Iran Promises to Destroy 35 U.S. Bases if Attacked

The New American
July 5, 2012

The commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force declared Wednesday that the IRGC has prepared comprehensive contingency plans to attack 35 American military bases in the region “within minutes” of an American military strike on his country.

"We have thought of measures to set up bases and deploy missiles to destroy all these bases in the early minutes after an attack," said Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh.

Hajizadeh said the 35 American bases were within range of Iran's ballistic missile arsenal, the most advanced of which can reportedly hit targets 1,300 miles away.

This figure is important because the United States and its allies maintain several operational military bases in the region, including the home of the Navy's 5th Fleet in Bahrain, a site only about 120 miles from Iran's southern border.

Another base used by the United States is located at the United Arab Emirates' al-Dafra air base, located less than 200 miles from the southern coast of Iran.

In April, the al-Dafra base received a shipment of multiple American F-22 stealth fighters. At the time of the delivery a U.S. Air Force spokesman assured the press that the deployment of these jets should not be interpreted as a threat to Iran.

A report published by ABC News, however, casts doubt on that comment. In April 2011 an official at Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer of the F-22, told ABC News “that the planes — which have never been used in combat — could find a home in quick strike missions in countries like Iran or North Korea.”

In light of all this, Hajizadeh’s promise of swift retribution for an American attack is perhaps predictable. So are similar statements made by a member of the Iranian Parliament.

Mansour Haqiqatpour, a member of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, echoed the military commander’s sentiments, saying, “The Islamic Revolution Guard Corps and the Iranian Army’s missiles can target and destroy any threatening target in the region,” according to a statement published by the Iranian Fars News Service.

It’s not just American concerns that will come under Iranian missile fire should the United States attack, however. In his statement, General Hajizadeh said that “the occupied [Palestinian] lands [Israel] are good targets for us as well."

Meanwhile, Haqiqatpour also included Israel in the threat, informing the Fars News Service that Iran keeps close tabs on activity at American bases in the Middle East and that the “slightest mistake [on their part] will cause them and their regional allies regret.”

“They will definitely incur losses,” he warned.

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DOT Construction Signs Hacked To Read 'Impeach Obama'

KTUU.com
July 05, 2012

By Todd Walker  Channel 2 News

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Several electronic road construction signs around Anchorage were hacked late Wednesday night or early Thursday morning, according to the state Department of Transportation.

Signs that normally display closure and detour information, like the one on Minnesota Drive near 100th Avenue, were changed to read “Impeach Obama.” That particular sign wasn’t fixed until sometime between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. Thursday.

It happened because DOT says it doesn't lock the boxes on the signs that hold the message control pad.

Construction managers say sign-hacking has never happened before, so they never thought to lock the boxes.

DOT says that changed this morning, and now all of them will be locked.

“I'm sure somebody thought it was a pretty funny joke but we try to convey a lot of important information with these signs,” said Tim Croghan, a regional construction engineer for DOT.

Tamara Douglas snapped a picture of the sign message around 6 a.m. Thursday.

The Collapsing US Economy and the End of the World

Paul Craig Roberts
Infowars.com
Sunday, July 8, 2012

In a recent column, “Can The World Survive Washington’s Hubris,” I promised to examine whether the US economy will collapse before Washington in its pursuit of world hegemony brings us into military confrontation with Russia and China. This is likely to be an ongoing subject on this site, so this column will not be the final word.

Washington has been at war since October, 2001, when President George W. Bush concocted an excuse to order the US invasion of Afghanistan. This war took a back seat when Bush concocted another excuse to order the invasion of Iraq in 2003, a war that went on without significant success for 8 years and has left Iraq in chaos with dozens more killed and wounded every day, a new strong man in place of the illegally executed former strongman, and the likelihood of the ongoing violence becoming civil war.

Upon his election, President Obama foolishly sent more troops to Afghanistan and renewed the intensity of that war, now in its eleventh year, to no successful effect.

