. The South Vietnamese forces fell back in total disarray, and once again, the United States did nothing. The South Vietnamese abandoned Pleiku and Kontum in the Highlands with very little fighting. Then Quang Tri, Hue, and Da Nang fell to the communist onslaught. The North Vietnamese continued to attack south along the coast toward Saigon, defeating the South Vietnamese forces at each encounter.<br />
<br />
The South Vietnamese 18th Division had fought a valiant battle at Xuan Loc, just to the east of Saigon, destroying three North Vietnamese divisions in the process. However, it proved to be the last battle in the defense of the Republic of South Vietnam. The South Vietnamese forces held out against the attackers until they ran out of tactical air support and weapons, finally abandoning Xuan Loc to the communists on April 21.<br />
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Having crushed the last major organized opposition before Saigon, the North Vietnamese got into position for the final assault. In Saigon, South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu resigned and transferred authority to Vice President Tran Van Huong before fleeing the city on April 25. By April 27, the North Vietnamese had completely encircled Saigon and began to maneuver for a complete takeover.<br />
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When they attacked at dawn on April 30, they met little resistance. North Vietnamese tanks crashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace and the war came to an end. North Vietnamese Col. Bui Tin accepted the surrender from Gen. Duong Van Minh, who had taken over after Tran Van Huong spent only one day in power. Tin explained to Minh, "You have nothing to fear. Between Vietnamese there are no victors and no vanquished. Only the Americans have been beaten. If you are patriots, consider this a moment of joy. The war for our country is over."Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-5991291451800445072014-04-11T16:02:00.001-04:002014-04-11T16:02:01.289-04:00“I Wasn’t Controlling the Aircraft. The Storm Was.” <br />
I just thought this was an interesting story. Really good to see the humanity in the cockpit.<br />
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<a href="http://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/above-and-beyond-may-2014-180950129/">http://www.airspacemag.com/military-aviation/above-and-beyond-may-2014-180950129/</a><br />
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<a class="pw-button pw-button-facebook button-type-square pw-size-medium pw-button-counter-horizontal" href="https://www.blogger.com/null" style="background-image: none !important; border: none !important; box-sizing: content-box; color: rgb(0, 51, 153) !important; display: inline-block !important; height: auto !important; line-height: 12px !important; margin: 0px 3px 1px 0px !important; padding: 0px !important; vertical-align: bottom; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="pw-icon ra1-pw-icon ra1-pw-icon-facebook" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/set-24.png); background-position: 0px -750px; box-sizing: content-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block !important; height: 24px; vertical-align: top; width: 24px;"></span><span class="pw-button-counter" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(102, 102, 102) !important; display: inline-block; line-height: 1px !important; margin: 0px !important; padding: 0px 0px 0px 6px !important; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;"><i class="pw-button-counter__brd" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/ra1-icoset.png); background-position: -98px 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; box-sizing: border-box; height: 8px; margin: 6px 0px 0px -6px !important; padding: 0px !important; position: absolute; width: 7px;"></i><span class="pw-button-counter__count ra1-pw-button-counter-value" style="-webkit-background-clip: padding-box; background-clip: padding-box; background-color: white; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px; border-top-left-radius: 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204) !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; font-size: 10px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px !important; min-width: 15px; padding: 0px 3px !important; text-align: center; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;">10</span></span></a><a class="pw-button pw-button-twitter button-type-square pw-size-medium pw-button-counter-horizontal" href="https://www.blogger.com/null" style="background-image: none !important; 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box-sizing: border-box; height: 8px; margin: 6px 0px 0px -6px !important; padding: 0px !important; position: absolute; width: 7px;"></i><span class="pw-button-counter__count ra1-pw-button-counter-value" style="-webkit-background-clip: padding-box; background-clip: padding-box; background-color: white; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px; border-top-left-radius: 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204) !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; font-size: 10px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px !important; min-width: 15px; padding: 0px 3px !important; text-align: center; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;">6</span></span></a><a class="pw-button pw-button-pinterest button-type-square pw-size-medium pw-button-counter-horizontal" href="https://www.blogger.com/null" style="background-image: none !important; border: none !important; box-sizing: content-box; color: rgb(0, 51, 153) !important; display: inline-block !important; height: auto !important; line-height: 12px !important; margin: 0px 3px 1px 0px !important; padding: 0px !important; vertical-align: bottom; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="pw-icon ra1-pw-icon ra1-pw-icon-pinterest" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/set-24.png); background-position: 0px -375px; box-sizing: content-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block !important; height: 24px; vertical-align: top; width: 24px;"></span><span class="pw-button-counter" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(102, 102, 102) !important; display: inline-block; line-height: 1px !important; margin: 0px !important; padding: 0px 0px 0px 6px !important; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;"><i class="pw-button-counter__brd" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/ra1-icoset.png); background-position: -98px 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; box-sizing: border-box; height: 8px; margin: 6px 0px 0px -6px !important; padding: 0px !important; position: absolute; width: 7px;"></i><span class="pw-button-counter__count ra1-pw-button-counter-value" style="-webkit-background-clip: padding-box; background-clip: padding-box; background-color: white; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px; border-top-left-radius: 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204) !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; font-size: 10px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px !important; min-width: 15px; padding: 0px 3px !important; text-align: center; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;">0</span></span></a><a class="pw-button pw-button-googleplus button-type-square pw-size-medium pw-button-counter-horizontal" href="https://www.blogger.com/null" style="background-image: none !important; border: none !important; box-sizing: content-box; color: rgb(0, 51, 153) !important; display: inline-block !important; height: auto !important; line-height: 12px !important; margin: 0px 3px 1px 0px !important; padding: 0px !important; vertical-align: bottom; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="pw-icon ra1-pw-icon ra1-pw-icon-googleplus" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/set-24.png); background-position: 0px -650px; box-sizing: content-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block !important; height: 24px; vertical-align: top; width: 24px;"></span><span class="pw-button-counter" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(102, 102, 102) !important; display: inline-block; line-height: 1px !important; margin: 0px !important; padding: 0px 0px 0px 6px !important; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;"><i class="pw-button-counter__brd" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/ra1-icoset.png); background-position: -98px 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; box-sizing: border-box; height: 8px; margin: 6px 0px 0px -6px !important; padding: 0px !important; position: absolute; width: 7px;"></i><span class="pw-button-counter__count ra1-pw-button-counter-value" style="-webkit-background-clip: padding-box; background-clip: padding-box; background-color: white; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px; border-top-left-radius: 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204) !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; font-size: 10px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px !important; min-width: 15px; padding: 0px 3px !important; text-align: center; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;">0</span></span></a><a class="pw-button pw-button-reddit button-type-square pw-size-medium pw-button-counter-horizontal" href="https://www.blogger.com/null" style="background-image: none !important; border: none !important; box-sizing: content-box; color: rgb(0, 51, 153) !important; display: inline-block !important; height: auto !important; line-height: 12px !important; margin: 0px 3px 1px 0px !important; padding: 0px !important; vertical-align: bottom; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="pw-icon ra1-pw-icon ra1-pw-icon-reddit" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/set-24.png); background-position: 0px -275px; box-sizing: content-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block !important; height: 24px; vertical-align: top; width: 24px;"></span><span class="pw-button-counter" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(102, 102, 102) !important; display: inline-block; line-height: 1px !important; margin: 0px !important; padding: 0px 0px 0px 6px !important; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;"><i class="pw-button-counter__brd" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/ra1-icoset.png); background-position: -98px 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; box-sizing: border-box; height: 8px; margin: 6px 0px 0px -6px !important; padding: 0px !important; position: absolute; width: 7px;"></i><span class="pw-button-counter__count ra1-pw-button-counter-value" style="-webkit-background-clip: padding-box; background-clip: padding-box; background-color: white; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px; border-top-left-radius: 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204) !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; font-size: 10px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px !important; min-width: 15px; padding: 0px 3px !important; text-align: center; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;">1</span></span></a><a aria-haspopup="true" class="pw-button pw-button-post button-type-square pw-size-medium pw-button-counter-horizontal" href="https://www.blogger.com/null" style="background-image: none !important; border: none !important; box-sizing: content-box; color: rgb(0, 51, 153) !important; display: inline-block !important; height: auto !important; line-height: 12px !important; margin: 0px 3px 1px 0px !important; padding: 0px !important; vertical-align: bottom; white-space: nowrap;"><span class="pw-icon ra1-pw-icon ra1-pw-icon-post" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/set-24.png); background-position: 0px -350px; box-sizing: content-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block !important; height: 24px; vertical-align: top; width: 24px;"></span><span class="pw-button-counter" style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(102, 102, 102) !important; display: inline-block; line-height: 1px !important; margin: 0px !important; padding: 0px 0px 0px 6px !important; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;"><i class="pw-button-counter__brd" style="background-image: url(http://i.po.st/static/v3/img/ra1-icoset.png); background-position: -98px 0px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; box-sizing: border-box; height: 8px; margin: 6px 0px 0px -6px !important; padding: 0px !important; position: absolute; width: 7px;"></i><span class="pw-button-counter__count ra1-pw-button-counter-value" style="-webkit-background-clip: padding-box; background-clip: padding-box; background-color: white; border-bottom-left-radius: 3px; border-bottom-right-radius: 3px; border-top-left-radius: 3px; border-top-right-radius: 3px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204) !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: inherit !important; cursor: pointer; display: inline-block; font-size: 10px; line-height: 22px; margin: 0px !important; min-width: 15px; padding: 0px 3px !important; text-align: center; vertical-align: top; width: auto !important;">55</span></span></a></div>
