Watch how many nuclear tests have been done from 1945 to 1998 around the world. Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto has created a beautiful, undeniably scary time-lapse map of the 2053 nuclear explosions which have taken place between 1945 and 1998, beginning with the Manhattan Project's "Trinity" test near Los Alamos and concluding with Pakistan's nuclear tests in May of 1998. This leaves out North Korea's two alleged nuclear tests in this past decade (the legitimacy of both of which is not 100% clear). Each nation gets a blip and a flashing dot on the map whenever they detonate a nuclear weapon, with a running tally kept on the top and bottom bars of the screen. Hashimoto, who began the project in 2003, says that he created it with the goal of showing"the fear and folly of nuclear weapons." It starts really slow — if you want to see real action, skip ahead to 1962 or so — but the buildup becomes overwhelming. 
Showing posts with label World. Show all posts
Showing posts with label World. Show all posts
Wednesday, 27 November 2013
Watch how many nuclear tests have been done from 1945 to 1998 around the world.
Watch how many nuclear tests have been done from 1945 to 1998 around the world. Japanese artist Isao Hashimoto has created a beautiful, undeniably scary time-lapse map of the 2053 nuclear explosions which have taken place between 1945 and 1998, beginning with the Manhattan Project's "Trinity" test near Los Alamos and concluding with Pakistan's nuclear tests in May of 1998. This leaves out North Korea's two alleged nuclear tests in this past decade (the legitimacy of both of which is not 100% clear). Each nation gets a blip and a flashing dot on the map whenever they detonate a nuclear weapon, with a running tally kept on the top and bottom bars of the screen. Hashimoto, who began the project in 2003, says that he created it with the goal of showing"the fear and folly of nuclear weapons." It starts really slow — if you want to see real action, skip ahead to 1962 or so — but the buildup becomes overwhelming. 
Monday, 25 November 2013
7 Volcanoes Erupt Around The World Erupt Within Days Of Each Other
Seven Volcanoes that are thousands of miles from one another all erupted within days of each other starting on November 17th 2013. Many of these eruptions were single day events almost as if earth was releasing energy in an intense but short purge.
Nov 17th. Possibly the most impressive eruptions took place in Italy at Mount Etna. The current eruption started a few days ago and has been getting stronger as time moves on. A massive eruption lit up the sky and disturbed residents yesterday and the ash cloud was high enough to see flights canceled. The lava flow was the biggest in years, and the town of Zafferana, which lay in its path, saw some damage. Lava diverters were put into place, and most of the town escaped unscathed.
Nov 17th. About 7,000 miles away in Mexico, the Colima volcano began erupting after a period of relative calm. In towns a few miles away, people heard the rumblings of the mountain and saw clouds of ash and steam as the volcano’s activity increased.
Nov 18th. Guatemala’s ‘Fire Mountain’ also saw increased activity as the mountain spewed lava and an ash cloud causing ash to litter the streets and houses of nearby towns. Ash wasn’t all that was seen and felt by the towns as people reported hearing explosions and feeling shock waves up to 6 miles from the volcano. Doors and windows were rattling but no damage has been reported so far.
Nov 18th. Indonesia was home of Mount Sinabung which also erupted causing a four mile high ash cloud to spew into the air which made life difficult for citizens in the area. The mountain was dormant for hundreds of years but came back to life in 2010. The recent rumbling caused the evacuation of over 6000 people as scientists feared a major eruption could occur. Although no lava flows have begun, the ash cloud is growing quite rapidly.
Nov 18th. Also in Indonesia, on the island of Java, Mount Merapi erupted. While there is little information as to what happened or what damage may have been caused, there are no reported casualties so far.
Nov 19th. Finally, in Vanuatu, the Yasur volcano began raising concern as weak explosions from the volcano began sending ash down onto nearby farmland. Although activity is weak, a close eye is being kept on the volcano in case activity increases.
Nov 21st. A submarine eruption just off the coast of Nishino-Shima Island, Japan has erupted for the first time in 40 years. This gave birth to a new island in the pacific ocean. The eruption was first noted by the Japanese Navy as explosions and boiling lava met sea water giving way to plumes of steam and ash.
The new island of Niijima at Nishino-shima, south of Japan, seen on November 21, 2013.
Why did all of these volcanoes suddenly become more active at a the so close to one another? The answer to that question is not yet known however it is interesting to note that according to the Smithsonian, we are currently experiencing much greater than normal amounts of active eruptions at one time. They state that normal parameters can account for up to 20 eruptions on a given day, we are currently sitting at 34.
Volcanoes are essentially release points on the earth and as pressure builds up beneath the earths surface, they release a mix of steam and gases. Sometimes volcanoes will also release rocks, molten rock and lava. Ultimately, a volcanic eruption is a release of built up energy, so one could say that the earth is releasing a great deal of built up energy at this time. This does tend to roll right along with many beliefs about a shift in consciousness taking place where both humanity and the earth will go through a series of changes ultimately reshaping the way humanity perceives the world. Since everything is energy and everything is consciousness, it could be said that this is all a part of what one might expect during this shift. At this time there is no scientific proof to go along with this especially since we don’t yet understand much about these eruptions, but I believe we are in very interesting times and not only are we changing but so is the planet. Do these eruptions relate to changes? I believe they do, but that is based on my intuition and not data I have found.
Sources:
Thursday, 10 October 2013
How to By-Pass Your Reptilian Brain and Restore Your Creative Power
Following my last article The Law of Attraction and The Power of Your Mind, the subsequent information intends to further expand into the application of the necessary skill of discernment in order to manifest your desired reality.
To recap: Your mind is a sophisticated broadcasting system. We emit and absorb frequencies according to the frequencies (thoughts and belief systems) that we hold in our mind. In order to reset our innate power of creation, we must get our mind right by consciously applying discernment to every frequency (thought or emotion) that we emit and absorb. In other words, choosing to accept or reject frequencies is the first step in re-setting your broadcast system (your mind). It is how we begin to attune ourselves to source energy, our higher self, our life’s purpose, happiness, love, our true potential, etc.
Since the average individual’s mind broadcasts in the ballpark of 70 000 thoughts per day, we would drive ourselves absolutely mad trying to discern (monitor) every one of those thoughts. Especially since the vast majority of those are ingrained in the sub-conscious through belief systems that have deeply conditioned our habitual neuron pathways. The good news is that there is a shortcut to monitoring your thoughts and re-attuning yourself to your true manifestation potential. That shortcut is your emotions: your innate guidance system. This is a basic process that is fundamental to manifestation. Focus on feeling good! When your emotions are signaling that something (a frenquency) doesn’t feel good, apply discernment and re-focus your vibration on anything that feels good (a higher frequency). Listen to the ‘whispers’ (aka frequencies) life is offering to you as Oprah would say….