These two wars have been expensive. According to estimates by Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, when all costs are counted the Iraq invasion cost US taxpayers $3 trillion dollars. Ditto for the Afghan war. In other words, the two gratuitous wars doubled the US public debt. This is the reason there is no money for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, the environment, and the social safety net.

Americans got nothing out of the wars, but as the war debt will never be paid off, US citizens and their descendants will have to pay interest on $6,000 billion of war debt in perpetuity.

Not content with these wars, the Bush/Obama regime is conducting military operations in violation of international law in Pakistan, Yemen, and Africa, organized the overthrow by armed conflict of the government in Libya, is currently working to overthrow the Syrian government, and continues to marshall military forces against Iran.

Finding the Muslim adversaries Washington created insufficient for its energies and budget, Washington has encircled Russia with military bases and has begun the encirclement of China. Washington has announced that the bulk of its naval forces will be shifted to the Pacific over the next few years, and Washington is working to re-establish its naval base in the Philippines, construct a new one on a South Korean island, acquire a naval base in Viet Nam, and air and troop bases elsewhere in Asia.

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New Obama Executive Order Seeks ‘Control’ Over Communications During ‘Crisis’

WhiteHouse.gov
Sunday, July 8, 2012

Executive Order — Assignment of National Security and Emergency Preparedness Communications Functions

EXECUTIVE ORDER

- – - – - – -

ASSIGNMENT OF NATIONAL SECURITY AND
EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS COMMUNICATIONS FUNCTIONS

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Policy. The Federal Government must have the ability to communicate at all times and under all circumstances to carry out its most critical and time sensitive missions. Survivable, resilient, enduring, and effective communications, both domestic and international, are essential to enable the executive branch to communicate within itself and with: the legislative and judicial branches; State, local, territorial, and tribal governments; private sector entities; and the public, allies, and other nations. Such communications must be possible under all circumstances to ensure national security, effectively manage emergencies, and improve national resilience. The views of all levels of government, the private and nonprofit sectors, and the public must inform the development of national security and emergency preparedness (NS/EP) communications policies, programs, and capabilities.

Sec. 2. Executive Office Responsibilities.

Sec. 2.1. Policy coordination, guidance, dispute resolution, and periodic in-progress reviews for the functions described and assigned herein shall be provided through the interagency process established in Presidential Policy Directive-1 of February 13, 2009 (Organization of the National Security Council System) (PPD-1).

Sec. 2.2. The Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) shall: (a) issue an annual memorandum to the NS/EP Communications Executive Committee (established in section 3 of this order) highlighting national priorities for Executive Committee analyses, studies, research, and development regarding NS/EP communications;

(b) advise the President on the prioritization of radio spectrum and wired communications that support NS/EP functions; and

(c) have access to all appropriate information related to the test, exercise, evaluation, and readiness of the capabilities of all existing and planned NS/EP communications systems, networks, and facilities to meet all executive branch NS/EP requirements.

Sec. 2.3. The Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism and the Director of OSTP shall make recommendations to the President, informed by the interagency policy process established in PPD-1, with respect to the exercise of authorities assigned to the President under section 706 of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended (47 U.S.C. 606). The Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism and the Director of OSTP shall also jointly monitor the exercise of these authorities, in the event of any delegation, through the process established in PPD-1 or as the President otherwise may direct.

Sec. 3. The NS/EP Communications Executive Committee.

Sec. 3.1. There is established an NS/EP Communications Executive Committee (Executive Committee) to serve as a forum to address NS/EP communications matters.

Sec. 3.2. The Executive Committee shall be composed of Assistant Secretary-level or equivalent representatives designated by the heads of the Departments of State, Defense, Justice, Commerce, and Homeland Security, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI), the General Services Administration, and the Federal Communications Commission, as well as such additional agencies as the Executive Committee may designate. The designees of the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Secretary of Defense shall serve as Co-Chairs of the Executive Committee.

Read the rest of the Tyranny here

Death of the US Constitution: Can Americans Escape the Deception?