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As a 21-year-old U.S. Army Air Forces Aviation Cadet in 1943, I was part of the testing of an accelerated bomber-pilot training program. At Brooks Field in San Antonio, Texas, we got our first up-close look at the airplane we would be flying—the Mitchell B-25. All of us were surprised by how easy the big airplane was to fly compared to the airplanes we had been flying, like the twin-engine Cessna AT-17.</div>
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During the next 10 weeks, I logged 80 hours in the B-25 and qualified as an Army Air Forces pilot with the rank of second lieutenant.</div>
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The brass decided I should fly the Martin medium bomber, the B-26 Marauder, which was bigger and faster than the B-25. After I logged 100 hours, I picked up a B-26 crew and started training them for combat.</div>
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Then, thanks to the war in the Pacific, I got a call to pick up a new crew for the Douglas A-26 Invader (“A” for attack), the last word in the Air Forces’ line of twin-engine bombers. Military strategists thought that ending the war might require an invasion of the Japanese mainland, and the A-26, with six to 14 forward-firing .50-caliber machine guns, could be used to attack the invasion sites so the Marines could land with fewer casualties.</div>
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The A-26 was lighter and faster and had more firepower than either the B-25 or -26. My crew consisted of the pilot, a navigator/bombardier, and one gunner. The A-26, like fighters, had only one set of flight controls—none for an instructor. The instructor gave the student an introduction to the A-26 ride, and from then on he would merely sit alongside the student. We did a lot of instrument flight training, as we did in the B-25 and -26. In three months I had logged about 100 hours of pilot time in the A-26 and was comfortable in it, especially if my navigator, Rex Whitney, was in the seat to my right. I never had to worry about where we were. He always knew.</div>
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On August 15, 1945, Japan surrendered. Within the week we got the news that we would be heading for Japan as part of the occupation forces.</div>
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The A-26 lacked the range to cross the Pacific nonstop. We would island-hop from Hawaii to Christmas Island, Canton, Tarawa, Enewetak, Guam, the Philippines, and then on to Japan. For the 1,350-mile trip to Christmas Island, our 12 airplanes cruised in a loose formation at 8,000 feet in sunny weather, seeing nothing but blue water and an occasional ship.</div>
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During the next two days, we flew to Canton and then to Tarawa. On the morning of August 29, we were warming up near the end of the runway on Tarawa in preparation for our flight to Enewetak. I told the squadron leader I had no oil pressure in my left engine. “Don’t move until the mechanical people find the problem,” he said. “When you get the oil pressure problem fixed, take off and join us at Enewetak.”</div>
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My navigator, gunner, and I studied the weather reports, which showed a tropical storm directly on our course. The squadron leader chose to avoid the weather by taking the other 11 airplanes on a course 200 miles to the east of the storm. My crew and I thought that we could save time by flying through it.</div>
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The mechanics spent a couple of hours getting an air bubble out of the oil pressure line. Navigator Whitney gave me a northwesterly heading to Enewetak—right through the middle of the storm. We took off at 11 a.m., climbed to 8,000 feet, trimmed the airplane to fly hands-off, and sat back to enjoy the flight.</div>
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At noon, I noticed tall cumulus clouds dead ahead. In short order we were in mild turbulence. Then the airplane was being tossed about like a leaf in a whirlwind. We were in dark clouds with no view of anything outside the cockpit, not even a horizon. Heavy rain pelted the airplane, lightning flashed continually, and the thunderclaps were deafening. Suddenly we were in a steep left bank followed by a dive. During my feeble attempt at keeping the airplane level, I noticed the rate-of-climb gauge said I was climbing at 4,000 feet per minute. The airplane was in a violent updraft. The altimeter read 17,000 feet, an altitude where oxygen starvation was a possibility. During flight training, I had experienced anoxia in a vacuum chamber—and at the equivalent of a much lower altitude. I had passed out, and came to with the help of an oxygen mask.</div>
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I lowered the nose and increased the throttle until I was doing 300 mph, hoping to stop or at least reduce the rate of climb. But I was still climbing at 2,000 feet per minute. I was not in control of the aircraft. The storm was.</div>
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Just as suddenly as we had been snatched by the updraft, we hit a downdraft and began losing altitude, more than 4,000 feet per minute. I wrestled the airplane to a nose-up attitude to counteract the rapid loss in altitude, all the while fighting turbulence. I feared that if the downdraft continued, we might end up in the ocean.</div>
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A short time later the rapid descent stopped, leaving us 2,000 feet above the Pacific. In less than 30 seconds we hit another updraft. Wash, rinse, repeat: lightning, thunder, rain, turbulence.</div>
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Then vertigo struck. The flight instruments indicated I was flying straight and level—as straight and level as could be expected under the circumstances—but my senses told me I was diving, climbing, in steep turns—even upside down. I had to fight off those signals and fly by the dictates of the flight instruments.</div>
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In all my flying, this was the most difficult thing I had ever been called on to do. I remembered how hard my instrument-flight instructors had been on me. “Fly the instruments—not your head!” My B-25 instrument-flight instructor kept telling me, “Relax, you’re too tense, you’re squeezing the life out of the throttles and the control column. You need sensitivity on the controls, especially when you’re flying on instruments, and when you’re tense, you lose it.” Once, when I got into a precarious situation, he hit the back of my throttle-squeezing hand really hard with his microphone. “I said RELAX!”</div>
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Whitney was sitting to my right. We didn’t exchange any words. I thought it best not to tell him I was battling vertigo. I was too busy just trying to keep us right side up. The gunner, Hugh Dunwoodie, was in his compartment behind the bomb bay, just in front of the tail section. I knew how rough our ride up front was: I can’t imagine what it was like for him back there.</div>
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The second updraft was more violent. My efforts to slow the rate of ascent had minimal effect. Once again, when we hit 17,000 feet, we leveled out. At that altitude, the turbulence wasn’t as bad, nor was the lightning and rain. I still feared anoxia, but there was nothing I could do about that.</div>
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It became increasingly clear that my efforts to fight the storm were useless. I gave up battling the up- and downdrafts and concentrated on keeping the airplane level, heading in approximately the direction of Enewetak. But the vertigo continued. Imagine hanging by your feet from a tree branch 10 feet off the ground, with someone standing in front of you telling you, “No, you’re not upside down, just ignore those sensations and go about your business.”</div>
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The downdraft continued sucking us down at 3,000 feet per minute. This time we leveled out at 5,000 feet. Then we hit a third updraft. I had a feeling the storm was becoming less intense. The airplane was becoming just a little bit easier to control.</div>
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Suddenly, at 8,000 feet, we were in sunshine. Upon seeing the blue sky, the water, and the horizon, my vertigo vanished. It was 1:30. Whitney got out his sextant, took a reading on the sun, did some calculations, and gave me a heading to Enewetak.</div>
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For two hours and 30 minutes, we flew that heading under perfect weather conditions. We saw no airplanes, no ships, no islands—just the beautiful blue Pacific.</div>
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I called Enewetak for landing instructions. The controller said that the other 11 airplanes of my squadron had landed earlier. They left Tarawa two hours before we did, and landed in Enewetak only 30 minutes before us. Our flight through the storm saved us 90 minutes. Now, at age 92, I’ve forgiven that 21-year-old for making such a dumb decision.</div>
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We taxied to where the other A-26s were parked. Everyone was in the airport lounge having a drink, celebrating their safe flight.</div>
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Whitney and I climbed down and stood alongside the A-26. Then Whitney took my right hand in his, gave a long, hard squeeze, and said, “Thanks.”</div>
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Dunwoodie opened the lower hatch below the gunners’ compartment, let himself down, and gave me a bear hug.</div>
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We went into the airport lounge to meet the rest of the squadron. They didn’t inquire about our flight—they assumed it was a ho-hum affair like theirs—so we left it right there and had a beer.</div>
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<span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Interesting piece of news. While I don't condone war, nor celebrate it, I cannot help but find compassion for the soldier that performs his duty. </span></h1>
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Thus ends another of the many sagas of WWII, one of the most harrowing times in the history of this world.</div>
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FILE 1974: Hiroo Onoda, center, salutes after handing over his military sword on Lubang Island, Philippines, when he comes out of hiding in the jungle.<span class="source" itemprop="name" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px none; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; vertical-align: baseline;"> (AP PHOTO/KYODO NEWS)</span></div>
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Onoda died Thursday at a Tokyo hospital after a brief stay there. Chief government spokesman Yoshihide Suga on Friday expressed his condolences, praising Onoda for his strong will to live and indomitable spirit.</div>
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"After World War II, Mr. Onoda lived in the jungle for many years and when he returned to Japan, I felt that finally, the war was finished. That's how I felt," Suga said.</div>
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"I don't consider those 30 years a waste of time. Without that experience, I wouldn't have my life today."</blockquote>
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- Hiroo Onoda told the AP in 1995</div>
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Onoda was an intelligence officer who came out of hiding, erect but emaciated, in fatigues patched many times over, on Lubang island in the Philippines in March 1974, on his 52nd birthday. He surrendered only when his former commander flew there to reverse his 1945 orders to stay behind and spy on American troops.</div>
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Onoda and another World War II holdout, Sgt. Shoichi Yokoi, who emerged from the jungle in 1972, received massive heroes' welcomes upon returning home.</div>
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Before and during the war, Japanese were taught absolute loyalty to the nation and the emperor. Soldiers in the Imperial Army observed a code that said death was preferable to surrender.</div>
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Onoda refused to give up, despite at least four searches during which family members appealed to him over loudspeakers and flights dropped leaflets urging him to surrender.</div>
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In his formal surrender to Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, Onoda wore his 30-year-old imperial army uniform, cap and sword, all still in good condition.</div>