Ok, now it’s time to elaborate on the implementation of discernment, here it is:
DISCERNMENT requires DETACHMENT.
Detachment is the state of being OBJECTIVE. In order to discern (or filter if that makes more sense to you) a situation (frequency) that you have manifested into your current reality, you must be able to detach yourself from it before compulsively (reptilian brain response) reacting to it. Being ‘impulsive’ is to react without forethought.
This will be a great challenge at first, I’m not gonna sugar coat it, I’ve found that this can stir up all kinds of change in your life. Because until recently in our history, we
had been conditioned to operate and function mainly out of the reptilian brain. We had been operating/ manifesting out of the ‘survival’ mode section of the brain. Once you can understand this concerted mental oppression, you can begin to re-train your mind (free yourself from constant reptilian brain generated reaction) and re-set your innate human gift of creative power.
had been conditioned to operate and function mainly out of the reptilian brain. We had been operating/ manifesting out of the ‘survival’ mode section of the brain. Once you can understand this concerted mental oppression, you can begin to re-train your mind (free yourself from constant reptilian brain generated reaction) and re-set your innate human gift of creative power.
This will be easier to apply if you can give yourself a minute to comprehend and really soak in the following aspects about the functioning of your brain:
Humans have 3 independent yet interconnected sections in our brain:
1) The Reptilian section 2) The Limbic section & 3) The Neo-cortex section. Each section has it’s purpose.
The Reptilian section (1) is the instant (no discernment) ‘survival mode’ response section of the brain. It is the oldest in terms of our human evolution, ‘The Old Brain’, The Reptilian Brain.
The Limbic section (2) is the section of the brain that first emerged in Mammals. It generates our feelings and emotions in regard to our current reality.
The Neo-cortex section (3) is the Neo-Mammalian section of the brain, the evolved section of higher order thinking (side note…I wonder if Keanu Reeve’s character’s name ‘Neo’ in The Matrix movie was derived from the understanding of the neo-cortex section of the human mind?…). It has infinite abilities. It is the evolved conscious section of our brain which is most in line with source, with our higher self, our true unlimited potential. It generates creation, manifestation, imagination, awareness, development, logical thinking, objectivity, empathy and most importantly: consciousness. ‘The New Brain’
Each section has its necessary purpose, for now anyway (I foresee the reptilian section going into stand-by mode once we attune ourselves to our manifestation power; The Neo-cortex section of our brain. In my intuitive opinion, I think every human today has the potential to eventually evolve through conscious effort which will eventually become automatic into a higher functioning brain capacity based in infinite love and respect which will see the evolutionary decline of the reptilian section of the mind).
We must learn to by-pass the reptilian brain in order to THRIVE instead of SURVIVE. The reptilian brain is based in survival mode which elicits impulsive programmed responses (constant reaction to present triggers). Characteristics of the Reptilian brain include dominance (dominate or be dominated), aggression, sex and seeking a mate, rigidity, obsessiveness, compulsiveness, worship, fear, submission and greed. These are all constricting and limiting frequencies.
That means that you must develop the ability to by-pass your reptilian brain frequencies through conscious DETACHMENT from the reptilian brain, by first recognizing it for what it is! It is simply a shift in perception that must occur within your consciousness.
By applying detachment to any situation through delayed reaction; aka objectivity (discernment filter), you can begin to re-create your reality because you 
allow yourself to properly use your mind to its full manifestation power. You make life happen for you according to your desires, instead of reacting to life happening to you. You take your power back.
allow yourself to properly use your mind to its full manifestation power. You make life happen for you according to your desires, instead of reacting to life happening to you. You take your power back.
A few things to consider: the vast majority of advertising campaigns, media content and political propaganda these days are targeting the reptilian response section of the brain in the masses, hence creating a de-evolution of a collectively manifested reality. Those who acquiesce to reptilian brain targeted triggers, perpetuate ‘survival’ mode for themselves and lose the innate gift we all hold to create a life of unlimited abundance.
You may find yourself asking ‘why?’ Why is our current reality based in low vibrational reptilian brain frequencies if the knowledge about the amazing creative power of the Limbic and Neo-Cortex sections of the brain is already out there? Well, had you heard about it until now? Were you taught this basic knowledge from Day 1 of your human experience here on Earth? Was it part of the imposed curriculum when you were attending school? Do we openly discuss this with our friends and family? Do we talk about this basic concept in mainstream media? No. We’ve been collectively oppressed to operate within the reptilian section of the brain.
Ask yourself about religious stories that depicted the reptilian brain influence and the importance of over-coming it in order to achieve high vibration manifestation (love, abundance, etc.). Ask yourself about the reptilian statues and symbolism that are ‘proudly’ displayed on our current government buildings. Ask yourself about military conflicts and the reptilian based authority that persuades masses into low frequency acquiescence and perpetuation of such low frequency manifestations. Consider which part of your brain is being triggered when you see an advertisement or a TV Show or a news program. Our current world is controlled by reptilian brain dominated authority. It’s in your face y’all!
Understand that as a human being, you are (well your brain is anyway) a hybrid of reptile, mammal and your true potential: creator. Upgrade your mind frequency and functioning through constant detachment and discernment and you will change your life.
It goes a little something like this. (*Hypothetical situation*) You are walking through the mall and a billboard with a sexually attractive model promoting whatever product ‘catches’ (*triggers*) your attention, and it’s on ‘sale!’ You instantly feel distracted, compelled to break stride, walk in and consider purchasing this product. That is how that scenario usually goes…
Now insert discernment into that scenario: You are walking through the mall with purpose, you are feeling good, and *oops* that advertisement catches your eye for a second. The conscious individual goes through a mind process something like this: “Ok. Something within me attracted that low vibration manifestation, I understand that my reptilian brain is being targeted, no thank you, cancel that frequency, replace with high vibrational thought or good feeling emotion, done, continue moving forward.” It’s a conscious process that will require constant effort at first, but it will become automatic over time once you persistently apply it to the point that you re-program your neuron pathways in a way that utilizes the full potential of your mind.
Understand the blessing of contrast that is provided with low vibrational manifestations (thoughts, emotions, circumstances). This contrast is not meant to drag you down into lower vibrational responses (although it will if you don’t understand how to get your mind right), it is meant to assist you through this observed duality you achieved through detachment/discernment, to tune into high vibrational frequencies that are in line with your life’s bliss, your life’s purpose, whatever it is that you are desiring to manifest into your life. Contrast and duality are tools (red flags) that help keep you in alignment (if perceived properly) and increase the specificity of your emitted vibration, to bring in what you want as quickly as possible.
Your perception needs to be shifted into the (2) and (3) section of the brain. Nothing is ‘bad’ unless you invite it to continue to be ‘bad’. Anything that ‘pops’ up into your reality that makes you feel bad (remember your emotions are your compass), they are simply the smack across your face you need to snap back into alignment and emit the frequency of what you want which was provided to you through that experience that you attracted to begin with.
