Flyby News
"News Fit to Transmit in the Post Cassini Flyby Era"
PentagonClimate * CIA Hijacked * Terror
24 February 2004
1) Now the Pentagon Tells Bush: Climate Change Will Destroy Us- - "Peak Oil" Update
2) C.I.A. Was Given Data on Hijacker Long Before 9/11
3) Foreign Policy Atrocities
4) Kucinich Campaign Update
5) Grassroots Forums on the War On Terror
Editor's Notes:Did Ralph Nader show his true colors when he announced his candidacy in the presidential race last Sunday on "Meet the Press", and though he made the rhetoric that he was supporting 3rd parties everywhere, he did not even mention Instant Runoff Voting (IRV's)? This voting method would end the debate of the 3rd party candidate in a spoiler role, but maybe Ralph likes the bad boy publicity. Norman Solomon in an article in TomPaine.com declared "..Ralph Nader appears to be politically tone deaf in a year when the crying need to defeat George W. Bush could hardly be louder or more urgent." But if Nader accomplishes anything, he does give more credibility and respect for the campaign of Dennis Kucinich, who shares many of the same platform issues for transforming the US government, but the big difference is the need for changing politics from within. Without the implementation of IRVs, a third party candidate cannot help but become a spoiler. So, instead of demanding IRVs in 2000, and the halt of the weaponization of space, Nader helped George W. steal the election, (with the support of Al Gore and Democratic Party leadership) and they, except for Dennis Kucinich and Howard Dean, don't even mention the solution for the 3rd party spoiler dilemma now in 2004!
Item 1 in this issue goes back to the concerns of Global Warming, and meanwhile the development of alternative sources of energy is crawling at a snail's pace. This makes the campaign of 2004 even more critical. Energy is plentiful when you look at renewable sources; and while a new patent was issued on an effective 200kW and higher output Stirling engine that can use most any fuel resource, including biomass, funding is still being delayed. In this item, too, you will find a summary on the Peak Oil [greed] issue by Ruppert's team. Item 2 includes a recent New York Times report that the C.I.A. was provided with information on a 9/11 accused hijacker long before the terrorist attacks. Item 3 contains updated information on foreign policy blunders, which feeds the emotional fuel for more terrorism. Item 4 is on a rare platform for a solution, with a link to Kucinich's peace plan for Iraq and the US. And item 5 is another update on grassroots forums on the war on terror and election 2004. I hope you will review these critical films and engage in forums in your communities. We need to keep united, educated, and working for effective solutions.
"The world is a dangerous place,
not because of those who do evil,
but because of those who look on and do nothing"
-- Albert Einstein
1) Now the Pentagon Tells Bush: Climate Change Will Destroy UsThe Observer
· Secret report warns of rioting and nuclear war
· Britain will be 'Siberian' in less than 20 years
· Threat to the world is greater than terrorism
Now the Pentagon Tells Bush: Climate Change Will Destroy Us
By Mark Townsend and Paul Harris
Sunday 22 February 2004
Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters..
A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.
The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy as countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food, water and energy supplies. The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say the few experts privy to its contents.
'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes the Pentagon analysis. 'Once again, warfare would define human life.'
The findings will prove humiliating to the Bush administration, which has repeatedly denied that climate change even exists. Experts said that they will also make unsettling reading for a President who has insisted national defence is a priority.
The report was commissioned by influential Pentagon defence adviser Andrew Marshall, who has held considerable sway on US military thinking over the past three decades. He was the man behind a sweeping recent review aimed at transforming the American military under Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Climate change 'should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a US national security concern', say the authors, Peter Schwartz, CIA consultant and former head of planning at Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and Doug Randall of the California-based Global Business Network.
An imminent scenario of catastrophic climate change is 'plausible and would challenge United States national security in ways that should be considered immediately', they conclude. As early as next year widespread flooding by a rise in sea levels will create major upheaval for millions.
Last week the Bush administration came under heavy fire from a large body of respected scientists who claimed that it cherry-picked science to suit its policy agenda and suppressed studies that it did not like. Jeremy Symons, a former whistleblower at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), said that suppression of the report for four months was a further example of the White House trying to bury the threat of climate change.