Global Research
July 4, 2012

Hot Air Day is upon us.  On July 4 hot air will spew forth all over the country as dignitaries deliver homilies to our “freedom and democracy” and praise “our brave troops” who are protecting our freedom by “killing them over there before they come over here.”

Not a single one of these speeches will contain one word of truth.  No speaker will lament the death of the US Constitution or urge his audience to action to restore the only document that protects their liberty.  No speaker will acknowledge that in the 21st century the Bush/Obama Regime, with the complicity of the Department of Justice, federal courts, Congress, presstitute media, law schools, bar associations, and an insouciant public have murdered the Constitution in the name of the “war on terror.”

As in medieval times, American citizens can be thrown into dungeons and never accounted for.  No evidence or charges need be presented to a court.  No trial is required, and no conviction.

As in tyrannies, US citizens can be executed at the sole discretion of the despot in the Oval Office, who sits there drawing up lists of people to be murdered. 

Protestors exercising their constitutionally guaranteed rights to freedom of speech and freedom of association are attacked by armed police, beaten, tasered, tear-gassed, pepper sprayed, and arrested.  

Whistleblowers who report the government’s crimes are prosecuted despite the statute that protects them.

US soldier Bradley Manning, who allegedly gave Wikileaks the documents revealing US war crimes, including the video of US soldiers in a helicopter gunship enjoying themselves murdering civilians walking along the street as if the soldiers were playing a video game, has been arrested and held in conditions of torture while the government tries to invent a case against him.  

According to the US Military Code, US soldiers are required to make war crimes known. However, the law on the books provided no protection to Bradley Manning, and conservative Republicans whom I know are foaming at the mouth for Manning to be executed for letting out the truth.  The truth, what is mere truth compared to the “exceptionalism of the great american people”?  America has carte blanche to do whatever it wishes to the unexceptional peoples. Manning deserves to die, they say, because he took the side of the oppressed and not the side of the amerikan oppressors. 

After the Swedish prosecutorial office dropped the case against Wikileaks’ Julian Assange, ruling that the charges of rape had no foundation, another prosecutor, many believe at the urging of the US government, demanded Assange be extradited from England in order to be questioned.  Normally, extradition only applies to those who have been charged with a crime and for whom a warrant has been issued, which is most certainly not the case with Assange.  But, of course, if Washington wants Assange, Washington will be sure every law is broken or bent until they get him. The Swedish puppet will do the exceptional country’s will and be paid well for its service.

Peace activists in several states had their homes invaded by FBI, computers and personal records taken, and a grand jury was convened in an attempt to indict them for supporting terrorism by their protests of Washington’s illegal wars, wars that are war crimes under the Nuremberg standard established by the US government itself.

None of this will be mentioned in July 4 patriotic speeches. The inebriated masses will be wrapped in the flag and return home full of the hubris that despises lesser foreigners, such as Muslims, Arabs, Chinese, and the French.

And no dignitary will mention that those that “we are killing over there” are mainly women,  children, village elders, and aid workers. The US troops seem to specialize in soft targets like weddings, funerals, kids’ soccer games, farm houses, and schools.

Recently Washington reduced the “collateral damage” count by declaring every murdered male of military age to have been a Taliban fighter or terrorist.  Obviously, Washington has no way of knowing whether they were or not, but Washington’s declaration is intended as a green light to murder Afghan males of military age.

Currently, Washington has wars underway, or occupations, or is violating the sovereignty of countries with drones and/or troops in seven Muslim countries, and is

arming rebels in Syria.  All of this is being done without the constitutionally-required authorization by Congress, allegedly the people’s representatives.  What a joke!

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The four horsemen of the sluggish economy

MyBudget360
July 8, 2012

The US economy is facing tremendous financial hurdles in the years to come.  The current market is being held together by a flood of debt that is masking underlying issues.  Total credit market debt is many times larger than our annual GDP.  Student loan debt continues to expand unabated even though the return-on-investment for many college degrees is not worth it.  We also have an interesting dynamic where we still do produce manufactured goods but require fewer and fewer workers to conduct these jobs.  These challenges will not go away when the last ballot is cast this November.  We also have big challenges of taking care of an older generation with a much less affluent and deeply in debt younger generation.

