Waking Up the Frogs

Did you feel the water just got a little warmer again?

Blue Ibis
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Programming is complete:
Anti-terror package passed by Congress, officially authorizing a Fascist state

Baltimore Sun
Sat, 28 Jul 2007 06:40 EDT

The House overwhelmingly passed anti-terrorism legislation yesterday, sending to President Bush a measure intended to tighten security on air and sea cargo and allocate federal money where the threat of attack is deemed greatest.

The 371-40 vote in the House came a day after the Senate approved the legislation 85-8. Bush will sign the bill now that his reservations about it have been addressed, said a White House spokesman, Scott Stanzel.

The House approval enabled members of both parties to claim victory, in the name of national security and common sense.

Comment: Unfortunately, common sense wasn't present when an "overwhelming" number of cowards passed a dictatorship bill.

Democrats had been eager to gain approval before the August recess to avoid being tagged as a do-nothing Congress.

"The American people will be safer," Maryland's Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, the Democratic majority leader, said before the vote.

New distribution

A crucial provision in the bill will change the way anti-terrorism grants from the Department of Homeland Security are distributed to the states.

It will cut in half the guaranteed minimum grant to each state, which was $3.8 million this year, and allow department officials to distribute money in discretionary grants where the threat and consequences of a terrorist attack are judged to be highest.

In past years, officials from populous states considered likely to be terrorist targets, such as New York, complained that less populous states received grants that were too big.

Now, Hoyer said, the government will ask, "Where are we most vulnerable?"

Intended to meet the recommendations of the commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks, the bill also requires that within three years all cargo carried by passenger jets be screened.

(The word screened is used instead of inspected because shippers who are specially certified will be allowed do their own pre-airport inspecting and sealing.)

The bill also sets a five-year goal of screening all cargo ships leaving foreign ports for the United States, to safeguard against smuggled nuclear or radiological weapons.

But it allows the Department of Homeland Security to postpone the requirement in two-year increments for various reasons.

To gain Republican support, Democrats dropped some provisions that had drawn Bush's veto threat, including one that would have required that airport security scanners be given collective-bargaining rights like most other federal workers.

Rep. John A. Boehner of Ohio, the House Republican leader, said Republicans were especially pleased that they had won inclusion of language to protect Americans who report suspected terrorist activity from "frivolous lawsuits."

That section was inspired by an episode last year in Minneapolis, where six Muslim men were removed from a Phoenix-bound US Airways flight after their praying and chanting in Arabic alarmed passengers.

Comment: Don't say we didn't warn you that this day was coming.

From The Hope:

"Let's think about that in light of the recent Prosecutors Purge scandal where it is becoming more evident every day that Bush and the Ziocons made a decision to get rid of any attorney's that were not supportive of the Bush program. Back in Hitler's day it was called 'Working towards the Führer'. Different words, same meaning.

Firing a bunch of Prosecutors that do not "toe the party line" is a sure way to put a chilling effect on the whole system. And certainly, exhibits of torture photos are a sure way to make the public afraid and willing to be "see things the right way" and turn in people for no reason other than not being like them."

The Muslims, imams about to fly home after a conference of religious clerics in Minneapolis, later sued the airline and the passengers who complained.

Boehner said the bill would preclude similar lawsuits. "In this era of radical jihadist terror," he said, "the bravery and vigilance of individual Americans is critical to our security."

Comment: From The Hope:

"The idea that the Gestapo itself was constantly spying on the population is demonstrably a myth.

So how was it possible that so few people exercised such control?

The simple answer is because the Gestapo received enormous help from ordinary Germans. Like all modern policing systems, the Gestapo was only as good or bad as the cooperation it received - and the files reveal that it received a high level of cooperation, making it a very good secret police force indeed.

Only around 10 per cent of political crimes committed between 1933 and 1945 were actually discovered by the Gestapo; another 10 per cent of cases were passed on to the Gestapo by the regular police or the Nazi Party. This means that around 80 per cent of all political crime was discovered by ordinary citizens who turned the information over to the police or the Gestapo. The files also show that most of this unpaid cooperation came from people who were not members of the Nazi Party - they were 'ordinary' citizens."

'Stronger, safer'

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joseph I. Lieberman, a Connecticut independent who steered the legislation through the Senate with Sen. Susan M. Collins, a Maine Republican, said it would "make our nation stronger, our cities and towns more secure and our families safer."

Republicans generally backed the bill while stressing their own administration's success in preventing another major terrorist attack.

The bill, said Rep. Peter T. King of New York, top Republican on the Homeland Security panel, "is another step in the right direction building on the steps of the previous 5 1/2 years."

"These efforts build upon the considerable progress we've made over the past six years," said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel.

Completion of the bill, six months after the House passed its original version on the first day of the current Congress, was a major victory for Democrats.

They have seen some of their other priorities - immigration and energy reform and stem cell research funding - thwarted by GOP and presidential resistance and House-Senate differences.

Comment: Niemöller's quote:

First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist, so I said nothing.

Then they came for the Social Democrats, but I was not a Social Democrat, so I did nothing.

Then came the trade unionists, but I was not a trade unionist.

And then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew, so I did little.

Then when they came for me, there was no one left to stand up for me.'

Heads UP!!

Just had to add this in. Things are heating up folks . . . . . . . Again, the Signs of the Times brings you the most important news and analysis weeks and months ahead of the MSM

Blue Ibis
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White House preparing to stage new September 11 - Reagan official

RIA Novosti
Fri, 20 Jul 2007 17:54 EDT

A former Reagan official has issued a public warning that the Bush administration is preparing to orchestrate a staged terrorist attack in the United States, transform the country into a dictatorship and launch a war with Iran within a year.

Paul Craig Roberts, a former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, blasted Thursday a new Executive Order, released July 17, allowing the White House to seize the assets of anyone who interferes with its Iraq policies and giving the government expanded police powers to exercise control in the country.

Roberts, who spoke on the Thom Hartmann radio program, said: "When Bush exercises this authority [under the new Executive Order], there's no check to it. So it really is a form of total, absolute, one-man rule."

"The American people don't really understand the danger that they face," Roberts said, adding that the so-called neoconservatives intended to use a renewal of the fight against terrorism to rally the American people around the fading Republican Party.

Old-line Republicans like Roberts have become increasingly disenchanted with the neoconservative politics of the Bush administration, which they see as a betrayal of fundamental conservative values.

According to a July 9-11 survey by Ipsos, an international public opinion research company, President Bush and the Republicans can claim a mere 31 percent approval rating for their handling of the Iraq war and 38 percent for their foreign policy in general, including terrorism.

"The administration figures themselves and prominent Republican propagandists ... are preparing us for another 9/11 event or series of events," he said. "You have to count on the fact that if al Qaeda is not going to do it, it is going to be orchestrated."

Roberts suggested that in the absence of a massive popular outcry, only the federal bureaucracy and perhaps the military could put constraints on Bush's current drive for a fully-fledged dictatorship.

"They may have had enough. They may not go along with it," he said.

The radio interview was a follow-up to Robert's latest column, in which he warned that "unless Congress immediately impeaches Bush and Cheney, a year from now the U.S. could be a dictatorial police state at war with Iran."

Roberts, who has been dubbed the "Father of Reaganomics" and has recently gained popularity for his strong opposition to the Bush administration and the Iraq War, regularly contributes articles to Creators Syndicate, an independent distributor of comic strips and syndicated columns for daily newspapers.

Words From the Heart

It is sadly rare in this world that one can raise their head from their own suffering and feel for another. I. G. Has know her own sorrows, yet can still feel for those who are so close and so forgotten.

Blue Ibis

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The Problems Of Palestine -The Problems Of Cyprus

I. G.
Signs of the Times
Fri, 20 Jul 2007 19:04 EDT

©Signs of the Times

Today I read the article Overcoming the conspiracy against Palestine, and I began thinking about the "Cyprus problem" and the "Palestinian problem", the sad stories behind them and the conditions that currently prevail in each country.

You see, when an army invades a country, confiscates the land and kills and imprisons the people, suddenly the whole sum of these people that have been killed, imprisoned and kicked out of their homeland become a "problem". The psychopathic leaders that caused the suffering have the gall to claim that the oppressed and beleaguered people of an invaded nation are the "problem". These psychopaths fume at the idea that their victims would dare to demand their rights, dare to talk of freedom and raise up their voices and arms towards their oppressors. Apparently those that survived the onslaught of the psychopaths in power should be grateful that their lives were spared.

Ah, this anger I feel today! You see today at 5:30 am, the sirens woke me up in Cyprus where I live. 33 years ago to this day, at this time, the Turkish army was illegally invading the island of Cyprus. They started by bombing via sea and air, the area of Kyrenia (Northern Cyprus, close to Turkey), and I swear, after all those years, I haven't got used to that sound. The average Cypriot old enough to remember might even get up and run to the window to check the skies with their heart beating like crazy, only if briefly, until they realize the date, until they realize that that was years ago.

But not in Palestine.

There, the sirens mean the prospect of death for all who hear them. In Palestine, the first thing that a child recognizes is this sound. The sirens are a daily occurrence for them, weekly at best. But it doesn't stop there: they know that another sound is sure to follow: the sound of bombing. And the little Palestinian children put their little hands over their small ears and curl up in the corner. Will they be the target this time? Will this latest missile destroy their house, kill their mother, father, sisters, brothers, friends? What is known is that every time - because the IDF and the Israeli government are committing genocide against all Palestinians - someone does die, houses are destroyed, and often, whole families are murdered. Can any of us even imagine living in such a hell every day? I can't imagine even that anyone could ever get used to the sound of the sirens and the sound of the bombs falling heartlessly to destroy their lives.