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After the initial sensation of his return home wore off, Onoda bought a ranch in Brazil. He later was head of a children's nature school in northern Japan.</div>
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"I don't consider those 30 years a waste of time," Onoda said in a 1995 interview with The Associated Press. "Without that experience, I wouldn't have my life today."</div>
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Still, he showed a great zeal for making up for years lost.</div>
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"I do everything twice as fast so I can make up for the 30 years," Onoda said. "I wish someone could eat and sleep for me so I can work 24 hours a day."</div>
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The son of a teacher, Onoda worked for a Japanese trading firm in Shanghai after finishing high school in 1939. Three years later, he was drafted and trained at a military academy.</div>
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In December 1944, he was sent to Lubang, about 90 miles southwest of Manila. Most other Japanese soldiers surrendered when U.S. troops landed on Lubang in February 1945, though hundreds remained missing for years after the war.</div>
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As he struggled to feed himself, Onoda's mission became one of survival. He stole rice and bananas from local people down the hill, and shot their cows to make dried beef, triggering occasional skirmishes.</div>
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The turning point came on Feb. 20, 1974, when he met a young globe-trotter, Norio Suzuki, who ventured to Lubang in pursuit of Onoda.<br />Suzuki quietly pitched camp in lonely jungle clearings and waited. "Oi," Onoda eventually called out, and eventually began speaking with him.</div>
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Suzuki returned to Japan and contacted the government, which located Onoda's superior — Maj. Yoshimi Taniguchi — and flew him to Lubang to deliver his surrender order in person.</div>
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FOR FURTHER READING:</div>
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<span style="font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 27px;">http://www.damninteresting.com/the-soldier-who-wouldnt-quit/</span></span></div>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-38254012570854911872014-01-21T06:30:00.003-05:002014-01-21T06:30:53.523-05:00Guess who said this...<span style="font-size: large;">Guess who said this...</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Power in defense of freedom is greater than power in behalf of tyranny and oppression, because power, real power, comes from our conviction which produces action, uncompromising action."</span>Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-71997336502474396462013-11-15T07:14:00.002-05:002013-11-15T07:14:44.502-05:00How the Western Black Rhino Went Extinct<h1 class="postTitle" id="postTitle2" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #222222; font-family: Brunel-for-Titles, georgia, times, serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 26px; margin: 0px 0px 5px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<a href="http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/extinction-countdown/2013/11/13/western-black-rhino-extinct/" target="_blank">How the Western Black Rhino Went Extinct</a></h1>
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<span class="byline" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 12px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px 5px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">By <a href="" id="author41" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: #19437c; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline;">John R. Platt</a> | </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: georgia, times, serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 12px;"></span><span class="datestamp" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 12px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px 5px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: nowrap;">November 13, 2013</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: georgia, times, serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 12px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #222222; font-family: georgia, times, serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 12px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">| <a href="http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/extinction-countdown/2013/11/13/western-black-rhino-extinct/#respond" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; color: #19437c; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;" title="Comment on How the Western Black Rhino Went Extinct"><img alt="Comments" class="iconComment" src="http://www.scientificamerican.com/assets/img/icon_comment_small.gif" style="background-color: transparent; border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px 4px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" />6</a></span></div>
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Oh what a difference a century makes. At the beginning of the 20th century, an estimated one million black rhinoceroses from four different subspecies roamed the savannas of Africa. By 2001 that number had dropped to about 2,300 black rhinos and just three subspecies. This is the tale of how we lost one of those subspecies, the western black rhinoceros (Diceros bicornis longipes). It is a story of greed, indifference, hope and despair.</div>
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Historically, the western black rhino had a fairly large range across central and western Africa, with populations in modern-day Cameroon, Chad, the Central African Republic, Sudan and South Sudan, making it the northernmost African rhino subspecies. Although it had lived in these countries for centuries, the western black—like most rhinos—found itself to be incompatible with the 20th century. Widespread sports hunting in the first decades of the century quickly decimated rhino populations. Industrial agriculture came next, clearing many historic rhino habitats for fields and settlements. Farmers and ranchers at the time viewed large herbivores such as rhinos as pests and dangers to their crops. The slaughter continued.</div>
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The final nail in the rhinos’ coffin began in the early 1950s, when Mao Zedong promoted so-called traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) as a tool for unifying the country he had recently come to lead. Even though Chairman Mao himself did not believe in TCM, he called for its use over Western medicine. Among the many “cures” touted by China’s “New Medicine” was powdered rhino horn, which was said to cure everything from fevers to cancer. (This last claim is a fairly recent development.)</div>
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That’s when poachers descended on Africa. Between 1960 and 1995 an astonishing 98 percent of black rhinos were killed by poachers, either to feed the new and voracious demand for TCM or, to a lesser extent, for horns to be used as ceremonial knife handles in the Middle East. All rhinos suffered; the western black rhino, already weakened by decades of overhunting, was the hardest hit.</div>
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By 1980 the western black rhino’s range had shrunk to just two countries: Cameroon, which held 110 of the animals, and Chad, where just 25 remained. Chad’s western blacks were wiped out within 10 years. Cameroon’s held on a bit longer. The country held an estimated 50 western black rhinos in 1991, a number that dropped to 35 just a year later. By 1997 the population had fallen to an estimated 10 final rhinos.</div>
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Even that count doesn’t fully convey the precarious nature of the subspecies at that point. The 10 last western black rhinos were scattered across 25,000 square kilometers of northern Cameroon. Four of them lived in fairly close proximity to one another. The remaining six lived in isolation, with an average of 60 kilometers between each animal and little, if any, hope to find one another and start breeding.</div>
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western black rhino skullIn 1999 the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) published a report called “African Rhino: Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan.” The authors wrote of the almost insurmountable challenge in preserving these final 10 western black rhinos. “Demographically and genetically the western black rhino seems doomed unless the discrete populations are captured and concentrated in one area of its range. Under current conditions, however, this would probably make the remaining animals more vulnerable to poaching.” The act of locating, catching and collecting these rhinos in one place would also be expensive and logistically next to impossible, as Cameroon at the time was plagued by corruption, civil unrest, currency devaluation and mistrust of the West. Even if that feat had been accomplished, the land in northern Cameroon was poorly suited for rhinos and provided very little food. Providing safe habitat for just 20 rhinos would require a fenced-in sanctuary 400 square kilometers in size. The authors wrote that the “lack of local conservation capacity and government commitment” would make consolidating the last rhinos difficult and concluded that the future of the subspecies was bleak.</div>
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They were right. Another WWF survey in 2001 found just five surviving western black rhinos, with the possibility of three additional, unconfirmed animals. That was the last time scientists or conservationists ever saw a western black rhino.</div>
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Even though things were grim at that point, a brief blip of hope occurred in 2004. That year, the nongovernmental organization Symbiose found evidence that as many as 31 western black rhinos still lived in Cameroon. That evidence, though, was quickly discredited. It turned out that trackers had faked rhino footprints in order to save their jobs.</div>
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Symbiose returned to Cameroon in 2006, conducing 46 field surveys over the course of six months. WWF and the Cameroon Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife also conducted a survey at the same time. The work wasn’t easy. Roads were poorly maintained or nonexistent. Access to vehicles was expensive and unreliable. Armed gangs attacked travelers on many roads. Wherever the researchers traveled they saw evidence of illegal hunting for a wide range of species. Snares were present everywhere, waterholes had been poisoned and the teams frequently found wounded or trapped animals. Even though the area was classified as a national park, they found that poaching pressure in the region was 2.22 times higher than in official trophy-hunting zones.</div>
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Tragically, although the research team heard several anecdotes about lone rhinos living in the area, none of the surveys found any evidence that the western black rhino actually still existed. A paper published in Pachyderm that year concluded that the last members of the subspecies had been poached in or around 2003 and that the western black rhino was probably extinct.</div>
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People kept looking, but no rhinos were ever found. In 2011, with no sightings in a decade, the International Union for Conservation of Nature formally declared that the western black rhino had gone extinct.</div>
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Unfortunately, the western black rhino will not be the last rhino species or subspecies that we lose. The Javan rhino subspecies in Vietnam was also declared extinct in 2011. The northern white rhino is down to its last seven, non-breeding, aged adults. The main Javan rhino species is down to fewer than 50 individuals and the Sumatran rhino has fewer than 200. The remaining three black rhino subspecies as a whole are considered critically endangered (one subspecies is listed as “vulnerable to extinction,” although its population is still quite low). The Indian one-horned rhino and the southern white rhino both enjoy healthier populations, but with poaching levels seemingly increasing almost every day, even they may not last long.</div>
