Eeyores News and View

Watch the names?
Holocaust Museum guard killed in shooting, gunman wounded
WASHINGTON — A Holocaust Museum guard died after being shot Wednesday in the crowded attraction and a gunman was seriously wounded in return fire, authorities said. The incident left panic-stricken visitors dashing for exits, witnesses said.
U.S. Park Police spokesman Sgt. David Schlosser said the gunman and officer were taken to George Washington University Hospital. According to D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, the gunman was in critical condition.
"Officer Stephen Tyrone Johns died heroically in the line of duty today," a late-afternoon museum statement said. "There are no words to express our grief and shock over these events.
"He served on the museum's security staff for six years. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Officer Johns' family."
The museum will remain closed Thursday and flags flown at half-staff in the officer's honor, the statement said.
Two law enforcement officials identified the suspected gunman as James Wenneker von Brunn, 88, of Maryland's Eastern Shore. The officials did not want to be identified because they were not yet authorized to release the name to the public.
Von Brunn's name is prominent on white-supremacist Internet sites.
Schlosser said that about 12:50 p.m., a man, "armed with a long gun," entered the museum and fired at a security guard. Two other officers returned fire and wounded the gunman, according to museum spokesman Andy Hollinger.
"There were no threats" against the museum, said D.C. police chief Cathy Lanier. "The second he stepped into the building he began firing." Lanier said he was shooting a rifle.
Another guard was treated by EMS personnel at the scene for wounds, including cuts, said D.C. fire spokesman Alan Etter.
Von Brunn was released from the federal penitentiary in Ray Brook, N.Y. on Sept. 15, 1989, after serving 5-1/2 years. He was convicted in 1983 of attempted kidnapping, burglary and assault with a deadly weapon in a 1981 incident at the Federal Reserve, said Felicia Ponce, a spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Prisons.
Von Brunn, a Holocaust denier, maintains a racist, anti-Semitic website and wrote a book titled Kill the Best Gentile.
Witnesses reported hearing at least five gunshots.
The museum normally has a heavy security presence with guards positioned both inside and outside. All visitors are required to pass through metal detectors at the entrance, and bags are screened.
The museum, located just off the National Mall near the Washington Monument, is a popular tourist attraction. It draws about 1.7 million visitors each year.
Maria Hernandez, 19, of Manassas, Va., was in the lobby with her grandparents when she heard what she thought were "firecrackers."
"It was toward the entrance of the museum," she said. "I think it was someone trying to run through the metal detector."
She saw Johns bleeding on the floor, she said. "There was just chaos, panic. We were scared, shaking."
Another visitor, Dave Unruh, 66, of Wichita, was at the museum with his wife, Karen, 66, and grandsons, Drew, 15, and Dalton, 17, when the shots rang out.
"We were scared to death," he said. He heard someone holler, "Hit the floor!" and he and his family obeyed the order until authorities herded them out of the building.
Anya Leck, 21, of Chicago, is attending Georgetown University this summer and was in the museum lobby when she heard a boom. "We all just ducked wherever we could," she said. She and eight others hid in an alcove until guards ran by yelling, "Go! Go! Go!"
"Everybody was just in shock," said Leck, who dashed out a back door with other visitors. She recalled the sounds of people crying and gasping as she lay on the ground.
A young visitor, Rebecca McDowell, 10, of Smith Center, Kan., said, "It was scary and I was crying."
Museum officials in Washington say they can't remember there ever being a shooting at a museum in the nation's capital, or even in any other museum in the USA, according to Linda St. Thomas, a spokeswoman for the multi-museum complex Smithsonian Institution, and to Dewey Blanton, a spokesman for the American Association of Museums in Washington.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-06-10-holocaust-museum-shooting_N.htm
http://wtop.com/?nid=25&sid=1693510

Please quite it, tassing a 70 year old, please. They need to lose their job, what a scum bag, shoots her in the back. Big brave policeman.
Deputy Tasers woman, 72, during traffic stop
June 10, 2009 - 4:24pm

In this image taken from a May 11, 2009 video released by the Travis County Constable's Office, Kathryn Winkfein, right, is shocked with a Taser by Deputy Chris Bieze outside of Austin, Texas. Video released by the constable's Office shows Deputy Bieze confronting 72-year-old Winkfein after stopping her for speeding. (AP Photo/Travis County Constable's Office) By JIM VERTUNO
Associated Press Writer
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - Cursing and belligerent, the great-grandmother refused to sign her speeding ticket, got out of her truck and dared a deputy to shock her with a Taser.
So he did.
Video released by a Travis County Constable's Office shows 72-year-old Kathryn Winkfein hitting the ground and moaning while the shocks jolted through her body after the May 11 confrontation with Travis County Sheriff's Deputy Chris Bieze.
Winkfein was stopped for driving 60 mph in a 45-mph zone just west of Austin. A dashboard camera in the deputy's car shows the 4-foot-11 Winkfein refusing to sign her speeding ticket, getting out of her white pickup truck and cursing at the deputy constable.
Bieze then pushes her to get her away from traffic.
"You're gonna shove a 72-year-old woman," Winkfein says angrily, standing inches from the deputy.
"If you don't step back, you're going to get Tased," Bieze says.
"Go ahead, Tase me," Winkfein says. "I dare you."
The video shows Bieze using the Taser and Winkfein hitting the ground and moaning in pain.
"Put your hands behind your back or you're going to be Tased again," Bieze yells, and then hits her with another jolt.
Winkfein was eventually charged with resisting arrest, a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail and fines up to $4,000.
A telephone message left with Constable Sgt. Maj. Gary Griffin of the constable's office was not immediately returned Wednesday. Telephone calls to a number listed for Kathryn Winkfein in Marble Falls, about 50 miles west of Austin, went unanswered.
Griffin has defended Bieze's actions and that Winkfein was belligerent and difficult to handle.
But Travis County Sheriff Greg Hamilton, whose office does not oversee the constables, issued a statement Wednesday saying:
"I do not personally agree with the actions of the deputy constable as they are shown in the video. When I look at the video I am in awe of what happened."
http://wtop.com/?nid=104&sid=1693324

Why would the dummies let them board?
Two passengers on doomed Air France jet had names linked to Islamic terror groups
Two passengers with names linked to Islamic terrorism were on board the Air France flight which crashed with the loss of 228 lives, it emerged today.
Both were men in their 20s of unspecified nationality, but their bodies have not yet been found, making proper identification impossible.
French secret servicemen established the connection while working through the list of those who boarded the doomed Airbus in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on May 31st.
It has also emerged that the laptop and boarding pass of British oil executive Arthur Coakley have been found in the wreckage of the jet.
Flight AF447 crashed in mid-Atlantic en route to Paris during a violent storm.
While it is certain that there were computer malfunctions – and that these were the most likely reason for the accident - terrorism has not been ruled out.
Soon after the fatal crash agents working for the DGSE (Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure), the French equivalent of MI6, were dispatched to Brazil.
It was there that they established that two names on the passenger list are also on highly classified documents listing the names of radical Muslims considered a threat to the French Republic.
There were 32 nationalities represented on the Air France flight, including Moroccans and Lebanese.
The suspicious names are linked to radical Islamic groups including Al Qaeda, which was behind the 9/11 suicide attacks on the U.S.A.
A source working for the French security services told Paris weekly L’Express that the link was ‘highly significant’.
Agents are now trying to establish dates of birth for the two dead passengers, and family connections.
There is a possibility that the name similarities are simply a ‘macabre coincidence’, the source added, but the revelation is still being ‘taken very seriously’.
Bizarrely the full official list of dead passengers has not been released by Air France, despite it being more than week since the plane crashed.
Such lists are normally released within 72 hours.
France has received numerous threats from Islamic terrorist groups in recent months, especially since French troops were sent to fight in Afghanistan.
Security chiefs have been particularly worried about airborne attacks similar to 9/11. French investigators confirmed that that terrorism has not been ruled out, with an Air France spokesman adding that ‘all the indications’ are that the Airbus suffered some kind of catastrophic equipment failure.
A total of 41 bodies have so far been recovered from the zone 700 miles off Brazil 's northeast coast where the plane came down.
Brazilian and French officials are using DNA samples from relatives and dental records to identify the remains.
On Monday, a Brazilian crew recovered the tail fin from the plane - considered significant because it could narrow the area underwater where the black boxes are.
The cause of the disaster is not known, but initial suspicions are focusing on the plane's airspeed sensors which were giving faulty readings, according to automatic data alerts sent by the plane in its final minutes in the air.
A French nuclear submarine, the Emeraude, and a naval vessel containing robot submarines should reach the crash site within the next day or so.
A large amount of material has already been recovered, including possessions belonging to Briton Mr Coakley.
His wife Patricia said a local police liaison officer called at the family home in Sandsend, near Whitby, North Yorks, to say her husband's laptop and boarding pass had been found.
'I just want to remember him smiling and laughing. He was a wonderful man,' she said.
'We are just in limbo and still waiting for the phone call we will get from the authorities, but don't want.
'We cannot plan anything at this time until we get more news. But I don't want to fly out to Brazil.'
Mrs Coakley had spoken to her husband by phone shortly before he boarded the plane.
He had planned to take an earlier flight, but it was fully booked. He should have been in Brazil for two weeks on business and home on May 19, but was delayed.
She has been married to her husband for 34 years and the couple have three children Dominic, 31, Patrick, 29 and Mise, 25.
Mr Coakley, 61, was a structural design engineer and partner in the PD&MS firm based at Aberdeen.
He had many working contacts on Teesside and was also a director at Wilton Engineering Services based in Middlesbrough.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1192065/Two-passengers-doomed-Air-France-jet-names-linked-Islamic-terror-groups.html

London's Metropolitan Police accused of waterboarding suspects
Metropolitan Police officers subjected suspects to waterboarding, according to allegations at the centre of a major anti-corruption inquiry, The Times has learnt.
The torture claims are part of a wide-ranging investigation which also includes accusations that officers fabricated evidence and stole suspects’ property. It has already led to the abandonment of a drug trial and the suspension of several police officers.
However, senior policing officials are most alarmed by the claim that officers in Enfield, North London, used the controversial CIA interrogation technique to simulate drowning. Scotland Yard is appointing a new borough commander in Enfield in a move that is being seen as an attempt by Sir Paul Stephenson, the Met Commissioner, to enforce a regime of “intrusive supervision”.
The waterboarding claims will fuel the debate about police conduct that has raged in the wake of hundreds of public complaints of brutality at the anti-G20 protests in April.
The part of the inquiry focusing on alleged police brutality has been taken over by the Independent Police Complaints Commission. It is examining the conduct of six officers connected to drug raids in November in which four men and a woman were arrested at addresses in Enfield and Tottenham. Police said they found a large amount of cannabis and the suspects were charged with importation of a Class C drug. The case was abandoned four months later when the Crown Prosecution Service said it would not have been in the public interest to proceed. It is understood that the trial, by revealing the torture claims, would have compromised the criminal investigation into the six officers.
None of the officers under suspicion has been arrested, but the IPCC said last night: “This is an ongoing criminal investigation and as such all six officers will be criminally interviewed under caution.”
A Scotland Yard spokesman said: “Whilst the investigation is ongoing it is not appropriate to make assumptions. These are serious allegations that raise real concern. The Met does not tolerate conduct which falls below the standards that the public and the many outstanding Met officers and staff expect.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6466430.ece