Senior climatologists, however, believe that their verdicts could prove the catalyst in forcing Bush to accept climate change as a real and happening phenomenon. They also hope it will convince the United States to sign up to global treaties to reduce the rate of climatic change.
A group of eminent UK scientists recently visited the White House to voice their fears over global warming, part of an intensifying drive to get the US to treat the issue seriously. Sources have told The Observer that American officials appeared extremely sensitive about the issue when faced with complaints that America's public stance appeared increasingly out of touch.
One even alleged that the White House had written to complain about some of the comments attributed to Professor Sir David King, Tony Blair's chief scientific adviser, after he branded the President's position on the issue as indefensible.
Among those scientists present at the White House talks were Professor John Schellnhuber, former chief environmental adviser to the German government and head of the UK's leading group of climate scientists at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research. He said that the Pentagon's internal fears should prove the 'tipping point' in persuading Bush to accept climatic change.
Sir John Houghton, former chief executive of the Meteorological Office - and the first senior figure to liken the threat of climate change to that of terrorism - said: 'If the Pentagon is sending out that sort of message, then this is an important document indeed.'
Bob Watson, chief scientist for the World Bank and former chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, added that the Pentagon's dire warnings could no longer be ignored.
'Can Bush ignore the Pentagon? It's going be hard to blow off this sort of document. Its hugely embarrassing. After all, Bush's single highest priority is national defence. The Pentagon is no wacko, liberal group, generally speaking it is conservative. If climate change is a threat to national security and the economy, then he has to act. There are two groups the Bush Administration tend to listen to, the oil lobby and the Pentagon,' added Watson.
'You've got a President who says global warming is a hoax, and across the Potomac river you've got a Pentagon preparing for climate wars. It's pretty scary when Bush starts to ignore his own government on this issue,' said Rob Gueterbock of Greenpeace.
Already, according to Randall and Schwartz, the planet is carrying a higher population than it can sustain. By 2020 'catastrophic' shortages of water and energy supply will become increasingly harder to overcome, plunging the planet into war. They warn that 8,200 years ago climatic conditions brought widespread crop failure, famine, disease and mass migration of populations that could soon be repeated.
Randall told The Observer that the potential ramifications of rapid climate change would create global chaos. 'This is depressing stuff,' he said. 'It is a national security threat that is unique because there is no enemy to point your guns at and we have no control over the threat.'
Randall added that it was already possibly too late to prevent a disaster happening. 'We don't know exactly where we are in the process. It could start tomorrow and we would not know for another five years,' he said.
'The consequences for some nations of the climate change are unbelievable. It seems obvious that cutting the use of fossil fuels would be worthwhile.'
So dramatic are the report's scenarios, Watson said, that they may prove vital in the US elections. Democratic frontrunner John Kerry is known to accept climate change as a real problem. Scientists disillusioned with Bush's stance are threatening to make sure Kerry uses the Pentagon report in his campaign.
The fact that Marshall is behind its scathing findings will aid Kerry's cause. Marshall, 82, is a Pentagon legend who heads a secretive think-tank dedicated to weighing risks to national security called the Office of Net Assessment. Dubbed 'Yoda' by Pentagon insiders who respect his vast experience, he is credited with being behind the Department of Defence's push on ballistic-missile defence.
Symons, who left the EPA in protest at political interference, said that the suppression of the report was a further instance of the White House trying to bury evidence of climate change. 'It is yet another example of why this government should stop burying its head in the sand on this issue.'
Symons said the Bush administration's close links to high-powered energy and oil companies was vital in understanding why climate change was received sceptically in the Oval Office. 'This administration is ignoring the evidence in order to placate a handful of large energy and oil companies,' he added.
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The original posting of this article was posted at URL:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1153513,00.htmlGuardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
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- - "Peak Oil" UpdateFrom the Wilderness Publication -
Why The Oil Markets May See Price Dips
Before The Collapse
and Why This Will Make the Outcomes Worse
by
Dale Allen Pfeiffer -- FTW Energy Editor
Suddenly, Peak Oil and Gas issues are everywhere. It's as if the light bulb is going on a day late and a tank or two short. ABC News, The Petroleum Review, BBC, Wall Street and many other "establishment" voices are beginning to sound the alarm. For North America, natural gas shortages are here now and can only worsen. The oil production numbers are bearing out that by 2007 demand will have permanently exceeded supply and production capacity. In both cases the outlook is not good. For natural gas the only solution is the importation of liquefied natural gas or LNG. The costs, dangers, political opposition and international competition for dwindling supplies create a complex calculus that will be exceptionally difficult to solve.