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Will we learn from the lessons of the western black rhino’s extinction? I think it’s possible. Although the species disappeared a decade ago, many people are still just learning that it is gone. In the past week alone dozens, if not hundreds, of media outlets have run articles proclaiming that the western black rhino has gone extinct. Almost all of them mistakenly reported that the extinction happened just this past week—a burst of coverage set off by CNN republishing its two-year-old story with an “updated” date of November 6, 2013. This unleashed a veritable tsunami of sadness for the western black rhino on social media. In some ways it’s good to see so many people express horror that the western black rhino has gone extinct. Maybe, just maybe, that will also lead to people caring about the rhino species that remain, and to take action before they, too, are gone.</div>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-60353994323326736642013-10-12T16:52:00.000-04:002013-10-12T16:52:05.970-04:00Brilliant. Is America the greatest country on earth???<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Summed up nicely. This is how I feel when I see what we've become: a paranoid nation of comfort seekers. We want our country to provide an illusion of security so that we can hide under the blanket of our comfort bathed in that blue glow of televisions, devoid of any of the critical thinking and selfless action of our forefathers.</div>
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<br />Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-53676797954317788292013-09-30T16:34:00.000-04:002013-09-30T16:39:25.311-04:00Americans Work More Than AnyoneAnd we are making less real income. The America of the 1970's was full of promise. The 80's still held dreams. The 90's caused reality to set in and the new millenia has devalued our dollar to the point where it's getting harder and harder to live comfortably.<br />
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This is the beginning folks. America will become the new third world unless we find a way to change it.<br />
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<a href="http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=93364&page=1" target="_blank">SOURCE</a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: small;">Americans Work More Than Anyone</span></h1>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">By Dean Schabner</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">DEAN SCHABNER More From Dean »</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Dean Schabner</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Weekend Manager/Editor</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Americans work more than anyone in the industrialized world.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">More than the English, more than the French, way more than the Germans or Norwegians. Even, recently, more than the Japanese.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And Americans take less vacation, work longer days, and retire later, too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">That much most people agree on. What's harder to pin down is exactly how much Americans are working. It may be more than our industrialized competitors, but is it more than we have ever worked before?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The short answer, according to the government, is that it is only slightly more and not so much that most people should really notice.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show a very gradually rising trend through the 1990s that has only just recently tapered off, hovering somewhere just north of 40 hours weekly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">A Month More a Year?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The long answer is, of course, more complicated. It depends who you ask, and about whom you're asking.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Author Juliet Schor, who wrote the best-selling book The Overworked American in 1992, concluded that in 1990 Americans worked an average of nearly one month more per year than in 1970.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">There are also volumes of surveys that ask people if they're working more than they used to. Generally, people say yes, of course they are. And they also estimate almost 10 more hours a week than the government does.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">A Bunch of Whiners?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Critics pooh-pooh such studies, saying self-estimators are exaggerators, although most of those studies echo the same general trend as governmental figures — a bit of a rise through the '90s with a slight dip recently.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Dissenters to overworked-American theories say it's better to base studies on employers' reports of worker hours, which is what the government does, but that leaves out overtime hours worked by salaried employees.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Critics also point to what they say is a growing number of part-time jobs. How can people be working more if they are not working full-time?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Here's where you have to ask which workers we're really talking about.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Measuring Past the Punch Clock</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">That's what Schor's book tries to do, as well as two recent releases: The White-Collar Sweatshop by Jill Andresky Fraser, and The Working Life by Joanne B. Ciulla.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">All those books have been embraced by a large part of the public that apparently feels harassed by the pressures of the workplace.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The authors all find evidence that many Americans are overstressed and overworked in trends that are not necessarily measured with a punch clock; trends such as road rage, workplace shootings, the rising number of children in day care and increasing demands for after-school activities to occupy children whose parents are too busy or still at work.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">They aren't the only ones finding long hours in at least certain parts of the workforce. According to a Bureau of Labor Statistics report released last year, more than 25 million Americans — 20.5 percent of the total workforce — reported they worked at least 49 hours a week in 1999. Eleven million of those said they worked more than 59 hours a week.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Sweat Under the White Collar</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Who are these people? Fraser, after four years of interviews, concludes they are white-collar workers, who do not punch a clock and whose hours therefore are the most difficult to track.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The other evidence often pointed to that people are not really working as much as they say is the increasing number of part-time jobs. How can people be working more if more people are not working full-time?</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 17px;">But the anecdotal evidence presented by Fraser, Schor and Ciulla — and met by millions of people everyday — is that many Americans feel they are working more than ever.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">An ABCNEWS.com poll released Monday found only 26 percent of Americans feel they work too hard. Although far more feel the opposite, that's still a lot of people and it's twice as many as the 13 percent who told a Harris Poll in 1960 that they felt overworked. And the percentage rises to about a third of people with kids, or people between 35 and 54 years old.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">What Happened to 'The Little Woman'?</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Even for people who are not actually working longer hours than they used to, there's an explanation for why some of them might feel over-burdened anyway, particularly men.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Experts who accept some of the arguments of both sides of the working-longer debate often focus less on individuals' hours worked, instead looking at household hours on the job.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">In Overworked and Underemployed, a study in The American Prospect, Barry Bluestone and Stephen Rose argue that to really understand the situation Americans face, you need to look beyond individuals and numbers.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">The overall figures for how many hours a week the average American works have been held down by the increasing number of part-time service and retail jobs in the economy. But since many of the part-time jobs have been filled by the increasing number of women in the workforce, and many of these women had previously been housewives, there are fewer hours when anyone is taking care of household chores.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Instead of coming home to find the refrigerator and cupboards stocked, dinner ready, the table set, the clothes washed, the house clean and the children entertained, men are coming home and finding they have to chip in, because their wives aren't "the little woman," anymore. They are now sharing duties as breadwinner, which means men have to share household chores. The situation is exaggerated when both spouses work full-time — particularly if they don't earn enough to hire help.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">If people aren't spending quite as many more hours at work as they think they are, the fact that they aren't allowed as much leisure time once they're off work might account for the apparent illusion.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; line-height: 17px;">Authors like Fraser, Schor and Ciullo, though, argue that there is no illusion, and the case made by the harried Americans who fill their books — and fill commuter trains and highways — is hard to discount.</span></div>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-15401159351034601642013-09-14T13:39:00.000-04:002013-09-14T13:39:28.182-04:00Former Presidents Warn About the “Invisible Government” Running the United States<a href="http://www.wakingtimes.com/2013/09/13/former-presidents-warn-about-the-invisible-government-running-united-states/" target="_blank">SOURCE:</a><br />
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<span class="meta-date">September 13, 2013 | </span><span class="meta-author">By <a href="http://www.wakingtimes.com/author/wakingtimes/" rel="author" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Posts by WakingTimes">WakingTimes</a> </span><span class="meta-comments">| <a href="http://www.wakingtimes.com/2013/09/13/former-presidents-warn-about-the-invisible-government-running-united-states/#comments" rel="bookmark" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Comments for Former Presidents Warn About the “Invisible Government” Running the United States">9 Replies</a></span></div>
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Ross Pittman, <em>Guest </em><br />
<a href="http://www.wakingtimes.com/2013/09/13/verified-warnings-former-u-s-presidents-invisible-government-running-u-s-allegiance-people/" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;"><strong>Waking Times</strong></a></div>
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“<em>Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.</em>”- George Santayana</div>
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Past presidents of the United States and other high profile political leaders have repeatedly issued warnings over the last 214 years that the U.S. government is under the control of an “invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.”</div>
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According to six of our former presidents, one vice-president, and a myriad of other <a href="http://www.wakingtimes.com/2013/09/12/maj-gen-smedley-butler-military-industrial-complex-original-whistleblower/" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Major General Smedley Butler – The Military Industrial Complex’s Original Whistleblower">high profile political leaders</a>, an invisible government that is “incredibly evil in intent” has been in control of the U.S. government “ever since the days of Andrew Jackson” (since at least 1836). They “virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes. They practically control both parties… It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection.”</div>
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As a result, “we have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world—no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.”</div>
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The sources for the above quotes (and more) are listed below. All of the quotes in this article have been verified as authentic and have associated links to the source materials. Also included below are statements made by David Rockefeller, Sr, former director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), and Federal Reserve Chairman’s Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke that appear to confirm some of the warnings.</div>
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<strong>Warnings About the Invisible Government Running the U.S.</strong></h3>