Try to picture your entire life to date in your mind, everything that comprises the life that you know... and then... Boom! It's gone.

Palestine is so close to Cyprus, but sometimes so far away...

For 33 years now, every 20th of July, Cypriots wake up to the sound of the sirens, but we never truly wake up on this island. Why is there no resistance in Cyprus like there is in Palestine? The answer is so simple: it is by design that there IS resistance in Palestine, and there IS NOT in Cyprus. In Palestine, Israel's plan is to kill all Palestinians. So they need the Palestinians to resist, to give the IDF the excuse and the "right" to kill them, in a massively one-sided war or rather "turkey shoot". Soon after the Turkish invasion and occupation of Cyprus, the Cypriot government received international aid and lots of money. The message was clear: "here's some money, now keep quiet! Ok?"

A year later, the refugees from the Northern cities of Cyprus had houses built for them. The Palestinians, 60 years later, still live in tents. Not long afterwards, Cyprus began to prosper economically. On this one, the Cypriots will say with pride: "It's because we are not afraid to work hard!" and I won't take it from them because it is true. But ... it is much easier to work and prosper when your primary needs of adequate food and shelter are already met by way of millions in International aid is it not? When you have no money, no roof over your head, no food, no medical aid, no water, no jobs - nothing! - how do you work? How do you prosper?

Yet the devil is lurking in there again. This financial "prosperity" in Cyprus, has brought about a strong materialism, blindness and self-centrism: the large majority of people in Cyprus now only care about what they own, how they look and how much of a "good time" they can afford. The recent history of Cyprus - the "Turko-Cypriot question" - is just another worn out story on the evening news for most. Not even the locals care about the history of their own small island sanctuary. And despite their ignorance of the FACTS of history, especially recent history, Cypriots have the audacity to lay claim to having "educated opinions" and "nationalistic sentiments", even while they exhibit their racist dumbed down beliefs, these "cosmopolitan" people with their Prada, their PhDs and their new Mercedes.

And there's still Palestine, where children die malnourished... geographically so close to us here, but yet so far away from our reality...

And in our ignorance, how can we recognize the enemy from our friend? We can't of course! Just as Abba's Fatah party has collaborated with the Zionist enemy against their own people, so too did EOKA B in Cyprus, with inspiration and support from the Athens junta and International forces, in a coup to overthrow Makarios, the democratically elected first president of the Cyprus republic, which was the event that gave Turkey the "excuse" to invade.

On the 15th of July some of us woke up by sirens again to commemorate that sad day of betrayal of the Cypriot people by a minority of deviants and the deluded. But who remembers anymore? Just as in Palestine where the collaborators now hold power, sotoo in Cyprus, the descendants of the traitors are in positions of power, enjoying the privileges of high office when they should be in jail. Those who truly care for Cyprus and the Cypriot people are defamed locally and Internationally, like Hamas is in Palestine. Palestinians know it though; Cypriots don't, they are sound asleep, and in their sleep they can't recognise friend from foe.

On August 15th, the sirens might disrupt some of our sleep again. We might even get irritated: "not again, let us sleep!" we will say, as we forget again that it was on August 15th in 1974 that Famagusta was taken, and the Cypriot troops who tried hard to fight the Turkish troops (a sad uneven battle lost from the start, considering the size of Turkish army, that of Cyprus, and the fact that the invasion was financed and applauded by the US and the British) were forced to withdraw.

My grandmother locked the door and took the key, upon leaving her house in Famagusta. "We'll return", she assured her 8 children, and kept assuring them during the months that they lived in the tents. A few years later my grandma died. My family have never returned. Cypriots have yet to acknowledge the wounds from that summer of 1974, wounds that still scar their hearts, wounds that they unwittingly pass on to their children .

And the distance becomes so small sometimes: here is Palestine, here is Cyprus, just a little piece of the blue Mediterranean between us. The same "act" being re-played, as it has been for centuries: psychopathic individuals, to meet their goals, find those among a nation with matching personality or characteristics, and together they to destroy a nation. And then the task is to silence the majority of people of the nation, by putting them to sleep with "gifts" or by exterminating them, little by little, so that they lose the will or energy to resist. And so it goes.

Seferis - a greek poet and diplomat who loved Cyprus - in his poem 'Eleni' - one from a collection dedicated to that island - using characters of the Trojan war to illustrate the act that replays again and again through the centuries, wrote:

[...] some other Teucrus* years later, or an Ajax*, or a Priam*, or a Hecuba*,
Or someone else unknown, anonymous,
Who however has seen a Scamander* full of dead corpses,
Has it in his fate to hear heralds who come to say
That so much pain
So many lives
Were lost in abyss
For an empty shirt, for one Eleni.

This is what the pathocrats sell, and the masses eagerly buy the lie that all suffering happens for a "grand cause", for "an ideal", for the beauty of Eleni, when in truth, it is because some "empty shirts" (psychopaths) got together and made a plan long ago on how to bring the whole world under their control. And the Cypriots still don't resist because they are infatuated with their slavery; and the Palestinians do resist, but they won't achieve anything until many more of us join them and all of us together decide, once and for all, to resist the rule of the psychopath.

Meanwhile, the sirens will keep sounding, and the bombs will keep falling, bodies and hearts will continue to be blown to pieces, lives will continue to be shattered, nations exterminated, the earth destroyed... and all FOR NOTHING!

*Teucrus: Ajax brother who did not return home to Salamis in Greece after Ajax was killed in Troy, and created Salamis in Cyprus
*Priam: King of Troy, father of Paris and Hector
*Hecuba: Wife of Priam
*Scamander: river of troy where the biggest battles took play

Comment: Why is she so rare? The book Political Ponerology explains exactly the process by which we becom spellbound by the material comforts. This leads us to selectively edit out perceptions that make us uncomfortable in our softness.

You're So Vain . . . . . . .

Creating panic in the populace is the oldest trick in the book. It worked in 2001 for Bush, who's number were tanking due to the slowing economy. What's really pathetic is that he thinks 9-11 was all for him, when in fact he is just the talking head for powers he barely perceives. As the song about the psychopath goes "You're so vain . . . . .

Blue Ibis
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Wake Up Call: We are About to Have Another 911

Paul Craig Roberts
Information Clearing House
Thu, 19 Jul 2007 19:59 EDT

This is a wake-up call that we are about to have another 9/11-WMD experience.

The wake-up call is unlikely to be effective, because the American attitude toward government changed fundamentally seventy-odd years ago. Prior to the 1930s, Americans were suspicious of government, but with the arrival of the Great Depression, Tojo, and Hitler, President Franklin D. Roosevelt convinced Americans that government existed to protect them from rapacious private interests and foreign threats. Today, Americans are more likely to give the benefit of the doubt to government than they are to family members, friends, and those who would warn them about the government's protection.

Intelligent observers are puzzled that President Bush is persisting in a futile and unpopular war at the obvious expense of his party's electoral chances in 2008.

In the July 18 Los Angeles Times ("Bush the Albatross"), Ronald Brownstein reminds us that Bush's behavior is disastrous for his political party. Unpopular presidents "have consistently undercut their party in the next election." Brownstein reports that "88% of voters who disapproved of the retiring president's job performance voted against his party's nominee in past elections. . . . On average, 80% of voters who disapproved of a president's performance have voted against his party's candidates even in House races since 1986."

Brownstein notes that with Bush's dismal approval rating, this implies a total wipeout of the Republicans in 2008.

A number of pundits have concluded that the reason the Democrats have not brought a halt to Bush's follies is that they expect Bush's unpopular policies to provide them with a landslide victory next year.

There is a problem with this reasoning. It assumes that Cheney, Rove,and the Republicans are ignorant of these facts or are content for the Republican Party to be destroyed after Bush has his warmonger-police state fling. "After me, the deluge."

Isn't it more likely that Cheney and Rove have in mind events that will, once again, rally the people behind President Bush and the Republican Party that is fighting the "war on terror" that the Democrats "want to lose"?

Such events could take a number of forms. As even diehard Republican Patrick J. Buchanan observed on July 17, with three US aircraft carrier battle groups in congested waters off Iran, another Tonkin Gulf incident could easily be engineered to set us at war with Iran. If Bush's intentions were merely to bomb a nuclear reactor, he would not need three carrier strike forces.

Lately, the administration has switched to blaming Iran for the war in Iraq. The US Senate has already lined up behind the latest lie with a 97-0 vote to condemn Iran.

Alternatively, false flag "terrorist" strikes could be orchestrated in the US. The Bush administration has already infiltrated some dissident groups and encouraged them to participate in terrorist talk, for which they were arrested. It is possible that the administration could provoke some groups to actual acts of violence.

Many Americans dismiss suspicion of their government as treasonous, and most believe conspiracy to be impossible "because someone would talk."

There is no basis in any known fact for this opinion.

According to polls, 36% of the American people disbelieve the 9/11 Commission Report. Despite this lack of confidence, and despite the numerous omissions and errors in the report, it has proven impossible to have an independent investigation of 9/11 or to examine the official explanation in public debate. Even experts and people with a lifetime of distinguished public service are dismissed as "conspiracy theorists," "kooks," and "traitors" if they question the official explanation of 9/11. This despite the fact that war in the Middle East, a long-planned goal of Bush's neoconservative administration, could not have been initiated without a "new Pearl Harbor."

That powerfully constructed steel buildings could suddenly turn to dust because they were struck by two flimsy aluminum airliners and experienced small fires on a few floors that burned for a short time appears unexceptionable to a majority of Americans.