Albert Einstein said: “You cannot solve a problem from the same consciousness that created it. You must learn to see the world anew.”
Source: Collective EvolutionMonday, 7 October 2013
19-year-old inventor finds way to clean up the world’s oceans in under 5 years time
***This Website is no longer operational, I have a new website:https://learninghowtothink.net***
By: Jack Taylor
Previously the idea of cleaning up the world’s oceans with their vast accumulations of disposed plastic material was considered an impossibility. Now a 19-year-old inventor says he and his foundation has a way to clean up the world’s oceans, and not only does he say we can do it, but that we can do it in five years time and produce a profit from it.
It is called the ‘Great Pacific Garbage Patch’ or sometimes the “Pacific Trash Vortex”, and it is a massive collection of plastic particles accumulating in the Pacific. Other oceans have their own collections of plastic wastes as well; furthermore, most of the debris in our oceans are plastic materials that accounts for approximately 90% of all the waste debris.
Scientists have considered all manner of ways how the debris could be retrieved but there was no clear answer for it.
Now a 19-year-old inventor by the name of Boyan Slat says we can remove nearly 20 billion tons of plastic waste with his concept he calls an ocean cleanup array. It is made from a massive series of floating booms and processing platforms that gradually suck in the floating plastic like a giant funnel.
The angle with how the array is set up allows all of the plastic to go to where the platforms processing centers are floating. At the platform processing area it would separate the naturally occurring life such as plankton an only keep the plastic materials to be recycled.
What is most impressive about the array is that once it goes operational it would clean up the oceans in only 5 years time! He also makes a point in saying that due to the vastness of our oceans most do not know how badly polluted the oceans really are.
“One of the problems with preventive work is that there isn’t any imagery of these ‘garbage patches’, because the debris is dispersed over millions of square kilometers,” Slat says on his website. “By placing our arrays however, it will accumulate along the booms, making it suddenly possible to actually visualize the oceanic garbage patches. We need to stress the importance of recycling, and reducing our consumption of plastic packaging.”
Slat was able to come up with the idea while in school, and so he wrote a paper on his concept. Once Slat's paper was published it immediately caught the attention of many marine experts. His paper won all manner of prizes, which included the Best Technical Design 2012 from the Delft University of Technology.
When he and others realized that the concept would work he took a leap of faith and created a non-profit organization he calls The Ocean Cleanup Foundation. This group will focus on the goal of developing his invention, raise funds for it and make it operational as soon as possible. His concept would save numerous aquatic species of fish and help reduce PCB and DDT containments affecting all of us. Best of all it operates on the power of the sun and by the oceans themselves.
Not only is Slat's concept self-powered, it would also be very profitable from the all the recycling, which is estimated in the amount of 500 million dollars (U.S.) per year.
According to Slat's website it "would make in fact more money than the plan would cost to execute. In other words; it's profitable."
According to Slat's website it "would make in fact more money than the plan would cost to execute. In other words; it's profitable."
Source: vr-zone.com
Wednesday, 2 October 2013
World Bank Whistleblower Karen Hudes Reveals How The Global Elite Rule The World
Michael Snyder
Activist Post
Karen Hudes is a graduate of Yale Law School and she worked in the legal department of the World Bank for more than 20 years. In fact, when she was fired for blowing the whistle on corruption inside the World Bank, she held the position of Senior Counsel. She was in a unique position to see exactly how the global elite rule the world, and the information that she is now revealing to the public is absolutely stunning. According to Hudes, the elite use a very tight core of financial institutions and mega-corporations to dominate the planet.
The goal is control. They want all of us enslaved to debt, they want all of our governments enslaved to debt, and they want all of our politicians addicted to the huge financial contributions that they funnel into their campaigns. Since the elite also own all of the big media companies, the mainstream media never lets us in on the secret that there is something fundamentally wrong with the way that our system works.
Remember, this is not some "conspiracy theorist" that is saying these things. This is a Yale-educated attorney that worked inside the World Bank for more than two decades.
The following summary of her credentials comes directly from her website...
Karen Hudes studied law at Yale Law School and economics at the University of Amsterdam. She worked in the US Export Import Bank of the US from 1980-1985 and in the Legal Department of the World Bank from 1986-2007. She established the Non Governmental Organization Committee of the International Law Section of the American Bar Association and the Committee on Multilateralism and the Accountability of International Organizations of the American Branch of the International Law Association.
Today, Hudes is trying very hard to expose the corrupt financial system that the global elite are using to control the wealth of the world. During an interview with the New American, she discussed how we are willingly allowing this group of elitists to totally dominate the resources of the planet...
A former insider at the World Bank, ex-Senior Counsel Karen Hudes, says the global financial system is dominated by a small group of corrupt, power-hungry figures centered around the privately owned U.S. Federal Reserve. The network has seized control of the media to cover up its crimes, too, she explained. In an interview withThe New American, Hudes said that when she tried to blow the whistle on multiple problems at the World Bank, she was fired for her efforts. Now, along with a network of fellow whistleblowers, Hudes is determined to expose and end the corruption. And she is confident of success.
Citing an explosive 2011 Swiss study published in the PLOS ONE journal on the “network of global corporate control,” Hudes pointed out that a small group of entities — mostly financial institutions and especially central banks — exert a massive amount of influence over the international economy from behind the scenes. “What is really going on is that the world’s resources are being dominated by this group,” she explained, adding that the “corrupt power grabbers” have managed to dominate the media as well. “They’re being allowed to do it.”
Previously, I have written about the Swiss study that Hudes mentioned. It was conducted by a team of researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland. They studied the relationships between 37 million companies and investors worldwide, and what they discovered is that there is a "super-entity" of just 147 very tightly knit mega-corporations that controls 40 percent of the entire global economy...
When the team further untangled the web of ownership, it found much of it tracked back to a "super-entity" of 147 even more tightly knit companies - all of their ownership was held by other members of the super-entity - that controlled 40 per cent of the total wealth in the network. "In effect, less than 1 per cent of the companies were able to control 40 per cent of the entire network," says Glattfelder. Most were financial institutions. The top 20 included Barclays Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co, and The Goldman Sachs Group.But the global elite don't just control these mega-corporations. According to Hudes, they also dominate the unelected, unaccountable organizations that control the finances of virtually every nation on the face of the planet. The World Bank, the IMF and central banks such as the Federal Reserve literally control the creation and the flow of money worldwide.
At the apex of this system is the Bank for International Settlements. It is the central bank of central banks, and posted below is a video where you can watch Hudes tell Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com the following...