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The warnings listed below, which appear in chronological order, began with our first president – George Washington. The last president to speak out was JFK, who was assassinated. Read what they and other political leaders have said about the invisible government.</div>
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George Washington wrote that the Illuminati want to separate the People from their Government</div>
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<em>“It was not my intention to doubt that, the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1439244219/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1439244219&linkCode=as2&tag=wakitime09-20" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><strong>Doctrines of the Illuminati</strong></a>, and principles of Jacobinism had not spread in the United States. On the contrary, no one is more truly satisfied of this fact than I am. The idea that I meant to convey, was, that I did not believe that the Lodges of Free Masons in this Country had, as Societies, endeavoured to propagate the diabolical tenets of the first, or pernicious principles of the latter (if they are susceptible of seperation). </em><strong><em>That Individuals of them may… actually had </em></strong><em><strong>a seperation [sic] of the People from their Government in view, is too evident to be questioned</strong>.” – George Washington, </em>1st President of the United States (1789–1797),<em> from a letter that Washington wrote on October 24, 1798, which </em><a href="http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/mgw:@field%28DOCID+@lit%28gw360395%29%29" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">can be found in the Library of Congress</a><em>. For an analysis of Washington’s warning, see the article “</em><a href="http://consciouslifenews.com/library-congress-confirms-george-washington-aware-nefarious-illuminati/1122149/" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">Library of Congress: George Washington Warns of Illuminati</a><em>”</em></div>
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“I sincerely believe, with you, that <strong>banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies</strong>.” —Thomas Jefferson, 3rd President of the United States (1801–1809) and principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), in a <a href="http://www.britannica.com/presidents/article-9116907" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">letter written to John Taylor on May 28, 1816</a></div>
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“A <strong>power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests</strong>, combined in one mass, and <strong>held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks</strong>.” – John C. Calhoun, Vice President (1825-1832) and U.S. Senator, <a href="http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_C._Calhoun" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">from a speech given on May 27, 1836</a></div>
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Note that it appears that Washington’s and Jefferson’s concerns regarding bankers and separation of the people from the government was realized by 1836. This fact was confirmed in a letter written by FDR in 1933 (see below) in which he wrote that “<strong>a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.</strong>” Jackson was the seventh president of the United States (1829-1937). Calhoun served as Jackson’s vice-president from 1829-1832.</div>
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“Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an <strong>invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people</strong>. <strong>To destroy this invisible government</strong>, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics <strong>is the first task of the statesmanship of the day</strong>.”— Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/146105656X/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=146105656X&linkCode=as2&tag=wakitime09-20" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><em>Theodore Roosevelt, An Autobiography</em></a>, 1913 (Appendix B)</div>
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“<strong>A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit</strong>. Our system of credit is privately concentrated. The growth of the nation, <strong>therefore, and all our activities are in the hands of a few men</strong>… <strong>[W]e have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated, governments in the civilized world</strong>—<strong>no longer a government by free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and the vote of the majority</strong>,<strong> but a government by the opinion and the duress of small groups of dominant men.</strong>” – Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1406564923/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1406564923&linkCode=as2&tag=wakitime09-20" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><em>The New Freedom</em></a>, 1913</div>
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“Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men’s views confided to me privately. <strong>Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it.</strong>” – Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1406564923/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1406564923&linkCode=as2&tag=wakitime09-20" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><em>The New Freedom</em></a>, 1913</div>
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“The real menace of our Republic is the <strong>invisible government</strong>, which like a giant octopus sprawls its slimy legs over our cities, states and nation… The little coterie of powerful international <strong>bankers virtually run the United States government for their own selfish purposes</strong>. They practically <strong>control both parties</strong>, … and <strong>control the majority of the newspapers and magazines in this country</strong>. They use the columns of these papers to club into submission or drive out of office public officials who refuse to do the bidding of the powerful corrupt cliques which compose the invisible government. It operates under cover of a self-created screen [and] <strong>seizes our executive officers, legislative bodies, schools, courts, newspapers and every agency created for the public protection</strong>.” - New York City Mayor John F. Hylan, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Francis_Hylan" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">New York Times, March 26, 1922</a></div>
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“Mr. Chairman, we have in this country one of <strong>the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Banks. </strong>The Federal Reserve Board, a Government board, <strong>has cheated the Government of the United States and the people of the United States out of enough money to pay the national debt…</strong>Mr. Chairman, when the Federal Reserve act was passed, the people of the United States did not perceive that<strong> a world system was being set up here</strong>… and that<strong>this country was to supply financial power to an international superstate</strong> — a superstate controlled by international bankers and international industrialists acting together to<strong>enslave the world for their own pleasure.</strong>” – Congressman Louis T. McFadden, from a speech <a href="http://www.afn.org/~govern/mcfadden_speech_1932.html" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">delivered to the House of Representatives on June 10, 1932</a></div>
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“The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know,<strong> that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson.</strong>” — Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (1933–1945), <a href="http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">in a letter to Colonel Edward M House dated November 21, 1933, as quoted in <em>F.D.R.: His Personal Letters, 1928-1945</em></a>.</div>
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“Today the path to total dictatorship in the U.S. can be laid by strictly legal means… <strong>We have a well-organized political-action group in this country,</strong> <strong>determined to destroy our Constitution</strong> and establish a one-party state…<strong> It operates secretly, silently, continuously to transform our Government</strong>… <strong>This ruthless power-seeking elite is a disease of our century… This group…is answerable neither to the President, the Congress, nor the courts</strong>. It is practically irremovable.” – Senator William Jenner, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_E._Jenner" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">1954 speech</a></div>
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“The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a <strong>conspiracy so</strong> <strong>monstrous</strong> he cannot believe it exists. <strong>The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst.</strong> <strong>It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent.</strong>” —J. Edgar Hoover, <a href="http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/J._Edgar_Hoover" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">The Elks Magazine, 1956</a></div>
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“<strong>The very word “secrecy” is repugnant in a free and open society;</strong> and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to<strong> secret societies,</strong> to secret oaths and to secret proceedings…<strong> Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe…</strong> <strong>no war ever posed a greater threat to our security.</strong> If you are awaiting a finding of “clear and present danger,” then I can only say<strong>that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent…</strong> For <strong>we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence–on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day</strong>.<strong>It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations.</strong> Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. <strong>Its dissenters are silenced, not praised.</strong> No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.” — John F Kennedy, 35th President of the United States, from a speech delivered to the American Newspaper Publishers Association on April 27, 1961 and <a href="http://wakeup-world.com/2011/05/20/jfks-speech-on-secret-societies/" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">known as the “Secret Society” speech (click here for full transcript and audio)</a>.</div>
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“<strong>The Rockefellers and their allies</strong> have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to <strong>use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world</strong>. Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. <strong>I am convinced there is such a plot, international in scope, generations old in planning, and incredibly evil in intent.</strong>” Congressman Larry P. McDonald, November 1975, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1568493681/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1568493681&linkCode=as2&tag=wakitime09-20" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">from the introduction to a book titled <em>The Rockefeller File.</em></a></div>
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“<strong>There exists a shadowy government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself</strong>.” – Daniel K. Inouye, US Senator from Hawaii<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Inouye" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">, testimony at the Iran Contra Hearings, 1986</a></div>
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<strong>The Federal Reserve</strong></h3>
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“<em>A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves</em>…” – John C. Calhoun<strong><br /></strong></div>
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“<em>… owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people.</em>” – Theodore Roosevelt</div>
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“… <em>one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board and the Federal Reserve Bank.</em>“ – Louis T. McFadden</div>
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In an interview with Jim Lehrer that was aired on <a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/business/july-dec07/greenspan_09-18.html" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">PBS’ News Hour on September 18, 2007</a> that you can <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QkmLnNEvdU" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">watch on YouTube</a>, formal Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said, essentially, that the Federal Reserve was above the law and that no agency of government can overrule their actions:</div>