Guess no one really has free speech
Exclusive: Miss California Carrie Prejean Loses Her Crown
Less than a month after being told by Donald Trump that she can keep her Miss California crown, Carrie Prejean was fired on Wednesday.
In a release first obtained by FOXNews.com, K2 Productions, the independent producers of the Miss California USA pageant, under license from Miss Universe, cited continued breach of contract issues as the reason for Prejean's firing.
"This was a decision based solely on contract violations," Keith Lewis, executive director of K2 Productions, said in the release. "After our press conference in New York we had hoped we would be able to forge a better working relationship. However, since that time it has become abundantly clear that Carrie has no desire to fulfill her obligations under our contract and work together.”
Prejean came under fire for her answer to a question about gay marriage two months ago in the Trump-owned Miss USA pageant, in which she was the runner-up. After the pageant, Prejean was continuously attacked as she defended her belief that gays and lesbians should not be given the right to marry in California. She became embroiled in more controversy when racy pictures of her were published that some construed as violations of her Miss California contract.
Trump came to her defense in a May 12 press conference attended by Prejean and Keith Lewis, calling her answer to the question "honest" and saying "we have determined ... that the pictures taken are fine." He allowed her to continue on as Miss California.
But it was Trump who gave the final OK to fire her, FOXNews.com learned.
"I told Carrie she needed to get back to work and honor her contract with the Miss California Organization and I gave her the opportunity to do so," Trump said in the same release. "Unfortunately it just doesn’t look like it is going to happen and I offered Keith my full support in making this decision."
Representatives for K2 and Donald Trump referred to the release when asked for fruther comment. Prejean did not respond for comment.
Prejean is not without supporters, however. The National Organization for Marriage, a group that opposes gay marriage, released a statement slamming Trump and the Miss California pageant.
"This cover story about a contract dispute doesn’t pass the smell test. Americans aren’t fooled that easily. God knows, and we know, the truth about Carrie: She’s a young woman of great beauty who chose truth over the glittering tiara that Hollywood offers,” said Brian Brown, Executive Director for NOM. “Of course they will try to punish her, but we know she will be fine in the end, because her values are in the right place.”
First runner-up Tami Farrell is slated to assume the role and responsibilities of Miss California USA. Additionally, the Miss Universe Organization will make the reigning Miss USA, Kristen Dalton, and Miss Universe, Dayana Mendoza, available to K2 Productions to fulfill appearance requests that were declined by Prejean.
According to a source, Prejean has aspirations to write a book and pursue other opportunities, which she will be able to do now that she has been released from her duties as Miss California.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,525716,00.html

Eeyore's News and View

Bug Out! – Volcano! - The Prequel

“You sure you want to do this?” Sam asked his wife of two months.

“Yes, Sam,” Peggy replied. “When my parents died, they had nothing. No retirement, no home of their own, no resources. Nada. Even if they’d made it to retirement, trying to live on Social Security with the menial jobs they’d always had would have been a nightmare. I don’t want to wind up that way.”

“Going to be a few lean years, especially the first two, if we buy this property, on top of the new house,” Sam responded.

“We’re making good livings, Sam. Are you trying to talk me out of it?”

Sam smiled. “No, honey, I’m not. But I want to be sure. You know how my father is. Always second guessing me. And we agreed to discuss major decisions before we came to any final conclusion.”

Peggy leaned forward and gave Sam a quick kiss. “Yes, dear. And we have. I want this piece of property for when we retire and for the other reasons we discussed. I know you don’t want to push your preparedness beliefs on me, but you have already brought me around to your way of thinking.

“It wasn’t that hard, if you remember. My parents never prepared for anything. That’s why they ended up they way they did. Just so I can keep up one or two of my hobbies, too, and everything is fine.”


That had been eighteen years ago, Sam mused. He thought about that day just about every time a preparedness issue came up. Peggy had been so supportive of his efforts to keep them safe and happy. She’d resisted, at first, getting a firearm for herself and learning to shoot, but had come to enjoy the shooting sports. She was still uneasy with the idea of needing to defend themselves, but after Ralph was born that maternal instinct kicked in and she decided she could and would defend the children and herself with deadly force if need be.

“What do you think, Pop? Did I do okay?” Ralph asked his father, bringing Sam out of his reverie.

Sam took the Para Ordinance P14 when his son handed it to him, the slide locked open. Sam checked the chamber with his finger automatically, then inspected the pistol closely. It was the first time Ralph had completely stripped the weapon, cleaned it thoroughly, and reassembled it on his own.

It took only a few moments for Sam to disassemble the .45 and put it back together again. “Perfect,” he replied to his son’s question.

“How about me, Daddy?” Melissa asked. “I put the .380 barrel back in the HK-4”

Sam handed the P14 back to Ralph. And, just like his father, Ralph checked the action to be sure it was unloaded. It was an automatic action Sam had drilled all of them to do whenever they handled their small arsenal.

Taking the HK-4, Sam broke it down and put it back together as he’d done with the P14. “You did good, honey. Everything where it’s supposed to be.”

Melissa grinned at her brother. He was a year and a few months older than she, but she was doing just as well with the hardware, as she usually referred to it, as Ralph did. And she was almost as good of a shot with her Ruger 10/22 as Ralph was with his.

“Okay kids. Everything is cleaned, magazines reloaded, and ready to be put away. You two go help your mother with dinner. I’ll put everything away.”

“We can help,” Melissa replied.

Sam laughed and ruffled Ralph’s unruly hair. “No thanks. Don’t want the eating machine here to go too long between meals. You two go ahead.”

As the two headed for the basement stairs, Melissa hesitated for a moment, then asked her father, “Daddy, have you decided about the AUG?”

“No, not yet. I’ll talk to your mother and we’ll see.” Sam shook his head as the pair went upstairs to help their mother. Melissa wanted a Steyr AUG like her mother’s. It had already been decided that Ralph could graduate to an HK-91 like Sam’s. They could probably afford both the rifles and Melissa had handled Peggy’s AUG at the range today like it had been made for her.

Sam gathered up the weapons they’d taken to the range that day and headed for his and Peggy’s bedroom. It took two trips but he soon had everything back in the large gun safe in their walk-in closet.

After their supper, after watching the news and discussing it, Sam let his mind wonder a bit as the others watched a movie. For some reason he was in a reflective mood today.

“Sweetheart, you sound just like you did ten years ago when we bought the retirement property. We’ve discussed this and have come to the decision to build the quads.” Peggy looked at the perplexed expression on Sam’s face.

“I do?” he asked.

“You do.” Peggy turned around and looked at the large corner lot they were getting ready to buy. There was another very much like it on the other side of town that was also part of the deal.

“It’s going to tie up our savings for a few years. Our retirement savings, not the emergency savings.”

“I know, but you know what housing is getting like around here now. The retirement property is worth twice what it was, and single wide trailers are renting for more than we were paying for our first house.

“The bank has already okayed the mortgages. This is a good investment. We’ll have the savings rebuilt in a few years and the land and quadra-plexes will be paid for in fifteen years. And we got a terrific interest rate.”

“Well, I just wanted to be sure, before we signed today. It’s just… well… you know. I just like to give you the right of refusal, just in case.”

“I know. And I may take you up on the offer sometime. But this is another of those times when we’re definitely on the same wavelength.”

That had worked out as well as the retirement property. The two quads had been constructed and all eight units rented out almost immediately. They kept a local handy-man on retainer to take care of everything for them. There’d been one or two tenants over the years that had been less than perfect, but with the quality construction they had insisted on, maintenance had been minimal. The income was paying the mortgages and quite a bit more. The extra went into the retirement funds.

Over the years they’d picked up some investment property. It was dual use. Each of the places had caches with supplies and equipment to shelter and sustain them for some time if they ever had to evacuate and couldn’t immediately go to the retirement property. When they retired they’d sell the property to add to their retirement. Of course, they’d probably pick up a small parcel or two near the retirement property for the same reason they had these properties.

Sam’s attention was drawn to the movie when Peggy, Melissa, and Ralph all laughed. But it was only a few moments before Sam was lost in thought again.

As the world situation, and the weather, ebbed and flowed, with tensions being heightened then lessoning, Sam and Peggy continued their preparations. Sam smiled without thought when he first introduced Peggy to shooting. She’d wound up loving to shoot that first Ruger 10/22. When she was comfortable it, and they had the money from an especially nice tax refund, they’d bought a Steyr AUG. Peggy hadn’t liked the HK-91 he’d purchased when he’d first ran across them.

The compact form of the AUG fitted Peggy’s needs perfectly. She also liked the HK-4 Sam had run across at a gun show. The HK-4 had been complete with all four barrel and magazine assemblies. It would shoot .22 LR, .25 ACP, .32 ACP, and .380 ACP depending on which barrel was installed. Peggy shot all four calibers at the range, but when she carried it on their outdoor adventures, it was also set up to use the .380.

Sam had been lucky to find the second complete HK-4 package. They got scarce quickly when Heckler & Koch quit producing them. Melissa liked the medium sized pistol as much as her mother, though she usually shot it using the .32 barrel. The only drawback was they only had a total of 6 magazines for each caliber. Sam would have preferred to have a dozen.

Sam had picked up a pair of Para-Ordinance P14 .45 ACP when they had some spare money, along with plenty of spare parts for all the weapons they had. Over the years they’d added a few more. When the kids hit 12 years old they each got their own Ruger 10/22. Sam and Peggy counted themselves lucky that both their children enjoyed shooting, though neither really wanted to hunt. Peggy wasn’t big on it either, though she’d gone on a couple of deer hunts with him in the early days.

Sam had seen that they could hunt, but never pressed the matter. If they needed to, they would. He and Peggy were sure of that. And like the kids, Peggy could and would hunt if necessary.

Peggy and both kids looked at Sam strangely since he was smiling as the movie went into a sad part. Seeing his eyes focused elsewhere they paid no more attention. They were used to his introspective interludes.

As their job opportunities increased, and therefore their incomes, they’d continued to acquire preparedness equipment and supplies. By the time they moved here and built this home, they had canned and packaged food for a year, LTS (long term storage) food for five years, stored water for at least a month, and means to procure more.

Their camping equipment was excellent, partly due to the fact that it had to be, since they did most of their camping in the fall and winter months. Not only did they car camp at times, they backpacked at least once a year, minus the porta-pottie, privacy shelter, insulated chests, camp stove, and the rest of the niceties they used when they camped out of the truck.