The picture for oil is worsened by the way the oil markets operate. Oil prices are driven only by very short-term criteria, essentially how much oil is in the pipeline for the next few months. The last so-called mega fields really only a few months supply in the global picture -- are scheduled to come on line in 2005 creating a short term glut even as the industry acknowledges that the cheap oil is gone forever. The result will be that the capital needed to build infrastructure or switch to alternatives will not be available as the last crucial window of opportunity for its use begins to close. Without that timely capital, there will be no brakes when petroleum civilization hits the wall.
Dale Allen Pfeiffer deconstructs the market forces
as mankind stands on the brink of a new dark age. MCR
For the complete story, see:
http://www.fromthewilderness.com
For information for a practical response to peak oil concerns, see link for a:
"STIRLING Solution for Onsite Power Production"and for an updated page from Flyby News archives, see this link for:
"The Mounting Evidence of Global Warming!"
2) C.I.A. Was Given Data on Hijacker Long Before 9/11New York Times - February 24, 2004
American investigators were given the first name and telephone number of one of the hijackers two and a half years before the attacks, officials say.
C.I.A. Was Given Data on Hijacker Long Before 9/11
By JAMES RISEN and ERIC LICHTBLAU
WASHINGTON, Feb. 23 — American investigators were given the first name and telephone number of one of the Sept. 11 hijackers two and a half years before the attacks on New York and Washington, but the United States appears to have failed to pursue the lead aggressively, American and German officials say.
The information — the earliest known signal that the United States received about any of the hijackers — has now become an important element of an independent commission's investigation into the events of Sept. 11, 2001, officials said Monday. It is considered particularly significant because it may have represented a missed opportunity for American officials to penetrate the Qaeda terror cell in Germany that was at the heart of the plot. And it came roughly 16 months before the hijacker showed up at flight schools in the United States.
For the complete story, see:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/24/politics/24TERR.html?th
3) Foreign Policy Atrocities- - Robert Fisk: Gunned down with abandon:
Iraqis who fail to see US military checkpoints, who overtake convoys under attack--or who merely pass the scene of an American raid--are being gunned down with abandon.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article5743.htm= = = = =
Soldiers accused of another fatal beating:
The family of an Iraqi headmaster who was seen being beaten with a rifle butt by British soldiers before they took him away, was told he had died in custody of a "sudden heart attack".
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=493880= = = = =
Oil pipeline attacked in southern Iraq:
An oil pipeline was sabotaged in southern Iraq while deadly violence flared in the north, as the war-torn country awaited the release Monday of the UN's findings on the best way forward.
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_world/view/72288/1/.html= = = = =
Information Clearinghouse is a free service and an unpaid volunteer effort to allow alternative viewpoints to reach the public.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/emaildigest.htm= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Breaking News from Legitgov.org
*News updated Tuesday, February 24, 2004 07:00 GMT
- - Pentagon Opens Halliburton Criminal Probe The Pentagon said on Monday it opened a criminal investigation of fraud allegations against a unit of [court appointed] Vice President Dick Cheney's old company Halliburton Co., including possible overpricing of fuel delivered to Iraq.
- - U.S. paying group that gave false leads The Bush dictatorship continues to pay millions to the group that provided some questionable prewar intelligence on Iraq. The Department of Defense is continuing to pay millions of dollars for information from the former Iraqi opposition group that produced some of the exaggerated and fabricated intelligence Dictator Bush used to argue his case for war.
- - Senator Levin Says Tenet Made False Statements on WMD A Democratic senator accused CIA Director George Tenet on Monday of making false statements when he said during public hearings that his agency gave the United Nations information about all the top suspected weapons of mass destruction sites in Iraq before the war. "All such sites were not shared, and Mr. Tenet's repeated statements were false," Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan said in a speech on the Senate floor.