Moreover, people have talked. Hundreds of them. Firefighters, police, janitors, and others report hearing and experiencing a series of explosions in upper floors and massive explosions in the underground basements. This eyewitness testimony was kept under wraps for three or more years until the official explanation had taken root. The oral histories were finally forced loose by freedom of information act suits. The eyewitness reports of explosion after explosion had no effect.

Larry Silverstein, who received billions of dollars in insurance payments for the destroyed buildings, talked. He said on public television that the order was given "to pull" building 7. His stunning admission had no effect.

The Bush administration is preparing us for more terrorist attacks. The latest intelligence report says that Al Qaeda has regrouped, rebuilt, and has the ability to come after us again. "Al Qaeda will intensify its efforts to put operatives here," says the report.

Security operatives, such as Michael Chertoff, and various instruments of administration propaganda have warned that we will be attacked before next year's election. Chertoff is not a person who wants to be known as Chicken Little for telling us that the sky is falling.

Bush has the Republican Party in such a mess that it cannot survive without another 9/11. Whether authentic or orchestrated, an attack will activate Bush's new executive orders, which create a dictatorial police state in event of "national emergency." [See HERE ]

The UK government is hand-in-glove with the Bush administration and will provide cover or verification for whatever claim the Bush administration advances. So will the right-wing governments in Canada and Australia. That takes care of the English-speaking world from which contrary explanations might reach the American people.

It is possible that Bush is now too weak, that suspicion is too great, and that there is too much internal resistance in the federal bureaucracy and military for any such scenario. If so, then my prediction prior to the invasion that the US invasion of Iraq will destroy Bush, the Republican Party, and the conservative movement will be proven true. The Democrats' strategy of doing nothing except making sure Bush gets his way will produce the landslide that they expect.

However, this assumes that Cheney, Rove, and their neoconservative allies have lost their cunning and their manipulative skills. It is difficult to imagine a more dangerous assumption for Democrats and the American people to make.

Once the US experiences new attacks, Bush will be vindicated. His voice will be confident as he speaks to the nation: "My administration knew that there would be more attacks from these terrorists who hate us and our way of life and are determined to destroy every one of us. If only more of you had believed me and supported my war on terror these new attacks would not have happened. Our security efforts were impaired by the Democrats' determined attempts to surrender to the terrorists by forcing our withdrawal from Iraq and by civil libertarian assaults on our necessary security measures. If only more Americans had trusted their government, this would not have happened." And so on. Anyone should be able to write the script.

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions. He can be reached at: PaulCraigRoberts@yahoo.com

It's All in the Wrist Folks!

We welcome Mr. Allen Branson as the latest editorial contributor to Signs of the Times. Ever wonder how the mainstream media, politicians and psychopaths in general put one over on you? Branson shows you the ins and outs of mental trickery using very clear simple illustrations.

Vaccinate your mind! It's the best thing you will ever do for your health and the health of the world.

Blue Ibis

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The Art of Deception

Allen Branson
Psychopaths, psyops and COINTELPRO
Tue, 10 Jul 2007 09:44 EDT

The man sitting across the table from you is known for trickery. He is a stage magician. You know he employs trickery, so he tells you he is going to do a card trick in which he can't possibly manipulate the cards. In this trick, you will do all of the card handling. He won't touch the cards at all.

He instructs you to cut the deck into four piles. You do so. He then tells you that you are going to randomize the order of the cards by shuffling them around and moving cards from one pile to another. Pointing to a pile of cards, he instructs you to take the top three cards and place them at the bottom of that pile. Then, take the next three cards and place them, one each, on top of the three piles remaining on the table. You repeat the procedure with all four piles of cards. The cards should now be very well mixed.

The man then begins his patter in earnest. He asks you to confirm the fact that he has not touched the cards. You agree. In no way could he have manipulated how you would cut the cards or handle them. Again, you agree. With a smile, he asks you to turn over the top card from each pile. You are amazed. The four aces sit at the top of each of the four piles of cards. For a moment, your mind might actually entertain the possibility that real magic has been performed, though you "know" you've been duped.

The fact is, this trick can be taught in a couple of minutes to any child capable of understanding the instructions. It requires no fine motor skills for clever card handling since the performer does not even handle the deck. The only thing required is setting up the deck before the trick is performed and being able to do a little sales patter in which you get the audience to agree to a statement that is blatantly false.

Take a moment and see if you can identify the lie that makes the trick believable. Everything the magician says is true with one exception. The trick is based completely on a facet of human psychology that most people--stage magicians, salesmen and politicians aside--don't understand. When a person is given a number of facts that are demonstrably true, they will tend to group all statements in that group together, agreeing to everything said, including an embedded lie.

1. The magician asked you to agree that he did not touch the cards during the trick: True
2. He asks you to agree that he did not influence you in any way in how the cards were cut: True
3. He asks you to agree that in no way did he manipulate you in the handling of the cards: FALSE

In fact, the only thing he did was manipulate you while creating the illusion in your mind that you were making free choices. If you don't see the manipulation yet, read through the description of the trick again. The magician did not allow you to choose how the cards would be shuffled once they were cut into four piles. Instead, he guided you through a pre-programmed series of moves--three cards to the bottom then three cards on top of the remaining piles--designed to move the four aces to the top of the four piles from their pre-placed position at the top of the deck! If you want to understand the mechanics of the trick, grab a deck of cards and try it. Just put the four aces at the top of the deck then simply follow the trick as outlined above.

Once you understand how the trick is done, you'll realize it is a very cheap bit of manipulation. If you found your mind reeling at the description of the trick, you'll probably feel a bit of a fool at how easily you could be duped. The trick really is a child's game and a very old one, at that. Yet, people are still fooled by it.

It works with more than just cards. The phrase, "stacking the deck" means using a variation of this kind of trick to predetermine the outcome of any situation by placing what is to be chosen in a particular position then guiding the chooser through a predefined set of movements that forces that particular choice while giving the illusion of free choice. There are a number of other methods used to force a selection in stage magic. Many card tricks rely on forced selection, but the magician can't use the same force twice in his act. As he changes methods, he informs you that each new method is an assurance that he is not engaging in any sort of trickery. Maybe he fooled you on the last one, so this time he won't even touch the cards. Next time, perhaps he'll use the force called Magician's Choice. He'll give you three choices and ask you to pick one at random. You, of course, have no choice but to pick exactly what you are forced to pick.

How can that be? It's easy. Given three choices, A, B and C, suppose I want you to pick B. I ask you to pick one at random. If you happen to pick B, the force is done. If you pick A, I set A aside and ask you to pick from B and C. If you pick C, I declare that you've left your choice, B, on the table. Again, a cheap trick that most people will fall for if done with the requisite theatricality. Forced choice and sleight-of-hand are not only the prevue of stage magicians, though. Take a look at how it is done in real life.

The most enduring form of the forced choice in the U.S. and western Europe is the electoral process. This is such an obvious forced choice that it can, rather paradoxically, remain undetected even after it is pointed out. The key is the emotional involvement of the electors, which just happens to be the key to stage magic, too. Once you've convinced someone they are making a free choice, they will provide the evidence of the freedom of their choice for you. If human beings didn't possess this peculiar bit of psychology, stage magic wouldn't work. It wouldn't matter what the magician said. The forced choice would be seen for precisely what it is: forced. Instead, a little salesmanship on the part of the performer convinces the audience of what is to come before the trick is performed. The audience then dutifully sees exactly what they were told to see and the magician is free to manipulate events to his favor.

Here is another example of the techniques of stage magic at work. On the morning of September 11, 2001, you awoke to reports that the unthinkable had happened--a massive terrorist attack had occurred on U.S. soil. As the day unfolds, you learn the following facts. Four planes had been hijacked to be used as veritable flying bombs against high profile targets. Two of those planes, in front of thousands of witnesses and several video cameras, fly into the twin towers of the World Trade Center. Later that morning, those towers collapse, leaving not even a bit of the structures left standing. In the Pennsylvania countryside, another of the hijacked planes crashes following an apparent heroic effort by the passengers to regain control of the aircraft from its hijackers. Also, something crashes into the Pentagon, causing massive damage, a huge fire ball and loss of life.

Eventually, it is announced that the damage at the Pentagon was caused by the fourth hijacked plane. This makes perfect sense to you. Four planes are hijacked, three are clearly accounted for, and something crashed into the Pentagon. The only logical choice is that the fourth plane crashed into the Pentagon. What doesn't occur to you is that you have been duped once again by another variation of the forced choice. Just like with the card trick, you don't think of the obvious, that the deck has been stacked and movements manipulated to force this particular choice.

Subsequent revelations about the inconsistencies in the official story of the event only further the illusion. A magician might turn your mind away from thoughts of the cheap manipulation he has performed by giving you a false choice of explanations for what you have witnessed. He only needs to give you one of the possible explanations, letting you provide the other in the privacy of your own mind. He tells you it must have been "magic." While you know it isn't true, his suggestion has clouded your thinking by introducing noise into your thought process. After all, if you were sufficiently impressed by the trick, that very thought likely went through your head. The same thing is done in the official story of the events of the day of 911. A false choice is set up by suggesting that the alternative to the official story is something preposterous, like holograms of planes flying into the twin towers, or rogue elements of the U.S. government committing this atrocity.

And here we see that a subtle variation of the trick, also used in stage magic, has been employed to divert your attention. You have been given two possible scenarios that contradict the official story. One of them is blatantly silly, one is not. Yet, as any stage magician, salesman or professional politician knows, your mind will group the statements together and dismiss the second with the first. In other words, the truth about the trick has been told openly, but in such a way that you will reject the truth, sending you down any number of dead-end blind alleys searching for the secret of how it was done.