"We don’t have to wait for anybody to fire the Fed or Bank for International Settlements . . . some states have already started to recognize silver and gold, the precious metals, as currency"
Most people have never even heard of the Bank for International Settlements, but it is an extremely important organization. In a previous article, I described how this "central bank of the world" is literally immune to the laws of all national governments...
An immensely powerful international organization that most people have never even heard of secretly controls the money supply of the entire globe. It is called the Bank for International Settlements, and it is the central bank of central banks. It is located in Basel, Switzerland, but it also has branches in Hong Kong and Mexico City. It is essentially an unelected, unaccountable central bank of the world that has complete immunity from taxation and from national laws. Even Wikipedia admits that "it is not accountable to any single national government." The Bank for International Settlements was used to launder money for the Nazis during World War II, but these days the main purpose of the BIS is to guide and direct the centrally-planned global financial system.
Today, 58 global central banks belong to the BIS, and it has far more power over how the U.S. economy (or any other economy for that matter) will perform over the course of the next year than any politician does. Every two months, the central bankers of the world gather in Basel for another "Global Economy Meeting". During those meetings, decisions are made which affect every man, woman and child on the planet, and yet none of us have any say in what goes on. The Bank for International Settlements is an organization that was founded by the global elite and it operates for the benefit of the global elite, and it is intended to be one of the key cornerstones of the emerging one world economic system.This system did not come into being by accident. In fact, the global elite have been developing this system for a very long time. In a previous article entitled "Who Runs The World? Solid Proof That A Core Group Of Wealthy Elitists Is Pulling The Strings", I included a quote from Georgetown University history professor Carroll Quigley from a book that he authored all the way back in 1966 in which he discussed the big plans that the elite had for the Bank for International Settlements...
[T]he powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basle, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world’s central banks which were themselves private corporations.And that is exactly what we have today.
We have a system of "neo-feudalism" in which all of us and our national governments are enslaved to debt. This system is governed by the central banks and by the Bank for International Settlements, and it systematically transfers the wealth of the world out of our hands and into the hands of the global elite.
But most people have no idea that any of this is happening because the global elite also control what we see, hear and think about. Today, there are just six giant media corporations that control more than 90 percent of the news and entertainment that you watch on your television in the United States.
This is the insidious system that Karen Hudes is seeking to expose. For much more, you can listen to Joyce Riley of the Power Hour interview her for an entire hour right here.
So what do you think about what Hudes is saying? Please feel free to share your thoughts by posting a comment below...
This article first appeared here at the Economic Collapse Blog. Michael Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Follow him on Twitter here.
When the team further untangled the web of ownership, it found much of it tracked back to a "super-entity" of 147 even more tightly knit companies - all of their ownership was held by other members of the super-entity - that controlled 40 per cent of the total wealth in the network. "In effect, less than 1 per cent of the companies were able to control 40 per cent of the entire network," says Glattfelder. Most were financial institutions. The top 20 included Barclays Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co, and The Goldman Sachs Group.But the global elite don't just control these mega-corporations. According to Hudes, they also dominate the unelected, unaccountable organizations that control the finances of virtually every nation on the face of the planet. The World Bank, the IMF and central banks such as the Federal Reserve literally control the creation and the flow of money worldwide.
At the apex of this system is the Bank for International Settlements. It is the central bank of central banks, and posted below is a video where you can watch Hudes tell Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com the following...
"We don’t have to wait for anybody to fire the Fed or Bank for International Settlements . . . some states have already started to recognize silver and gold, the precious metals, as currency"
Most people have never even heard of the Bank for International Settlements, but it is an extremely important organization. In a previous article, I described how this "central bank of the world" is literally immune to the laws of all national governments...
An immensely powerful international organization that most people have never even heard of secretly controls the money supply of the entire globe. It is called the Bank for International Settlements, and it is the central bank of central banks. It is located in Basel, Switzerland, but it also has branches in Hong Kong and Mexico City. It is essentially an unelected, unaccountable central bank of the world that has complete immunity from taxation and from national laws. Even Wikipedia admits that "it is not accountable to any single national government." The Bank for International Settlements was used to launder money for the Nazis during World War II, but these days the main purpose of the BIS is to guide and direct the centrally-planned global financial system.
Today, 58 global central banks belong to the BIS, and it has far more power over how the U.S. economy (or any other economy for that matter) will perform over the course of the next year than any politician does. Every two months, the central bankers of the world gather in Basel for another "Global Economy Meeting". During those meetings, decisions are made which affect every man, woman and child on the planet, and yet none of us have any say in what goes on. The Bank for International Settlements is an organization that was founded by the global elite and it operates for the benefit of the global elite, and it is intended to be one of the key cornerstones of the emerging one world economic system.This system did not come into being by accident. In fact, the global elite have been developing this system for a very long time. In a previous article entitled "Who Runs The World? Solid Proof That A Core Group Of Wealthy Elitists Is Pulling The Strings", I included a quote from Georgetown University history professor Carroll Quigley from a book that he authored all the way back in 1966 in which he discussed the big plans that the elite had for the Bank for International Settlements...
[T]he powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences. The apex of the system was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basle, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world’s central banks which were themselves private corporations.And that is exactly what we have today.
We have a system of "neo-feudalism" in which all of us and our national governments are enslaved to debt. This system is governed by the central banks and by the Bank for International Settlements, and it systematically transfers the wealth of the world out of our hands and into the hands of the global elite.
But most people have no idea that any of this is happening because the global elite also control what we see, hear and think about. Today, there are just six giant media corporations that control more than 90 percent of the news and entertainment that you watch on your television in the United States.
This is the insidious system that Karen Hudes is seeking to expose. For much more, you can listen to Joyce Riley of the Power Hour interview her for an entire hour right here.
So what do you think about what Hudes is saying? Please feel free to share your thoughts by posting a comment below...
This article first appeared here at the Economic Collapse Blog. Michael Snyder is a writer, speaker and activist who writes and edits his own blogs The American Dream and Economic Collapse Blog. Follow him on Twitter here.
Tuesday, 1 October 2013
Sunday, 29 September 2013
Spirit Science 12 ~ The Human History Movie
Our history is not what we think! Over the past few thousand years, we have warped our own history. Our versions of the past has been mistranslated, changed, altered, and skewed to fit our understanding of reality, and completely left our many things that we cannot explain. Today, we are going to look at an alternate version of our history, a version that was recorded across many ancient tablets and artifacts throughout time, which have only recently been uncovered. This story may be a little cosmic, it may not even be true, but you will have to decide that for yourself.