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Jim Lehrer: “What is the proper relationship, what should be the proper relationship between a chairman of the Fed and a president of the United States?”</div>
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<strong>Alan Greenspan:</strong> “Well, first of all, the Federal Reserve is an independent agency, and that means, basically, that <strong>there is no other agency of government which can overrule actions that we take. </strong>So long as that is in place and there is no evidence that the administration or the Congress or anybody else is requesting that we do things other than what we think is the appropriate thing, then <strong>what the relationships are don’t frankly matter.</strong>”</div>
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The fact that the Fed is above the law was demonstrated by current Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke, during his appearance before Congress on March 4, 2009 (<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCWXrMCGJT4" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">as shown in this video</a>). Senator Bernie Sanders asked Bernanke about $2.2 trillion in American tax dollars that was lent out by Federal Reserve. Bernanke refused to provide an answer:</div>
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Senator Sanders: “<strong>Will you tell the American people to whom you lent $2.2 trillion of their dollars?</strong> … Can you tell us who they are?”</div>
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<strong>Bernanke: “No”</strong></div>
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<strong>David Rockefeller and the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)</strong></h3>
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“<em>We have a well-organized political-action group in this country, determined to destroy our Constitution and establish a one-party state</em>…” – William Jenner</div>
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“<em>The Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world</em>.” – Larry P. McDonald</div>
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<a href="http://theunjustmedia.com/Banking%20&%20Federal%20Reserve/The%20Federal%20Reserve%20is%20Privately%20owned.htm" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">In 1921 the stockholders of the Federal Reserve financed an organization called the “Council on Foreign Relations” (CFR)</a>. A full discussion on the CFR is beyond the scope of this article. Suffice it to say that the CFR likely plays a prominent role in the invisible government that we have been warned about. <a href="http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/NWO/Council_Foreign_Relations.htm" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">The CFR is alleged to be the arm of the Ruling Elite in the United States</a>. Most influential politicians, academics and media personalities are members. The CFR uses its influence to push their New World Order agenda on the American people.</div>
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David Rockefeller, Sr is the current patriarch of the Rockefeller family. He is the only surviving grandchild of oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil. Rockefeller began a lifelong association with the CFR when he joined as a director in 1949. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0812969731/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0812969731&linkCode=as2&tag=wakitime09-20" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">In Rockefeller’s 2002 autobiography “Memoirs” he wrote</a>:</div>
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“For more than a century ideological extremists at either end of the political spectrum have seized upon well-publicized incidents such as my encounter with Castro to attack the Rockefeller family for the inordinate influence they claim we wield over American political and economic institutions. <strong>Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as internationalists and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure — one world, if you will. If that’s the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it.”</strong></div>
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James Warburg, son of CFR [Council on Foreign Relations] founder Paul Warburg, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Warburg" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">delivered blunt testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on February 17, 1950</a>:</div>
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“We shall have world government, whether or not we like it. The question is only whether world government will be achieved by consent or by conquest.”</div>
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<strong>Cognitive Dissonance</strong></h3>
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“<em>The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent</em>.” —J. Edgar Hoover</div>
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Because of a deep rooted beliefs that the U.S. government is “for the people” and the protector of the free world, many will reject the notion of an evil shadow government. When our beliefs are challenged or when two beliefs are inconsistent, <a href="http://www.wakingtimes.com/2012/03/02/cognitive-dissonance/" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Cognitive Dissonance">cognitive dissonance</a> is created. It’s human nature to try to hold our beliefs in harmony with our world view and avoid disharmony (or dissonance).</div>
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For those of you who having difficulty believing the information presented in this article, I fully understand. For the first 57 years of my life, I would not have believed in the possibility that a shadow government could exist. Three years ago my world view changed. While on vacation in Mount Shasta, I came across a book titled “Global Conspiracy” that seemed strangely out of place in a metaphysical book store. I had never heard of the author before – some guy named David Icke. I scanned through the book and frankly didn’t believe 99% of what I read. But, I saw one thing that caught my attention in that I knew that I could easily verify Icke’s assertion. I did my own research and turned out what Icke had stated was true. That led me down a rabbit hole and many, many hundreds of hours of independent research.</div>
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So, keep an open mind, do your own research, and use discernment. Beware that there is a ton of disinformation on the internet, much of which is intentionally placed to confuse the public. At a CFR meeting on geoengineering (see the article “<a href="http://consciouslifenews.com/millions-spent-confuse-public-geoengineering/116250/" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Millions Spent to Confuse Public About Geoengineering</a>“), M. Granger Morgan stated (it’s captured on video for you to see and hear for yourself):</div>
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“<em>First of all, of course, <strong>there is a lot of money getting spent to make sure that a very substantial portion of the public stays totally confused about this.</strong> And, I mean, it’s been really quite pernicious. But there’s been literally tens of millions of dollars spent on every little thing that comes along that might, you know, relate to some uncertainty.</em>”</div>
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What Can We Do?</h3>
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“<em>Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has</em>.” – Margaret Mead</div>
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In addition to doing your own research, please spread the word, and get involved. The <a href="http://www.thrivemovement.com/solutions-hub" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Thrive Solutions Hub</a> is an excellent place to join with others who are taking positive action steps expose corruption and to create a world in which we can all thrive. You can watch the full <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEV5AFFcZ-s" style="color: #f06a1d; outline: none; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Thrive movie on YouTube here</a>.</div>
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-11518544606173499632013-09-14T10:56:00.002-04:002013-09-14T10:56:48.926-04:00Facebook for apes:???<h1 style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 1em; margin: 0px; min-height: 1px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;">Something a little less serious in scope, but way more natural.</span></h1>
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<a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2419900/Facebook-apes-Orangutans-plan-day-night-let-friends-know-theyre-to.html?ico=sciencetech^headlines" target="_blank">source</a></h1>
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Facebook for apes: Orangutans plan their day the night before and let their friends know what they're up to </h1>
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<li style="list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 1.4em;"><b>This is done by sending out a long whooping call that can last 4 minutes</b></span></li>
<li style="list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 1.4em;"><b>Scientists believes males do this so females can come along for the trip</b></span></li>
<li style="list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-size: 1.4em;"><b>Research claims that planning and social networking aren't just human traits</b></span></li>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">It's the ape equivalent of Google Maps and Facebook. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">The night before a big trip, Arno the orangutan plots his journey and lets others know where he is going with a long, whooping call. </span><span style="font-size: 1.2em;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">What he and his orangutan friends do in the forests of Sumatra tells scientists that advance trip planning and social networking aren't just human traits.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Scroll down for audio..</span><span style="font-size: 1.2em;">.</span></b></div>
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The night before a big trip, orangutans plot their journey and lets others know where they are going</div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">A new study of 15 wild male orangutans finds that they routinely plot out their next day treks and share their plans in long calls, so females can come by or track them, and competitive males can steer clear.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">The researchers closely followed the males as they traveled on 320 days during the 1990s. The results were published this week in the journal PLoS One. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Typically, an orangutan would turn and face in the direction of his route and let out a whoop, sometimes for as long as four minutes.</span></div>
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AUDIO Male apes tell females when and where 'to meet them'</div>
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Researchers believe the male lets the world know his plans so females can come to him or stay close</div>
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'<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">This guy basically thinks ahead,' Mr van Schaik said. 'They're continuously updating their Google Maps so to speak. Based on that, they're planning what to do next.'</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">The apes didn't just call once, but they keep at it, calling more than 1,100 times over the 320 days. </span><span style="font-size: 1.2em;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">'This shows they are very much like us in this respect,' Mr van Schaik said. 'Our earliest hominid ancestor must have done the same thing.'</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Scientists had seen such planning in zoos and controlled experiments, but this study provides solid evidence of travel planning in the wild, said Frans de Waal of Atlanta's Emory University, who was not part of the study. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Mr Van Schaik said he and colleagues happened upon the trip calls by accident nearly 20 years ago, first with the dominant male Arno, who they followed more than the other 14 males. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">They waited to publish the results because he thought few people would believe orangutans could do such planning. But in recent years, the lab and captivity studies have all shown such planning. </span><span style="font-size: 1.2em;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Based on previous studies and monitoring, Mr van Schaik figured the male lets the world know his plans so females can come to him or stay close. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 1.2em;">Some females may want to stay within earshot in case they are harassed by other males and need protection. Others can come to mate.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 10px;"><br /><br />Read more: <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2419900/Facebook-apes-Orangutans-plan-day-night-let-friends-know-theyre-to.html#ixzz2esZJe7vf" style="color: #003399; cursor: pointer; margin: 0px; min-height: 1px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;">http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2419900/Facebook-apes-Orangutans-plan-day-night-let-friends-know-theyre-to.html#ixzz2esZJe7vf</a><br />Follow us: <a href="http://ec.tynt.com/b/rw?id=bBOTTqvd0r3Pooab7jrHcU&u=MailOnline" style="color: #003580; cursor: pointer; margin: 0px; min-height: 1px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">@MailOnline on Twitter</a> | <a href="http://ec.tynt.com/b/rf?id=bBOTTqvd0r3Pooab7jrHcU&u=DailyMail" style="color: #003580; cursor: pointer; margin: 0px; min-height: 1px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">DailyMail on Facebook</a></span>Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-2381609417468034882013-09-02T13:01:00.002-04:002013-09-02T13:01:34.138-04:00Hindu ParableThis parable speaks greatly to me. As I generally become more and more quiet during an argument. When we shout, we push others away. When we speak quietly, we challenge them to hear our words and see our motives.<br />