Take a moment again to review what you were told and what you actually saw with your own eyes. If you want to see how the trick is done, do not accept anything the magician tells you at face value. He is a liar. His job is to give you as much truth and openness as possible, for the purpose of proving to you that he is not manipulating events in any way, so that the critical lie that makes the trick work will go undetected by the average observer. In the case of 911, you were flooded with demonstrable facts that were horrifying, engaging your emotions to a high degree. Remember, the key to all trickery is the emotional involvement of the audience in supporting the lie. Each fact presented made the ensuing lies all the more believable.

Two planes really did crash into the twin towers. A plane really did crash into the Pennsylvania countryside. Something really did crash into the Pentagon. All of this is a matter of record, so everything that comes after, your mind will tell you, is a matter of record, too.

But it isn't.

In fact, the evidence strongly suggests that a commercial aircraft could not have crashed into the Pentagon. There was, for example, no wreckage found at the scene that could have come from such a craft. For the craft to have hit the building as low as it did, its engines would have had to scrape the ground, yet the lawn in front of the Pentagon was left unmarked. The hole left in the Pentagon was barely as wide as the fuselage of such a craft. Assuming that the fuselage managed to fully penetrate the building and disintegrate, creating a hole that size, one is still left to account for the wings and engines. The official story would have the folding back and penetrating the building along with the fuselage. But there is simply no room for them to have made it through the hole.

In the case of the twin towers, the claim has been made that they collapsed--as did the building 7, later--due to a loss of structural integrity caused by massive fire and a weakening of supports from the shock caused by the impact of the planes. This was accepted as a reasonable explanation, despite the fact that the buildings were designed to withstand such a shock and no steel reinforced building has ever collapsed due to fire, before or since. Also, as any publicly available video of the collapse of the towers will show you, the tops of the towers leaned to one side as they began to fall, yet still managed to right themselves and fall into the footprint of the building. This would be impossible without a controlled demolition of the buildings.

You have also been asked to believe that each and every safeguard against such an event put in place by the U.S. military failed simultaneously on that fateful day, despite the fact that those safeguards had been called to action over 60 times in the preceding 12 months and worked perfectly each and every time. In the words of our stage magician, "it was magic!"

Of course, in the case of stage magic, the lies are told for our amusement. No harm done, maybe even a lesson learned. In the case of a deception like 911, the stakes are a bit higher. The art of deception is as old as mankind. Strike that. It is far older. It is as old as the universe itself. Deception is a key survival strategy for nearly everything that has ever been alive. How curious, then, that we - the one species we believe capable of rational thought on the planet - remain almost completely ignorant of the various means of deception. What's even more curious is the fact that many remain steadfast in their belief that such deception is rare when the evidence contradicting that belief can be seen in even the most cursory investigation of nature.

Chameleons change color to blend into their surroundings. Some species of moths and butterflies have markings that are so close to the bark of the trees on which they perch that you can look right at them and not notice they are there. Carnivorous plants will mimic the smell of rotting flesh in order to attract the flies they like to eat. The list goes on and on, from one link in the food chain to the next. Why do we insist that this behavior ends with mankind?

The key, once again, is emotional involvement in a lie we have been told. Since the time we were children, it has been drummed into our heads. Everyone is the same inside. It's a lovely democratic sentiment, but it is a sentiment that is contradicted by evidence. Just like in stage magic, we are directed away from seeing the truth through clever means of misdirection. The belief of what we are to see is planted in our heads before we ever see it. If we begin to suspect the truth, noise is injected into our thought process and true statements are mixed with false to use our psychology against us.

The simple fact is, all who look human are not human in the way we normally understand humanity. A small but very destructive minority of those who look human lack some of the most basic of human characteristics - empathy and conscience. These creatures use deception and misdirection to prey on human beings. If humans begin to suspect that all is not right with them, they will put a preprogrammed set of movements into play that are designed to steer you away from the truth. And, just like in the trick, everything they do is mechanical. Yet, as long as people remain unaware of their methods, their actions continue to befuddle and even amaze.

Another real world example of how this kind of trickery is performed. As you read this, the chances are pretty good that a soldier for the IDF (Israel Defense Forces) is either using a Palestinian mother as a human shield while he terrorizes innocent people in their homes, ostensibly to search for terrorists, or is shooting a small Palestinian child in the back for the egregious crime of throwing rocks at an Israeli checkpoint in anger.

If this were any other country, you would be outraged. But this is not any country. This country was set up with immunity from criticism before it even existed. Do you see the correlation to stage magic again? The audience is told what they will see BEFORE they see it, preparing them to look for clues that validate what they were told and ignore what doesn't fit. In the case of Israel, the audience was told that they are God's chosen people who have suffered endlessly and now deserve to have this little plot of land to call home and live in peace.

What the audience misses is the fact that a large portion of the Jews who have made Israel their home are the descendents of converts to Judaism rather than descendents of the founders of that religion, and that they appear to be lead by some of the aforementioned almost-human predators, a.k.a., psychopaths. Even the slightest hint of criticism of Israel is met with cries of anti-Semitism, another bit of manipulation in which the only choice given is to wholeheartedly support everything Israel does or side with the Nazis. It's another bit of forced choice that is as cheap as any described here...and it is remarkably effective.

The fact is, most Jews are caring, compassionate people who really do want to live their lives in peace. Because nearly everyone has had at least a Jewish friend or two and has observed this for themselves, charges of anti-Semitism can carry weight in their minds. Jews are not monsters, so how could these people claim they are doing anything but defending themselves against a relentless Palestinian terrorist mob that threatens their very existence? Let's look at the statements in the same way we looked at the card trick.

1. Most Jews are caring and compassionate: True
2. Jews deserve a home in which they can live in peace like everyone else: True
3. Therefore, Israel is only defending itself when it imposes curfews, limits travel and even shoots small Palestinian children: FALSE

No one deserves a home at the expense of others. The Palestinians were living peacefully in the region for thousands of years before the U.N. created the state of Israel. Even after that event, Palestinians were gracious to their new neighbors. It was not until the leaders of Israel saw fit to demolish Palestinian homes and drive a people from a land that had been theirs for thousands of years that things turned ugly. Put yourself in their position for a moment and tell me you wouldn't be just a little pissed off.

You may think I've given three examples of trickery in the real world - voting, 911 and the assumed irreproachability of Israel. In fact, I've only given one. The best tricks have multiple levels. One deception follows another until the audience is completely lost in the trickery with no hope of unraveling the secrets. The same is true, here. There are more levels to this particular trick, far more than we could talk about now. The rabbit hole is deep with a lot of branching tunnels that lead nowhere.

It is possible to unravel this trick, however. The key, as always, is to avoid taking any of what the magician says at face value. To see how the trick is done requires a little study and a willingness to accept that you have been tricked at all. Maintain your emotional attachment to supporting the lie and you will only fall further under the spell of the magician. Learn to open your eyes and you will suddenly see what has been going on right under you nose, undetected. One day, the trick will seem cheap and obvious and you will wonder how you didn't see it all along.

If that day comes for you, the day your study has paid off and you can see the trickery of the magician, you will have a future.

The Ponerology of Apathy and War

Are you being lulled to sleep by the Siren song of the Pathocrats? Here's a wake-up

Blue Ibis

The Video Israel Doesn't Want You to See

Notice the family is considered by one soldier to be "dirty" , sub-human. Isn't that the same thing Jews suffered in Germany? And this was 2002. Things have only gotten worse.

Blue Ibis.
******************************************************

Israeli army embarrassed by video broadcast

CBC News, 19 March 2002

The Israeli army has expressed a note of contrition after a television station aired a videotape showing an army assault on a Palestinian home in which a mother of five children died. When CBC News spoke with Ismail Hawarjeh at Bethlehem's hospital earlier this month, there was no way to verify the story he told about how his wife had died, until Israel's Channel 2 broacast the tape last weekend.

The Palestinian school administrator said his wife Huda had been killed in their home by an Israeli tank shell during the army's March 8 assault on the Aida refugee camp. The army wouldn't comment and foreign journalists weren't allowed inside the camp.

But Israeli media were allowed to ride along with the soldiers, and they went right into the Hawarjeh home. An Israeli camera recorded the army blowing off the door, and found Huda Hawarjeh bleeding on the floor.

The pictures conformed to Ismail Hawarjeh's story about his wife being hit by shrapnel in the front hallway of the house, and about the Israeli soldiers doing little to help her for an hour while she bled to death in front of her five children.

Finally, the soldiers allowed an ambulance to come to a nearby street, and soldiers helped Hawarjeh carry his wife to it. Doctors tried to revive her at the hospital but couldn't.

Huda Hawarjeh was one of seven people to die in the Bethlehem area that day.

The Israeli army allows the media such close access on the understanding it can embargo anything it doesn't want broadcast.

The tapes of the assault on the Hawarjeh home fell into that category. But Channel 2 broke the embargo anyway.

The army, government and many Israeli citizens didn't like what they saw.

Channel 2 showed Hawarjeh begging soldiers to allow an ambulance through. The camera captured the terror of the woman's daughter, and her brother's attempt to stop her from showing the soldiers her fear.

After the woman was finally taken out, one of the soldiers looked into the camera and said: "I don't know what we're doing here. Purification, maybe. It's dirty here. I don't know why a good Hebrew boy should be here, so far from his home."

The soldiers tore the home apart, evidently looking for weapons.

Another daughter begged them not to demolish the home's wall. Soldiers commonly smash walls to move into adjacent houses.

Israeli spokesman Ranaan Gissin said the government was disappointed by the decision to air the tapes. "I would have expected a little bit more self-censorship on the part of the Israeli media," he said.

Ma'ariv, Israel's second-biggest newspaper, ran the story on its front page on Monday, under a banner headline that read "Gaffe!"