Michael Cremo is interviewed about his archeological discoveries and the cover up of the scientific community. Cremo gives several examples of archeological evidence that has been suppressed by the establishment in the name of "scientific conformity". His books include 'The Hidden History Of The Human Race' and 'Forbidden Archeology'. Michael Cremo is a member of the World Archeological Congress and the European Association of Archaeologists as well as an associate member of the Bhaktivedanta Institute specializing in history and philosophy of science. “Looking at the possibility that there were previous advanced civilizations on Earth, modern buildings made of steel and glass will not last over vast periods of time. However, ancient stone structures, like the pyramids, remain intact to this day. So, I think we have to ask, who's really more advanced?”-Michael Cremo “There is evidence that humans were present before, during, and after the age of the dinosaurs. Human footprints alongside dinosaur footprints found in Texas and a modern human skeleton found in a 300 million-year-old layer of slate rock in Illinois.”
-Michael Cremo “They are discovering evidence all over the world, up to the present moment findings that suggest 'modern' humans existed in ancient times. Recent reports of footprints from Kenya match the contemporary human foot, found in layers of rock about 1.5 million years old. Unfortunately, instead of acknowledging the amazing find for what it is, scientists have tried to fit it into pre-conceived notions of human evolution. This is a perfect example of how this knowledge filtering process works.” -Michael Cremo
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Michael Cremo is interviewed about his archeological discoveries and the cover up of the scientific community. Cremo gives several examples of archeological evidence that has been suppressed by the establishment in the name of "scientific conformity". His books include 'The Hidden History Of The Human Race' and 'Forbidden Archeology'. Michael Cremo is a member of the World Archeological Congress and the European Association of Archaeologists as well as an associate member of the Bhaktivedanta Institute specializing in history and philosophy of science. “Looking at the possibility that there were previous advanced civilizations on Earth, modern buildings made of steel and glass will not last over vast periods of time. However, ancient stone structures, like the pyramids, remain intact to this day. So, I think we have to ask, who's really more advanced?”-Michael Cremo “There is evidence that humans were present before, during, and after the age of the dinosaurs. Human footprints alongside dinosaur footprints found in Texas and a modern human skeleton found in a 300 million-year-old layer of slate rock in Illinois.”
-Michael Cremo “They are discovering evidence all over the world, up to the present moment findings that suggest 'modern' humans existed in ancient times. Recent reports of footprints from Kenya match the contemporary human foot, found in layers of rock about 1.5 million years old. Unfortunately, instead of acknowledging the amazing find for what it is, scientists have tried to fit it into pre-conceived notions of human evolution. This is a perfect example of how this knowledge filtering process works.” -Michael Cremo
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Saturday, 28 September 2013
Model Of Sustainability: Sweden Runs Out Of Garbage, Forced to Import From Norway
By: Amanda Froelich,
Imagine a world where pollution is a non-issue, cities are pristine, healthy environments to live in, and little to no entanglements from discarded trash injures wildlife or clogs the oceans. In Sweden, this is almost a reality, yet it’s causing a paradoxical predicament for the recycle-happy country that relies on waste to heat and provide electricity to hundreds of thousands of homes.
The Scandinavian nation of more than 9.5 million citizens has run out of garbage; while this is a positive – almost enviable – predicament for a country to be facing, Sweden now has to search for rubbish outside of its borders to generate its waste-to-energy incineration program. It’s namely Norway officials who are now shipping in 80,000 tons of refuse annually to fuel the country with outside waste.
The population’s remarkable pertinacious recycling habits are inspiration for other garbage-bloated countries where the idea of empty landfills is scarce. In fact, only 4 percent of all waste in Sweden is land-filled, a big win for the future of sustainable living. By using its two million tons of waste as energy and scrapping for more outside of its borders, this country is shown in international comparisons to be the global leader in recovering energy in waste. Go Sweden.
Public Radio International has the whole story. This (albeit short-term) solution is even highly beneficial for the Scandinavian country; Norway pays Sweden to take its excess waste, Sweden burns it for heat and electricity, and the ashes remaining from the incineration process, filled with highly polluting dioxins, are returned back to Norway and land filled.
Catarina Ostland, senior advisor for the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, suggests that Norway may not be the perfect partner for the trash import-export scheme, however. “I hope that instead we will get the waste from Italy or from Romania or Bulgaria, or the Baltic countries because they landfill a lot in these countries” she tells PRI. “They don’t have any incineration plants or recycling plants, so they need to find a solution for their waste”.
There’s definitely something to be said about being ‘green’. Regardless of its sourcing, hopefully Sweden’s impeccable job of reducing its carbon footprint may serve as an example to other areas of the world that have more than enough trash to utilize and put to sustainable use.
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Source: trueactivist.comWednesday, 25 September 2013
25 Facts about the Great Pyramid of Giza
***This Website is no longer operational, I have a new website:https://learninghowtothink.net***
- The pyramid is estimated to have around 2,300,000 stone blocks that weigh from 2 to 30 tons each and there are even some blocks that weigh over 50 tons.
- The Pyramid of Menkaure, the Pyramid of Khafre and the Great Pyramid of Khufu are precisely aligned with the Constellation of Orion.
- The base of the pyramid covers 55,000 m2 (592,000 ft 2) with each side greater than 20,000 m2 (218,000 ft2) in area.
- The interior temperature is constant and equals the average temperature of the earth, 20 Degrees Celsius (68 Degrees Fahrenheit).
- The outer mantle was composed of 144,000 casing stones, all of them highly polished and flat to an accuracy of 1/100th of an inch, about 100 inches thick and weighing approx. 15 tons each.
- The cornerstone foundations of the pyramid have ball and socket construction capable of dealing with heat expansion and earthquakes.
- The mortar used is of an unknown origin (Yes, no explanation given). It has been analyzed and its chemical composition is known but it can’t be reproduced. It is stronger than the stone and still holding up today.
- It was originally covered with casing stones (made of highly polished limestone). These casing stones reflected the sun’s light and made the pyramid shine like a jewel. They are no longer present being used by Arabs to build mosques after an earthquake in the 14th century loosened many of them. It has been calculated that the original pyramid with its casing stones would act like gigantic mirrors and reflect light so powerful that it would be visible from the moon as a shining star on earth. Appropriately, the ancient Egyptians called the Great Pyramid “Ikhet”, meaning the “Glorious Light”. How these blocks were transported and assembled into the pyramid is still a mystery. - http://www.gizapyramid.com/general.htm
- Aligned True North: The Great Pyramid is the most accurately aligned structure in existence and faces true north with only 3/60th of a degree of error. The position of the North Pole moves over time and the pyramid was exactly aligned at one time.
- Center of Land Mass: The Great Pyramid is located at the center of the land mass of the earth. The east/west parallel that crosses the most land and the north/south meridian that crosses the most land intersect in two places on the earth, one in the ocean and the other at the Great Pyramid.
- The four faces of the pyramid are slightly concave, the only pyramid to have been built this way.
