If you see a camera or microphone, be careful not to be trampled by a politician rushing to shout their "outrage" at AIG, and its brazen scheme to pay $165 million in bonuses to employees at the company unit responsible for driving the company to the edge of insolvency.

The Department of Homeland Security and police forces label anyone who they disagree with - or who disagrees with government policies - as "terrorists".

Don't believe me?

Well, according to a law school professor, pursuant to the Military Commissions Act, "Anyone who ... speaks out against the government's policies could be declared an 'unlawful enemy combatant' and imprisoned indefinitely. That includes American citizens."

The American nation, from the President down, is outraged over the continuing multi-million dollar bonuses to AIG executives and traders after $180 billion in public funds have gone to shore up this massive insurance firm. At AIG, especially in its London operation, massive numbers and amounts of insurance policies were written to ensure risky trades by customers. Policies that largely did not have any reserve set aside to cover payouts.

Beginning in the late 1940s, Blair took parts in "The Guilt of Janet Ames," and "A Double Life." But her movie career stalled after her enthusiasm for leftist causes landed her on Hollywood's blacklist.

"To be very left-wing in Hollywood was to work for the unions, to work for the blacks, the ordinary things that are social democratic principles," Blair told Britain's The Guardian newspaper in an interview in 2001.

An Arizona court on Wednesday dismissed the case against a gun-store owner accused of looking the other way while front men purchased weapons to deliver to Mexico's drug cartels.

The trial, which began earlier this month, had been heralded as an example of U.S. authorities working to stanch the flow of weapons to Mexico, where a recent war among drug gangs is believed to have killed more than 6,000 people.

Invoking art, history and “the common humanity that binds us,” President Obama offered a “new day” in America’s relationship with Iran, using a videotaped message to make an unusual appeal directly to Iranians for a shift away from decades of confrontation.

Judge Edmunds (described by The Ann Arbor News and The Grand Rapids Press as guilty of perverting justice in another recent case, as well) granted a DOJ- and IRS-requested “summary judgment” in a lawsuit attempting to force the Hendricksons to change sworn testimony on their tax returns in order to give the federal government a pretext for claiming the couple owed income taxes in 2002 and 2003.

Edmunds’ "order" is purely for the consumption of a gullible public and press. Forcing someone to change sworn testimony is not only outside the authority of any court (or anyone else) but attempting to do so is a violation of several different criminal statutes.

Missouri Governor Jay Nixon has defended a report issued by the Missouri Information Analysis Center that smears Ron Paul supporters, people who have knowledge of the U.S. Constitution, and people who display political bumper stickers as potential domestic terrorists.

British media reported the decision was due to his views on Afghanistan and the presence of Canadian troops there.

Yesterday, New Yorkers remembered the start of Dubya’s invasion of Iraq. Union Square, an historic site for mass protests was the scene of the demo, afterwards they marched off to the Times Square Military Recruiting Station to continue their protest.

From Gaza… The witness and the martyr…

Congress says they are looking into this Bernard Madoff scandal. So, the guy that made $50 billion disappear is being investigated by the people who made $750 billion disappear.

Within minutes of arriving back at the consulate just before 7pm, demonstrators were more or less milling around and chanting when one officer began to assault demonstrators who were standing near some barricades and newspaper stands. Within seconds, up to a dozen cops rushed in swinging their billy clubs wildly at anyone they could hit in the crowd -- swinging overhead, swinging to their sides, just swinging at everyone in front of them.

When they later unlocked their store, the Nams allege, they discovered that a case of lighter fluid and handfuls of Zippo lighters were missing. The police said they seized $2,573 in the raid. The Nams say they actually had between $3,800 and $4,000 in the store.

The Nams' story is strikingly similar to those told by other mom-and-pop store owners, from Dominicans in Hunting Park to Jordanians in South Philadelphia.

The soon-to-be prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes that "a national emergency" such as Israel's involvement in a major war would help him in his frantic attempts to form a new ruling coalition.

Employees at the Blackjack Pizza at Quebec and 35th found the man when they got to work just before 7 a.m. Friday morning. They saw his leg hanging from the ceiling.

Rabbis in the Israeli army told battlefield troops in January's Gaza offensive that they were fighting a "religious war" against gentiles, according to one army commander's account published on Friday.

"Their message was very clear: we are the Jewish people, we came to this land by a miracle, God brought us back to this land and now we need to fight to expel the gentiles who are interfering with our conquest of this holy land," he said.