[That's all the Zionists think this is. A procedural faux pas instead of what it is, yet another violation of human rights. Oh wait. I forgot. Palestinians aren't human.]

The army, after trying to suppress distribution of the pictures, admitted the soldiers' actions pushed the boundaries of public acceptance.

"Our action is so difficult to be done that it is to the extremities of acceptance," said Olivier Rafowicz, an Israeli Defence Force spokesman.

He called what happened in the Hawarjeh home "a mistake."

Comment:

At one point in the video an Israeli soldier says. "I don't know what we're doing here. Purification maybe. It's dirty here. I don't know why a good Hebrew boy should be here so far from his home."

These are people he is talking about!

That Israel is able to kill innocent Palestinians while saying what amounts to how hard it is to do the killing without being condemned is sickening.

Applying Lessons of Imperialism: Zionism Learns Fast

Crosses, double-crosses, triple-crosses. This is the history of Zionist behaviour towards the people who's land they stole. Crying "Peace, peace" but in action, promoting everything but. And it sure appears the psychopaths in charge of Israel are almost enjoying it.

Jonathan Cook is a resident of Nazareth. He knows where of he speaks.

Blue Ibis
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Divide and rule, Israeli style

Jonathan Cook
The Electronic Intifada
Tue, 26 Jun 2007 11:46 EDT

©Omar Rashidi/MaanImages/POOL/PPO

After deposing the Hamas government, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abas meets with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Sharm al-Sheikh, Egypt. King Abdullah of Jordan and Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak were also present at the meeting arranged to discuss Hamas' control of Gaza, 25 June 2007.

The boycott by Israel and the international community of the Palestinian Authority finally blew up in their faces with Hamas' recent bloody takeover of Gaza. Or so argues Gideon Levy, one of the saner voices still to be found in Israel. "Starving, drying up and blocking aid do not sear the consciousness and do not weaken political movements. On the contrary ... Reality has refuted the chorus of experts and commentators who preached [on] behalf of the boycott policy. This daft notion that it is possible to topple an elected government by applying pressure on a helpless population suffered a complete failure."

But has Levy got it wrong? The faces of Israeli and American politicians, including Ehud Olmert and George W. Bush, appear soot-free. On the contrary. Over the past fortnight they have been looking and sounding even more smug than usual.

The problem with Levy's analysis is that it assumes that Israel and the US wanted sanctions to bring about the fall of Hamas, either by giving Fatah the upper hand so that it could deal a knockout blow to the Palestinian government, or by inciting ordinary Palestinians to rise up and demand that their earlier electoral decision be reversed and Fatah reinstalled. In short, Levy, like most observers, assumes that the policy was designed to enforce regime change.

But what if that was not the point of the sanctions? And if so, what goals were Israel and the US pursuing?

The parallels between Iraq and Gaza may be instructive. After all, Iraq is the West's only other recent experiment in imposing sanctions to starve a nation. And we all know where it led: to an even deeper entrenchment of Saddam Hussein's rule.

True, the circumstances in Iraq and Gaza are different: most Iraqis wanted Saddam out but had no way to effect change, while most Gazans wanted Hamas in and made it happen by voting for them in last year's elections. Nevertheless, it may be that the US and Israel drew a different lesson from the sanctions experience in Iraq.

Whether intended or not, sanctions proved a very effective tool for destroying the internal bonds that held Iraqi society together. Destitution and hunger are powerful incentives to turn on one's neighbor as well as one's enemy. A society where resources -- food, medicines, water and electricity -- are in short supply is also a society where everyone looks out for himself. It is a society that, with a little prompting, can easily be made to tear itself apart.

And that is precisely what the Americans began to engineer after their "shock and awe" invasion of 2003. Contrary to previous US interventions abroad, Saddam was not toppled and replaced with another strongman -- one more to the West's liking. Instead of regime change, we were given regime overthrow. Or as Daniel Pipes, one of the neoconservative ideologues of the attack on Iraq, expressed it, the goal was "limited to destroying tyranny, not sponsoring its replacement ... Fixing Iraq is neither the coalition's responsibility nor its burden."

In place of Saddam, the Americans created a safe haven known as the Green Zone from which its occupation regime could loosely police the country and oversee the theft of Iraq's oil, while also sitting back and watching a sectarian civil war between the Sunni and Shia populations spiral out of control and decimate the Iraqi population.

What did Washington hope to achieve? Pipes offers a clue: "When Sunni terrorists target Shiites and vice-versa, non-Muslims [that is, US occupation forces and their allies] are less likely to be hurt. Civil war in Iraq, in short, would be a humanitarian tragedy but not a strategic one." In other words, enabling a civil war in Iraq was far preferable to allowing Iraqis to unite and mount an effective resistance to the US occupation. After all, Iraqi deaths -- at least 650,000 of them, according to the last realistic count -- are as good as worthless, while US soldiers' lives cost votes back home.

["Civil war in Iraq, in short, would be a humanitarian tragedy but not a strategic one."!! If that isn't a psychopath in full flight, what is?]

For the neocon cabal behind the Iraq invasion, civil war was seen to have two beneficial outcomes.

First, it eroded the solidarity of ordinary Iraqis, depleting their energies and making them less likely to join or support the resistance to the occupation. The insurgency has remained a terrible irritation to US forces but not the fatal blow it might have been were the Sunni and Shia to fight side by side. As a result, the theft of Iraq's resources has been made easier.

And second, in the longer term, civil war is making inevitable a slow process of communal partition and ethnic cleansing. Four million Iraqis are reported to have been forced either to leave the country or flee their homes. Iraq is being broken up into small ethnic and religious fiefdoms that will be easier to manage and manipulate.

[Amazing! Just what the "Clean Break" paper, prepared for Israel in 1996 by US Neocons proposed as being the most advantageous to it.]

Is this the model for Gaza now and the West Bank later?

It is worth recalling that neither Israel nor the US pushed for an easing of the sanctions on the Palestinian Authority after the national unity government of Hamas and Fatah was formed earlier this year. In fact, the US and Israel could barely conceal their panic at the development. The moment the Mecca agreement was signed, reports of US efforts to train and arm Fatah forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas became a newspaper staple.

The cumulative effect of US support for Fatah, as well as Israel's continuing arrests of Hamas legislators in the West Bank, was to strain already tense relations between Hamas and Fatah to breaking point. When Hamas learned that Abbas' security chief, Mohammed Dahlan, with US encouragement, was preparing to carry out a coup against them in Gaza, they got the first shot in.

Did Fatah really believe it could pull off a coup in Gaza, given the evident weakness of its forces there, or was the rumour little more than American and Israeli spin, designed to undermine Hamas' faith in Fatah and doom the unity government? Were Abbas and Dahlan really hoping to topple Hamas, or were they the useful idiots needed by the US and Israel? These are questions that may have to be settled by the historians.

But with the fingerprints of Elliott Abrams, one of the more durable neocons in the Bush administration, to be found all over this episode, we can surmise that what Washington and Israel are intending for the Palestinians will have strong echoes of what has unfolded in Iraq.

By engineering the destruction of the unity government, Israel and the US have ensured that there is no danger of a new Palestinian consensus emerging, one that might have cornered Israel into peace talks. A unity government might have found a formula offering Israel:

- limited recognition inside the pre-1967 borders in return for recognition of a Palestinian state and the territorial integrity of the West Bank and Gaza;
- a long-term ceasefire in return for Israel ending its campaign of constant violence and violations of Palestinian sovereignty;
- and a commitment to honor past agreements in return for Israel's abiding by UN resolutions and accepting a just solution for the Palestinian refugees.

After decades of Israeli bad faith, and the growing rancor between Fatah and Hamas, the chances of them finding common ground on which to make such an offer, it must be admitted, would have been slight. But now they are non-existent.

That is exactly how Israel wants it, because it has no interest in meaningful peace talks with the Palestinians or in a final agreement. It wants only to impose solutions that suit Israel's interests, which are securing the maximum amount of land for an exclusive Jewish state and leaving the Palestinians so weak and divided that they will never be able to mount a serious challenge to Israel's dictates.

Instead, Hamas' dismal authority over the prison camp called Gaza and Fatah's bastard governance of the ghettoes called the West Bank offer a model more satisfying for Israel and the US -- and one not unlike Iraq. A sort of sheriff's divide and rule in the Wild West.

Just as in Iraq, Israel and the US have made sure that no Palestinian strongman arises to replace Yasser Arafat. Just as in Iraq, they are encouraging civil war as an alternative to resistance to occupation, as Palestine's resources -- land, not oil -- are stolen. Just as in Iraq, they are causing a permanent and irreversible partition, in this case between the West Bank and Gaza, to create more easily managed territorial ghettoes. And just as in Iraq, the likely reaction is an even greater extremism from the Palestinians that will undermine their cause in the eyes of the international community.

Where will this lead the Palestinians next?

Israel is already pulling the strings of Fatah with a new adeptness since the latter's humiliation in Gaza. Abbas is currently basking in Israeli munificence for his rogue West Bank regime, including the decision to release a substantial chunk of the $700 million tax monies owed to the Palestinians (including those of Gaza, of course) and withheld for years by Israel. The price, according to the Israeli media, was a commitment from Abbas not to contemplate re-entering a unity government with Hamas.

The goal will be to increase the strains between Hamas and Fatah to breaking point in the West Bank, but ensure that Fatah wins the confrontation there. Fatah is already militarily stronger and with generous patronage from Israel and the US -- including arms and training, and possibly the return of the Badr Brigade currently holed up in Jordan -- it should be able to rout Hamas. The difference in status between Gaza and the West Bank that has been long desired by Israel will be complete.

