Iraq Veterans Against the War argues that well-publicised incidents of U.S. brutality like the Abu Ghraib prison scandal and the massacre of an entire family of Iraqis in the town of Haditha are not the isolated incidents perpetrated by "a few bad apples", as many politicians and military leaders have claimed. They are part of a pattern, the group says, of "an increasingly bloody occupation".
"The problem that we face in Iraq is that policymakers in leadership have set a precedent of lawlessness where we don't abide by the rule of law, we don't respect international treaties, so when that atmosphere exists it lends itself to criminal activity," argues former U.S. Army Sergeant Logan Laituri, who served a tour in Iraq from 2004 to 2005 before being discharged as a conscientious objector.
US: Vets Break Silence on War Crimes
FBI documents contradict 9/11 Commission report
Newly-released records obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request contradict the 9/11 Commission’s report on the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and raise fresh questions about the role of Saudi government officials in connection to the hijackers.
The FBI timeline reveals that Al-Ghamdi, the alleged United hijacker, was booked onto several flights scheduled for after the 9/11 attacks, a piece of information not documented in the Commission’s final report. According to the FBI timeline, Al-Ghamdi was booked on another United Airlines flight on the very day of the attack.
TVNL Comment: Can you say "patsies?"
Government Concedes Vaccine-Autism Case in Federal Court - Now What?
After years of insisting there is no evidence to link vaccines with the onset of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), the US government has quietly conceded a vaccine-autism case in the Court of Federal Claims.
The claim, one of 4,900 autism cases currently pending in Federal "Vaccine Court," was conceded by US Assistant Attorney General Peter Keisler and other Justice Department officials, on behalf of the Department of Health and Human Services, the "defendant" in all Vaccine Court cases.
The child's claim against the government -- that mercury-containing vaccines were the cause of her autism -- was supposed to be one of three "test cases" for the thimerosal-autism theory currently under consideration by a three-member panel of Special Masters, the presiding justices in Federal Claims Court.
Karzai only controls 1/3 of Afghanistan
More than six years after the U.S. invaded to establish a stable central regime in Afghanistan, the Kabul government under President Hamid Karzai controls just 30 percent of the country, the top U.S. intelligence official said Wednesday.
Colloidal Silver Has Mainstream Medicine Singing the Blues
The truth is that silver has been used effectively by mankind to fight germs and ailments for thousands of years, and the instances of modern use of colloidal silver turning people's skin blue are so rare as to be almost non-existent - and unlike thousands of prescribed and approved over-the-counter mainstream medications including the common aspirin, silver has never killed anyone.
9/11 responders demand health care funding
The Bush administration has proposed cutting 9/11-related health care programs by 77 percent in next year's budget, to $25 million from $108 million. The cuts would affect a program at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Manhattan designed for 9/11 workers, rally organizers said.
TVNL Comment: It is hard not to use profanities about George W. Bush while reporting this.
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US Quietly Breaks UN Treaty
The treaty is the "supreme law of the land" under the US Constitution, article 6, clause 2. Every nation that signed the treaty (one hundred seventy-seven) was charged with giving a national report on such basic areas of discrimination as health care, education and prison terms. According to the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute and the National Lawyers Guild, the United States on Friday presented a report to the United Nations Committee, never mentioning Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo or the behavior of US corporations working under US military contracts.
TVNL Comment: The term "quietly" can be directly translated into an accusation of media complicity to not report. In other words when the government does something in full view of the world and it is not reported you can say they did it quietly, without the media reporting it. It is one thing when the government does things out of sight. But when they do things for all to see, and the media does not report it, there is no other way to describe it other than to call it a conspiracy among the media to not report. This in essence makes them complicit.
EPA staff had advised OK of California's stricter emissions rule, probe finds
Before the head of the Environmental Protection Agency denied California permission to implement its own global-warming law, his staff advised that there was "no legal or technical justification" for turning down the state's request.
That was among the findings of congressional investigators probing internal EPA documents to determine whether EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson was swayed by political pressure in his decision to refuse to allow California to enact emission standards for new cars and trucks that are more stringent than the federal government's.
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