I won't try to summarize the intrigue that Madsen describes, aside from revealing the "cornerstone" of his charge: Judge Denny Chin, who has accepted Madoff's guilty plea and will be in charge of sentencing him, is a major investor in the Cornerstone project.

How did a nation that took so much pride in lively debate and different opinions become a nation that questions the loyalty of people who have dared to disagree with the policymakers in Washington? When did political dissent become a reason to end up grounded at an airport because you found out at a most inconvenient time that your name had been mysteriously added to a “no-fly list”? When did the American government begin building FEMA camps and what exactly is their purpose? When did Congress become the rubber stamp for policies of reading the correspondence and listening in on the conversations of the American public?

First, let me assure you that I am not advocating revolution. In fact, I am a strong anti-violence advocate. However, that does not mean I cannot urge you to shoot back when the time comes.

I think a true violent revolution in America now is inevitable. The dominos already are falling and the inexorable result lies directly ahead.

Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated 40 years ago this month at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. Sirhan B. Sirhan, a 24 year old immigrant, is the alleged lone gunman and is presently serving a life sentence.

In a new book, An Open and Shut Case, Dr. Robert Joling and Philip Van Praag have joined a growing list of people who don’t believe that Sirhan acted alone.

Uhh, excuse my ignorance, but if Auschwitz was truly a death camp, why would the Nazis release someone who had became seriously ill? Isn't dying part of the regimen at a "death camp?"

Gordon Brown, Britain's prime minister, has said Iran has the right to civil nuclear power, but could face tougher sanctions if it refuses to co-operate with the international community over its atomic programme.

The Swedish financial chief known as "Mr Fix It" has been summoned to Washington to advise on how Sweden's model might avert a global banking meltdown.

A United Nations human rights investigator said on Thursday that Israel's military assault on densely populated Gaza appeared to constitute a grave war crime.

Army veterans reveal how they gunned down innocent Palestinian families and destroyed homes and farms

The Washington Post is apparently losing lots of money and may close in the foreseeable future, barring a deus ex machina intervention by some foreign billionaire such as saved the New York Times. While the decline of newspapers worldwide is regrettable, the Post's troubles are really good news, and bankruptcy would be a richly deserved fate for a rag that has been an enabler of every neocon fantasy for the past 20 years.

President Barack Obama went on national television last night again. No, it wasn't a Town Hall meeting or a press conference or an address to Congress. It was to sit and whoop it up with Jay Leno, host of NBC's The Tonight Show. I alternate between thinking this was the most brilliant strategic move by perhaps America's most telegenic, media-savvy president ever, and, what the hell is the President of the United States doing on a friggin' talk show? What's next, Letterman's Stupid Human Tricks?

The shooting at the Harmony nursery school occurred just as parents were coming to collect their children in the late morning. The shots appeared to be aimed at the building.

Five of the injured received light wounds and the others suffered even less significant injuries, said Raphaelle Padovani, a spokesperson for the regional prefecture.

Part One of the Al Qaeda Doesn't Exist documentary from The Corbett Report, dealing with the founding and funding of what we know as Al Qaeda. This installment of the documentary goes into Zbigniew Brzezinski, Operation Cyclone, the ISI-CIA-MAK-US government funding circle and CIA connections to Osama Bin Laden.

The reports in a military institute's newsletter resembled accounts given by many Palestinians during and after the winter offensive. In gripping language cited by two Israeli newspapers, they appeared to support contentions by some human rights groups that Israel had violated the laws of war.

A military strike by Israel against Iranian Nuclear Facilities is possible and the optimum route would be along the Syrian-Turkish border then over a small portion of Iraq then into Iran, and back the same route. However, the number of aircraft required, refueling along the way and getting to the targets without being detected or intercepted would be complex and high risk and would lack any assurances that the overall mission will have a high success rate.

Marking from the USA war machine on the bullets and shells
The indiscriminate use of white phosphor is still making victims.
Children with out shoes are walking on it.
Just glimpse of the horror that israel imposes on the world.

“It’s a big bullet the Fed’s firing here,” he said. “The Fed is kind of going all in.”

The U.S. and Iran are entangled in a dispute over the Persian Gulf nation’s nuclear program, which the U.S. contends is a cover for developing weapons. Iran denies that the program has military aims, saying it’s trying to produce more electricity for a growing population.

Fifteen sailors were slightly injured aboard the submarine, the Hartford, and returned to duty, the Navy said in an e-mailed statement. No one serving on the amphibious vessel, the New Orleans, was hurt.