Sam settled a little deeper in his chair. That had been another of the big decisions. They’d had a nice Subaru wagon for several years, but after the volcano started acting up they’d decided to get something more capable to evacuate with if things got bad.

They’d traded in the Subaru on the pickup and taken money out of the savings account to purchase the Suburban. Again Sam’s mouth twitched into a smile as he remembered the expression on the parts manager’s face when he ordered all the replacement parts for the Suburban the day he picked it up. They had enough spare parts for those items that might be likely to fail to rebuild the Suburban twice. There were two complete sets of system computers in metal cans to protect them from EMP.

They took a little more money out of savings to finish equipping the Suburban, and decided to do the same for the Ford Ranger. He’d found a welder willing to work with him and they’d come up with the receiver hitch mounted racks to carry extra fuel and water for both vehicles. The welder had also helped him install the heavy-duty full-length roof rack on the Suburban.

The front bumpers and hydraulic winches were a package deal. The welder had made the brackets, and a mechanic friend had helped Sam and Ralph install a second power steering pump on each vehicle to run the winches and some hydraulic tools.

While they stored much of the preparedness equipment in the basement disaster shelter, the stuff they would need for an evacuation was kept ready to load into the vehicle in the garage, except for the fuel. The fuel was in the yard shed with the lawn mower and grill.

When he’d started to buy some simple plastic storage boxes to keep their camping and emergency supplies in, Peggy had insisted they go ahead and get shipping containers and good storage racks.

It had been Melissa that suggested they get those “neat” streamlined cargo carriers for the roof rack. Then Ralph suggested they make a pulley system in the garage for the carriers so they could load and unload them easily.

One of the cargo carriers held the lighter camping equipment like the sleeping bags, the two large four-season tents, and privacy shelter, some lightweight folding chairs and a rollup camping table. The other held clothing for the four of them for all seasons. Though not light by any means, having them loaded with those items allowed for the heavier items to be carried inside the Suburban and in the bed of the Ranger.

The roof rack, besides the cargo carriers, also held, in special brackets, two shovels, a pick-mattock, a double bit axe, a Hi-Lift jack, and a pair of bridging planks. Of course there were auxiliary lights on all four sides of the rack.

Sam reviewed the shipping containers in his mind. One held a comprehensive mechanic’s tool set. Another field tools for working timber and rock to allow for construction of whatever they might need in the wild. The third case was carpentry tools and the fourth plumbing tools. Next was a longer case to hold long tools such as the cross-cut and rip saws for time work, along with a few other long tools. Another case held other specialty tools. Yet another held fasteners for use with the tool sets. One very large case held nothing but tarps and sheet goods. A companion to that case was one holding cordage, wire, extra awing/tent poles and stakes, and lots of duct tape.

Other cases held LTS food. Water was in squarish 5-gallon water containers. There was a kitchen case holding a field kitchen setup with tools and condiments and a water purifier. It also contained a fire ring, tripod and grate. Another case held the shower bags, supplies for the porta-pottie and other sanitation needs. The porta-pottie had a case that also included some supplies. There was an extensive first-aid/trauma kit.

One case lined with heavy-duty aluminum foil held communications equipment. Battery/AC/DC shortwave receiver, crank shortwave receiver, AM/FM/TV band radio, handheld public service band scanner, SAME weather radio, and antennas for everything. A companion case held compact solar panels, a deep cycle battery, a solar AAA/A/C/D/9 volt battery charger, and plenty of rechargeable batteries of different sizes.

Two smaller cases, due to the weight of the contents, held ammunition. One case held snaring equipment and fishing gear. Six cases held additional clothing. There were more, but Sam was beginning to doze and lost the train of thought. His last thought was that they were in pretty good shape.

Peggy had to shake him a second time to wake Sam. “Time for bed, sweetie. You were out like a light.”

“Yeah. Little tired.” He managed a grin. “Been thinkin’.”
“That’d do it,” Peggy joked back. After a moment she asked, “About what?”
“Oh, just how much I love you and the kids and how good we have it. And trying to figure out what else we might need to do to become better prepared. There always seems to be something bad happening every few days. Fortunately not right here, at the moment, but it keeps me thinking.”

“Well, get a good nights sleep. You’ll think of whatever it is that is bothering you. Melissa said something about an AUG. I think we should get it for her, along with the HK-91 we were planning for Ralph.”

“I’ll get on the internet tomorrow and see if I can find one for sale. The local gun shop doesn’t have one. I checked the other day, but Tommy said he’d be glad to receive one in for us if we found one. He still had that HK-91 he’s been trying to get rid of.”

“Don’t worry yourself too much, Sam,” Peggy said. “We’re sitting pretty good. We’ve got the equipped and stocked shelter here, a means to evacuate with equipment and supplies, and several places to go to if necessary. If there are some more details we’ll deal with them as we think of them.

“And by the way… I love you for caring about us enough to go to the pains you have to get and keep us prepared.”

“Wasn’t me alone. You’ve been there every step of the way. And I love you, too.” He gave her a hug and a long kiss to seal the words.

“I just wish that volcano would settle down,” he whispered as they headed for the bedroom, hand in hand.



Bug Out! – A Vignette

Sam was happy with his life. He was sure his wife, Peggy, and his two children, Ralph, 17, and Melissa, 16, were too. His job was going well and so was Peggy’s. Ralph and Melissa had annuities set up for their college educations. The two quadra-plexes in the town near their retirement property were paying for themselves and generating a nice supplemental income.

The retirement property was paid for and the well and septic system were installed. A large earth sheltered building that was pump house, garage, and shop was already built. It had a full bathroom and a work sink as part of the equipment. The foundation for the house was poured. The materials to build the house, a small earth sheltered concrete dome, were stored in the garage and shop. He and Peggy would live in the garage and shop until they finished construction of the house. That would be after Melissa graduated from high school and went off to college.

The house here in the city was in good condition and was appreciating in value. When they moved into the retirement house when it was completed, the sale of the current house would finish off the retirement package they’d set up over time. “Just three more years,” he muttered to himself, eyes going to the volcano in the distance as he drove in to the office where he worked. “Just keep your lid on three more years and we’ll be out of here.” The volcano didn’t respond. The cloud of steam just hung there like it had been doing for the last two years as he drove his four-wheel-drive Ford Ranger into the parking lot of the office building where he worked.

It was almost noon when the sirens sounded. Someone turned on the radio in the office. The volcano was making noises, and the city was being put on alert for a possible evacuation. Sam had found out everything he could about the volcano when they first moved to the area. It had been dormant then. The little activity the last few years had been considered only a minor danger. But he knew that if the volcano erupted, it was the type that could dump a pyroclastic flow onto the city in only minutes if it erupted big time. It wasn’t something you took a chance with.

He knocked on his boss’s door. “Mike,” he said, when he was motioned into the office. “from the report on the radio they haven’t ordered the evacuation yet, but I don’t plan on waiting. I hope you understand. I’m taking off now.”

Mike frowned. “Well, I can’t stop you, of course, but we’re going to have a serious talk about this when you get back. You’ve been a good employee for a long time, but I can’t let something like this just pass. See me when you come back after this scare is over.”

“Yes, sir.” Sam didn’t wait. He grabbed the small backpack he kept in the bottom right hand drawer of his desk. He wanted the items the small pack contained with him. There was one similar to it in the Ranger, but he wasn’t going to take any chances at all.

Sam kept the broadcast radio in the Ranger turned on. The station was giving announcements about the volcano. The authorities were encouraging people to get prepared to evacuate, but the order to actually leave had not yet been given. Apparently there was already a mob scene at several of the schools. People wanted their children with them.

Sam suddenly had to whip the truck to the right. Someone had cut into his lane to pass, speeding on the way to somewhere. Sam didn’t worry about his kids. At least not very much. They’d run drills for this before. As soon as the school dismissed them, they would meet up and head for the house in Ralph’s old Honda Civic. Taking a lot more care than some of those on the road right now, Sam was sure. They were responsible kids.

When he tried to get Peggy on her cell phone he got the rapid busy. Probably a third of the cell phones in the city were talking to another third. Sam checked the dashboard clock. If Peggy, or the kids, couldn’t make it home by two, which was just a little over two hours after the initial warning, they would all head for the first designated rendezvous point other than the house.

When he pulled into the drive at his house, his neighbor Harry was out watering the lawn. Harry called over to Sam, grinning. “You’re home early. This is just an alert, Sam. Like that drill they had last year. Just want to wake people up, just in case.”

Sam wouldn’t argue the point. When the ground shook just a little and the volcano belched a little more steam than usual, Harry looked a bit unsure of himself. “Of course, getting ready wouldn’t be a bad idea,” he said, heading for his garage.

“Right,” Sam muttered. “That’s just what I’m doing.” Sam opened both garage doors, then unsnapped and removed the bedcover of the Ranger pickup truck. The bed was empty.

Working quickly, Sam began loading shipping containers from the shelving system in the garage into the truck. The heavy-duty containers held equipment and supplies to support Sam and his family for at least a month. There was a years supply at the retirement property, cached, just in case of a break in.

He had the radio in the garage going. Still just the occasional update about the situation. And calls for the citizens of the city not to panic. Sam checked his watch again. High school students were being sent home. Students in lower grades were if the parents could be contacted. The rest would be cared for at the schools until the normal dismissal time or their parents came for them earlier. He glanced down the street. Ralph and Melissa should be getting here soon.

The truck bed loaded to capacity, he closed the tailgate. It didn’t take long to arrange a tarp over the load and fasten it in space with a tie down net. Going to a rack on the wall, Sam carried a custom built rack back to the Ranger and inserted the support tube into the receiver hitch under the step bumper and locked it into place.

Sam took out his set of keys for the four-wheel-drive Suburban that was in the other side of the garage and started it up. It took a couple of tries to get it centered under the two long, streamlined cargo containers suspended from the ceiling of the garage.

Once it was centered though, it took only a couple of minutes each to lower the containers onto the roof rack of the Suburban and latch them into place. They were already loaded with equipment and supplies, just as the shipping cases he’d loaded into the truck had been.

He pinned a removable cargo rack similar to the one for the Ranger onto the mount on the rear of the Suburban, then went to the small metal storage shed at the rear of the lot. He moved ten 5-gallon fuel cans and four 5-gallon water cans to the vehicles. Five cans of fuel and two of water went onto the racks he’d just installed on the vehicles.

Now for the inside stuff. The gun safe in the big walk-in closet of his and Peggy’s bedroom was quickly emptied of its few firearms, and a group of cases. The cases contained important papers, keepsakes, and valuables. Part went into the Suburban, the rest into a steel box that was installed behind the seats of the Ranger.

He’d been glancing at the street often the last few minutes. He breathed a sigh of relief when Ralph pulled up in the Civic and he and Melissa got out.