The Palestinian people have already been carved up into a multitude of constituencies. There are the Palestinians under occupation, those living as second-class citizens of Israel, those allowed to remain "residents" of Jerusalem, and those dispersed to camps across the Middle East. Even within these groups, there are a host of sub-identities: refugees and non-refugees; refugees included as citizens in their host state and those excluded; occupied Palestinians living under the control of the Palestinian Authority and those under Israel's military government; and so on.

Now, Israel has entrenched maybe the most significant division of all: the absolute and irreversible separation of Gaza and the West Bank. What applies to one will no longer be true for the other. Each will be a separate case; their fates will no longer be tied. One will be, as Israelis like to call it, Hamastan, and other Fatahland, with separate governments and different treatment from Israel and the international community.

The reasons why Israel prefers this arrangement are manifold.

First, Gaza can now be written off by the international community as a basket case. The Israeli media is currently awash with patronizing commentary from the political and security establishments about how to help avoid a humanitarian crisis in Gaza, including the possibility of air drops of aid over the Gaza "security fence" -- as though Gaza were Pakistan after an earthquake. From past experience, and the current menacing sounds from Israel's new Defence Minister, Ehud Barak, those food packages will quickly turn into bombs if Gaza does not keep quiet.

As Israeli and US officials have been phrasing it, there is a new "clarity" in the situation. In a Hamastan, Gaza's militants and civilians can be targeted by Israel with little discrimination and no outcry from the international community. Israel will hope that message from Gaza will not be lost on West Bank Palestinians as they decide who to give their support to, Fatah or Hamas.

Second, at their meeting last week Olmert and Bush revived talk of Palestinian statehood. According to Olmert, Bush "wants to realize, while he is in office, the dream of creating a Palestinian state." Both are keen to make quick progress, a sure sign of mischief in the making. Certainly, they know they are now under no pressure to create the single viable Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza once promised by President Bush. An embattled Abbas will not be calling for the inclusion of Gaza in his ghetto-fiefdom.

Third, the separation of Gaza from the West Bank may be used to inject new life into Olmert's shopworn convergence plan -- if he can dress it up in new clothes. Convergence, which required a very limited withdrawal from those areas of the West Bank heavily populated with Palestinians while Israel annexed most of its illegal colonies and kept the Jordan Valley, was officially ditched last summer after Israel's humiliation by Hizballah.

Why seek to revive convergence? Because it is the key to Israel securing the expanded Jewish fortress state that is its only sure protection from the rapid demographic growth of the Palestinians, soon to outnumber Jews in the Holy Land, and Israel's fears that it may then be compared to apartheid South Africa.

If the occupation continues unchanged, Israel's security establishment has long been warning, the Palestinians will eventually wake up to the only practical response: to dissolve the Palestinian Authority, Israel's clever ruse to make the Palestinian leadership responsible for suppressing Palestinian resistance to the occupation, thereby forcing Israel to pick up the bill for the occupation rather than Europe. The next stage would be an anti-apartheid struggle for one state in historic Palestine.

For this reason, demographic separation from the Palestinians has been the logic of every major Israeli policy initiative since -- and including -- Oslo. Convergence requires no loss of Israel's control over Palestinian lives, ensured through the all but finished grid of walls, settlements, bypass roads and checkpoints, only a repackaging of their occupation as statehood.

The biggest objection in Israel to Olmert's plan -- as well as to the related Gaza disengagement -- was the concern that, once the army had unilaterally withdrawn from the Palestinian ghettoes, the Palestinians would be free to launch terror attacks, including sending rockets out of their prisons into Israel. Most Israelis, of course, never consider the role of the occupation in prompting such attacks.

But Olmert may believe he has found a way to silence his domestic critics. For the first time he seems genuinely keen to get his Arab neighbors involved in the establishment of a Palestinian "state". As he headed off to the Sharm al-Sheikh summit with Egypt, Jordan and Abbas this week, Olmert said he wanted to "jointly work to create the platform that may lead to a new beginning between us and the Palestinians."

Did he mean partnership? A source in the Prime Minister's Office explained to The Jerusalem Post why the three nations and Abbas were meeting. "These are the four parties directly impacted by what is happening right now, and what is needed is a different level of cooperation between them." Another spokesman bewailed the failure so far to get the Saudis on board.

This appears to mark a sea change in Israeli thinking. Until now Tel Aviv has regarded the Palestinians as a domestic problem -- after all, they are sitting on land that rightfully, at least if the Bible is to be believed, belongs to the Jews. Any attempt at internationalizing the conflict has therefore been strenuously resisted.

But now the Israeli Prime Minister's Office is talking openly about getting the Arab world more directly involved, not only in its usual role as a mediator with the Palestinians, nor even in simply securing the borders against smuggling, but also in policing the territories. Israel hopes that Egypt, in particular, is as concerned as Tel Aviv by the emergence of a Hamastan on its borders, and may be enticed to use the same repressive policies against Gaza's Islamists as it does against its own.

Similarly, Olmert's chief political rival, Binyamin Netanyahu of Likud, has mentioned not only Egyptian involvement in Gaza but even a Jordanian military presence in the West Bank. The "moderate" Arab regimes, as Washington likes to call them, are being seen as the key to developing new ideas about Palestinian "autonomy" and regional "confederation." As long as Israel has a quisling in the West Bank and a beyond-the-pale government in Gaza, it may believe it can corner the Arab world into backing such a "peace plan."

What will it mean in practice? Possibly, as Zvi Barel of Haaretz speculates, we will see the emergence of half a dozen Palestinian governments in charge of the ghettoes of Gaza, Ramallah, Jenin, Jericho, and Hebron. Each may be encouraged to compete for patronage and aid from the "moderate" Arab regimes but on condition that Israel and the US are satisfied with these Palestinian governments' performance.

In other words, Israel looks as if it is dusting off yet another blueprint for how to manage the Palestinians and their irritating obsession with sovereignty. Last time, under Oslo, the Palestinians were put in charge of policing the occupation on Israel's behalf. This time, as the Palestinians are sealed into their separate prisons masquerading as a state, Israel may believe that it can find a new jailer for the Palestinians -- the Arab world.

Jonathan Cook, a journalist based in Nazareth, Israel, is the author of Blood and Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State (Pluto Press, 2006). His website is www.jkcook.net

Bush Past 2008?? You Are Now Warned

Here is one of the many gems to be found on the SOTT Forum, the most lucid, intelligent group of people to be met on the planet.

From the thread "Bush Term Ends in 2008". :

"Any clue how it is possible for a military dictatorship to occur before his term ends before 2009 or do you think that a major event will occur preventing a normal primary election for a new president? I mean, why are there candidates lining up now and not next year since there is a full year and a half left of his term?"

A stark summation by ScioAgapeOmnis:

It might go something like this..

From _http://www2.dsu.nodak.edu/users/dmeier/Holocaust/hitler.html

The Creation of the Nazi Dictatorship, 1933-1939

Phase One, 1933-1934
Nazi domestic policy can be broken into three phases beginning with 1933-34. During these years, Hitler consolidated his authority through the destruction of all other political parties, "coordination" of all aspects of German life, and the liquidation of dissent among Nazis and conservatives. After taking office as chancellor, Hitler quickly out maneuvered Papen and the conservative nationalists.

The Reichstag Fire, February 1933
A new Reichstag election was scheduled for early March 1933. Only a few days before the election, on February 27, the Reichstag building was partially destroyed by fire. The Nazis may well have set the blaze, but they blamed the Communists, charging that the Communists were plotting to seize power. Hitler convinced Hindenburg to take strong action against the supposed Communist threat, and the president suspended freedom of speech and the press and other civil liberties.

March 1933 Election
The Nazis stepped up their harassment of their political opponents, and the March 5 election was held in an atmosphere of fear and intimidation. Polling 44 percent of the votes, the Nazis won 288 seats in the Reichstag. With the support of their conservative nationalist allies, who held 52 seats, the Nazis controlled a majority of the 647 member Reichstag. The Nazi majority was even more substantial, since none of the 81 Communist deputies were allowed to take their seats.

The Enabling Act, March 1933
On March 23, 1933, the Reichstag passed the Enabling Act, which gave dictatorial authority to Hitler's cabinet for four years. Armed with full powers, Hitler moved to eliminate all possible centers of opposition. His policy is known as Gleichschaltung, which translates literally as coordination. In this context, however, it meant more precisely subordination, that is, subordinating all independent institutions to the authority of Hitler and the Nazi Party.

It was the Enabling Act of March 23, 1933, which in a legal way conferred dictatorial powers on Adolf Hitler. Only 94 Social Democratic votes were cast against it. The date for its abrogation (see Article 5) was never kept. Indeed, the Enabling Act is the last measure which the Reichstag passed under the republican and democratic Constitution of the Republic. It spelled its end and the beginning of National Socialist dictatorship.

From: _http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic

At the meeting of the new cabinet on March 15, Hitler introduced the Enabling Act, which would have authorised the cabinet to enact legislation without the approval of the Reichstag. [...]

At the last internal Centre meeting prior to the debate on the Enabling Act, Kaas expressed no preference or suggestion on the vote, but as a way of mollifying opposition by Centre members to the granting of further powers to Hitler, Kaas somehow arranged for a letter of constitutional guarantee from Hitler himself prior to his voting with the centre en bloc in favor of the Enabling Act. This guarantee was not ultimately given. Kaas, the party's chairman since 1928, had strong connections to the Vatican Secretary of State, later Pope Pius XII. In return for pledging his support for the act, Kaas would use his connections with the Vatican to set in train and draft the Holy See's long desired Reichskonkordat with Germany (only possible with the co-operation of the Nazis).