- The centers of the four sides are indented with an extraordinary degree of precision forming the only 8 sided pyramid, this effect is not visible from the ground or from a distance but only from the air, and then only under the proper lighting conditions. This phenomenon is only detectable from the air at dawn and sunset on the spring and autumn equinoxes, when the sun casts shadows on the pyramid.
- The granite coffer in the “King’s Chamber” is too big to fit through the passages and so it must have been put in place during construction.
- The coffer was made out of a block of solid granite. This would have required bronze saws 8-9 ft. long set with teeth of sapphires. Hollowing out of the interior would require tubular drills of the same material applied with a tremendous vertical force.
- Microscopic analysis of the coffer reveals that it was made with a fixed point drill that used hard jewel bits and a drilling force of 2 tons.
- The Great Pyramid had a swivel door entrance at one time. Swivel doors were found in only two other pyramids: Khufu’s father and grandfather, Sneferu and Huni, respectively.
- It is reported that when the pyramid was first broken into that the swivel door, weighing some 20 tons, was so well balanced that it could be opened by pushing out from the inside with only minimal force, but when closed, was so perfect a fit that it could scarcely be detected and there was not enough crack or crevice around the edges to gain a grasp from the outside.
- With the mantle in place, the Great Pyramid could be seen from the mountains in Israel and probably the moon as well.
- The weight of the pyramid is estimated at 5,955,000 tons. Multiplied by 10^8 gives a reasonable estimate of the earth’s mass.
- The Descending Passage pointed to the pole star Alpha Draconis, circa 2170-2144 BCE. This was the North Star at that point in time. No other star has aligned with the passage since then.
- The southern shaft in the King’s Chamber pointed to the star Al Nitak (Zeta Orionis) in the constellation Orion, circa 2450 BCE The Orion constellation was associated with the Egyptian god Osiris. No other star aligned with this shaft during that time in history.
- Sun’s Radius: Twice the perimeter of the bottom of the granite coffer times 10^8 is the sun’s mean radius. [270.45378502 Pyramid Inches* 10^8 = 427,316 miles]
- The curvature designed into the faces of the pyramid exactly matches the radius of the earth.
- Khufu’s pyramid, known as the great pyramid of Giza, is the oldest and largest, rising at 481 feet (146 meters). Archaeologists say it was the tallest structure in the world for about 3, 800 years.
- The relationship between Pi (p) and Phi (F) is expressed in the fundamental proportions of the Great Pyramid.
Reference:
The Great Pyramid: A Miracle in Stone, 1973, Joseph A. Seiss
Secrets of the Great Pyramid, 1978, Peter Tompkins
Back in Time 3104 B.C. to the Great Pyramid, 1990, S. G. Taseos
The Authorship and Message of the Great Pyramid, 1953, Julian T. Gray, E. Steinmann & Co.
Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid, 1891, C. Piazzi Smyth
http://www.timstouse.com
http://www.gizapyramid.com/general.htm
Tuesday, 24 September 2013
People are WAKING UP!!! Resistance to Corporate Power and Warmongering is Growing All Around Us
Believe It! Resistance to Corporate Power and Warmongering Is Growing All Around Us.
There are reasons to celebrate despite continued economic stagnation and growing debt: the culture of resistance in the US is here and it’s having an effect.
This week we reflect on the second anniversary of Occupy Wall Street and the fifth anniversary of the financial collapse.
There are reasons to celebrate despite continued economic stagnation and growing debt: the culture of resistance in the US is here and it’s having an effect. The corporate power that has so blatantly stomped on our rights and whipped Congress to do its bidding is faltering and losing its grip. There are cracks in the pillars of power, and it’s up to us to pry them open and shine light on the lies and corruption that have been used to steal our future. We see a movement that is building momentum.
We look back over the events of the past two years and we feel cautiously optimistic. We remember wondering as we watched the Arab Spring bloom and the encampments grow in Spain and state capitals like Madison whether people in the US were ready to rise up and demand more than the crumbs we’ve been convinced to accept for decades.
A turning point for us was in December, 2010 at an action in front of the White House to protest war. Many spoke that day about the need to build a culture of resistance in the US. Following that action, as we met with allies over the next few months, there was agreement that we needed to do something different. The traditional tools used to create change weren’t working. One-day protests, usually on a weekend, are ignored. It was time for something new, time to bring an occupation to the national capital.
As we met to organize the occupation of Freedom Plaza in Washington, DC, there was a strong sense of suspense. Some said that Americans weren’t feeling enough pain, that we hadn’t reached the tipping point. We decided that we would only find out if we tried, and so what if it didn’t work the first time. Most mass movements don’t arise spontaneously; they come after years of organizing and multiple failed actions. A key ingredient is persistence.
Similarly, the organizers of Occupy Wall Street acted out of anticipation. They staked out a place in the heart of the monster and held it. At first there were a few hundred, not the tens of thousands that Adbusters called for. But by holding that space courageously, more people were inspired to join them. People arrived from all over the country. Excitement and wonder were in the air. Could the people really take on Wall Street?
Obviously Wall Street thought so because they ordered excessive and constant police protection. They must have seen something brewing because Wall Street firms donated an unprecedented millions to the NYPD over the previous year. It was police aggression towards peaceful protesters that grabbed public attention and sympathy. A few weeks after the start of Occupy Wall Street, an amazing 43 percent of Americans supported Occupy.
By the time of the occupation of Freedom Plaza in early October, there were hundreds of encampments throughout the nation and around the world. The new language of the 99% raised class consciousness in ways that had not been heard for a long time. A spark had been lit and there was no going back.
Two years later, the physical encampments are gone, but the Occupy Movement remains. Occupying public space was a tactic, not an end in itself. It was a way to make the issues visible, a place for people to gather, a model for a new way of doing things based on respect, mutual aid and democracy and a metaphor for claiming what has been taken. The ‘public’ is disappearing, not just public space but also public services, research and resources have been privatized, expropriated for the profits of a few.
Wednesday, 18 September 2013
Profit Driven Prison Industrial Complex: The Economics of Incarceration in the USA
For every 100,000 Americans, 743 citizens sit behind bars
By: Nile Bowie
For anyone paying attention, there is no shortage of issues that fundamentally challenge the underpinning moral infrastructure of American society and the values it claims to uphold. Under the conceptual illusion of liberty, few things are more sobering than the amount of Americans who will spend the rest of their lives in an isolated correctional facility – ostensibly, being corrected. The United States of America has long held the highest incarceration rate in the world, far surpassing any other nation. For every 100,000 Americans, 743 citizens sit behind bars. Presently, the prison population in America consists of more than six million people, a number exceeding the amount of prisoners held in the gulags of the former Soviet Union at any point in its history.