“We’ve got another thirty minutes to wait for Mom. Load your bug out bags, then take your time and pack up secondary items,” Sam told them.

“This isn’t just going to be a drill this time, is it?” Ralph asked.

“I don’t know, son. I don’t know. But we are not taking any chances.” Sam glanced up and down the street. There didn’t seem to be anyone else attempting to get ready to evacuate. Not even Harry.

Ralph and Melissa both had their bug out kits in the Suburban and were gathering up a few more things. He started to caution them about what to take and not take, but decided to leave them alone. Their choices might not be perfect, but they were taking pains to think about items before they loaded them up. He looked around himself and decided on a couple of not really required items and took them out to the Suburban.

“It’s almost time. We probably should have already suited up. Get your Tyvek suits on and keep your respirators with you.” With a bit of pride he noted that both of them had laid out the clothing and equipment, ready to don it in a hurry. It took them less than two minutes to be suited and booted, their respirator bags strapped to their thighs.

“Daddy?” Melissa said, giving Sam a quizzical look.

Sam suddenly looked down at himself and said, “Oh, Jeez!” He quickly went to the bedroom and donned his own white Tyvek suit and steel toed rubber boots. He handed Peggy’s hazmat equipment bag to Melissa to take to the Suburban. Peggy had a Tyvek suit in her daypack, but only a simple dust respirator and pair of safety goggles, not the full-face respirator in the hazmat bag. Peggy only had a pair of athletic shoes in her daypack to replace the pumps she wore to work.

“It’s been two hours and ten minutes since the alarm sounded,” Ralph said, looking at his watch.

“Yeah. We can’t wait here for Mom. We’ll pick her up at the rendezvous,” Sam said.

Peggy was carpooling with Elizabeth today, and Sam had suspected that Peggy wouldn’t be able to talk Elizabeth into leaving work early. It would be easier for her to catch a cab or some kind of ride, walk if necessary, to the fast food joint just on the edge of the city on their main route out.

“Okay, Ralph,” Sam said. “You’ve got the Suburban. You ride shotgun with him Melissa, until we pick up Mom. Melissa, you pull the Civic into the garage when Ralph pulls out.”

It was the work of only a few moments for the switch to be made and for them to hit the road, Sam in the lead in the Ranger. Sam didn’t realize he was so tense until he noticed his knuckles were white on the steering wheel of the truck. He made himself relax, reassuring himself that Peggy would be at the rendezvous. That worry wasn’t the only thing contributing to the tenseness. There was some really bad driving going on.

The traffic on the routes out of the city didn’t look that much heavier than the traffic into the city and on the city streets. The driving going all directions seemed equally poor.

Sam said a little prayer to himself when he saw the white Tyvek clad figure sitting on a sign support at the fast food restaurant. Peggy was swinging her legs back and forth, bouncing the rubber heels of her athletic shoes against the concrete. The dust mask was hanging down around her neck, the goggles projecting from a pocket.

“Been getting a few looks,” Peggy said with a smile as the family reunited. “due to my apparel, I think.”

The others laughed as they shared hugs. “You remember the new photo album?” she asked Sam after the quick reunion was over.

“Yep,” Sam said. “I added it to the others in the case from the safe. “Let’s get on the road before traffic gets any crazier than it is.”

“When I was inside people couldn’t make up their minds about whether to stay or go. I’m glad we’re going. Have you felt the temblors?” Suddenly the ground was shaking again. Enough to feel, but not that bad.

“Yes,” Sam said. “Let’s go.”

The traffic thinned out not long after they left the city limits and the little convoy pulled into a service station to refuel. They had plenty of spare fuel, but the plan called for refueling the first chance they could, every time the tanks dropped below half full. Only when they couldn’t get additional fuel would they use the extra fuel they carried.

When they got near a small town several miles from the city, Ralph called Sam on the Family Radio Band hand held radios each of them carried on their belt. “We doing plan Charlie? Mom wants to know.”

Melissa lifted her radio and looked at Sam. “I think not. Nothing seems to be happening. Let’s stop at that place up ahead and get rooms. Monitor things and find out what’s happening. The radio isn’t saying much about the situation right now.”

Melissa keyed the radio and relayed Sam’s remarks. Ralph held his radio so Peggy could hear it easily. When Peggy nodded, Ralph keyed up and said, “That’s a go.”

Melissa grinned. “Ralph loves these radios.”

Sam had to smile. They could only talk about a mile on the radios, maybe two under perfect conditions, but they got the job done and not too many people were likely to hear them with that short of a range. Still, Sam and Peggy had trained themselves and the children to use some code words for certain communications.

If they’d gone to Plan Charlie they would stop in the town they were passing now. They owned a quarter acre lot in an area that wasn’t going to be developed for some time. There was a good gravel road going past the lot at the moment. It would eventually be a street. The ground was kind of rolling so it had been easy to have a 40 foot connex shipping container delivered to the site, then mound it over with earth. If you didn’t know something was there, you’d just think that particular mound was part of the terrain.

The family had three places like that, spaced several miles from the city in three different directions. There were caches of equipment and supplies buried near the shelters. If need be, they could stop there and be quite comfortable. And safe. They were really only stops on the way to the final destination, which was the retirement property they’d bought so long ago, partly for this very reason.

The town lots would be sold, like the house in the city, and new properties acquired on routes out from the retirement property when they moved there.

It was still early afternoon when they found a good place to stop. Turned out they weren’t the only ones that had left the city before the evacuation had been called for. They’d heard the report just before they stopped. A full evacuation had been ordered for the city and areas surrounding the volcano. When Peggy was registering them in, she heard another couple talking about how glad they were they’d left early.

They got two rooms, one for Sam and Peggy and one with two queens for the kids. The vehicles were moved over by the rooms.

They ate an early supper at the restaurant next door to the motel, then went to Sam and Peggy’s room to watch the news. The evacuation was not going well. Even though it was still early, they all decided to go to bed. They would get up at six the next morning, breakfast, and get back on the road.

It was a well built motel. They neither felt nor heard the eruption when it took place that night shortly after midnight. They saw it on the news the next morning.

The city and surrounding area had a population of almost a million people. Many had left by the time the eruption took place. Most had not. Of the estimated 750,000 people left in the affected area, almost 400,000 were killed by the effects of the eruption. Most died when the massive pyroclastic flow spread out over much of the city. It took less than five minutes. There was some lava flow, but it was relatively minor. But many were killed directly by lava bombs, more by the fires they started. Ash and fumes got the rest.

White faces looked at one another as they sat in their pajamas in front of the television that morning. The news camera helicopters were already flying over the area. They didn’t see their house, but they did see several houses in the same area. They looked scorched, but were still standing. Their area had been at the furthest reaches of where the pyroclastic flow had traveled before it dissipated.

Sam thought for a long time before he spoke. “We need to make a decision,” he said. “I had fully intended to go up to the property, no matter what, until things calmed down. We’d be fine there.”

“But the danger is over now. People are going to need help aren’t they?” Peggy asked.

Sam nodded. Sam and Peggy both looked at their children. “Red Cross will need all the volunteers they can get,” Ralph said.

Melissa agreed. “As long as the house is okay, and the danger is over, I don’t mind going back to help.”

“There is no guarantee that all the danger is over, but you heard the scientists. They don’t think there’ll be another large scale eruption for a long time,” Sam replied.

“The way it stacks up,” he continued, “is that we can go back and stay at the bug out stop until things settle down. Or we can go on up to the property. We can stay there until things settle down, or we can go ahead and start building the house and stay permanently. Enroll you two in the school in town there. Or we can give it a day, then go back home and do what we can to help.”

The decision was affected by another news announcement. The city had been sealed off, except for rescue teams. No one was being allowed in at the moment.

“I think,” Peggy said, “in light of that, we should go on up to the property and set up for an extended stay. As soon as they start letting people back in, we go back and help where we can.”

“Kids?” Sam asked.

Melissa and Ralph looked at one another for a moment, then both looked at their parents and nodded.

“That’s the plan then. We’ll go back when the authorities say we can go back. They’re bound to have alternate arrangements for school. Whether Peggy and I have jobs when we go back is something of a moot point. If not, we’ll just find something else. The rebuilding is bound to take a lot of people.”

With the decision made, they got dressed, had breakfast, and were on their way to the retirement property. It was almost two weeks before the government began allowing people back into the city. Sam’s old firm no longer existed. He got a job with FEMA, working as an office manager in their assistance office. Peggy worked as a file clerk and data entry person in a similar office on the other side of the ruined city.

Their house had a quite a bit of damage, but they were able to make it livable, using their camping and emergency preparedness equipment. An alternate school was set up and Ralph and Melissa attended the abbreviated classes. They helped where they could, working with a youth brigade set up by the Red Cross when they weren’t in school.

The massive aid effort lasted for a year. Electrical power was restored the first month, but it was months before the water and sewer systems were restored in many areas. There were daily water deliveries and waste pickups conducted by the National Guard in the areas without those services, so they continued to stay in the house until it, like every other one in the area, was condemned.

It was going to be too expensive to restore full services to all areas. The housing wasn’t needed, anyway. It would be decades before the population ever grew to what it had been before the eruption, if it ever did. The volcano continued to vent vapors. Sam and Peggy took the compensation for their house and decided to retire early. They rented an apartment until Melissa graduated from high school the following year, then they headed for their property once again. During that summer before Melissa went off to college, she stayed with them on the property to help with the construction of the house. Ralph came in from college and did the same.

By the time their two children headed to college that fall, Sam and Peggy were ensconced in their new home. The garden plot was ready to absorb the winter snow moisture, and Sam had bought a Bobcat 5600T Toolcat with many of the available attachments to work the garden and do a little side work around the area to stay busy. There was a lot of new construction going on in the area.

Sam and Peggy started something of a trend with their near disaster proof place. Many more people moved into the area with the same idea. Sam bought a franchise to build dome homes like the one he’d built and supplemented their retirement income with one or two sales a year.

All in all, a good plan, proper equipment and supplies, the willingness to use them, and a little luck, had brought them through dangerous times.


End ********

Copyright 2004
Jerry D Young

Only going to post two stories today an neither are very new but both are import i think. Not that there are not a lot of important stuff out there, this is enough.