Ludwig Kaas is considered along with von Papen as being one of the two most important political figures in the creation of a National Socialist dictatorship.[5]

From: _http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enabling_Act_of_1933

The Enabling Act (Ermächtigungsgesetz in German) was passed by Germany's parliament (the Reichstag) on March 23, 1933 and signed by President Paul von Hindenburg the same day. It was the second major step after the Reichstag Fire Decree through which the democratically-elected Nazis obtained dictatorial powers using largely legal means. The Act enabled Chancellor Adolf Hitler and his cabinet to enact laws without the participation of the Reichstag.

The formal name of the Enabling Act was Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich ("Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Nation").

Enabling Act Text

Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Empire
The Reichstag has enacted the following law, which is hereby proclaimed with the assent of the Reichsrat, it having been established that the requirements for a constitutional amendment have been fulfilled:

Article 1
In addition to the procedure prescribed by the constitution, laws of the Reich may also be enacted by the government of the Reich. This includes the laws referred to by Articles 85 Paragraph 2 and Article 87 of the constitution.[1]

Article 2
Laws enacted by the government of the Reich may deviate from the constitution as long as they do not affect the institutions of the Reichstag and the Reichsrat. The rights of the President remain undisturbed.

Article 3
Laws enacted by the Reich government shall be issued by the Chancellor and announced in the Reich Gazette. They shall take effect on the day following the announcement, unless they prescribe a different date. Articles 68 to 77 of the Constitution do not apply to laws enacted by the Reich government.[2]

Article 4
Treaties of the Reich with foreign states which affect matters of Reich legislation shall not require the approval of the bodies of the legislature. The government of the Reich shall issue the regulations required for the execution of such treaties.

Article 5
This law takes effect with the day of its proclamation. It loses force on 1 April 1937 or if the present Reich government is replaced by another.

[...]

While there had been previous enabling acts in the earliest years of the Weimar Republic, this one was more far reaching since Article 2 allowed for deviations from the constitution. The law therefore formally required a two-thirds majority in the Reichstag. Hitler had taken care of that: under the provisions of the Reichstag Fire Decree, the Communist Party deputies — and a few Social Democratic deputies as well — were already jailed, and the Communist mandates were declared "dormant" by the government shortly after the elections.

From: _http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichstag_Fire_Decree

The Reichstag Fire Decree (Reichstagsbrandverordnung in German) is the common name of the decree issued by German president Paul von Hindenburg in direct response to the Reichstag fire of February 27, 1933. The decree nullified many of the key civil liberties of German citizens. With Nazis in powerful positions of the German government, the decree was used as the legal basis of imprisonment of anyone considered to be opponents of the Nazis, and was used to suppress publications not considered "friendly" to the Nazi cause. The decree is considered by historians to be one of the key steps in the establishment of a one-party Nazi state in Germany.

Adolf Hitler had been named chancellor of Germany and invited by President von Hindenburg to lead a coalition government only four weeks previously, on January 30, 1933. Hitler's government urged von Hindenburg to dissolve the Reichstag and to call elections for March 5.

On the evening of February 27, 1933 — six days before the parliamentary election — fire broke out in the Reichstag chambers. While the exact circumstances of the fire remain unclear to this day, what is clear is that Hitler and his supporters quickly capitalized on the fire as a means by which to speed their consolidation of power. Seizing on the burning of the Reichstag building as the opening salvo in a communist uprising, the Nazis were able to throw millions of Germans into a convulsion of fear at the threat of Communist terror. The official account stated:

The burning of the Reichstag was intended to be the signal for a bloody uprising and civil war. Large-scale pillaging in Berlin was planned.... It has been determined that ... throughout Germany acts of terrorism were to begin against prominent individuals, against private property, against the lives and safety of the peaceful population, and general civil war was to be unleashed....

The decree was improvised on the day after the fire (February 28) after discussions in the Prussian Ministry of the Interior, which was led by Hermann Göring, and was then brought before the Reich cabinet. In the ensuing discussions, Hitler stated that the fire made it now a matter of "ruthless confrontation of the KPD" and shortly thereafter, President von Hindenburg, 84 years old and lapsing in and out of senility, signed the decree into law.

The decree, officially the Verordnung des Reichspräsidenten zum Schutz von Volk und Staat (Order of the Reich President for the Protection of People and State), invoked the authority of Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution which allowed the Reichspräsident to take any appropriate measure to remedy dangers to public safety.

The decree consisted of six articles. Article 1 suspended most of the civil liberties set forth in the Weimar Constitution — freedom of the person, freedom of expression, freedom of the press, the right of free association and public assembly, the secrecy of the post and telephone, not to mention the protection of property and the home. Articles 2 and 3 allowed the Reich government to assume powers normally reserved to the federal states (Länder). Articles 4 and 5 established draconian penalties for certain offenses, including the death penalty for arson to public buildings. Article 6 simply stated that the decree took effect on the day of its proclamation.

Text of the decree

The preamble and Article 1 of the Reichstag Fire Decree show the methods by which the civil rights protections of the Weimar Republic's democratic constitution were abolished in a legal manner by the Nazis:

Order of the Reich President for the Protection of People and State

On the basis of Article 48 paragraph 2 of the Constitution of the German Reich, the following is ordered in defense against Communist state-endangering acts of violence:

§ 1. Articles 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124 and 153 of the Constitution of the German Reich are suspended until further notice. It is therefore permissible to restrict the rights of personal freedom [habeas corpus], freedom of opinion, including the freedom of the press, the freedom to organize and assemble, the privacy of postal, telegraphic and telephonic communications, and warrants for house searches, orders for confiscations as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed.

The decree was not accompanied by any written guidelines from the Reich government; this omission gave wide latitude in interpreting the decree to Nazis like Göring, who as Prussian interior minister was in authority over the police forces in Germany's largest province.

I'm not posting anything we don't already know, but sometimes the striking parallels are worth another look, as a shocking reminder of just where we are today. There were plenty of "presidential candidates", Hitler was simply one of them. This has nothing to do with what is planned, and what is to come, it's just "business as usual". And with that let me come to the present situation.

Bush steals election.
September 11 attacks occur.

The Patriot Act is "enabled":

Introduced into the House of Representatives as H.R. 3162 by Congressman James F. Sensenbrenner (R, WI), the Act swept through Congress remarkably quickly and with little dissent. House Resolution 3162 was introduced in the House of Representatives on October 23, 2001. Assistant Attorney General Viet D. Dinh and future Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff were the primary drafters of the Act. The bill passed in the House of Representatives on October 24, 2001, and in the Senate (Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) cast the lone dissenting vote, and Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) was the sole non-voting member) on October 25, 2001. President George W. Bush signed the bill into law on October 26, 2001.

From: _http://www.citypages.com/databank/24/1168/article11196.asp

Some of the provisions:

It is a crime for anyone in this country to contribute money or other material support to the activities of a group on the State Department's terrorist watch list. It is a crime for anyone in this country to contribute money or other material support to the activities of a group on the State Department's terrorist watch list. Organizations are so designated on the basis of secret evidence, and their inclusion on the list cannot be challenged in court. Members of any such targeted organization can be deported even if they have not been involved in any illegal activities. The government freely admits that some of the groups it will designate are broad-based organizations engaged in lawful social, political, and humanitarian activities as well as violent activities.

The FBI can monitor and tape conversations and meetings between an attorney and a client who is in federal custody, whether the client has been convicted, charged, or merely detained as a material witness.

Americans captured on foreign soil and thought to have been involved in terrorist activities abroad may be held indefinitely in a military prison and denied access to lawyers or family members. No federal court can review the reason for the detention.

The FBI can order librarians to turn over information about their patrons' reading habits and Internet use. The librarian cannot inform the patron that this information has been provided.

Foreign citizens charged with a terrorist-related act may be denied access to an attorney and their right to question witnesses and otherwise prepare for a defense may be severely curtailed if the Department of Justice says that's necessary to protect national security.

Resident alien men from primarily Middle Eastern and Muslim countries must report for registration. And hundreds of the ones who have reported have been detained and arrested for minor immigration infractions. It recently came to light that immigration authorities are refusing to let the men appear with their attorneys, a refusal that is a violation of Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services (BCIS, formerly the INS) regulations.

Lawful foreign visitors may be photographed and fingerprinted when they enter the country and made to periodically report for questioning.

The government can conduct surveillance on the Internet and e-mail use of American citizens without any notice, upon order to the Internet service provider. Internet service providers may not move to quash such subpoenas.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) can search any car at any airport without a showing of any suspicion of criminal activity.

The TSA can conduct full searches of people boarding airplanes and, if the passenger is a child, the child may be separated from the parent during the search. An objection by a parent or guardian to the search will put the objector at the risk of being charged with the crime of obstructing a federal law enforcement officer and tried in federal court.

The TSA is piloting a program to amass all available computerized information on all purchasers of airline tickets, categorize individuals according to their threat to national security, and embed the label on all boarding passes. The Computer Assisted Passenger Prescreening System (CAPPS II) program is designed to perform background checks on all airline passengers and assigns each passenger a "threat level." Passengers will not be able to ascertain their classification or the basis for the classification.

The TSA distributes a "no-fly" list to airport security personnel and airlines that require refusal of boarding and detention of persons deemed to be terrorism or air piracy risks or to pose a threat to airline or passenger safety. This is an expansion of a regulation that since 1990 has looked out for threats to civil aviation. Names are added daily based upon secret criteria. Several lawsuits that challenge these regulations are now pending, some from irate passengers who were mistaken for people on the list.

American citizens and aliens can be held indefinitely in federal custody as "material witnesses," a ploy sometimes used as a punitive measure when the government does not have sufficient basis to charge the individual with a terror-related crime.

