Saturday, October 18, 2008

Conspiracy, Clowns, and High Weirdness in Outer Space. Saturday afternoon done right at Cabaret Apocalypto.

The NSA, Phone Sex, and the Palestine Hotel.
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5987804&page=1
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/politics/content/nation/epaper/2008/10/09/a1a_intel_1010.html?cxntlid=inform_sr
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/5/13/fmr_military_intelligence_officer_reveals_us
http://www.thought-criminal.org/2007/07/03/spying-on-americans-new-nsa-whistleblower-speaks
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestine_Hotel
http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2003/palestine_hotel/palestine_hotel.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/us-lied-about-deaths-of-journalists-in-the-palestine-hotel-573354.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3145965.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2928153.stm

Adrienne Kinne is one of "Them". She is, or was, an agent for "Military Intelligence" (which from what I can tell translates as "The NSA" in this instance). She is however making a name for herself by whistle blowing about the NSA's warrentless wiretapping program. Concerning, among other things, their tendency to zero in not on terrorist related transmissions, but on phone sex.

According to Ms. Kinne No Such Agency was using Carnivore & Echelon for tracking down lurid bits of communications. Phone calls, e-mails, texts, etc.. and spreading them around the office for entertainment/spanking material. Needless to say, this is a tad embarrassing for the intelligence community. Usually when someone "blows the lid off" something in the deep black world of espionage it relates to murder. Murder, while illegal and immoral, is cool. Well, it's a lot cooler than being the nerd in the tree watching his neighbor undress in the bedroom or scamming free phone sex with a fake credit card. Being James Bond and shooting the bad guy off of a radio telescope is cool, being the old guy jerking off under a raincoat behind two young lovers on the bus is not.

Of course thats not the only impropriety Agent Kinne is talking about, its just the only one the mainstream media will discuss.

The CIA and NSA added the Palestine Hotel to a list of viable targets for the US Military in 2003 during the invasion of Baghdad. The hotel, while outside what would come to be the "Green Zone", was the staging point for a majority of the international press corp (and the unembedded American journalists).

Now its a big building, with a big sign that says "Palestine Hotel", and its in Baghdad to boot. So its easy to see why when the target list came down the pipe a tank crew driving along a bridge nearby fired a few shells into the building. Target of Opportunity they call it.

Several journalists were killed, everyone was both shaken and stirred, and as soon as the hotel was confirmed as shelled the CIA removed it from the list of "kill this as quick as you can" targets. Ms. Kinne says that was entirely deliberate.

The facts seem to support that story. Go ahead and find pictures from that day of the tank crew, take a look at how they feel after firing on unarmed civilians (some of which were American citizens). They did not know. They were told it was a viable military target. They were used to murder innocent people at random. Maybe there was a specific target in mind and it was a clumsy assassination attempt, or maybe it was just malice that lead to the deaths of Taras Protsyuk (Reuters) and Jose Couso (Telecinco) and the wounding of three others.

The US Military has been accused of everything from criminal negligence to murder in this case. If Agent Kinne is telling the truth then they are no more guilty than a gun or knife in a murder. I am not normally what you would call an apologist for the military, but those kids in that tank killed innocent people, and it was not their faults. They get to live with that for the rest of their lives while the nameless suit that is responsible will sleep soundly on a pillow of taxpayer money tonight.

Phantom Clowns 2: Chicago South Side Super Creepy Pony Ride
http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/clown.sightings.kids.2.842883.html
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,438228,00.html
http://www.suntimes.com/news/24-7/1221492,clown-abduction-children-101408.article

The Phantom Clowns, one of Americas creepiest historical oddities/urban legends is back. This time a silver sedan and your standard issue child molestation family van are on the prowl on the South Side of Chicago. The very same area Barack Obama started his political career as a community organizer.

Two per vehicle they come, bearing candy, balloons, and wicked grins. Trying to entice children into their vehicles just like in the 1980's. Also just like the 1980's they have yet to actually abduct a child. Well, so far no child abductions can be reliable attributed to them, thats not to say they have not done it.

The last time the clowns stalked the streets of Americas cities we had Satanic Ritual Abuse Syndrome dominating the news cycle. This time its the Presidential election and the collapse of Wall Street. The clowns are showing up in an area with a connection to the Obama campaign, in an area rife with the dealings of Tony Rezco. A man the Obama campaign would certainly like to forget, as Barack's ill-advised land deal with him has been a stick which his rivals have beat him with non-stop for almost two years. Not that there is a connection at all mind you, I just think its weird that out of all the places for this to crop up its right there. Little weird.

