Failed Energy Standards, Record Poverty Numbers, CIA Recruited War Criminals
Revealing News Articles
March 3, 2007
Dear friends,
Below are key excerpts of important news articles you may have missed. These articles include revealing information on failed U.S. energy standards, record poverty numbers, CIA recruited war criminals, and more. Each excerpt is taken verbatim from the major media website listed at the link provided. If any link fails to function, click here. Key sentences are highlighted for those with limited time. By choosing to educate ourselves and to spread the word, we can and will build a brighter future.
With best wishes,
Fred Burks for PEERS and WantToKnow.info
Former language interpreter for Presidents Bush and Clinton
Feds miss energy standards by up to 15 years
March 1, 2007, MSNBC/Associated Press
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17403743
The government for decades has failed to meet legal deadlines for tougher energy efficiency standards for appliances and other equipment, costing consumers and industry tens of billions of dollars in electric costs, a congressional study said Thursday. The Government Accountability Office reported that over several decades the Energy Department has "missed all 34 congressional deadlines for setting efficiency standards," with delays ranging from several months to as long as 15 years. The standards approved by Congress seek to reduce energy use from a broad range of products from refrigerators and home heating systems to electricity grid transformers and electric motors in factories. If the deadlines had been met on only four widely used consumer products - refrigerators, freezers, central air conditioners and heat pumps - consumers would have saved $28 billion in accumulated energy costs by 2030 - because more energy efficient products would have been on the market sooner. Andy Karsner, the department's assistant secretary in charge of energy efficiency programs, acknowledged the department has had "a simply abysmal" record on meeting efficiency standard deadlines set by Congress.
Note: Could it be that the powerful energy lobby didn't want these policies instituted? For more, click here.
Bird flu vaccine recommended
February 28, 2007, Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-birdflu28feb28,1,4548749.story
A federal advisory committee on Tuesday recommended approval of the first bird flu vaccine for humans, despite concerns about its safety and evidence that the shots won't protect most people. The panel said although the vaccine had significant shortcomings, it was safe and effective for use during a pandemic or in high-risk situations, such as military deployment to regions facing an outbreak. The government plans to buy and stockpile enough doses for 20 million people. [The] director of the FDA's vaccine office told the panel that the vaccine was a stopgap measure. "There are numerous vaccines under development that are potentially better than this one," he said. The bird flu strain known as H5N1 originated in Asia. Although it rarely infects people, experts fear a mutation could make it easily transmissible, triggering a pandemic. From the start of 2003, 167 people, mostly in Asia, have died of the virus, according to the World Health Organization. In clinical trials, a two-shot series of the Sanofi vaccine provided protection in 45% of adults who received the highest dose, according to an FDA analysis this week. No serious side effects were detected among the 450 healthy adults who participated in a clinical test. However, some panel members were concerned that the trial was too small to reveal rare side effects. Some experts also worried about possible allergic reactions to the vaccine because it requires a massive dose – 12 times that of the seasonal inoculation.
Note: Who pays for and who profits from the purchase of these 20 million vaccine doses? It's pretty clear that the taxpayer covers the costs and the big drug companies make huge profits. Fear is quite useful for driving up profits. For lots more on profiteering from the avian flu, click here.
US generals 'will quit' if Bush orders Iran attack
February 25, 2007, London Times
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article1434540.ece
Some of America's most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defence and intelligence sources. Tension in the Gulf region has raised fears that an attack on Iran is becoming increasingly likely. Up to five generals and admirals are willing to resign rather than approve what they consider would be a reckless attack. A generals' revolt on such a scale would be unprecedented. Robert Gates, the defence secretary, has repeatedly warned against striking Iran and is believed to represent the view of his senior commanders. The threat of a wave of resignations coincided with a warning by Vice-President Dick Cheney that all options, including military action, remained on the table. He was responding to a comment by Tony Blair that it would not "be right to take military action against Iran". A second US navy aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS John C Stennis arrived in the Gulf last week. Vice Admiral Patrick Walsh, the commander of the US Fifth Fleet, warned: "The US will take military action if ships are attacked or if countries in the region are targeted or US troops come under direct attack." But General Peter Pace, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said recently there was "zero chance" of a war with Iran. He played down claims by US intelligence that the Iranian government was responsible for supplying insurgents in Iraq, forcing Bush on the defensive. Pace's view was backed up by British intelligence officials who said the extent of the Iranian government's involvement in activities inside Iraq by a small number of Revolutionary Guards was "far from clear".
Note: When internal fighting in the military and government is reported in the major media, it is a sign of very deep internal schisms. Yet the ships are in place for another "Gulf of Tonkin" incident.