Immigration authorities may detain immigrants without any charges for a "reasonable period of time." The BCIS need not account for the names or locations of the detainees, and what constitutes a "reasonable period of time" is not defined.

American colleges and universities with foreign students must report extensive information about their students to the BCIS. BCIS in turn may revoke student visas for missteps as minor as a student's failure to get an advisor's signature on a form that adds or drops classes. College personnel cannot notify students to correct the lapse in order to save them from deportation. To a very large extent, campus police and security personnel have become agents of the immigration authorities.

Accused terrorists labeled "unlawful combatants" can be tried in military tribunals here or abroad, under rules of procedure developed by the Pentagon and the Department of Justice. All it takes to be named an unlawful combatant is the affidavit of a Pentagon employee, who is not required to provide the rationale for his or her decision, even to a federal judge. (In the case of Yaser Hamdi, the federal appellate court ruled that it has no authority to look behind this affidavit and question the determination.) Unlawful combatants are also denied counsel and contact with family members. In fact, hundreds of "unlawful combatants" are still being held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, without attorneys, without family contact, and under conditions said by some to be tantamount to physical and psychological torture. A federal court ruled in March that these persons had no access to the federal courts since they were on Cuban, not American, soil.

A warrant to conduct widespread surveillance on any American thought to be associated with terrorist activities can be obtained from a secret panel of judges, upon the affidavit of a Department of Justice official. If arrested as a result of the surveillance (as was the case with the attorney, Lynne Stewart), the defendant has no right to know the facts supporting the warrant request.

The FBI can conduct aerial surveillance of individuals and homes without a warrant, and can install video cameras in places where lawful demonstrations and protests are held. Facial recognition computer programs are used to identify persons the FBI deems suspicious for political reasons.

Most of these restrictions on liberty were not part of the letter of the Patriot Act; they were shaped by means of rules and regulations adopted in agencies and departments of government with little notice to the public. That's because the Patriot Act granted sweeping new powers to agencies like the Department of Justice, the FBI, and BCIS to go their own way in prosecuting the war on terror.

Now let's look at the Executive Orders:

From: http://www.cassiopaea.org/cass/exec_tyranny.htm

Here we have a nation that has and will invade other countries in order to bomb and kill thousands of civilians to further its despotic aims under a pretext of "preemptive strikes" that is deeply insulting to anyone with half a neuron of humanity. These are dangerous psychopaths at the helm of a country that has reduced it’s populace to some of the most mind controlled people on this earth, where successive executive orders most particularly during the Nixon, Carter, Reagan and Clinton administrations have brought us to a very dangerous stage indeed. And following the crimes of the PATRIOT Act, the recently passed obscenity that is PATRIOT Act II, and the Home Security Act, we find the following executive orders in the Federal Register which are passed without a whiff of red tape. And should a National emergency suddenly materialize then an executive tyranny will replace all notions of just governing. Most importantly, prior congressional approval is not needed for such directives - they are instantly effective once the National Emergency is declared:

EXECUTIVE ORDER 10990 allows the government to take over all modes of transportation and control of highways and seaports.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 10995 allows the government to seize and control the communication media.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 10997 allows the government to take over all electrical power, gas, petroleum, fuels and minerals.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 10998 allows the government to take over all food resources and farms.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11000 allows the government to mobilize civilians into work brigades under government supervision.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11001 allows the government to take over all health, education and welfare functions.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11002 designates the Postmaster General to operate a national registration of all persons.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11003 allows the government to take over all airports and aircraft, including commercial aircraft.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11004 allows the Housing and Finance Authority to relocate communities, build new housing with public funds, designate areas to be abandoned, and establish new locations for populations.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11005 allows the government to take over railroads, inland waterways and public storage facilities.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11051 specifies the responsibility of the Office of Emergency Planning and gives authorization to put all Executive Orders into effect in times of increased international tensions and economic or financial crisis.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11310 grants authority to the Department of Justice to enforce the plans set out in Executive Orders, to institute industrial support, to establish judicial and legislative liaison, to control all aliens, to operate penal and correctional institutions, and to advise and assist the President.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11049 assigns emergency preparedness function to federal departments and agencies, consolidating 21 operative Executive Orders issued over a fifteen year period.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 11921 allows the Federal Emergency Preparedness Agency to develop plans to establish control over the mechanisms of production and distribution, of energy sources, wages, salaries, credit and the flow of money in U.S. financial institution in any undefined national emergency. It also provides that when a state of emergency is declared by the President, Congress cannot review the action for six months.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 12148 created the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) that is to interface with the Department of Defense for civil defense planning and funding. An "emergency czar" was appointed. FEMA has only spent about 6 percent of its budget on national emergencies, the bulk of their funding has been used for the construction of secret underground facilities to assure continuity of government in case of a major emergency, foreign or domestic.

EXECUTIVE ORDER 12656 appointed the National Security Council as the principal body that should consider emergency powers. This allows the government to increase domestic intelligence and surveillance of U.S. citizens and would restrict the freedom of movement within the United States and granted the government the right to isolate large groups of civilians. The National Guard could be federalized to seal all borders and take control of U.S. air space and all ports of entry. Many of the figures in the Iran-Contra scandal were part of this emergency contingent, including Marine Colonel Oliver North.

Let’s not forget a selection of long forgotten acts that are now being homogenized into the above executive orders:

National Security Act of 1947

Allows for the strategic relocation of industries, services, government and other essential economic activities, and to rationalize the requirements for manpower, resources and production facilities.

1950 Defense Production Act

Gives the President total control over all aspects of the economy.

International Emergency Economic Powers Act

Property of a national or foreign country can be seized by the President. These powers were transferred to FEMA during the Carter administration and the unearthing of further executive orders in 1979.

The Violent Crime Control Act 1991

Provides additional powers to the President allowing the suspension of the Constitution and Constitutional rights of Americans during a "drug crisis". It provides for the construction of detention camps, seizure of property, and military control of populated areas.

Let's check out the more recently enacted "Military Commissions Act"

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_C … ct_of_2006

The Act changes pre-existing law to explicitly forbid the invocation of the Geneva Conventions when executing the writ of habeas corpus or in other civil actions [Act sec. 5(a)]. This provision applies to all cases pending at the time the Act is enacted, as well as to all such future cases.

If the government chooses to bring a prosecution against the detainee, a military commission is convened for this purpose. The following rules are some of those established for trying alien unlawful enemy combatants.

‘‘(b) NOTICE TO ACCUSED.—Upon the swearing of the charges and specifications in accordance with subsection (a), the accused shall be informed of the charges against him as soon as practicable.

* A civilian defense attorney may not be used unless the attorney has been determined to be eligible for access to classified information that is classified at the level Secret or higher. [10 U.S.C. sec. 949c(b)(3)(D)]

* A finding of Guilty by a particular commission requires only a two-thirds majority of the members of the commission present at the time the vote is taken [10 U.S.C. sec. 949m(a)]

* In General- No person may invoke the Geneva Conventions or any protocols thereto in any habeas corpus or other civil action or proceeding to which the United States, or a current or former officer, employee, member of the Armed Forces, or other agent of the United States is a party as a source of rights in any court of the United States or its States or territories. [Act sec. 5(a)]

* As provided by the Constitution and by this section, the President has the authority for the United States to interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions and to promulgate higher standards and administrative regulations for violations of treaty obligations which are not grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions. [Act sec. 6(a)(3)(A)]

* No person may, without his consent, be tried by a military commission under this chapter a second time for the same offense. [10 U.S.C. sec. 949h(a)].

The Act also contains provisions (often referred to as the "habeas provisions") removing access to the courts for any alien detained by the United States government who is determined to be an enemy combatant, or who is 'awaiting determination' regarding enemy combatant status. This allows the United States government to detain such aliens indefinitely without prosecuting them in any manner.

These provisions are as follows:[5]

(e)(1) No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination. (2) Except as provided in paragraphs (2) and (3) of section 1005(e) of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (10 U.S.C. 801 note), no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any other action against the United States or its agents relating to any aspect of the detention, transfer, treatment, trial, or conditions of confinement of an alien who is or was detained by the United States and has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.

Just like in Nazi Germany, currently everything above is perfectly and 100% legal. The most horrible tyranny imaginable is already in the law books. "Terrorism" is not defined. "Enemy Combatants" is not defined. The government can accuse anyone of terrorism, and the evidence is legally classified so they don't have to have any. This is all perfectly legal. It is not a question of us becoming "like Nazi Germany" - clearly and without a single doubt we have reached every possible limit of control that the Nazis have reached, and superceded them in many areas due to modern technology that enables the tyranny much more powerful. The question is now - when will the above executive acts be used? The answer is simple - when the opportunity presents itself. Are psychopaths known to sit around waiting for life to throw them a bone? No, they are creating this "opportunity" as we speak. All we need is either an economic depression, a terrorist act, or anything else that can oh so easily be created, and all of the above laws will be in full utilization, all our rights are gone, and not a word, not a peep, not a thought will be allowed that is not friendly to the system, else you're assisting the terrorists, you ARE a terrorist. I hope the above answers the question how it is possible for military dictatorship to occur, because it is shockingly simple. It's already here, all the laws and precepts of a military dictatorships are already legal and active. We just haven't been informed of it on Fox News just yet, and so most Americans don't realize that their constitution has already been suspended, it is null and void. The next step is Bush announcing it for us on Fox News, as the next step in the "war on terror". And let's not forget that most of the above acts and "laws" are currently being tested and used on thousands of innocent people, Americans and foreigners alike. Soon, EVERYONE will be included.

It's really that simple.