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<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>WHY WE SHOUT IN ANGER MUST READ</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>A Hindu saint who was visiting river Ganges to take bath found a group of family members on the banks, shouting in anger at each other. He turned to his disciples smiled and asked.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>'Why do people shout in anger at each other?'</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>Disciples thought for a while, one of them said, 'Because we lose our calm, we shout.' </i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>'But, why should you shout when the other person is just next to you? You can as well tell him what you have to say in a soft manner.' asked the saint</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>Disciples gave some other answers but none satisfied the other disciples.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>Finally the saint explained…</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>'When two people are angry at each other, their hearts are distant. To cover that distance they must shout to be able to hear each other. The angrier they are, the stronger they will have to shout to hear each other to cover that great distance. </i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>What happens when two people fall in love? They don't shout at each other but talk softly, because their hearts are very close. The distance between them is either nonexistent or very small'</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>The saint continued, 'When they love each other even more, what happens? They do not speak, only whisper and they get even closer to each other in their love. Finally they even need not whisper, they only look at each other and that's all. That is how close two people are when they love each other.'</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>He looked at his disciples and said.</i></span></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i><br /></i></span></span>
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><span class="text_exposed_show" style="background-color: white; display: inline; line-height: 14px;"></span></i></span><br />
<span style="color: grey; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="line-height: 14px;"><i>'So when you argue do not let your hearts get distant, Do not say words that distance each other more, Or else there will come a day when the distance is so great that you will not find the path to return.’</i></span></span><br />
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-68326356631295404902013-08-17T12:25:00.000-04:002013-08-17T12:25:17.025-04:00the horses ass....important or not?(not my work but it's a fun tale to share and it's not really serious)<br />
<br />
This is Quite Interesting<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread965224/pg1" target="_blank">source</a><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Railroad tracks.<br />
The US standard railroad gauge<br />
(distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number.<br />
Why was that gauge used?<br />
Because that's the way they built them in Scotland,<br />
and Scottish expatriates designed the US railroads.<br />
<br />
Why did the Scottish build them like that?<br />
Because the first rail lines were built by the<br />
same people who built the pre-railroad<br />
tramways, and that's the gauge they used.<br />
<br />
Why did 'they' use that gauge then ?<br />
Because the people who built the tramways<br />
used the same jigs and tools that they had used for building wagons, which used that same<br />
wheel spacing.<br />
<br />
<br />
Why did the wagons have<br />
that particular odd wheel spacing ? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing,<br />
the wagon wheels would break on the old, long distance roads in Scotland because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.<br />
<br />
<br />
So who built those old rutted roads?<br />
Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads<br />
in Europe (including Scotland ) for their legions.<br />
Those roads have been used ever since.<br />
<br />
And the ruts in the roads?<br />
Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts,<br />
Which everyone else had to match<br />
for fear of destroying their wagon wheels..<br />
<br />
Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome ,<br />
they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.<br />
Therefore the United States standard railroad gauge<br />
of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot.Bureaucracies live forever....<br />
<br />
So the next time you are handed a specification/procedure/process and wonder,<br />
'What horse's ass came up with this?', you may be right.<br />
<br />
Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses.<br />
Now, the twist to the story:<br />
<br />
When you used to see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there were two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank.<br />
These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs.<br />
The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah .<br />
<br />
The engineers who designed the SRBs<br />
would have preferred to make them a bit<br />
fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped<br />
By train from the factory to the launch site.<br />
The railroad line from the factory happens<br />
to run through a tunnel in the mountains,<br />
and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel.<br />
The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track,<br />
and the railroad track, as you now know,<br />
is about as wide as two horses' behinds.<br />
<br />
<br />
So, a major Space Shuttle design feature<br />
of what was arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of two horses' asses.<br />
And you thought being a horse's ass wasn't important!<br />
Ancient horses' asses control almost everything...<br />
And current Horses' Asses in government<br />
are controlling everything else.<br />
AND HERE ENDETH THE LESSON!<br />
<br />
Well I thought I t was interesting....Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-71556685030835979162013-08-09T16:09:00.001-04:002013-08-09T16:09:05.403-04:00Another casualty in the war for the ConstitutionAnother casualty in the war for the Constitution...<br />
<br />
I applaud you Lavabit. Respect.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://lavabit.com/" target="_blank">source</a><br />
<br />
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 20px; width: 605px;">
My Fellow Users,</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 20px; width: 605px;">
I have been forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or walk away from nearly ten years of hard work by shutting down Lavabit. After significant soul searching, I have decided to suspend operations. I wish that I could legally share with you the events that led to my decision. I cannot. I feel you deserve to know what’s going on--the first amendment is supposed to guarantee me the freedom to speak out in situations like this. Unfortunately, Congress has passed laws that say otherwise. As things currently stand, I cannot share my experiences over the last six weeks, even though I have twice made the appropriate requests.</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 20px; width: 605px;">
What’s going to happen now? We’ve already started preparing the paperwork needed to continue to fight for the Constitution in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. A favorable decision would allow me resurrect Lavabit as an American company.</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 20px; width: 605px;">
This experience has taught me one very important lesson: without congressional action or a strong judicial precedent, I would _strongly_ recommend against anyone trusting their private data to a company with physical ties to the United States.</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 20px; width: 605px;">
Sincerely,<br />Ladar Levison<br />Owner and Operator, Lavabit LLC</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; margin-bottom: 20px; width: 605px;">
Defending the constitution is expensive! Help us by donating to the Lavabit Legal Defense Fund <a href="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=7BCR4A5W9PNN4" style="color: red;">here</a>.</div>
Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-58721427178786126632013-08-07T16:48:00.005-04:002013-08-07T16:48:56.274-04:00We're living '1984' todayThis editorial sums up the American Experience quite well, at least in this present day. (And who thought I'd ever agree with CNN?)<br />
<br />
<h1 style="border: 0px; font-family: arial; font-size: 30px; line-height: 33px; margin: 15px 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; width: 600px;">
We're living '1984' today</h1>
<br />
<div class="cnnByline" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #666666; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, Utkal, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
By <strong style="color: black; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Lewis Beale,</strong> Special to CNN</div>
<div class="cnn_strytmstmp" style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #666666; font-family: arial; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; margin: 0px; padding: 1px 0px 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
updated 9:22 AM EDT, Sat August 3, 2013</div>
<a href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/03/opinion/beale-1984-now/index.html?iid=article_sidebar" target="_blank">SOURCE:</a><br />
<br />
<br />
Editor's note: Lewis Beale writes about culture and film for the Los Angeles Times, Newsday and other publications.<br />
(CNN) -- It appears that the police now have a device that can read license plates and check if a car is unregistered, uninsured or stolen. We already know that the National Security Agency can dip into your Facebook page and Google searches. And it seems that almost every store we go into these days wants your home phone number and ZIP code as part of any transaction.<br />
So when Edward Snowden -- now cooling his heels in Russia -- revealed the extent to which the NSA is spying on Americans, collecting data on phone calls we make, it's not as if we should have been surprised. We live in a world that George Orwell predicted in "1984." And that realization has caused sales of the 1949, dystopian novel to spike dramatically upward recently -- a 9,000% increase at one point on Amazon.com.<br />
Comparisons between Orwell's novel about a tightly controlled totalitarian future ruled by the ubiquitous Big Brother and today are, in fact, quite apt. Here are a few of the most obvious ones.<br />
Lewis Beale<br />
Lewis Beale<br />
Telescreens -- in the novel, nearly all public and private places have large TV screens that broadcast government propaganda, news and approved entertainment. But they are also two-way monitors that spy on citizens' private lives. Today websites like Facebook track our likes and dislikes, and governments and private individuals hack into our computers and find out what they want to know. Then there are the ever-present surveillance cameras that spy on the average person as they go about their daily routine.<br />