While miserable statistics illustrate some measure of the ongoing ethical calamity occurring in the detainment centers inside the land of the free, only a partial picture of the broader situation is painted. While the country faces an unprecedented economic and financial crisis, business is booming in other fields – namely, the private prison industry. Like any other business, these institutions are run for the purpose of turning a profit. State and federal prisons are contracted out to private companies who are paid a fixed amount to house each prisoner per day. Their profits result from spending the minimum amount of state or federal funds on each inmate, only to pocket the remaining capital. For the corrections conglomerates of America, prosperity depends on housing the maximum numbers of inmates for the longest potential time – as inexpensively as possible.
By allowing a profit-driven capitalist-enterprise model to operate over institutions that should rightfully be focused on rehabilitation, America has enthusiastically embraced a prison industrial complex. Under the promise of maintaining correctional facilities at a lower cost due to market competition, state and federal governments contract privately run companies to manage and staff prisons, even allowing the groups to design and construct facilities. The private prison industry is primarily led by two morally deficient entities, theCorrections Corporation of America (CCA) and the GEO Group (formerly Wackenhut Corrections Corporation). These companies amassed a combined revenue of over $2.9 billion in 2010, not without situating themselves in the center of political influence.
The number of people imprisoned under state and federal custody increased 772% percent between 1970 and 2009, largely due to the incredible influence private corporations wield against the American legal system. Because judicial leniency and sentencing reductions threaten the very business models of these private corporations, millions have been spent lobbying state officials and political candidates in an effort to influence harsher “zero tolerance” legislation and mandatory sentencing for many non-violent offenses. Political action committees assembled by private correctional corporations have lobbied over 3.3 million dollars to the political establishment since 2001. An annual report released by the CCA in 2010 reiterates the importance of influencing legislation:
“The demand for our facilities and services could be adversely affected by the relaxation of enforcement efforts, leniency in conviction or parole standards and sentencing practices or through the decriminalization of certain activities that are currently proscribed by our criminal laws. For instance, any 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. Legislation has been proposed in numerous jurisdictions that could lower minimum sentences for some non-violent crimes and make more inmates eligible for early release based on good behavior. Also, sentencing alternatives under consideration could put some offenders on probation with electronic monitoring who would otherwise be incarcerated. Similarly, reductions in crime rates or resources dedicated to prevent and enforce crime could lead to reductions in arrests, convictions and sentences requiring incarceration at correctional facilities.”
Considering today’s private prison population is over 17 times larger than the figure two decades earlier, the malleability of the judicial system under corporate influence is clear. The Corrections Corporation of America is the first and largest private prison company in the US, cofounded in 1983 by Tom Beasley, former Chairman of the Tennessee Republican Party. The CCA entered the market and overtly exploited Beasley’s political connections in an attempt to exert control over the entire prison system of Tennessee. Today, the company operates over sixty-five facilities and owns contracts with the US Marshal Service, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Bureau of Prisons. The GEO Group operates 118 detention centers throughout the United States, South Africa, UK, Australia and elsewhere. Under its original name, the Wackenhut Corrections Corporation was synonymous for the sadistic abuse of prisoners in its facilities, resulting in the termination of several contracts in 1999.
The political action committees assembled by private prison enterprises have also wielded incredible influence with respect to administering harsher immigration legislation. The number of illegal immigrants being incarcerated inside the United States is rising exponentially under Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an agency responsible for annually overseeing the imprisonment of 400,000 foreign nationals at the cost of over $1.9 billion on custody-related operations. The agency has come under heavy criticism for seeking to contract a 1,250-bed immigration detention facility in Essex County, New Jersey to a private company that shares intimate ties to New Jersey’s Governor, Chris Christie. Given the private prison industry’s dependence on immigration-detention contracts, the huge contributions of the prison lobby towards drafting Arizona’s recrementitious immigration law SB 1070 are all but unexpected. While the administration of Arizona’s Governor Jan Brewer is lined with former private prison lobbyists, its Department of Corrections budget has been raised by $10 million, while all other Arizona state agencies are subject to budget cuts in 2012’s fiscal year.
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of this obstinate moral predicament presents itself in the private contracting of prisoners and their role in assembling vast quantities of military and commercial equipment. While the United States plunges itself into each new manufactured conflict under a wide range of fraudulent pretenses, it is interesting to note that all military helmets, ammunition belts, bulletproof vests, ID tags, uniforms, tents, bags and other equipment used by military occupation forces are produced by inmates in federal prisons across the US. Giant multinational conglomerates and weapons manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Corporation employ federal prison labor to cheaply assemble weapons components, only to sell them to the Pentagon at premium prices. At the lowest, Prisoners earn 17 cents an hour to assemble high-tech electronic components for guided missile systems needed to produce Patriot Advanced Capability 3 missiles and anti-tank projectiles.
In the past, political mouthpieces of the United States have criticized countries such as China and North Korea for their role in exploiting prisoner labor to create commodity products such as women’s bras and artificial flowers for export. Evidently, outsourcing the construction of the military equipment responsible for innumerable civilian causalities to the prisons of America warrants no such criticism from the military industrial establishment. In utter derision toward the integrity of the common worker, prison inmates are exposed to toxic spent ammunition, depleted uranium dust and other chemicals when contracted to clean and reassemble tanks and military vehicles returned from combat. Prison laborers receive no union protection, benefits or health and safety protection when made to work in electronic recycling factories where inmates are regularly exposed to lead, cadmium, mercury and arsenic.
In addition to performing tasks that can result in detrimental illnesses, prison labor produces other military utilities such as night-vision goggles, body armor, radio and communication devices, components for battleship anti-aircraft guns, land mine sweepers and electro-optical equipment. While this abundant source of low-cost manpower fosters greater incentives for corporate stockholders to impose draconian legislation on the majority of Americans who commit nonviolent offenses, it’s hard to imagine such an innately colossal contradiction to the nation’s official rhetoric, i.e. American values. Furthermore, prison labor is employed not only in the assembly of complex components used in F-15 fighter jets and Cobra helicopters, it also supplies 98% of the entire market for equipment assembly services, with similar statistics in regard to products such as paints, stoves, office furniture, headphones, and speakers.
It is some twisted irony that large sections of the workforce in America’s alleged free-market are shackled in chains. Weapons manufactured in the isolation of America’s prisons are the source of an exploitative cycle, which leaves allied NATO member countries indebted to a multibillion-dollar weapons industry at the behest of the U.S. State Department and the Pentagon. Complete with its own trade exhibitions, mail-order catalogs and investment houses on Wall Street, the eminence of the private prison industry solidifies the ongoing corrosion of American principles – principles that seem more abstract now, than the day they were written.