Intrigue persists over lights in sky
February 25, 2007, Arizona Republic (leading newspaper of Phoenix)
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/0225phxlights0225.html
On a mild springlike evening the string of amber orbs appeared ... that would in the coming weeks make headlines and video highlights across the nation. The hovering and evenly spaced balls of light would soon become known as the Phoenix Lights, an event that 10 years later continues to spark debate over just what was seen that night. In the ensuing decade, the Phoenix Lights would change outlooks, minds and even a few lives. What she was seeing had barely registered when Lynne Kitei raced inside to fetch her video camera. Lights, six of them, evenly spaced in a direct line. By the time she was back on her patio, only three lights continued to shine. She pressed "Record," and those several seconds of tape would become one of the seminal recordings of the Phoenix Lights to be shown on the news, TV specials and, several years later, her own documentary. In the decade since that night Kitei, a respected physician, has resigned from her position at the Arizona Heart Institute to devote herself full time to talk about, and further investigate, the Phoenix Lights. For seven years she spent nearly all her spare time trying to answer the question that plagued her: What were those orbs, and what did they want? She finished with 750 pages of notes detailing her interviews with witnesses, experts and UFO investigators. She condensed her notes into a 222-page book, The Phoenix Lights, where she revealed her findings. Kitei ... said she still receives e-mails from fans of her book and her documentary, The Phoenix Lights . . . We Are Not Alone. She takes no offense at those who call her efforts a waste of time. "That's OK if it gives them comfort. Everyone in their own time."
Note: For Dr. Kitei's website on this (including video clip), click here. For the work of Dr. Steven M. Greer, another prominent physician who risked his life and career to expose a major cover-up of UFOs, click here. You will likely be amazed at some of the top witnesses who publicly testify to the cover-up at this link.
CIA Recruited Japanese War Criminals
February 24, 2007, Washington Post/Associated Press
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/24/AR2007022400539.html
Col. Masanobu Tsuji was a fanatical Japanese militarist and brutal warrior, hunted after World War II for massacres of Chinese civilians. And then he became a U.S. spy. Newly declassified CIA records ... document more fully than ever how Tsuji and other suspected Japanese war criminals were recruited by U.S. intelligence in the early days of the Cold War. The records [were] declassified in 2005 and 2006 under an act of Congress in tandem with Nazi war crime-related files. In addition to Tsuji ... conspicuous figures in U.S.-funded operations included [a] mob boss and war profiteer [and] former private secretary to Hideki Tojo, the wartime prime minister hanged as a war criminal in 1948. The assessments ... show evidence that other U.S. agencies, such as the Air Force, were also looking into using some of the same people as spies, and that the CIA itself had contacts with former Japanese war criminals. Historians long ago concluded that the Allies turned a blind eye to many Japanese war crimes, particularly those committed against other Asians. Some of Japan's most notorious wartime killers [came] under U.S. sponsorship. Tsuji, for instance, was wanted for involvement in the Bataan Death March of early 1942, in which thousands of Americans and Filipinos perished. The U.S. Air Force attempted unsuccessfully to recruit him after he was taken off the war crimes list in 1949. The Army considered him a potentially valuable source. [Yet] a CIA assessment from 1954 ... says: "Tsuji is the type of man who, given the chance, would start World War III without any misgivings."
Note: Those who claimed the U.S. government had links to former Nazi and Japanese war criminals were once called "conspiracy theorists." Why does it take over 50 years for the truth to come out? For more, click here.
Report: In U.S., record numbers are plunged into poverty
February 23, 2007, USA Today/AFP
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-02-25-us-poverty_x.htm
The gulf between rich and poor in the United States is yawning wider than ever, and the number of extremely impoverished is at a three-decade high. Based on the latest available U.S. census data from 2005, [a] McClatchy Newspapers analysis found that almost 16 million Americans live in "deep or severe poverty" defined as a family of four with two children earning less than 9,903 dollars – one half the federal poverty line figure. For individuals the "deep poverty" threshold was an income under 5,080 dollars a year. The number of severely poor Americans grew by 26% from 2000 to 2005. The surge in poverty comes alongside an unusual economic expansion. "Worker productivity has increased dramatically since the brief recession of 2001, but wages and job growth have lagged behind. At the same time, the share of national income going to corporate profits has dwarfed the amount going to wages and salaries. That helps explain why the median household income for working-age families, adjusted for inflation, has fallen for five straight years. These and other factors have helped push 43% of the nation's 37 million poor people into deep poverty – the highest rate since at least 1975," the report said. Since 2000, the number of severely poor – far below basic poverty terms – in the United States has grown "more than any other segment of the population. That was the exact opposite of what we anticipated when we began," said Steven Woolf of Virginia Commonwealth University, a study co-author. U.S. social programs are minimal compared to those of western Europe and Canada.