Total credit market debt

The total credit market in the US is over $55 trillion while GDP is roughly $15 trillion.  This ratio was not always the case.  It is interesting that once the US went off the gold standard in the 1970s did we enter a phase where deficit spending seemed to become the norm.  This ballooned in the 1980s and we have yet to look back.  Of course this can only continue so long as GDP growth continues to expand at a healthy pace. US GDP growth has slowed dramatically and actually contracted severely during the recession.

Global markets around the world are facing peak debt situations.  The solution thus far has been to extend more debt to cover up current existing debt payments.  The reality is that central banks would like to inflate the debt away since this would be the gentlest path forward yet this will bring pain to the working and middle class.  Ask the unemployed around the world how gentle this path is.

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Defense Cuts Harmful to Economy or National Security?

SIC SEMPER TYRANNIS!!!
July 8, 2012




Antiwar.com
July 8, 2012

There are two doomsday scenarios Washington and their welfare recipients in the war industry are predicting if defense budgets get cut. The first is that the defense corporations will have to lay off workers and unemployment will increase massively, sending the country into another deep recession. The second is that we will be less safe. Both are completely untrue.

Politicians from both parties have been harping about perverse economic consequences of budget cuts for a while now. They want to keep giving out goodies to their local corporations and fear any dip in employment. But defense corporations are now joining in the public relations campaign. One recent study, “commissioned by a top defense and aerospace trade association” – namely, the Aerospace Industries Association and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers – found that “a new batch of planned Pentagon spending cut would cause 1 million jobs to be lost next year.” The National Association of Manufacturers, another lobby group,repeated this finding, adding that proposed cuts would “increase unemployment by 0.7 percent, and decrease gross domestic product by almost 1 percent.”

But, as Lawrence Korb et al have just written, these lobby groups kind of fibbed up their numbers:

Most of these jobs, however, would not come from the defense industry itself. To maximize their findings (and their political impact), both studies assessed the effects of defense sequestration on every sector of the economy that could be hit by “induced effects,” including secondary and tertiary effects like reduced consumer spending. As a result, the “1 million jobs” figure includes jobs in industries as distant from defense as “retail trade” and “leisure and hospitality services.”

And besides, Korb points out, “defense spending is not a jobs program.” At least, it’s not supposed to be. And the jobs that these rent-seeking defense corporations maintain only show what big business can do with diverted (read: stolen and redistributed to less productive sectors) wealth. As Cato’s Chris Preble wrote this week, “It’s easy to focus exclusively on the companies and individuals hurt by the cuts and forget that the taxed wealth that funded them is being employed elsewhere.”

US News and World Report:

Gordon Adams, who over saw defense budgeting for the Clinton administration, says the industry-commissioned study fails to account for “a whole bunch of other things.”

For instance, if the new cuts occur, Washington would be spending about $55 billion less than planned each year on the military.

“That’s $55 billion that wouldn’t just disappear into the ether,” says Adams. “There would be other economic benefits from borrowing $55 billion for defense.”

And finally, the proposed cuts to defense budgets (sequestration) are, frankly, puny. Overall defense industry profits have skyrocketed since 9/11 and the harshest scenario for defense cuts would put budgets back at about the 2007 level. But only after some time; after all, we’re talking here about a decrease in the rate of growth in projected defense spending. So budgets will still be growing. Just less fast.

The minuscule defense cuts being contemplated could easily target areas of waste. As a recent report from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments found, while the source of growth in annual defense budgets since 2001 has been mostly (54%) due to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, much of the rest has been spent on wasteful superfluous weapons technology, bloated salaries and benefits plans, and expensive peacetime operating costs for the 900-plus military bases in 130-plus countries around the world.

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