Copy Cats? The same clowns? Distraction from something else? Supernatural weirdness? Who knows. It will be interesting to see if it spreads again, like last time.

Dark Flow: Not a new Jam Band, not a PS3 game, not what happens to your girlfriend once a month. No, it is both cooler and scarier than those.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/080923-dark-flows.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/09/080923104410.htm
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/09/25/universe-dark-flow.html
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,427082,00.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26857495/
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2008/dark_flow.html

How big is the universe? Big. Really, really big. Is it infinite? Well, no. Probably not. For as large as it is it might as well be, but its not. What is outside of the universe? Until a few months ago most scientists would shrug and say "probably nothing". Recently however "probably nothing" became "most likely something so fucking weird and scary that your human brain cannot properly conceive of it without going mad".

No, this is not a ham-fisted intro to a Lovecraft story. Rather its a ham-fisted introduction to high weirdness on a universal scale. Dark Flow.

Assume the Big Bang happened. OK. So we have ALL matter and energy in the Universe (even that which is contained inside Steven Seagal) traveling outward from the zero point at impossible speeds. So we have an ever expanding sphere of matter and energy which Al Gore likes to call "The Universe".

Everything inside this "The Universe" is moving at more or less the same speed in predictable directions as its a spherical model. So flash forward about 15 or so billion years and you have everything where it is now. Some things slowed down a bit, some sped up, but aside from various crashes and explosions shaking up the model its all pretty predictable. Right Science? Science says well, um, no. Not entirely.

A few Galactic Clusters (which are not hair metal bands or Little Debbie cakes but rather are giant cloud-like clusters of galaxies) are moving in the wrong directions. In the wrong direction at about 2 million kilometers per hour (our galaxy takes about 200 million years to make a complete orbit around galactic central point). They are not moving how they should be moving, but are moving in a straight line outwards, towards the edge of the observable universe. Once they get there they will then exit reality as we know it.

Thats pretty weird right? It gets better, in the way that Lovecraft's stories get more "hopeful" and "optimistic" at the end. This is being caused by "Dark Flow". A name scientists made up because the only cause for this problem that fits the math is gigantic structures of impossible geometry and material alien to our universe sitting outside normal space and time warping the very fabric of reality. The gravity well of these structures is affecting a certain region of our universe and pulling material (in this case galactic clusters) outside of observable space and time into another, weirder something (its not another dimension, or universe, its just something sitting outside of our universe).

So there you have it. Sleep tight.

* * *

I promised a full post and here it is. I guess my article about the Battle of Las Angeles was not as popular as my paranoid ranting about the government and martial law. I had to take a little break from writing about it for a week, I was about to pop a blood vessel deep in my brain. We are back this week however with a little of column A and B. Look closely at the first article, you can see my potential aneurysm throbbing...

/End Transmission.

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Rage Against the UFO: Weird Tales of WW2

Another small post this week, but at least it has pictures. There will be more later, I promise. In the meanwhile enjoy this bit of weird history.

The Battle of Los Angeles is not just a Rage Against the Machine album.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Los_Angeles
http://www.presidentialufo.com/west_coast_air_raid.htm
http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist9/aaf2.html
http://ufos.about.com/od/bestufocasefiles/p/losangeles1942.htm
http://www.rense.com/ufo/battleofla.htm
http://www.rense.com/general27/battle.htm
http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=649
http://brumac.8k.com/BATTLEOFLA/BOLA1.html

In the wee hours of the morning on February 25th, 1942 searchlights lit the sky above LA. The city was plunged into emergency black out and anti-aircraft guns exploded shells into a target above the city for over an hour. Several civilians died as a result of friendly fire, a few buildings burned down, and at least 3 people had heart attacks during the attack.

What the fuck was going on?

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was less than three months earlier and the West Coast was considerably edgier than it usually is. Not your average over-caffeinated twitch response mind you. It was full on paranoia that at any moment the sky would fill with Zero fighters raining high caliber machine gun death on the quirky but generally peace loving people of Southern California.