WHO chief warns H1N1 swine flu likely to worsen

22 May 2009 21:33:01 GMT Source: Reuters

VACCINE CASH U.S. officials reported 6,552 suspected and confirmed cases, 300 hospitalizations and nine deaths but said there were likely far more than that. The CDC's Dr. Anne Schuchat said only about one in 20 cases of influenza are reported, which would put the U.S. caseload at about 130,000. Beijing's municipal health bureau reported the second case in the Chinese capital, a 65-year-old Chinese-American man who flew to Beijing from New York on Thursday. * Chan says H1N1 could mutate in "unpredictable ways" * Japan relaxes flu measures, but prepares big aid project * U.S. gives companies $1 billion to start vaccine * Gene analysis shows virus lurked undetected(Updates with vaccine news and genetic studies) By Laura MacInnis and Stephanie Nebehay GENEVA, May 22 (Reuters) - The world must be ready for H1N1 swine flu to become more severe and kill more people, World Health Organization chief Dr. Margaret Chan said on Friday. A genetic analysis of the new virus showed it must have been circulating undetected for some time, in pigs or perhaps in other animals. The WHO is poised to declare a full pandemic of the virus, which has infected more than 11,000 people in 42 countries and killed 86. And U.S. health officials released $1 billion for companies to get started on a vaccine in case it is needed. The virus must be closely monitored in the southern hemisphere, as it could mix with ordinary seasonal influenza and change in unpredictable ways, Chan told the WHO annual congress in Geneva. [ID:nLM945575] "In cases where the H1N1 virus is widespread and circulating within the general community, countries must expect to see more cases of severe and fatal infections," she said. "This is a subtle, sneaky virus." An international team of researchers who analyzed all eight genes of the new virus confirmed its sneakiness, saying it was so different from its ancestral strains that it must have been circulating undetected for years. [ID:nN22387017] They confirmed it is a hybrid of two other mixtures -- one a so-called triple reassortant of pig, bird and human viruses, and another group of swine viruses from Europe and Asia. "The results of the study show the global need for more systematic surveillance of influenza viruses in pigs," Dr. Nancy Cox, chief of the influenza division at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters. The researchers said it is likely that other odd mixtures are infecting pigs but simply have not yet been seen. "We do know that our veterinary colleagues at USDA (the U.S. Department of Agriculture) and elsewhere in the world are now looking to see if samples in freezers from pigs or other animals might provide the missing link," Cox said. The U.S. Health and Human Services Department said it was setting aside $1 billion to help companies develop a vaccine against the new strain. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the money will be used for clinical studies over the summer and for production of vaccine ingredients for the government's stockpile of drugs and vaccines that is on hold in case of a pandemic of influenza. Companies approved to sell flu shots in the United States are Sanofi-Aventis SA , Novartis AG , GlaxoSmithKline PLC and CSL Ltd . AstraZeneca unit MedImmune also sells a nasal spray flu vaccine. Flu activity was calming in general across the United States, with a few exceptions, she said. "Today the situations in the New York City area and a few other parts of the country have led to more schools closing," she said. "We believe that there are 60 schools around the country that have dismissed students and that there are about 42,000 students out of schools because of this virus." Russia reported its first confirmed case of the disease and the WHO was testing two suspected cases in Democratic Republic of Congo, which would be Africa's first. [IDLM967383] STORING ANTIVIRALS Japan said it would launch a $31.85 million project to fight the virus in poorer Asian states.[ID:nSP476538] Under the initiative, Japan will store Roche AG's Tamiflu and GlaxoSmithKline's Relenza flu drugs as well as masks and gowns, at a warehouse in Singapore in case of a major outbreak. WHO officials say Asian nations, with young populations and endemic chronic illnesses, are particularly vulnerable to the spread of the new virus. [ID:nMAN91504] Most of Japan's 300 infections appear mild and officials relaxed preventive measures to allow some suspected patients to go to regular medical institutions rather than special "fever centres," and schools will not be automatically shut down. [ID:nSP476538] Robert Booy, who heads Sydney University's immune research and surveillance centre, said more people than usual in Southern Hemisphere countries could become infected this winter and die from the new flu because of its novelty. "Once you have enough virus out there, evolution is simple," Booy said, adding that the H1N1 virus could change to the point that it could get "nasty." In Australia, where cases have spread across several states, the government raised its flu alert level to mid-range "containment, which gives it authority to close schools.
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N22387871.htm

PATH TO RADICAL ISLAM BEGAN IN JAILS
They were like a million other petty criminals -- until they embraced radical Islam behind bars, launching a terrifying march to a planned mass murder that ended only when authorities sabotaged their sinister plot.
"He was not born Muslim. He's an institutional Muslim," said Richard Williams, uncle of Onta Williams, one of the four Bronx terror suspects.
"He wasn't raised that way."
Richard Williams said that his 32-year-old nephew fell under the sway of dangerously radical Islamo-fascists while serving time on drug charges -- and that he became "brainwashed" after his mother died and his ex-wife fought him for custody of their child.
"They played on his weaknesses and what was going on with his family," Richard said. "He was brainwashed and manipulated in the system."
Authorities say Onta Williams fell in with his three alleged co-conspirators, James Cromitie, 45, David Williams, 28, and 37-year-old Laguerre Payen, at a Newburgh mosque, where they bonded when they discovered they were all ex-cons.
Relatives and friends of the other three men charged in the horrific plot to blow up two Bronx synagogues and shoot down an Air National Guard plane said the men never expressed any interest in terrorism. But they all quickly developed a deep interest in Islam in jail.
Williams' uncle -- who himself once served 10 years on a drug charge -- said he was familiar with prison converts to Islam. ... If you want to the read the rest go to the link provided
http://www.nypost.com/seven/05222009/news/regionalnews/path_to_radical_islam_began_in_jails_170478.htm

Eeyores News and view

NYC Police: Terror suspects wanted to commit 'jihad'
NEW YORK (AP) — The New York City police commissioner says four men arrested Thursday morning wanted to commit "jihad" when they plotted to bomb a Jewish temple and shoot down military planes in upstate New York.
At a news conference outside the Bronx temple Thursday, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly quoted one of the men as saying, "If Jews were killed in this attack ... that would be all right."
"Jihad" is an Arabic word generally translated as meaning "struggle" or "holy war." It was not clear if the four men who were arrested were Muslim, but one told an informant that his parents had lived in Afghanistan.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg warned against stereotypes. He stressed that the Riverdale Temple in the Bronx is open to people of all faiths, including a Muslim girl who sometimes prays there.
The city leaders met privately with congregants Thursday morning. Kelly said neighborhood security was heightened to improve residents' comfort level.
The defendants are due in federal court Thursday in White Plains.
Four men due in court Thursday to face charges of plotting to bomb Jewish sites and shoot down military planes were arrested after planting what they thought were explosive devices near a synagogue and community center, authorities say.
Officials told The Associated Press the arrests came after a nearly year-long undercover operation that began in Newburgh, N.Y., about 70 miles north of New York City.
James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen, all of Newburgh, were charged with conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction within the United States and conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles, the U.S. attorney's office said.
Three of the defendants are U.S. citizens and one is of Haitian descent, officials said.
The men had planned to detonate a car with plastic explosives outside the Riverdale Temple and shoot military planes at the New York Air National Guard base at Stewart Airport in Newburgh with Stinger surface-to-air guided missiles, authorities said.
The defendants planned to "destroy a synagogue and a Jewish community center with C-4 plastic explosives," Acting U.S. Attorney Lev L. Dassin said.
The religious targets were the Riverdale Temple, founded in 1947, and the Riverdale Jewish Center, authorities said.
"This latest attempt to attack our freedoms shows that the homeland security threats against New York City are sadly all too real and underscores why we must remain vigilant in our efforts to prevent terrorism," New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said earlier in a statement.
The defendants, in their efforts to acquire weapons, dealt with an informant acting under law enforcement supervision, authorities said. The FBI and other agencies monitored the men and provided an inactive missile and inert C-4 to the informant for the defendants, a federal complaint said.
In June 2008, the informant met Cromitie in Newburgh and Cromitie complained that his parents had lived in Afghanistan and he was upset about the war there and that many Muslim people were being killed in Afghanistan and Pakistan by U.S. military forces, officials said.
Cromitie also expressed an interest in doing "something to America," they said in the complaint.
In October 2008, the informant began meeting with the defendants at a Newburgh house equipped with concealed video and audio equipment, the complaint said.
Beginning in April 2009, the four men selected the synagogue and the community center they intended to hit, it said. They also conducted surveillance of military planes at the Air National Guard Base, it said.
The suspects were arrested Wednesday night, shortly after planting a mock explosive device in the trunk of a car outside the Riverdale Temple and two mock bombs in the backseat of a car outside the Jewish Center, authorities said.
Rep. Peter King, the senior Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, was briefed on the case following the arrests.
"This was a long, well-planned investigation, and it shows how real the threat is from homegrown terrorists," said King, of New York.
Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said if there can be any good news out of this case it's that "the group was relatively unsophisticated, penetrated early and not connected to any outside group."
"The shocking plan to blow up a Jewish house of prayer with what the jihadist terrorists thought were C-4 explosives is dramatic proof that the dangers from such fanaticism have not passed and that American Jews must maintain their vigilance," said a statement released by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Jewish human rights group.
The defendants were jailed Wednesday night and couldn't be contacted for comment. The FBI didn't immediately return a telephone message seeking information on whether the men had lawyers.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-05-21-bomb-plot_N.htm

Day of reckoning looms for the U.S. dollar
The U.S. dollar's day of reckoning may be inching closer as its status as a safe-haven currency fades with every uptick in stocks and commodities and its potential risks - debt and inflation - are brought under a harsher spotlight.
Ashraf Laidi, chief market strategist at CMC Markets, said Wednesday a "serious case of dollar damage" was underway.
"We long warned about the day of reckoning for the dollar emerging at the next economic recovery," Mr. Laidi said in a note.
Mr. Laidi said economic recovery would weigh on the greenback as real demand for commodities, coupled with improved risk appetite, caused investors to seek higher yields in emerging markets and commodity currencies. This would draw investment away from the U.S. dollar, which was dragged down by growing debt and the risk quantitative easing would eventually spark a surge in inflation.
The U.S. dollar slid against most major currencies Wednesday, hitting a five-month low of US$1.3775 against the euro and pushing the Canadian dollar up US1.21¢ to a seven-month high of US87.69¢.
John Curran, the senior corporate dealer at Canadian Forex, said the U.S. dollar would likely fall further in the next week, with the Canadian dollar likely reaching about US88.35¢, at which point it could break higher to test the US92.35¢ level.
"The U.S. dollar is continuing to slide as investor appetite is gaining momentum," Mr. Curran said. "People are getting comfortable about taking on a little more risk."
The rise in the Canadian dollar has moved in lock-step with the improvement in equity markets since March 9. Over this time, the S&P 500 has risen by 34%, the S&P/TSX composite index has gained 35% and the Canadian dollar has increased by 14%, equal to almost US11¢. Since Feb. 18, light-crude oil has risen by 46% to US$62.12.
But as risk appetite and equities improve, Mr. Curran said it was unlikely the U.S. dollar would embark on a long-term decline.
"While things are beginning to thaw, it doesn't mean it's full-on summertime just yet," he said. "A lot of people are looking for the Canadian dollar to strengthen dramatically again towards par. I'm not sure about that just yet."
Nevertheless, concern has been mounting that the increasing U.S. debt load, as well as a potential inflation time bomb in the form of the quantitative easing, could drag down the greenback. Garnering attention is the risk the United States could lose its triple-A sovereign credit rating, which reflects the chance of the borrower defaulting on its debt.
"By many measures, the U.S. appears just a few short steps away from losing its coveted triple-A status, unless the recovery turns out to be considerably stronger than expected and the fiscal repair is faster than commonly expected," said Douglas Porter, deputy chief economist at BMO Capital Markets. "A downgrade could boost the cost of funding U.S. debt at the margin, but underlying inflation and fiscal fundamentals will ultimately be the primary driver."
Despite the risk, Paul Ashworth, chief economist at Capital Economics, said the United States was unlikely to lose its rating. But, in the event of a downgrade, he said it would probably not have a lasting impact on the U.S. dollar.
However, he said a big threat lurked in the country's expanded monetary base, which now stands at about US$1.8-trillion. While the expanded monetary base was needed to feed economic growth and ward off deflation under the Fed's quantitative easing plan, Mr. Ashworth said such high levels could fuel rampant inflation once broader monetary conditions improved.
He said it remained to be seen how much success the Fed will have when it decides to end its quantitative-easing plan and shrink the monetary base.
http://www.financialpost.com/news-sectors/story.html?id=1612964