Predictably, the potential profit of the prison labor boom has encouraged the foundations of US corporate society to move their production forces into American prisons. Conglomerates such as IBM, Boeing, Motorola, Microsoft, AT&T, Wireless, Texas Instrument, Dell, Compaq, Honeywell, Hewlett-Packard, Nortel, Lucent Technologies, 3Com, Intel, Northern Telecom, TWA, Nordstrom’s, Revlon, Macy’s, Pierre Cardin, Victoria’s Secret, and Target have all begun mounting production operations in US prisons. Many of these Fortune 500 conglomerates are corporate members of civil society groups such as the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). These think tanks are critical toward influencing American foreign policy. Under the guise of democracy promotion, these civil societies fund opposition movements and train dissent groups in countries around the world in the interest of pro-US regime change. With naked insincerity, the same companies that outsource the production of their products to American prisons simultaneously sponsor civil societies that demanded the release of Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest – an overly political effort in the on-going attempts to install a compliant regime in that country.
The concept of privatizing prisons to reduce expenses comes at great cost to the inmates detained, who are subjected to living in increasingly squalid conditions in jail cells across America. In 2007, the Texas Youth Commission (TYC) was sent to a West Texas juvenile prison run by GEO Group for the purpose of monitoring its quality standards. The monitors sent by the TYC were subsequently fired for failing to report the sordid conditions they witnessed in the facility while they awarded the GEO Group with an overall compliance score of nearly 100%. Independent auditors later visited the facility and discovered that inmates were forced to urinate or defecate in small containers due to a lack of toilets in some of the cells. The independent commission also noted in their list of reported findings that the facility racially segregated prisoners and disciplined Hispanics for speaking Spanish by denying their access to layers and medical treatment. It was later discovered that the TYC monitors were employed by the GEO Group. Troublingly, the Walnut Grove Youth Correctional Facility (WGYCF) operated by the GEO Group in Mississippi has been subject to a class-action lawsuit after reports that staff members were complicit in the beating and stabbing of a prisoner who consequently incurred permanent brain damage. The official compliant authored by the ACLU and Southern Poverty Law Center also highlights cases where the administration turned a blind eye to brutal cases of rape and torture within the facility.
The first private prison models were introduced following the abolishment of slavery after the American Civil War from 1861 to 1865, which saw expansive prison farms replace slave plantations. Prisons of the day contracted groups of predominately African-American inmates to pick cotton and construct railroads principally in southern states such as Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi. In 2012, there are more African-Americans engrossed in the criminal-justice system than any point during slavery. Throughout its history, the American prison system has shared little with the concept of rehabilitation. Like the post-Civil War prison farms, today’s system functions to purport required labor, largely on a racially specific basis. African-Americans consist of 40% of the prison population and are incarcerated seven times more often than whites, despite the fact that African-Americans make up only 12% of the national population. Once released, former inmates are barred from voting in elections, denied educational opportunities and are legally discriminated against in their efforts to find employment and housing. Few can deny the targeting of underprivileged urban communities of color in America’s failed War on Drugs. This phenomenon can largely be contributed to the stipulations of its anti-drug legislation, which commanded maximum sentencing for possession of minute amounts of rock cocaine, a substance that floods poor inner-city black communities.
Unbeknown to the vast majority of Americans, the US government has been actively taking steps to modify the legal infrastructure of the country to allow for a dramatic expansion of the domestic prison system at the expense of civil rights. On December 31st, 2011, Barack Obama signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) H.R. 1540.
Emulating the rouge military dictatorships the US Government has long condemned in its rhetoric, the NDAA introduces a vaguely worded legislation that allows for US citizens to be arbitrarily detained in military detention without due process – might they be predictably be deemed radical, conspiratorial or suspected of terrorism. In a climate of rising public discontent, the establishment media has steadfastly worked to blur the line between public activism and domestic extremism. In addition to the world’s largest network of prison facilities, over 800 located detainment camps exist in all regions of the United States with varying maximum capacities.
Emulating the rouge military dictatorships the US Government has long condemned in its rhetoric, the NDAA introduces a vaguely worded legislation that allows for US citizens to be arbitrarily detained in military detention without due process – might they be predictably be deemed radical, conspiratorial or suspected of terrorism. In a climate of rising public discontent, the establishment media has steadfastly worked to blur the line between public activism and domestic extremism. In addition to the world’s largest network of prison facilities, over 800 located detainment camps exist in all regions of the United States with varying maximum capacities.
Facing economic stagnation, many Americans have been detained in responder camps as a consequence of publically demonstrating in accordance with the Occupy Wall Street movement launched in New York City. Under the guise of protecting Americans from a largely contrived and abstract threat of fundamentalist violence, citizens have been denied the right of peaceful assembly and placed in detainment apparatuses, managed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Documents have been released by the American Civil Liberties Union detailing the Pentagon’s widespread monitoring of public demonstrations and the targeting of individual activists under threat of national security. Co-authored by Senator Joe Lieberman, the Enemy Expatriation Act (HR 3166) gives the US government the power to detain nationals and revoke their American citizenship under suspicion of behavior perceived as terrorism.
This legislation becomes increasingly more dangerous as citizens can be labeled domestic extremists based on their constitutionally protected activism or personal political leanings. In January 2006, a contract to construct detention facilities for the Department of Homeland Security worth a maximum of $385 million was awarded to KBR, a subsidiary of Haliburton. Following the signing of NDAA earlier in 2012, leaked documents reveal that KBR is now seeking to staff its detention centers and award contracts for services such as catering, temporary fencing and barricades, laundry and medical services, power generation, and refuse collection. It would be reasonable to assume that these facilities could be managed in partnership with private corporations such as the GEO Group or the CCA, as many federal and state penitentiaries privatize sections of their facilities to privately owned companies. Declassified US Army documents originally drafted in 1997 divulge the existence of inmate labor camps inside US military installations. It is all but unexpected that the relationship between the upper echelons of government and the private prison enterprise will grow increasingly more intimate in the current climate of prison industrial legislation.
The partnership between the United States government and its corporate associates spans various industries however, they all seek the common pursuit of profit irrespective of the moral and ethical consequence – the human consequence. The increasing influence of the Prison Industrial Complex towards official legislation and economic undertakings signifies a reprehensible threat to basic human rights. Perhaps the issuance of government legislation that leads offenders into detainment for the benefit of private shareholders is the purest embodiment of fascism, as cited in Mussolini’s vision of a Corporate State. Perhaps we all (this author included) fail to grasp the seriousness of these legislations and their implications on our lives.
Mumia Abu-Jamal has spent over three decades on death row in the throngs of the American prison system. Prior to his conviction in 1981 for the murder of a white police officer, Jamal was a political activist and President of the Philadelphia Association of Black Journalists. Critical evidence vindicating Jamal was withheld from the trial prior to the issuance of the death penalty. Forensic experts believe he was denied a fair trial. On December 7, 2011, the Philadelphia District Attorney announced that prosecutors would no longer seek the death penalty for Jamal. He remains imprisoned for life without parole and continues his work as a journalist from his jail cell in Pennsylvania.
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