The whole country stood at a definite "War Footing" as we readied what remained of our Navy to take the fight all the way to Tokyo like a red, white, and blue flag waving, cigar chomping, radioactive death dealing giant lizard. The government was wondering out loud about putting everyone of Asian ancestry, regardless of citizenship status, into internment camps. The Nazi threat loomed in Europe as Hitler gave the free world the finger and essentially told everyone to brush up their German and learn to love his brand of hot sausage. Things were scary and weird.

So into this equation you have a mystery object, traveling slowly down the coast from Santa Monica heading to Long Beach. It is almost invisible to radar (it was detected intermittently, and was possibly one of as many as five objects), silent, makes no attempt to identify itself, and looks a bit too much like an upside down silver pie plate for comfort. All of these factors contributed to one of the loudest and most hostile welcomes in LA history.

Over 1400 12.8lb anti-aircraft shells were fired at the object over the course of an hour. Many of those shells, according to the artillery crews and civilians, impacted on the object or exploded in close proximity. No debris was found, no damage observed, after an hour of sustained firing the thing simply vanished. Of course nobody had a clue as to who the fight was with, what the other side wanted, or if there would be more fight to come.

The US Army and the Government have offered a few explanations over the years for the incident and object, all of which must be true until a new official report is published that contradicts the last one. Here are a few of the explanations...

False Alarm: Attributed to "War Nerves". Fair enough. People were crazy with worry over a possible additional Japanese sneak-attack. That is actually perfectly plausible. However an object was shot at, and hit to no effect, and this is known because newspaper men and the Army photographed it as it happened. So unless the citizens of LA were so nervous as to psychically imprint their worry in the shape of a flying saucer on tons of film, "Move along, nothing to see here" may not be the best explanation.

Japanese "Fire Balloon": A good theory, except that a balloon filled with flammable hydrogen (the Japanese did not have access to non-explosive lighter than air gasses like helium) and carrying a payload of flammable liquids and dynamite is doubtful to withstand sustained artillery fire for more than an hour. Also, the Japanese did not start unleashing their wildly ineffective balloon assault until 1944.

Birds: Birds are silent, at high altiude can appear to be slow moving, and are often covered by a reflective metal surface. However those points conceded, it can be assumed that most birds will not hover stationary in the face of powerful search lights and giant explosions for longer than an episode of The Lawrence Welk Show.

Weather Balloon: I will accept this explanation if you can explain to me how 1400+ 12.8lb anti-aircraft shells could not even move one, while in another five years one crashed on its own in Roswell, New Mexico and left a debris field around 300 feet long and with several burned and broken crash test dummies in its wake. It can be assumed from this that our earlier weather balloons were invulnerable titans of modern engineering while models produced less than a decade later folded like a house of cards at the slightest provocation.

Japanese/Nazi (Japanazi) Secret Weapon: Also a good speculation. However since this article is not written in German, Kanji, or a crude Germanese/Spanglish dialect I will assume that this was not a forgotten Wunderweapon of the 3rd Reich.

What we have here is one of the best examples of a UFO sighting in recorded history. Both Military and civilian sources observed it, fired at it, and were scared shitless of it. Photographic evidence still exists even, probably because it was not assumed to be anything other than birds or lost Japanese fighter planes with no guns searching for Sushi Bar and rest room. Despite it being such a good example, with a pretty good pile of evidence, one rarely hears about it. Why? Probably because its a good example of something unknown with a pretty good pile of evidence.

Bonus! Pictures! [Click on them for full size]

The most common image of the battle.
Photobucket

A photo taken directly from the microfilm copies.
Photobucket

Here is the negative of the first photo. Isn't that something?
Photobucket

The Negative of the image shows the object in the center of the searchlights in pretty good detail. I am not saying that its full of little green men, but it is interesting.

What is also interesting is despite all that attention, the photographs, media reports, shells fired, and civilian deaths there was no Congressional investigation into the mater. Not a one. The Army concluded at the time it must have been civilian planes operated by unauthorized pilots engaged in a psychological warfare operation of some kind. They theorize that the planes were being flown at low speed and high altitude so as to avoid the shelling from below. Which would work out as an explanation, except the object and the exploding shells can be seen in the photo's, and with even more clarity in the negative.

