Gates Blasts NATO, Questions Future of Alliance

BRUSSELS — In a stern rebuke, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned Friday that the future of the NATO military alliance is at risk because of European penny-pinching and distaste for front-line combat. The United States won't carry the alliance as a charity case, the outgoing Pentagon chief said. 

 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43351604/ns/world_news-europe/

Some NATO countries bristled, but Britain quickly and heartily agreed.
Gates' assessment that NATO could face "a dim if not dismal" future echoes long-standing concern of U.S. policymakers about European defense spending. But rarely, if ever, has it been stated so directly by such a powerful American figure, widely respected in the United States and internationally.
The remarks, at the close of Gates' final overseas trip, reflect a new reality of constrained American finances and a smaller global reach.
Earlier in the week Gates played "bad cop" to U.S. President Barack Obama's good, criticizing Germany's abstention from the air campaign in Libya two days after Obama lavished an award and fancy White House dinner on visiting Chancellor Angela Merkel.
But Gates spoke for the Obama administration, and his warning Friday was aimed squarely at Europe's priorities.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfI0dtgXu0A&feature=player_embedded
Defense Secretary Robert Gates says America's military alliance with Europe, which has been the cornerstone of U.S. security policy for six decades, faces a "dim, if not dismal" future. (June 10)

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Fukushima Debacle Risks Chernobyl ‘Dead Zone’ as Radiation in Soil Soars

Image by NASA Goddard Photo and Video via Flickrhttp://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-30/japan-risks-chernobyl-like-dead-zone-as-fukushima-soil-radiation-soars.html
Radioactive soil in pockets of areas near Japan’s crippled nuclear plant have reached the same level as Chernobyl, where a “dead zone” remains 25 years after the reactor in the former Soviet Union exploded.
Soil samples in areas outside the 20-kilometer (12 miles) exclusion zone around the Fukushima plant measured more than 1.48 million becquerels a square meter, the standard used for evacuating residents after the Chernobyl accident, Tomio Kawata, a fellow at the Nuclear Waste Management Organization of Japan, said in a research report published May 24 and given to the government.
Radiation from the plant has spread over 600 square kilometers (230 square miles), according to the report. The extent of contamination shows the government must move fast to avoid the same future for the area around Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant as Chernobyl, scientists said. Technology has improved since the 1980s, meaning soil can be decontaminated with chemicals or by planting crops to absorb radioactive materials, allowing residents to return.
“We need to finish this treatment as quickly as possible, within three years at most,” Tetsuo Iguchi, a specialist in isotope analysis and radiation detection at Nagoya University in central Japan, said in a telephone interview. “If we take longer, people will give up on returning to their homes.”

Radiation levels similar to nuclear bomb test site

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032568_Fukushima_dead_zone.html#ixzz1Ny8ROgTi

http://www.naturalnews.com/032568_Fukushima_dead_zone.html#ixzz1Ny7opXKR

One soil sample taking 25 kilometers away from Fukushima showed Cesium-137 exceeding 5 million becquerels per square meter. This level, of course, makes it uninhabitable by humans, yet both the Japanese and U.S. governments continue to downplay the whole event, assuring their sheeple that there's nothing to worry about. By their logic, since all the people are sheeple anyway, as long as the area is safe enough for sheep, it's also safe enough for the human population.

Both Japan and the U.S. have made huge efforts to raise the limits of allowed radiation exposure in foods and beverages. This was, of course, a deceitful tactic to try to reclassify radiation contamination as somehow magically being "safe" by redefining it.

The outright lying and tactics of deception that have been used to try to downplay the severity of the radioactive fallout from Fukushima are nothing less than despicable. In a time when radiation threatens the safety and food supply of hundreds of millions of people, we are getting nothing but a Fukushima whitewash.

Fukushima is now far worse than Chernobyl ever was and yet we're all being told it's no problem and that the government has it all under control. I ask: How is 5 million becquerels per square meter not a problem? It's amazing that we even got this information, considering how frequently TEPCO claims its sensors and meters aren't working (basically any time they get a reading that's "too high").