Teen beats mom over french fries
May 21, 2009 - 4:44am
PORT DEPOSIT, Md. (AP) - The Cecil County Sheriff's Office says a teenager beat his mother with an aluminum baseball bat because she wouldn't share her french fries with him.
Seventeen-year-old Dennis Hickman III is charged as an adult with first- and second-degree assault.
Lt. Bernard Chiominto, a spokesman for the sheriff's office, says Hickman "went berserk for a while."
The incident occurred Tuesday night. Deputies said Hickman, who lives with his mother, also slashed tires on her car and kicked the front door, knocking it off its hinges.
Hickman's 52-year-old mother, who was not identified, was treated at Union Hospital in Elkton for injuries to her head, wrist and leg.
Information from: Cecil Whig of Elkton, Md., http://www.cecilwhig.com

But check the underware of Sandy Beger sounds like something else the clintons needed to cover up, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/20/AR2007022001344.html)
Disappearance of Disc With Clinton Data Investigated
By Edwin Chen
May 20 (Bloomberg) -- Federal authorities are investigating the disappearance of a computer disc from the National Archives containing Social Security numbers and Secret Service procedures from former President Bill Clinton’s administration, congressional officials said.
Among the files on the disc were 100,000 Social Security numbers, including that of one of former Vice President Al Gore’s daughters, contact information for officials who served in the Clinton administration, logs of events and “other highly sensitive information,” according to a statement from the office of Representative Darrell Issa, the ranking Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
Democratic Representative Edolphus Towns of New York, chairman of the committee, called it a “serious security breach.”
Mark McKenna, a spokesman for former President Bill Clinton said Clinton Foundation officials have asked the Archives for “a full accounting of what was on the drive.”
The disc was lost sometime between October 2008 and March 2009 and a criminal probe is underway by the Archives inspector general and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Susan Cooper, director of communications for the Archives, said the loss was confirmed in early April and the inspector general immediately began a criminal investigation.
The Archives also “immediately undertook a review of our internal controls and we have implemented improved security processes,” Cooper said in a statement.
Call for Investigation
Issa called for a congressional investigation.
“This egregious breach raises significant questions regarding the security protocols that are in place at the National Archives and Records Administration,” Issa said.
The disc, which contained one terabyte of data, is missing from the Archives facility in the Washington suburb of College Park, Maryland. The statement from Issa’s staff quoted the inspector general as saying that one terabyte of data is the approximate equivalent of “millions of books.”
“The full extent of the contents of the drive is still being investigated,” the statement said.
The hard drive was left unsecured in a work area while the records were being processed, according to Issa’s statement. At least 100 people with Archive badges had access to the area. In addition, the inspector general said janitors, visitors and interns passed through the area where the drive was being kept, the Republican statement said.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=aAINQhUs7Nxc

Swine Flu Arrives in Tokyo Area After Students’ New York Trip
May 21 (Bloomberg) -- Two high school students have been confirmed as the first cases of swine flu in the Tokyo area after they returned from a school trip to New York, local government officials said.
The 16-year-old girls, both from the same high school in Kawasaki, south of Tokyo, returned from a week-long trip to New York on May 19, officials said. Both are hospitalized with the H1N1 virus, which has sickened more than 10,000 people worldwide.
“The students are from Hachioji and Kawasaki and I was informed yesterday that tests showed that they had contracted the new flu,” Japan’s Health Minister Yoichi Masuzoe said in parliament today.
The cases around Tokyo, the world’s largest metropolitan area, come after the government yesterday shut 4,464 schools in western Japan after a swine flu outbreak around Osaka. Japan’s Health Ministry yesterday said 234 people have the virus, formally known as A/H1N1. Evidence of human-to-human transmission in a region outside North America, where a majority of the cases worldwide have occurred, may prompt the World Health Organization to raise its pandemic alert by one grade to the highest level, Hitoshi Oshitani, the former head of the agency’s Western Pacific region, said in a May 19 interview.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=awF_0oQDV9c0&refer=worldwide

Eeyore's News and View

This is a problem most won't face, but it is a real problem in the near future for us. Home grown terrorist and immigrant terrorist. As we see the new administration i expect the US to experience another and then more and more terrorist attacks in the US. The only thing that will happen is that we will lose rights more and more rights that we will never regain.
Somalis leaving Minn. for jihad MINNEAPOLIS — Mohamud Ali Hassan once told the Somali grandmother who raised him that he'd become a doctor and care for her. The Somali immigrant, who moved to the "Land of 10,000 Lakes" when he was 8, had good grades at the University of Minnesota and called Muslims to prayer at his mosque, where he also slept during the holy month of Ramadan.But on Nov. 1, Hassan disappeared, as have a dozen other boys and young men here — two days after another young Muslim from Minnesota blew himself up as a suicide bomber in Somalia.Hassan, 18, called his grandmother to say he was back in Somalia, where an Islamist militia is trying to take over the Horn of Africa nation. What he was doing there, he did not say.Now the FBI is asking questions, as are members of the Somali community. The Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center denies any wrongdoing, but many here suspect that the mosque and its imam are radicalizing their youth to become jihadists in an Islamic holy war overseas or perhaps even in the United States "They are very powerful, whoever got into his mind and got him to do this," says Hassan's grandmother Fadumo Elmi, 83. "We were forced out of our country one time. We don't want to be forced out of here."Details of the disappearances are few, but what little is known is cause for concern, says Abdizirak Bihi, a community activist who represents six families of young men who disappeared in early November.Among them was Bihi's nephew, Burhan Hassan, 17, a high school junior.All were good students, had no problems with the law, Bihi says. All were raised by single mothers and spent a lot of time in the Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center.The center is the largest mosque in the Twin Cities. Bihi worries it is preaching a radical Islamic ideology to vulnerable young men. Shirwa Ahmed, 19, who left in August with no notice to his family, was among five terrorists who blew themselves up Oct. 29 in an attack that killed 24 people in Somalia, Bihi says."We are wanting the government and politicians to investigate who is responsible for sending our kids and we are requesting the American government to help us to get us back our kids." Bihi says.Other Somali immigrants worry the disappearances may foretell dangers for their adopted nation. "That kid that blew himself up in Somalia could have done it here in Minneapolis," says Omar Jamal, executive director of the Somali Justice Advocacy Center in St. Paul.Special Agent E.K. Wilson of the FBI in Minneapolis would not say whether his agency is investigating the mosque. Bihi and Elmi said the FBI has talked to them and others about the missing.Wilson said the FBI knows that Muslims here have been going overseas to fight."We're aware that a number of Somali men have traveled from around the United States including Minneapolis to potentially fight overseas," Wilson said.A lawyer for the Abubaker As-Saddique Islamic Center denied any involvement in planning or financing the men's travels or any political indoctrination."The mosque has taken a position that it would never take a stand on any political issues," says lawyer Mahir Sherif in San Diego. "We do not support terrorism or any kind of suicide bombing or act of violence."He said federal authorities last month prevented the mosque's religious leader, Sheik Abdirahman Ahmed, from flying to Mecca.Somalia has been plagued by lawlessness, terrorism and warfare since the collapse of the military government in 1991. In recent years, a radical Islamist militia that seeks to impose Islamic law captured the capital of Mogadishu, where 18 U.S. soldiers died in the infamous "Blackhawk Down" battle of 1993. Troops from Ethiopia invaded in 2006 to counter the Islamists, who have been praised by Osama bin Laden.Yusuf Shaba, who writes about Islamic ideology and radicalism for the Warsan Times, a Somali-English monthly newspaper published in Minneapolis, says he decided to speak out about what he considers Islamic indoctrination at Minneapolis mosques because he doesn't want his sons to follow the same path he did.Shaba, 34, joined Al Ittihad Al-Islami (Islamic Union) at age 16 and was wounded at age 19 in Somalia. Al Ittihad was Somalia's largest Islamic terrorist group in the 1990s.Shaba says jihadists generally recruit young men from among two groups: those shunned by their families because they've turned to drugs, gangs or alcohol; and the sons of families who forbid exposure to Western culture and allow them to socialize only at the mosque.Shaba says he and his three teenage sons attended a program two months ago at Abubaker As-Saddique Islamic Center, where a former Somali warrior sat in a circle with other young people and delivered a passionate recitation of his experiences during the Somali civil war.Some mosques also screen videos about the war in Afghanistan and about Muslim victims of perceived injustices in such places as Nigeria and the Palestinian territories. "They give them all the grievances that Osama Bin Laden has," Shaba says. "They talk about nothing but jihad and it's the best thing that can happen to a Muslim."When the brainwashing is done and the teachers are confident students will do anything asked of them, the teachers give them tazkia, or clearance, to get more specialized training in the United States or abroad, Shaba says."The people who trained us encouraged us to not get married, to sever our ties with our families, so that when the mission comes we won't worry about family."Shaba says similar activities occur at Minnesota Da'wah Institute in St. Paul, another mosque. Sheik Mahamud Hassan, the institute's imam, says nothing like that is happening as his mosque. "It's liars," he says. "I'm not missing any members."Elmi wrapped herself in her shawl and sobbed as she thought of Hassan in her one bedroom apartment in a Minneapolis public housing high rise. Outside, snow covered the parking lot and temperatures were below zero.They moved to the United States in 1996, when Hassan was 8 and after his father was killed in the civil war. Hassan was obedient, but after going to the mosque, "He was completely changed.""I thought the mosque would be a much safer place than the night clubs and bars," she said, crying. "I don't want God to curse me because I say something bad about the mosque."
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/200 ... alis_N.htm

Verdict expected Monday in Fort Dix case

CAMDEN, N.J. (AP) — Jurors in the case of five men accused of plotting an attack on New Jersey's Fort Dix say they expect to finish deliberating Monday.