Citigroup Inc. plans to spend about $10 million on new offices for Chief Executive Officer Vikram Pandit and his lieutenants, after the U.S. government injected $45 billion of cash into the bank.

'The most moral army in the world' killed civilians without cause

A.I.G. is effectively suing its majority owner, the government, which has an 80 percent stake .... The company is in effect asking for even more money, in the form of tax refunds. The suit also suggests that A.I.G. is spending taxpayer money to pursue its case....

Many people in Washington were surprised when the Obama administration tapped Charles Freeman to chair the National Intelligence Council, the body that oversees the production of National Intelligence Estimates: Freeman had a distinguished 30-year career as a diplomat and Defense Department official, but he has publicly criticised Israeli policy and America’s special relationship with Israel, saying, for example, in a speech in 2005, that ‘as long as the United States continues unconditionally to provide the subsidies and political protection that make the Israeli occupation and the high-handed and self-defeating policies it engenders possible, there is little, if any, reason to hope that anything resembling the former peace process can be resurrected.’ Words like these are rarely spoken i

The tests rarely save lives, researchers say, and treatment can cause more harm than the potential tumor.

The Administration's long-awaited plan to save America's banks is being delayed again, government sources tell Time. Fears of an AIG-like backlash among potential private investors, and the difficulty of creating a model to price toxic assets on the banks' balance sheets, have both contributed to the delay, the sources say.

As many as three million people took to the streets across France today to protest against President Nicolas Sarkozy's handling of the economic crisis and demand more help for struggling workers.

The protests, which polls show are backed by three quarters of the French public, reflect growing disillusion with Sarkozy's pledges of reform as the crisis has thrown tens of thousands out of work and left millions more worried about their jobs.

A ground-breaking medical device that eliminates the symptoms of Parkinson's disease by electrically stimulating the brain could be tested in humans as early as next year, according to scientists working on the project.

A US court said Thursday it was delaying a decision on an appeal by jailed Wall Street fraudster Bernard Madoff to be granted bail.

New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo today announced the indictment of Henry (“Hank”) Morris and David Loglisci on 123 charges relating to a multi-mllon dollar payoff scam. They are charged with conspiring to sell access to billions of taxpayer dollars in exchange for millions of dollars in kickbacks and other payments for political and personal gain.

Professor Michael Hudson (CounterPunch, March 18) is correct that the orchestrated outrage over the $165 million AIG bonuses is a diversion from the thousand times greater theft from taxpayers of the approximately $200 billion “bailout” of AIG. Nevertheless, it is a diversion that serves an important purpose. It has taught an inattentive American public that the elites run the government in their own private interests.

Americans are angry that AIG executives are paying themselves millions of dollars in bonuses after having cost the taxpayers an exorbitant sum. Senator Charles Grassley put a proper face on the anger when he suggested that the AIG executives “follow the Japanese example and resign or go commit suicide.”

Thirteen firms receiving federal bailouts owe more than $220 million in unpaid federal taxes, a powerful House Democrat said Thursday.

More and more Western countries are either announcing their boycott or are threatening to boycott Durban II, a United Nations conference scheduled for April to review progress made since the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) held in Durban, South Africa in 2001, nicknamed Durban I. Earlier this month, Italy became the first EU member to withdraw from the event, stating that it could not endorse a draft agenda that criticizes Israel. Italy followed in the footsteps of Israel, Canada and the United States. France and the Netherlands are threatening their own boycotts. Maxime Verhagen, the Dutch foreign minister, recently explained that "The Netherlands will not be party to a propaganda circus." In December 2008, Verhagen claimed that the 2001 summit was an "anti-Semitic witch-hunt."

As Israel shifts steadily to the fanatic, racist right, as the latest parliamentary election results have shown, Palestinians under its control are increasingly being brutalized by its escalating colonial and apartheid policies, designed to push them out of their homeland to make a self-fulfilling prophecy out of the old Zionist canard of "a land without a people." In parallel, international civil society, according to numerous indicators, is reaching a turning point in its view of Israel as a pariah state acting above the law of nations and in its effective action, accordingly, to penalize and ostracize it as it did to apartheid South Africa.

More than seven years after terrorist attacks on America left nearly 3,000 people dead, U.S. Congress took a major step today toward establishing 9/11 as an annually recognized National Day of Service.

Isolated outbreaks have erupted after beleaguered business owners or managers defaulted on debts, stopped paying workers and went into hiding.

The U.S. unemployment rate was probably around 9.5 percent, comparable to the jobless rate in 1982 if adjustments were made to factor in demographic changes and undercounting, a think tank said on Thursday.