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/032568_Fukushima_dead_zone.html#ixzz1Ny7opXKR

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The Survival Station - Americans Will Need DHS Approval for Private Sector Jobs

http://blog.survivalstation.org/americans-will-need-dhs-approval-for-private-sector-jobs-62848.html
You’ve heard of no fly and no buy lists – get ready for no work lists. Millions of workers now must apply to the DHS and prove they are not terrorists in order to be granted permission by the government to work.
On the Alex Jones Show today, a caller pointed to information posted on a union website for ironworkers spelling out details on the Department of Homeland Security’s TWIC and SWAC programs.
TWIC is short for Transportation Worker Identification Credential and SWAC stands for Secure Worker Access Consortium.
TWIC “is a biometric credential that ensures only vetted workers are eligible to enter a secure construction site, unescorted,” Ironworkers Local 361 in Ozone Park, New York, explains. “Before issuing a TWIC, TSA must conduct a security threat assessment on the TWIC applicant. An applicant who, as a result of the assessment, is determined to not pose a security threat, will be issued a TWIC card.”
In other words, construction workers in New York will need permission from the TSA and DHS in order to practice their profession and earn a living. It was much the same in the former Soviet Union and authoritarian states such as China where the government determines all aspects of an individual’s life and where even the mildly rebellious are severely punished.

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Russia gives powers to FSB to prosecute 'thought crime'

clipped from www.telegraph.co.uk The Russian security service has been given extended powers to act against people for so-called "thought crime" under a new law which opponents say marks a return to Soviet-era policing. The bill, criticised by rights groups, would allow the Federal Security Service (FSB) to issue official warnings to individuals whose actions are deemed to be creating the conditions for crime. Rights groups say the bill would essentially put the special service above the law and harks back to Soviet times when the much-feared FSB predecessor KGB used warnings to persecute dissidents. The bill had already sailed through the lower and upper houses of parliament and was today signed into law by the Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev. In response to protests from human rights activists, lawmakers earlier removed an amendment allowing the FSB to summon people to their offices to hand out the warnings and also publish their warnings in the media.

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New powers given to Russia's security agency

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New powers given to Russia's security agency

about a minute ago from todaysworld

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  MOSCOW – The upper house of Russia's parliament on Monday passed a bill granting expanded powers to the country's main security agency, a move that critics say echoes the era of the Soviet KGB.
  The bill, which now goes to President Dmitry Medvedev to be signed into law, would allow the Federal Security Service to issue warnings to people suspected of preparing to commit crimes against Russia's security.
  Human rights and democracy activists say this power could be used to intimidate government opponents and stifle protests.
  "This law is targeted against the opposition ... It's a draconian law which is unprecedented in the world and is reminiscent of our repressive past," Boris Nemtsov, a leader of the opposition Solidarity movement, was quoted as saying by the news agency Interfax.
  The security service is the main successor agency to the KGB.
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  The bill was approved by the upper house by a vote of 121-1. The sole vote against was cast by the house's speaker, Sergei Mironov, who said he had was apprehensive about the measure.
  Opposition groups frequently are denied permission to hold rallies or are allowed to hold them only in out-of-the-way neighborhoods. Riot police often break up unsanctioned rally attempts swiftly and brutally.
  The bill has raised doubts about President Dmitry Medvedev's commitment to promoting full-fledged democracy and freedom of expression. Medvedev often has spoken of instituting judicial and police reforms, and has taken a less hard line on many issues than his predecessor Vladimir Putin, a former KGB agent and later head of the FSB.

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Iran and Russia Clash in Worst Row for Years

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clipped from abcnews.go.com TEHRAN/MOSCOW Iran and Russia clashed on Wednesday over Kremlin support for draft U.N. sanctions against the Islamic Republic, in one of the worst rows between the two powers since the Cold War. The public clash indicates growing concern in Tehran after the United States said Russia and China, the closest thing Iran has to big-power allies, had agreed to a draft sanctions resolution to punish Iran over its nuclear program. "If I were the Russian president, when making decisions about subjects related to a great nation (Iran) ... I would act more cautiously, I would think more," Ahmadinejad said in a televised outdoor speech. Though trade ties have grown over the past two decades, Russia is still regarded with deep distrust in Iran after several wars between Persia and the Tsarist Empire, followed by rocky relations with the atheist Soviet Union. "It is simply the latest attempt by the Iranian president to lay the blame for his own problems at someone else's door."

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Polish leader, 96 others dead in Russia jet crash

clipped from news.yahoo.com SMOLENSK, Russia – Polish President Lech Kaczynski and some of the country's highest military and civilian leaders died on Saturday when the presidential plane crashed as it came in for a landing in thick fog in western Russia, killing 97, officials said. Russian and Polish officials said there were no survivors on the 26-year-old Tupolev, which was taking the president, his wife and staff to events marking the 70th anniversary of the massacre in Katyn forest of thousands of Polish officers by Soviet secret police. Although initial signs pointed to an accident with no indication of foul play, the death of a Polish president and much of the Polish state and defense establishment in Russia en route to commemorating one of the saddest events in Poland's long, complicated history with Russia, was laden with tragic irony. "This is a great tragedy, a great shock to us all," former president and Solidarity leader Lech Walesa said.