The endless war -- In Orwell's book, there's a global war that has been going on seemingly forever, and as the book's hero, Winston Smith, realizes, the enemy keeps changing. One week we're at war with Eastasia and buddies with Eurasia. The next week, it's just the opposite. There seems little to distinguish the two adversaries, and they are used primarily to keep the populace of Oceania, where Smith lives, in a constant state of fear, thereby making dissent unthinkable -- or punishable. Today we have the so-called war on terror, with no end in sight, a generalized societal fear, suspension of certain civil liberties, and an ill-defined enemy who could be anywhere, and anything.<br />
Doublethink -- Orwell's novel defines this as the act of accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct. It was exemplified by some of the key slogans used by the repressive government in the book: War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength. It has also been particularly useful to the activists who have been hard at work introducing legislation regulating abortion clinics. The claim is that these laws are only to protect women's health, but by forcing clinics to close because of stringent regulations, they are effectively shutting women off not only from abortion, but other health services.<br />
Snowden documents: U.S. spied on EU Bush vs. Obama on surveillance Police are tracking where you drive Brok: NSA's spying on EU 'out of control'<br />
Newspeak -- the fictional, stripped down English language, used to limit free thought. OMG, RU serious? That's so FUBAR. LMAO.<br />
Memory hole -- this is the machine used in the book to alter or disappear incriminating or embarrassing documents. Paper shredders had been invented, but were hardly used when Orwell wrote his book, and the concept of wiping out a hard drive was years in the future. But the memory hole foretold both technologies.<br />
Anti-Sex League -- this was an organization set up to take the pleasure out of sex, and to make sure that it was a mechanical function used for procreation only. Organizations that promote abstinence-only sex education, or want to ban artificial birth control, are the modern versions of this.<br />
So what's it all mean? In 1984, Winston Smith, after an intense round of "behavior modification" -- read: torture -- learns to love Big Brother, and the harsh world he was born into. Jump forward to today, and it seems we've willingly given up all sorts of freedoms, and much of our right to privacy. Fears of terrorism have a lot to do with this, but dizzying advances in technology, and the ubiquity of social media, play a big part.<br />
There are those who say that if you don't have anything to hide, you have nothing to be afraid of. But the fact is, when a government agency can monitor everyone's phone calls, we have all become suspects. This is one of the most frightening aspects of our modern society. And even more frightening is the fact that we have gone so far down the road, there is probably no turning back. Unless you spend your life in a wilderness cabin, totally off the grid, there is simply no way the government won't have information about you stored away somewhere.<br />
What this means, unfortunately, is that we are all Winston Smith. And Big Brother is the modern surveillance state.Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7599973.post-2591458796243377422013-07-31T15:59:00.002-04:002013-07-31T15:59:28.239-04:00Edward Snowden and Reason...A letter has recently been published which I think we would all do well to read. History is written by the victors, and we should all do well to help Reason be not defeated.<br />
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<a href="http://www.activistpost.com/2013/07/snowdens-dad-schools-obama-pelosi-and.html" target="_blank">SOURCE</a><br />
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-QUOTE-<br />
Snowden's Dad SCHOOLS Obama, Pelosi, and Holder in Open Letter<br />
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Dees Illustration<br />
Activist Post<br />
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Re: Civil Disobedience, Edward J. Snowden, and the Constitution<br />
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Dear Mr. President:<br />
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You are acutely aware that the history of liberty is a history of civil disobedience to unjust laws or practices. As Edmund Burke sermonized, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”<br />
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Civil disobedience is not the first, but the last option. Henry David Thoreau wrote with profound restraint in Civil Disobedience: “If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go: perchance it will wear smooth certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter friction to stop the machine.”<br />
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Thoreau’s moral philosophy found expression during the Nuremburg trials in which “following orders” was rejected as a defense. Indeed, military law requires disobedience to clearly illegal orders.<br />
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A dark chapter in America’s World War II history would not have been written if the then United States Attorney General had resigned rather than participate in racist concentration camps imprisoning 120,000 Japanese American citizens and resident aliens.<br />
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Civil disobedience to the Fugitive Slave Act and Jim Crow laws provoked the end of slavery and the modern civil rights revolution.<br />
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We submit that Edward J. Snowden’s disclosures of dragnet surveillance of Americans under § 215 of the Patriot Act, § 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Amendments, or otherwise were sanctioned by Thoreau’s time-honored moral philosophy and justifications for civil disobedience. Since 2005, Mr. Snowden had been employed by the intelligence community. He found himself complicit in secret, indiscriminate spying on millions of innocent citizens contrary to the spirit if not the letter of the First and Fourth Amendments and the transparency indispensable to self-government. Members of Congress entrusted with oversight remained silent or Delphic. Mr. Snowden confronted a choice between civic duty and passivity. He may have recalled the injunction of Martin Luther King, Jr.: “He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it.” Mr. Snowden chose duty. Your administration vindictively responded with a criminal complaint alleging violations of the Espionage Act.<br />
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From the commencement of your administration, your secrecy of the National Security Agency’s Orwellian surveillance programs had frustrated a national conversation over their legality, necessity, or morality. That secrecy (combined with congressional nonfeasance) provoked Edward’s disclosures, which sparked a national conversation which you have belatedly and cynically embraced. Legislation has been introduced in both the House of Representatives and Senate to curtail or terminate the NSA’s programs, and the American people are being educated to the public policy choices at hand. A commanding majority now voice concerns over the dragnet surveillance of Americans that Edward exposed and you concealed. It seems mystifying to us that you are prosecuting Edward for accomplishing what you have said urgently needed to be done!<br />
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The right to be left alone from government snooping–the most cherished right among civilized people—is the cornerstone of liberty. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson served as Chief Prosecutor at Nuremburg. He came to learn of the dynamics of the Third Reich that crushed a free society, and which have lessons for the United States today.<br />
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Writing in Brinegar v. United States, Justice Jackson elaborated:<br />
The Fourth Amendment states: “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”<br />
These, I protest, are not mere second-class rights but belong in the catalog of indispensable freedoms. Among deprivations of rights, none is so effective in cowing a population, crushing the spirit of the individual and putting terror in every heart. Uncontrolled search and seizure is one of the first and most effective weapons in the arsenal of every arbitrary government. And one need only briefly to have dwelt and worked among a people possessed of many admirable qualities but deprived of these rights to know that the human personality deteriorates and dignity and self-reliance disappear where homes, persons and possessions are subject at any hour to unheralded search and seizure by the police.<br />
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We thus find your administration’s zeal to punish Mr. Snowden’s discharge of civic duty to protect democratic processes and to safeguard liberty to be unconscionable and indefensible.<br />
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We are also appalled at your administration’s scorn for due process, the rule of law, fairness, and the presumption of innocence as regards Edward.<br />
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On June 27, 2013, Mr. Fein wrote a letter to the Attorney General stating that Edward’s father was substantially convinced that he would return to the United States to confront the charges that have been lodged against him if three cornerstones of due process were guaranteed. The letter was not an ultimatum, but an invitation to discuss fair trial imperatives. The Attorney General has sneered at the overture with studied silence.<br />
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We thus suspect your administration wishes to avoid a trial because of constitutional doubts about application of the Espionage Act in these circumstances, and obligations to disclose to the public potentially embarrassing classified information under the Classified Information Procedures Act.<br />
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Your decision to force down a civilian airliner carrying Bolivian President Eva Morales in hopes of kidnapping Edward also does not inspire confidence that you are committed to providing him a fair trial. Neither does your refusal to remind the American people and prominent Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate like House Speaker John Boehner, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, Congresswoman Michele Bachmann,and Senator Dianne Feinstein that Edward enjoys a presumption of innocence. He should not be convicted before trial. Yet Speaker Boehner has denounced Edward as a “traitor.”<br />
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Ms. Pelosi has pontificated that Edward “did violate the law in terms of releasing those documents.” Ms. Bachmann has pronounced that, “This was not the act of a patriot; this was an act of a traitor.” And Ms. Feinstein has decreed that Edward was guilty of “treason,” which is defined in Article III of the Constitution as “levying war” against the United States, “or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort.”<br />
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You have let those quadruple affronts to due process pass unrebuked, while you have disparaged Edward as a “hacker” to cast aspersion on his motivations and talents. Have you forgotten the Supreme Court’s gospel in Berger v. United States that the interests of the government “in a criminal prosecution is not that it shall win a case, but that justice shall be done?”<br />
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We also find reprehensible your administration’s Espionage Act prosecution of Edward for disclosures indistinguishable from those which routinely find their way into the public domain via your high level appointees for partisan political advantage. Classified details of your predator drone protocols, for instance, were shared with the New York Times with impunity to bolster your national security credentials. Justice Jackson observed in Railway Express Agency, Inc. v. New York: “The framers of the Constitution knew, and we should not forget today, that there is no more effective practical guaranty against arbitrary and unreasonable government than to require that the principles of law which officials would impose upon a minority must be imposed generally.”<br />
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In light of the circumstances amplified above, we urge you to order the Attorney General to move to dismiss the outstanding criminal complaint against Edward, and to support legislation to remedy the NSA surveillance abuses he revealed. Such presidential directives would mark your finest constitutional and moral hour.<br />
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Sincerely,<br />
Bruce Fein<br />
Counsel for Lon Snowden<br />
Lon Snowden<br />
<br />
Bruce Fein & Associates, Inc.<br />
722 12th Street, N.W., 4th Floor<br />
Washington, D.C. 20005<br />
Phone: 703-963-4968<br />
bruce@thelichfieldgroup.com<br />
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Edsterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04752444244696970298noreply@blogger.com0