The Missouri Information Analysis Center (”MIAC”) recently published a report, “The Modern Militia Movement” that cautioned police to look for certain signs that individuals are part of the militia movement and to be wary of such people. (1.7 MB pdf of report found at Infowars – note that I do not support all of the comments made in that posting, though I defend Infowars’ right to say them. News report here; another informative blog post here — including some statements I do not support.) There has been an uproar because it is clear the MIAC is creating a “dangerous person” profile that includes political affiliation and policies.

One day shy of just two months in office, the abject failures of the Obamanation coup are already becoming clear. Obama needs to be called back from his favorite occupation of 'master of the campaign trail' to fire Timothy Geithner, along with Ben Bernanke who is the fraudulent head of the Federal Reserve System; along with everyone else in his "cabinet" and the White House that are attempting to serve two masters.
"The collusion to save this toxic company [AIG] in order to salvage the rogue financiers who conspired to enrich themselves by impoverishing millions is being revealed as the greatest financial scandal in U.S. history. Instead of taking bonuses, the culprits should be taking perp walks.

Many detainees locked up at Guantanamo were innocent men swept up by U.S. forces unable to distinguish enemies from noncombatants, a former Bush administration official said Thursday. "There are still innocent people there," Lawrence B. Wilkerson, a Republican who was chief of staff to then-Secretary of State Colin Powell, told The Associated Press. "Some have been there six or seven years."

Appearing on Capitol Hill, AIG CEO Edward Liddy was repeatedly questioned over why the failed insurance giant is paying out over $165 million in bonuses after it received a $170 billion taxpayer bailout. While the Obama administration is expressing outrage, more details have come to light indicating that some officials have known about the bonuses for months.

Russia will deploy a new multiple-warhead, nuclear-capable missile after a key US-Russian arms control treaty expires in December, a top general said on Tuesday, quoted by news agencies. “After December 5, that is after the expiration of the START-1 treaty, a regiment with one command centre and one rocket division armed with RS-24 complexes with detachable warheads will be placed on a state of combat readiness,” General Nikolai Solovtsov was quoted as saying.

During Operation Cast Lead, Israeli forces killed Palestinian civilians under permissive rules of engagement and intentionally destroyed their property, say soldiers who fought in the offensive.

U.S. consumer prices rose in February by the largest amount in seven months as gasoline prices surged again and clothing costs jumped the most in nearly two decades.

The number of U.S. workers drawing state unemployment benefits hit another record high early this month and factory activity in the Mid-Atlantic region shrank again as the economy battles a severe downturn.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told CNN Thursday his department asked Sen. Chris Dodd to include a loophole in the stimulus bill that allowed bailed-out insurance giant American International Group to keep its bonuses.

More than a million angry French workers took to the streets Thursday in a nationwide strike to force President Nicolas Sarkozy to boost wages and protect jobs as the economic crisis deepens.

Global stocks traded higher, as did the dollar against the euro, Thursday after the Federal Reserve's surprise announcement it would buy $300 billion in US Treasurys in order to help the ailing economy.

But experts tell CNBC they have concerns over the Fed's latest move and that the current national balance sheet is a disaster.

Everybody complains about the water in Baghdad , and few are willing to risk drinking it from the tap. Six years after the U.S. invaded Iraq , 36 percent of Baghdad's drinking water is unsafe, according to the Iraqi Environment Ministry — in a good month. In a bad month, it's 90 percent. Cholera broke out last summer, and officials fear another outbreak this year.

Israel's ex-president Moshe Katsav was formally charged on Thursday with several counts of rape, sexual harassment and an indecent act, the justice ministry said.

"He has been indicted for rape and sexual harassment," a spokeswoman for the justice ministry told AFP.

A U.N. panel will next week recommend that the world ditch the dollar as its reserve currency in favor of a shared basket of currencies, a member of the panel said on Wednesday, adding to pressure on the dollar.

You won’t find them calling it by that name, but the “New Green Deal” being proposed by the Obama administration, as well as U.N. environment agency head Achim Steiner, is nothing more than a global warming tax designed to further castrate U.S. sovereignty and geld Americans to accept increasingly centralized global regulations.

Spectacular columns are spewing out of the sea about 6 miles from the southwest coast off the main island of Tongatapu - an area where up to 36 undersea volcanoes are clustered, geologists said.

As Finlay methodically roles out its "unannounced" plan for liquidation, its problems begin to spill over to Zale's beleaguered balance sheet. Here's why Zale may be the fourth large jewelry to sink into financial obscurity over the next 24 months.