Another interesting factor is that in addition to the Motion Picture studios, Southern California at that time was a powerhouse of industrial production. Of what you may ask? Why, weapons of course. Ships, guns, bombs, bullets, you name it. Industrial production for the backbone of Americas war effort. All being churned out by cute little California beach bunnies. All kinds of weapons, even nukes.

Robert Oppenheimer was hard at work at the University of California (Berkley) at this time, finishing his calculations concerning critical mass and detonation. If there is a connection I have no idea what it is. Probably just a coincidence, just an interesting one.

* * *

More later.

/End Transmission.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Pirates! Mad Cow! The Collapse of Wall Street! Do I know how to party or what?

Calvin: I know more about the private lives of celebrities than I do about any governmental policy that will actually affect me. I'm interested in things that are none of my business, and I'm bored by things that are important to know.
Hobbes: The media aim to please.
Calvin: Maybe the economy should be discussed in cheap motel rooms.
-Calvin & Hobbes, by Bill Waterson

US Soldiers exposed to cancer causing agent while guarding an Iraqi water treatment plant.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/military_watertreatment_cancer_iraq_092908w/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium_dichromate
http://msds.chem.ox.ac.uk/SO/sodium_dichromate.html
http://www.osha.gov/dts/chemicalsampling/data/CH_228697.html
http://www.elementischromium.com/products/dichromate.htm

Sodium Dichromate is scary shit. The OSHA permissible exposure limits are really very tiny (in the 0.005 micrograms range, think of that as 0.005% of the average tab of acid) due to its extreme toxicity and carcinogenic effects.. It would seem that a giant vat of it was sitting open outside with the wind blowing through it (powder form) and at least 600 National Guardsmen were exposed to it. Yikes.

While I am not pointing fingers that the Amry was dumping known carcinogens into the Iraqi water supply, I am pointing a finger at someone for not being smarter and probably killing a whole bunch of people. It seems that the contractors we keep giving no-bid contracts to are determined to kill more of our troops than the Iraqi's are.

At least you know where you stand facing an angry man with an AK. Companies like Halliburton who are supposed to be taking care of our guys are killing them in worse ways, all while singing songs about how much we need their help. I can think of many more things one needs in life ahead of cancer, or drinking diesel fuel, or bathing in waste water, or having corporate thugs pull guns on you in public because they caused a traffic accident, or...

Somali Pirates die after taking an Iranian merchant ship. Die mysteriously. Symptoms of the mysterious illness include skin burns, hair loss, collapse of immune response, loss of teeth, cancer, cancer, cancer... I wonder what was poorly stored on that ship?
http://www.thetimes.co.za/PrintArticle.aspx?ID=851953
http://press.jrc.it/NewsExplorer/entities/en/247211.html
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/latestnews/Pirates-stolen--your-supertanker.3881777.jp

So it goes that the mainstream media again misses the boat. So to speak. One would think FOX News would be all over this. Not a peep, not a whisper.

Iran is importing nuclear materials from China by the look of it. Not just reactor parts, but actual uranium by the look of it. Also given how quickly these men are succumbing to radiation poisoning I would venture to guess its already been refined. Isn't that something.

Maybe the media black out is because, like Darfur, acknowledging the problem means directly saying that China is working against us. Which means we would have to do more than occasionally maybe kinda talk tough about them.

Why is that such an issue? Well ignore their military for a moment. Ignore all the products we import from them that are used on a daily basis for a moment. Ignore their yummy food for a moment. What does China do for us that is so important that they can shit in our hands like this and we will pretend its cake? Easy, money. Where do you think all the money for the Iraq war is coming from? All that debt we are in, who do you think is holding the fucking marker on that? Mostly China.

Sure America, go to war with another Arab nation! Go on, spend yourselves into debt so deep the only sunshine you see will belong to China, go ahead! China wants to own our ecconomy, and they are pretty much almost there.

Back to the article for a moment... The ship is an Iranian ship, which set sail from China, according to the company that owns it (the Iranian government, its a state owned company) it was heading for Rotterdam and was purchased by a German client. Of course they also say the cargo is "Minerals" and "Industrial Materials", so who knows. They are threatening to sue the man who is trying to help them get their ship back for saying the cargo is radioactive.