The jury worked on the case for nearly seven hours on Sunday. It was the fifth day of deliberations.

There were no notes or other requests during Sunday's deliberations. The jury asked for two transcripts in the first four days.

The five defendants are all foreign-born Muslim men who lived for years in a Philadelphia suburb. They're charged with conspiring to kill military personnel and attempted murder. They would face life in prison if convicted of those charges.

None of the men testified in their trial, but their lawyers say they were not plotting anything.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-12-21-fort-dix_N.htm

Forecast: A Long, Cold Winter
Stephanie Pomboy, Founder and President, MacroMavens
By LAWRENCE C. STRAUSS MORE ARTICLES BY AUTHOR
AN INTERVIEW WITH STEPHANIE POMBOY: It will take consumers at least five years -- and probably more -- to recover from this crisis.
"LIKE THE BUBBLE IN FINANCIAL ASSETS, THE NEW REAL-ESTATE bubble has its own distinctly disturbing characteristics," Stephanie Pomboy wrote in an April 2002 note titled "The Great Bubble Transfer." The founder and president of MacroMavens was on to something, even if she was early, and she worried about the big buildup of consumer debt fueled by rising home prices. Pomboy, whose Manhattan firm analyzes macroeconomic themes and their investment implications, remains bearish, convinced that a long period of paltry U.S. economic growth is in store -- akin to what happened in Japan in the 1990s. For more of her views and forecasts, read on.
Brad Trent for Barron's
"If you want to get long socialism, one of the next market segments that will be given a guarantee will be municipal bonds." –Stephanie Pomboy
Barron's: How bad has the macro economy gotten?
Pomboy: It is certainly the toughest one any of us has lived through. My fear is that it's actually just in the early stages and that it is going to get substantially worse on the economic side, although all the government measures that have taken place so far might help to insulate some of the damage on the financial side.
What about the short-term outlook?
Having been bearish, for me the real challenge is to identify the turn. One thing at work right now is what I call the cattle prod -- essentially the Fed poking people to take risk. They are taxing cash by having negative real returns on cash. At the same time, yields on investment-grade and junk bonds are incredibly alluring. You can pick up 15 percentage points over cash buying junk bonds. Or you can pick up 8.5 percentage points on investment-grade paper. At some point, the cattle prod will get people moving, as it did in March of '03 when the market turned.
What else do you see happening in the near term?
With the government guaranteeing all manner of private-credit claims, many investors may decide to get long "socialism," for lack of a better term. Or, as some euphemistically put it, this is partnering with the government. So in the short run, we could see a rally in risky assets and a selloff in Treasuries. But the economic deleveraging has barely begun, and that's my longer-term thesis. It all revolves around the idea that U.S. consumers are actually going to do the unthinkable -- they are going to save -- and that we will be more like Japan than anyone believes is possible.
Hence, consumption declines.
Right. Wages have been silently crowded out by benefits as a share of total compensation, as companies look to offset rising health-care costs. The result is that the share of income that consumers can actually spend is at its lowest in the post-war period. It had not been a problem, because consumers would just borrow to fill that gap. But now, they don't have appreciating assets against which to borrow. So while we could get a rally in risk assets -- including high-yield debt -- it's likely to be a short-term rally within a context of a secular bear market.
Any other important longer-term trends you expect?
We are going to see a secular rotation from paper assets to hard assets like gold. The whole global competitive currency devaluation, including that of the dollar, plays right into that.
Do you see any asset classes besides junk bonds benefiting from a short-term rally?
There is a chance that equities participate in that rally as well, although I think investment-grade corporate credits look much more attractive than stocks. But when you think about pension funds that are trying to make 8% annual returns, they are not doing it by getting 1% on two-year Treasury notes. They can't use the secret sauce of leverage anymore.
If I was going to hold my nose and buy anything, I probably would buy higher-quality corporate credits. If you want to get long socialism, one of the next segments of the market that will be given a guarantee will be municipal bonds. That's because state and local governments are a huge share of total [gross domestic product] and employment, and we can't afford to have them down for the count.
One thing that caught our eye in one of your recent notes was the steep decline of Treasury-buying by foreigners. What are the ramifications of that?
We are acting as though there are no consequences to basically running the money off the printing press and handing it to the Federal government to backstop financial markets or bail out homeowners or what not. There is no consequence to doing this, unless or until the rest of the world says to us, 'We don't like this game' and 'We don't want to have all the dollar claims we are holding debased by [Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke] running his printing press.'
So if foreign investors stop buying Treasuries, or even significantly pare their buying, that means higher rates in the U.S.
That's correct. But then [Bernanke] will start buying Treasuries to arrest the rise in interest rates. I've always had a very simplistic view about this: Either we are going to pay for our policy sins via higher interest rates or a weaker dollar. And for an economy that is as levered as the one in the U.S. is, the former choice is not an option. We can't pay through higher interest rates; we barely got to 4.5%, 5% before the whole subprime crisis erupted. So a weaker dollar is the natural valve. But right now, we are enjoying some real competition in the ugly contest from the currencies of the European Union and the United Kingdom, and that will probably persist for a while because they are in pretty bad shape, and they are a little bit behind the curve relative to us.
Could you elaborate on that choice between higher rates or a weaker dollar?
If we rely on foreign creditors to lend us the money to sustain our lifestyles -- and that's what we do -- we need to compensate them for that risk of lending to us. As the economy weakens and our credit quality should theoretically be deteriorating, the only way we can really attract that same capital is by offering a higher interest rate or making our assets cheaper to them, in this case by having our currency be weaker.
How would you assess the job Fed Chairman Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson have done in responding to the financial crisis?
My preferred solution would have been to do nothing. I think it's the meddling of policy makers that got us into this situation in the first place, along with the asymmetric practice of capitalism where, as long as everyone is succeeding, it is wonderful thing -- but the moment someone fails, we need to revert to socialism. That is really how we got to this place. And [former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan] Greenspan's desire to constantly lubricate any pain by pumping money into the system really created this bubble. But since doing nothing was not a compelling option to [Bernanke and Paulson], I would have favored more aggressive action to arrest home-price deflation, which would have been tackling the disease. Instead, they've chosen to treat the symptoms. Having said all of that, Bernanke and Paulson are determined to mitigate the pain.
You were concerned about housing before it blew up. What worried you?
First, it was the incredible expansion in lending on housing. I was also focused on the share of household income that was actually spendable money, and it was puzzling how consumers could sustain consumption when their income certainly wasn't supportive of that. Clearly, the reliance on asset inflation as a substitute for income was a major source of concern for me.
It also shocked me that as a share of bank assets, exposure to real estate was at a record level. Almost 50% of total bank assets were either in first mortgages, mortgage-backed securities or investments in real estate, and that was unprecedented. And yet there seemed to be this general idea that 'Oh, no, the banks had securitized and off-loaded all of their real-estate risk.' Clearly, as we have discovered, that was not the case at all. Yes, they securitized a lot of mortgages, but then they turned around and invested it in mortgage-backed securities. Ultimately, they ended up sitting on record exposure to one of the biggest bubbles in our lifetime.
What kind of economic conditions do you see going forward?
I expect that we'll just have a prolonged period of subpar growth. I don't think it will be exactly like Japan, but it will be Japanesque. Clearly, we have been far more aggressive in the U.S., in terms of policy actions. But what will happen here is that credit is no longer the answer, because households decide they don't want to borrow. As a result, the government will really become more important as spender of last resort.
What domestic GDP growth will we get?
In terms of nominal GDP, I see it being around 1% for a long time, five years for sure. One thing to consider is that after the dot-com bubble burst, it took the corporate sector five years to get back to the 2000 peak for capital expenditures, and employment never got back to that level. And the tech bubble was nothing as a share of total assets compared to housing on household balance sheets. This is so much larger. If it took the corporate sector five years to recover from the bursting of the dot-com bubble, to suggest that it would take five years for consumers to recover from this seems like a very conservative call.
What about unemployment?
Having the standard unemployment rate at 10% is definitely a possibility, though it does depend on what is done in terms of the state and local governments, which are 13% of total employment. But they have been the only area that is growing right now in terms of employment.
Where do you see rates going?
I have been bullish on Treasuries, and I did feel silly sticking with that view, because I'm really squeezing the last couple of basis points out of a multi-decade bull market. Having said that, looking back at the charts of JGBs [Japanese government bonds] in 1989, I am certain no one back then thought JGBs would ever yield under 1%. And here in 2008, even in the dark recesses of my bear cave with all the other growling bears in there, nobody believes that could happen here. There's this sense about how horrible it is that Treasuries have been able to get to these low yields, and I totally agree.
We are really abusing the privilege of dollar hegemony by printing all this money. But if I'm right and the whole economic deleveraging is still to come, you might get a selloff in Treasuries on this short-term rally in riskier assets. Then, the next thing you know, people will say, "Oh, wait. Consumers aren't coming back to the trough, this is a problem," and the market will sell off further. So on balance, I wouldn't short Treasuries.
Where do you see opportunities?
In terms of absolute returns, it is going to be very hard to come up with really compelling ideas. I like hard assets in this environment, gold in particular, where basically the major currencies are all being debased. I also think emerging markets, on a relative basis, are going to do much better than developed markets are.
We are all hanging on the edge of our seats to find out if China can pull off keeping its economy going while the rest of the world goes down the tubes. This shock-and-awe stimulus that China is applying to its own economy certainly speaks to its urgent motivation to ensure that its GDP growth stays at 10%-plus. So with the arsenal of foreign reserves they can continue to tap to support growth, I would be looking at going long equities in emerging Asian countries, including China, as well as commodities, which move hand-in-hand with emerging markets.
Why would China want to lighten its holdings of Treasuries?
It just seems to be a no-brainer that you would rather support local consumption than buy U.S. Treasuries. The interesting thing is that, contrary to most people's impressions, foreign holdings of Treasuries are really short term. Fifty percent of foreign Treasury holdings have a maturity of three years or less, so foreign holders are constantly facing the decision of what to do with rolling over that paper. It can change very quickly.
What keeps you up at night?
I do worry about preservation of capital from the standpoint of how many more unconventional policy actions we are going to have. If I'm correct about the economic deleveraging still ahead and that it will continue for many years, that's a legitimate concern.
That's why I'm long gold. I view it as the best way to protect my capital. The other worry is unemployment and this vicious circle where as consumers spend less, companies make less money, and they cut back workers.
The unemployment rate continues to rise. It is very hard to figure out how you break out of that.
Thanks, Stephanie.
http://online.barrons.com/article/SB122912505428802977.html?mod=b_hpp_9_0002_b_this_weeks_magazine_home_left&ref=

Here is a blog that covers food and cooking, it was mentioned on Survival Blog, that is where i found it. It seems to be full of great info on using storage food and recipes. Enjoy
http://www.survival-cooking.blogspot.com/

Got this article from 411man of a forum i frequent and via email form a friend.
Global systemic crisis – New tipping-point in March 2009: 'When the world becomes aware that this crisis is worse than the 1930s crisis'

Public announcement GEAB N°30 (December 16, 2008) -

LEAP/E2020 anticipates than the unfolding global systemic crisis will experience in March 2009 a new tipping point of similar magnitude to the September 2008 one. According to our team, at that period of the year, the general public will become aware of three major destabilizing processes at work in the global economy, i.e.:

• the length of the crisis
• the explosion of unemployment worldwide
• the risk of sudden collapse of all capital-based pension systems

A whole range of psychological factors will contribute to this tipping point: general awareness in Europe, America and Asia that the crisis has escaped from the control of every public authority, whether national or international; that it is severely affecting all regions of the world, even if some are more affected than others (see GEAB N°28); that it is directly hitting hundreds of millions of people in the “developed” world; and that it is only worsening as its consequences reveal throughout the real economy. National governments and international institutions only have three months left to prepare themselves to the next blow, one that could go along severe risks of social chaos. The countries which are not properly equipped to cope with a surge in unemployment and major risks on pensions will be seriously destabilized by this new public awareness.