Going to Canada? Check your past
February 23, 2007, San Francisco Chronicle (San Francisco's leading newspaper)
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/02/23/MNGCAO9NSB1.DTL
Welcome to the new world of border security. Unsuspecting Americans are turning up at the Canadian border expecting clear sailing, only to find that their past -- sometimes their distant past -- is suddenly an issue. There was a time not long ago when a trip across the border from the United States to Canada was accomplished with a wink and a wave of a driver's license. Those days are over. Take the case of 55-year-old Lake Tahoe resident Greg Felsch. Stopped at the border in Vancouver this month at the start of a planned five-day ski trip, he was sent back to the United States because of a DUI conviction seven years ago. Not that he had any idea what was going on when he was told at customs: "Your next stop is immigration." Felsch was ushered into a room. "There must have been 75 people in line," he says. "We were there for three hours. One woman was in tears. A guy was sent back for having a medical marijuana card. I felt like a felon with an ankle bracelet." Or ask the well-to-do East Bay couple who flew to British Columbia this month for an eight-day ski vacation at the famed Whistler Chateau, where rooms run to $500 a night. They'd made the trip many times, but were surprised at the border to be told that the husband would have to report to "secondary" immigration. There, in a room he estimates was filled with 60 other concerned travelers, he was told he was "a person who was inadmissible to Canada." The problem? A conviction for marijuana possession ... in 1975. This is just the beginning. Soon other nations will be able to look into your past when you want to travel there.
Green limo line at Oscars gets longer and sexier
February 21, 2007, Washington Post/Reuters
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/21/AR2007022102144.html
From a plug-in hybrid car to the sexy electric Tesla Roadster, celebrities wanting to make a green statement on the way to the red carpet of the Oscars will have plenty of environment-friendly rides. Global Green USA has lined up 30 cars to shuttle the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio and Davis Guggenheim, director of the Oscar-nominated documentary on global warming "An Inconvenient Truth," to the star-studded ceremony in Hollywood. The environmental group began the green limousine campaign five years ago at the Oscars to raise awareness among the tens of millions of viewers worldwide about alternative fuel cars, energy independence and solutions to global warming. On a Hollywood parking lot ahead of Wednesday's Global Green USA celebrity party, Steve Schneider showed off his tiny $10,000 ZAP (Zero Air Pollution) cars made in California. One was a mini pick-up and the other a three-wheeler. "It is the first time that common people can be introduced to this type of technology," said Schneider. "We are trying to have mass appeal. This vehicle operates at a cost of a penny a mile." But it is the two-seat, scarlet-colored prototype of the Tesla Roadster, invented and financed in Silicon Valley, that will be the coveted car pulling up to the red carpet. Already 330 celebrities, including George Clooney, have signed up to buy the electric car that goes from 0 to 60 mph (0 to 100 kph) in four seconds. Production will begin later this year and the base price is $92,000, although the company also is working on a sedan that will cost between $50,000 and $65,000.
Note: Why has the media given so little attention to these breakthrough vehicles? For an answer, click here.
Older Article Of Key Importance
U.S. Military Wanted to Provoke War With Cuba
May 1, 2001, ABC News
http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92662
In the early 1960s, America's top military leaders reportedly drafted plans to kill innocent people and commit acts of terrorism in U.S. cities to create public support for a war against Cuba. Code named Operation Northwoods, the plans reportedly included the possible assassination of Cuban émigrés, sinking boats of Cuban refugees on the high seas, hijacking planes, blowing up a U.S. ship, and even orchestrating violent terrorism in U.S. cities. The plans were developed as ways to trick the American public and the international community into supporting a war to oust Cuba' s... Fidel Castro. America's top military brass even contemplated causing U.S. military casualties, writing: "We could blow up a U.S. ship in Guantanamo Bay and blame Cuba," and, "casualty lists in U.S. newspapers would cause a helpful wave of national indignation." The plans had the written approval of all of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and were presented to President Kennedy's defense secretary, Robert McNamara, in March 1962. But they apparently were rejected by the civilian leadership and have gone undisclosed for nearly 40 years. The Joint Chiefs even proposed using the potential death of astronaut John Glenn during the first attempt to put an American into orbit as a false pretext for war with Cuba. Should the rocket explode and kill Glenn, they wrote, "the objective is to provide irrevocable proof ... that the fault lies with the Communists." The scary thing is none of this stuff comes out until 40 years after.
Note: Many military and political leaders tend to look at the world as a chess board. Sacrificing pawns (innocent civilians) is sometimes necessary to capture the queen. Is it beyond comprehension that this might have been the case with 9/11? And why was ABC the only major news source to report this highly revealing story? To read the shocking declassified documents, click here.
Special Note: For those who are not aware of the major cover-up around the 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City, I highly recommend watching the four-minute video-clip showing live media coverage of the bombing available here. The official story is that one truck with a huge bomb was parked in front of the building and only Timothy McVeigh and his partner were involved. The news footage proves that others must have been involved, as other unexploded bombs were recovered from points inside the building. And for a five-minute CNN clip of Seymour Hersh showing incredibly manipulation of funds by the current administration, click here. For an eight-minute news clips on ingenious cars that run on compressed air, click here.
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Failed Energy Standards, Record Poverty Numbers, CIA Recruited War Criminals