My theory? I know you are dying to hear it, so here goes. The cargo is indeed refined uranium 235, or enough raw ore (mined in Africa, hmmmm) to choke a camel. The crew, Iranian sailors, knew that the Somali pirates would kill all of them due to them all being poor sailors and not important folks. So they decided to get the pirates from beyond the grave, they cracked open the seals on the uranium canisters in the shipping boxes and closed the boxes back up. The pirates shot the crew, but the crew killed them via radiation poisoning. I applaud the crew of the ship. That is what I would have done.

Of course now there is a boat sitting at sea full of cancerous pirates and exposed uranium that's getting hotter by the minute. That sucks. That ladies and gentlemen is what I call "A Problem".

Mad Cow human variant (CJD) kills two in Spain, from the same family.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/conditions/09/25/mad.cow.spain/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

Not a lot to say on this one except that the problem is not going away. Despite increased safety precautions around the world the number of identified victims steadily increases.

*sigh*

And I do so love a good cheeseburger.

Why are Obama & McCain both HOT HOT HOT for the $700 Billion Bailout Plan? Just take a look at their top campaign contributors silly!

http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cycle=2008&cid=n00006424
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/bundlers.php?id=N00006424
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?id=N00009638&cycle2=2008&goButt2.x=0&goButt2.y=4&goButt2=Submit
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/bundlers.php?id=N00009638&cycle2=2008&goButt2.x=8&goButt2.y=9&goButt2=Submit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soft_money

Contributors in BOLD are financial/credit/banking institutions. Most of the ones whose names are not readily recognizable are law firms. On both lists, not just Obama.

John Mccain's Puppet Masters
Merrill Lynch $298,413
Citigroup Inc $269,251
Morgan Stanley $233,272
Goldman Sachs $208,395
JPMorgan Chase & Co $179,975

AT&T Inc $174,487
Blank Rome LLP $150,426
Credit Suisse Group $150,025
Greenberg Traurig LLP $146,787
UBS AG $140,165
PricewaterhouseCoopers $140,120
US Government $137,617
Bank of America $129,475
Wachovia Corp $122,846
Lehman Brothers $117,500

FedEx Corp $113,453
Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher $104,250
US Army $103,613
Bear Stearns $99,300
Pinnacle West Capital $97,700

Non-Disclosure of funding sources: 11.1%

Top Industries of McCain Bundlers

Securities & Investment $11,350,000
Real Estate $9,500,000
Lobbyists $6,250,000
Lawyers/Law Firms $4,900,000
Misc Finance $4,500,000

Barack Obama's Puppet Masters
Goldman Sachs $691,930

University of California $611,207
Citigroup Inc $448,599
JPMorgan Chase & Co $442,919

Harvard University $435,769
Google Inc $420,174
UBS AG $404,750
National Amusements Inc $389,140
Microsoft Corp $377,235
Lehman Brothers $370,524
Sidley Austin LLP $350,302
Moveon.org $347,463
Skadden, Arps et al $340,264
Time Warner $338,527
Wilmerhale Llp $335,398
Morgan Stanley $318,070
Latham & Watkins $297,400

Jones Day $289,476
University of Chicago $278,885
Stanford University $276,038
Non-Disclosure of funding sources: 5.8%

Top Industries of Obama Bundlers
Lawyers/Law Firms $11,700,000
Securities & Investment $8,900,000
TV/Movies/Music $3,150,000
Computers/Internet $2,150,000
Business Services $2,100,000

Sorta puts it all in perspective, don't it?

Steve Fosset Watch Update! Who needs money or ID in the 5th Dimension?
http://news.wired.com/dynamic/stories/F/FOSSETT_SEARCH?SITE=WIRE&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/10/01/fossett.discovery/index.html

Some hikers found his wallet, maybe his jacket, ID's, and a big pile of money in the mountains... of California. An odd story that just gets more so with every turn...

Steve Fosset Watch EXTRA UPDATE! 1 light aircraft + a sheer mountain side = no body...
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/10/02/steve.fossett.search/index.html
http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/10/belongings-of-m.html

It seems that Steve's plane crashed into a mountain head first. The investigators say there is no possible way someone could have survived that crash. Yet there was no body in the wreck, and some of Steve's belongings were found some distance away.

Steve Fosset: 5th Dimensional explorer or senile aging adventurer? Stay tuned!

***

Today is the day Active Duty troops are being deployed in the US. Keep an eye out for where kids! Its like a scavenger hunt, only more depressing.

/End Transmission.