In this 30th issue of the GEAB, the LEAP/E2020 team describes these three destabilizing processes (two of them are described in this public announcement) and gives recommendations to cope with the surge in risks. In addition, this issue also provides the opportunity to make an objective assessment of the reliability of LEAP/E2020's anticipations and specifies a number of methodological aspects of the analytical process used. In 2008, LEAP/E2020's success rate reaches 80%, and even 86% when it comes to strictly socio-econimic anticipations. In a year of major upheavals, our teal ise altogether quite proud of this result.

The crisis will last at least until the end of 2010

Evolution of the US money base and indications of related major US crisis periods (1910 – 2008) - Source: Federal Reserve Bank of Saint Louis / Mish’s Global Economic Analysis

As we already explained in GEAB N°28, the crisis will affect in different ways the different regions of the world. However, and LEAP/E2020 wishes to be very clear on that aspect, contrary to the dominant stance today (coming from those experts who denied the fact that a crisis was coming up three years ago, who denied that it was global two years ago, and who denied the fact that it was systemic six months ago), we anticipate that the minimum duration of the decanting phase of the crisis is 3 years (1). It shall be finished neither in spring 2009, nor in summer 2009, nor at the beginning of 2010. It is only towards the end of 2010 that the situation will start stabilizing again and improving a little in some regions of the world, i.e. Asia and the Eurozone, as well as in countries producing energy, mineral and food commodities (2). Elsewhere, it will continue; in particular in the US and UK, and in all the countries depending on their economy, were the duration could approximate a decade. In fact these countries should not expect any real return to growth before 2018.
Moreover no one should imagine that the improvement at the end of 2010 will correspond to a return of high growth. The recovery will take long. For instance, stock markets will take a decade to return to levels comparable to 2007, if they ever return to that. Remember that it took twenty years before Wall Street resumed its 1920 levels. Well, according to LEAP/E2020, the present crisis is deeper and longer than in the 1930s. The general public will gradually become aware of the long-term aspect of this crisis in the coming three months and this situation will immediately trigger two tendencies carrying with them socio-economic instability: fear of the future and enhanced criticism towards leaders.

The risk of sudden collapse of all capital-based pension systems

Finally, among the various consequences of the crisis for dozens of millions of people in the US, Canada, UK, Japan, Netherlands and Denmark in particular (3), there is the fact that, from the end of the year 2008 onward, news about major losses on the part of the organizations in charge of managing the financial assets supposed to finance pensions will multiply. The OECD anticipates that pension funds will lose 4,000 billion USD in 2008 only (4). In the Netherlands (5) as well as in the United Kingdom (6), monitoring organizations recently blew the whistle asking for an emergency contribution reappraisal and a State intervention. In the United States, growing numbers of announcements call for contribution increases and benefit reductions (7), knowing that it is only in a few weeks time that most of these funds will start calculating their total losses (8). Most of them are still deluding themselves about their capacity to build up again their capital after the markets turn around. In March 2009, when pension fund managers, pensioners and governments will become simultaneously aware of the fact that the crisis is there to last, that it coincides with the « baby-boomer » generation’s age of retirement and that the markets will not resume their 2007 levels until many long years (9), chaos will flood this sector and governments will reach the moment when they will be compelled to nationalize all these funds. And Argentina, who took this decision a few months ago already, will appear a pioneer.

All the trends described above are already at work. Their combination and the public becoming aware of the consequences they could entail, will result in the great collective psychological trauma of Spring 2009, when everyone will realize that we are all trapped into a crisis worse than in the 1930s and that there is no possible way out in the short-term. The impact on the world’s collective mentalities of people and policy-makers will be decisive and modify significantly the course of the crisis in its next stage. Based on greater disillusion and fewer beliefs, social and political instability will settle down worldwide.

Finally, this GEAB N°30 presents a series of 13 questions & answers designed to enhance savers'/investors'/decision-makers' capacity to understand and anticipate the next stages of the global systemic crisis:
1. Is this crisis different from the previous crises which affected capitalism?
2. Is this crisis different from the 1930s crisis?
3. Is the crisis as serious in Europe or Asia as in the USA?
4. Are the current actions undertaken by public authorities worldwide sufficient to curb the crisis?
5. What are the major risks still weighting on the world financial system? And are all savings equal in front of the crisis?
6. Is the Eurozone a true protection shield against the worst aspects of the crisis and what should the Eurozone do to improve its protection status?
7. Is the Bretton Woods system (in its 1970s last version) currently collapsing? Should the Euro take the place of the Dollar?
8. What can be expected from the next G20 meeting in London?
9. Do you think that deflation is right now the biggest threat to economies worldwide?
10. Do you think that the Obama administration will be able to prevent the USA from sinking into what you called the ‘Very Great US Depression’?
11. In terms of currencies, beyond your anticipation of the Dollar resuming its collapse in the very next months, do you think that the UK Pound and the Swiss Franc are still currencies with an international status?
12. Do you think that the CDS market is about to implode in the coming months? And what could be the consequences of such a phenomenon?
13. Is there a ‘US Treasury Bonds Bubble” about to burst?

---------
Notes:
(1) It can be useful to read on this crisis a very interesting contribution by Robert Guttmann published in the 2nd half of 2008 on the website Revues.org, supported by the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme Paris-Nord.
(2) As a matter of fact, commodities have already started contributing to boost the market of international sea transport. Source: Financial Times, 12/14/2008
(3) It is in those countries that capital-based pension systems were most developed (see GEAB N°23) but is also the case of Ireland. Source: Independent, 11/30/2008
(4) Source: OECD, 11/12/2008
(5) Source: NU.NL, 12/15/2008
(6) Source: BBC, 12/09/2008
(7) Sources: WallStreetJournal, 11/17/2008; Phillyburbs, 11/25/2008; RockyMountainNews, 11/19/2008
(8) Source: CNBC, 12/05/2008
(9) Not to mention the effect of an explosion of the US T-Bond bubble on pension funds. See Q&A, GEAB N°30.
http://www.leap2020.eu/GEAB-N-30-is-available!-Global-systemic-crisis-New-tipping-point-in-March-2009-When-the-world-becomes-aware-that-this_a2567.html

Scripture baking blends spirtuality and cooking
December 19, 2008 - 9:27pm
Scripture Cake is seen in this Sunday, Nov. 16, 2008 photo. Having a Bible on hand may not be a common tool in the kitchen unless you are ready to try the recipe for this cake. The names of ingredients are turned into references in passages in the The Good Book and your Bible knowledge is tested in a fun way. - Spoons and bowls and baking pans and... a Bible?

Most modern bakers probably don't associate The Good Book with pulling together a batch of their favorite treats, but during the late 1800s some Christians began using scripture as a code for turning recipes into riddles.

"This was a cutsie way of letting people know that they knew their Bible. If you knew it off the top of your head, you felt proud of yourself," says Joan Houston Hall, chief editor of the "Dictionary of American Regional English."

Recipes for so-called scripture cake fell out of popularity by the mid-1900s, but recently have enjoyed a revival among faith-based youth groups and parents looking to use the kitchen as another conduit to faith.

"Since I teach Hebrew School one of the beauties of these recipes is that they are great way to force my students to read/translate and interpret the Hebrew Bible," says Michael Twitty, culinary historian and teacher at Temple Beth Ami religious school in Rockville, Md. "This year I'm teaching Torah to the seventh graders again, and it makes it fun for them because otherwise they would have no interest whatsoever in picking up the world's best- seller,"

Recipes can be found online on sites such as MormonChic.com and at numerous recipe sites. Some youth ministry groups even set up races between groups to see who can decipher and bake the ingredients first.

"It is very fun to do," says Evelyn Birge Vitz, author of faith-based cookbook "A Continual Feast." She enjoys not only the riddle of making the cake, but also comparing recipes to find different passages that refer to the same ingredients.

Scripture recipes call for ingredients by citing passages from the Bible; the cook has to sort out which ingredient each passage refers to. For example, 2 cups of Jeremiah 6:20 is one way of calling for 2 cups of sugar.

Not obvious? It works because the 20th verse of the sixth chapter of the Book of Jeremiah includes a reference to "the sweet cane from a far country."

Some ingredients aren't quite so clear. Amos 4:5 calls for "leaven," often interpreted as baking powder. Other passages leave even more room for interpretation.

"In the Second Book of Chronicles, it calls for spices in the general sense. So, you can use nutmeg and cinnamon, or make it more gingery," says Evelyn Birge Vitz, author of the faith-based cookbook "A Continual Feast."

Despite some claims that scripture baking dates to colonial times, most historians trace it to the late 1800s. Recipes first appeared in church cookbooks and later in mainstream publications, including a Good Housekeeping cookbook.

Recipes varied slightly _ as did the Bible passages _ but, in general, they produced a basic cake seasoned with spices and dried fruit, such as raisins and figs. Sometimes it was served with Burnt Jeremiah (Sugar) Syrup.

"In the 1880s there was this explosion of cake making. There were a lot of cakes named after historical figures or 'tipsy' cake, made with as much white wine as the cake would absorb. Scripture Cake is in that period between 1880 and 1910 when there were just loads of cake recipes," says Kathleen Fitzgerald, co-author of "America's Founding Food."

It's a concept that is easily adapted for most baked goods. The Bible has numerous references to sugar, flour, eggs, spices, milk, honey and other common ingredients, particularly in the Old Testament.

And which Bible you use generally doesn't matter, though some versions may not have your key word. Several versions of the Bible can be searched simultaneously at various Web sites.

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