For links to the articles of the above summaries, see:
http://www.legitgov.org/index.html#breaking_news= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
From the News Insider - -
http://www.newsinsider.org/- - New book claims Israel has 82 nuclear warheads
A book recently published in the US claims Israel has 82 nuclear warheads.
For the complete article, published in Ha'aretz [Israel],
24 February 2004, see:
http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=397456&contrassID=1&subContrassID=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y
4) Kucinich Campaign UpdateCampaign info
We need 300+ delegates to go to the convention and have the ability to play and broker there. There is just over 1100 delegates on super Tuesday chosen (roughly over a 1/3 of all delegates.) Kerry and Edwards will need to win states… we need to begin courting Dean Delegates and supporters. We will build our base as time moves on.. the magic number… 300 – 400 delegates. We have great plans at the conventions, and THAT is where the nominee will be chosen. With our strategy, we only need that many delegates. So THAT is why Dennis is still in the race, that is why this platform needs to be heard!
For the Kucinich Plan to Bring Our Troops Home, see:
http://www.kucinich.us/bringourtroopshome.php
5) Grassroots Forums on the War On TerrorFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
INDECENT WAR ON FREEDOMGrassroots Forums on the War On Terror
February 26, 28, 29, 2004
In Amherst, MA, White River Junction, Montpelier, and Brattleboro, VT
2/26 at the Bangs Community Center, Boltwood Walk; Amherst, MA;
- - - - Thursday; 7:00 pm < info@flybynews.com >
2/28 at the Hotel Coolidge in White River Junction, VT
- - - - Saturday 1:30 p.m. < brandonasny@yahoo.com >
2/28 Unitarian Church, Montpelier, VT, (130 Main St., Upstairs Chapel)
- - - - Saturday, 7:30 p.m. < yonashahar@pshift.com >
2/29 at the Brattleboro Savings and Loan Community Room
- - - - 221 Main Street -- Brattleboro, VT; Sunday, 4:00 pm < mwhitehorn@muses.ca >
All events are free and open to the public!Featured Film:
"Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror
A Special Report by John Pilger"
Also included will be discussions and
Dennis Kucinich's speech, "A Prayer for America"A grassroots forum presenting John Pilger’s film, "Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror” will be held in Amherst, MA on Thursday February 26, 2004, and in White River Junction, Montpelier, and Brattleboro, Vermont on February 28th and 29th. Besides the Pilger film, the program will include discussions on the war on terror, and a film (18 min.) of Dennis Kucinich’s speech to the Southern California Americans for Democratic Action on February 17, 2002, called "A Prayer for America." Dennis Kucinich is the only 2004 presidential candidate that voted against the Patriot Act. His speech, about five months after 9/11/01, expresses his thoughts about the US government’s response to 9/11 and the loss of civil liberties and US Constitutional rights. Kucinich rallied in the House of Representatives to get 2/3 of the Democrats to vote against giving George W. Bush the authority to preemptively attack Iraq.
Flyby News, one of the co-sponsors for the event, is a nonprofit news resource on the Internet since NASA’s Cassini space probe's “flyby” of Earth. Flyby News’ resources include “Films that Make a Difference.” Jonathan Mark, editor, says he’s governed by reporting on news “for life’s survival in the 21st Century.“ This work began by his reporting on the high-speed high-risk Plutonium-laden Cassini-Earth-flyby. Flyby News discovered Dennis Kucinich when the Congressman from Ohio, and co-Chair of the Progressive Caucus, introduced legislation to ban space-based weapons. Yet, instead of halting the expansion of the arms race, Congress stood by while President Bush launched into a new platform for war, and unilaterally withdrew from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Now, the War on Terror is destabilizing our world, harming innocent life, taxing our economies, adding pollution, and accelerating unprecedented harm to our planet.
This program is not just to provide an awareness of the problems at hand, but also encourages grassroots potential solutions. Two days before the Bangs Community Center program, Dennis Kucinich will be speaking at John M. Greene Hall at Smith College in Northampton, MA, Feb. 24th; 7 p.m. and February 25th at UMASS, Amherst and Springfield. This week before Super Tuesday Primary Elections Flyby News is encouraging citizens to make voting count! This could be our last best chance for democracy to survive during a time of weapons of mass destruction, and distortions of truth and freedom.
# # #
For more information on these films and forums, see
"Films that Make a Difference!"
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