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Subway Blasts Kill Dozens in Moscow

clipped from www.nytimes.com MOSCOW — Suicide bombers set off huge explosions during Monday morning’s rush hour in two subway stations in central Moscow, officials said, killing at least 35 people and raising fears that the Muslim insurgency in southern Russia was once again being brought to the country’s heart. “The terrorist acts were carried out by two female terrorist bombers,” said Moscow’s mayor, Yuri M. Luzhkov. “They occurred at a time when there would be the maximum number of victims.” Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia has sought to suppress a Muslim insurgency in the country’s south, in the Caucasus region, centered on Chechnya. Two brutal wars in Chechnya and a guerrilla insurgency gave rise to numerous bombings and acts of terror in southern Russia throughout the 1990s. Starting in 2002, Chechen separatists then began to export their bombing campaign to Moscow.

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US, Russia Hammer Out New Nuclear Agreement

clipped from www1.voanews.com The United States and Russia say a new strategic arms agreement will be formally announced when the presidents of both countries have spoken with one another about it.  White House and Russian Foreign Ministry spokesmen say the conversation is expected soon.  A new accord would set an auspicious tone for President Barack Obama's nuclear summit in Washington on April 12 and 13.  The agreement faced difficult negotiations, and more problems could emerge during ratification in the U.S. Senate. Before the United States and Soviet Union signed the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) both sides had tens of thousands of nuclear warheads.  The pact mandated a reduction to about 6,000. Delivery systems, such as missiles and bombers, will also be limited. It also raises expectations for further weapons reductions in the years ahead. And success of that conference, said Mr. Ban, can help the whole world live without fear of nuclear weapons.

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clipped from edition.cnn.com Fake Russian invasion broadcast sparks Georgian panic Emotions are still raw in many parts of Georgia after Russian tanks, troops and armored vehicles advanced into the former Soviet Republic in August 2008. That invasion was triggered after Georgian troops attacked pro-Russian separatists in the breakaway republic of South Ossetia. In the fighting that ensued, each side offered conflicting figures on how many people died. On Saturday night, the pro-government Imedi TV in Georgia broadcast what it called a "simulation" of what a fresh invasion would look like. And the broadcast ended with a note that the events in it were not real. However, the show did not run any on-screen notes during the half-hour broadcast to alert viewers that what they were watching was not real. Consequently many were alarmed. "I understand the position of the journalists," she said in a statement. "I understand that it is possible to make such projects, but it mustn't impact the population of the country.

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Apathy-America's Greatest Enemy

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Be sure to read all of this article. Our lives and our Country may depend on it.

clipped from hubpages.com I see it all the time now; just close your eyes and it will go away! PEOPLE WAKE UP!!!! Look at what the powers that are leading you are doing!! Or are you asleep? many people are speaking truth and the majority of readers are just calling it conspiracy theories or are just blowing it off as nothing. This story comes to mind: Our government is doing all of us wrong in many,many ways and the majority of people just don't care. The maneuvers that the administration are pulling rate right up there with others such as Stalin, Hitler, and others. Many people have become "dull" to the important news. There are some who have been trying to open the eyes but I see and hear all the time these people being called "freaks" and "dingbats". How many of you just said to yourselves " Our military wouldn't do that "? If you did, you are apathetic. This is the exact way men like Hitler take over.

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South Carolina Lawmaker Seeks to Ban Federal Currency

clipped from www.cbsnews.com South Carolina Rep. Mike Pitts has introduced legislation that would mandate that gold and silver coins replace federal currency as legal tender in his state. As the Palmetto Scoop first reported, Pitts, a Republican, introduced legislation this month banning "the unconstitutional substitution of Federal Reserve Notes for silver and gold coin" in South Carolina. In an interview, Pitts told Hotsheet that he believes that "if the federal government continues to spend money at the rate it's spending money, and if it continues to print money at the rate it's printing money, our economic system is going to collapse." "The Germans felt their system wouldn't collapse, but it took a wheelbarrow of money to buy a loaf of bread in the 1930s," he said. "The Soviet Union didn't think their system would collapse, but it did. Ours is capable of collapsing also."

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