The US government has warned of an al-Qaeda call to attack US online stock market and banking services.
The threat, seen on an al-Qaeda website, applied to the whole of December.

It was said to be in revenge for the continued detention of suspects at the US prison camp in Guantanamo Bay.

A spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, Russ Knocke, said there was no evidence to corroborate the threat. (more…)

Without notifying the public, federal agents for the past four years have assigned millions of international travelers, including Americans, computer-generated scores rating the risk they pose of being terrorists or criminals.

The travelers are not allowed to see or directly challenge these risk assessments, which the government intends to keep on file for 40 years.

The scores are assigned to people entering and leaving the United States after computers assess their travel records, including where they are from, how they paid for tickets, their motor vehicle records, past one-way travel, seating preference and what kind of meal they ordered. (more…)

Detectives are investigating letters smuggled out of Russia purporting to show the existence of a secret squad set up to target poisoned spy Alexander Litvinenko and others.

Scotland Yard has been passed copies of two letters apparently penned in jail by former Russian intelligence officer Mikhail Trepashkin, in one of which Mr Litvinenko is warned that both he and his family are at risk.

Mr Litvinenko’s London friend Alex Goldfarb said scans of the letters came into his possession on Thursday and he passed them to Scotland Yard. (more…)

“Although the Democrats are very uncomfortable with the way the Iraq policy is being executed, they are at pains not to appear that they are shortchanging troops in the field,” Loren Thompson, CEO of the Lexington Institute, yet another “think tank,” this one connected at the hip to the neocon infested Center for Strategic and International Studies, told the Associated Press. “This is their opportunity to show that they, too, are pro-defense,” that is to say pro-killing Iraqis in prodigious numbers with an inventory of truly heinous weapons.

In order to test the loyalty to the neocon ethic of ever ballooning “defense” (i.e., invade small countries) appropriations, the “Bush administration is hammering out its largest-ever appeal for more Iraq war funds—a record $100 billion, at least, and that figure reflects cuts from wish lists originally circulating around the Pentagon,” a “wish list” no different than one submitted by a heroin addict, forever increasing his dosage and thus requiring more and more money, to the ultimate ruination of family and friends. (more…)

Cyberspace police state dismissed by some, yet agenda for regulated, controlled, patrolled “Internet 2″ advances

The Internet is the last true unregulated outpost of freedom of speech but moves are afoot to stifle, suffocate and control the world wide web. These threats are not hidden nor are they hard to deduce and yet a significant minority of truth seekers and activists remain naive as to their scope.

Following our publication of yesterday’s article, RIAA Legal Ruling Could Shut Down The Internet, we received a mixed response. Many were aware of the imminent dangers that threaten to change the face of the Internet but others were more hostile to the supposition that the world wide web could be devastated by landmark copyright case rulings as well as plans to develop “Internet 2.” (more…)

Dick Cheney is a Traitor, an evil and wicked man, yet the foolish and damned “conservatives” are seduced to believe him to be a God fearing Christian, when he is anything but. Here, we see him admit to his dishonesty. What a shame unto the foolish of the Republic who constantly refuse to see their leaders for who they are and even admit to being.

Source: YouTube

Bush and co paving the way for power mad freaks like Gingrich

Newt Gingrich’s latest attack on the First Amendment is a revealing insight into the long term agenda of elite minds in America today. Those who would be successors to the Bush Administration are even more bent on power and dominance and they see absolutely no place for the freedoms America was founded on to continue to exist under their leadership.

At a dinner honouring the sanctity of the First Amendment this week, Newt Gingrich stood up and gave a talk about restricting freedom of speech.

Gingrich stated: (more…)

The bipartisan Iraq Study Group reached a consensus on Wednesday on a final report that will call for a gradual pullback of the 15 American combat brigades now in Iraq but stop short of setting a firm timetable for their withdrawal, according to people familiar with the panel’s deliberations.

The report, unanimously approved by the 10-member panel, led by James A. Baker III and Lee H. Hamilton, is to be delivered to President Bush next week. It is a compromise between distinct paths that the group has debated since March, avoiding a specific timetable, which has been opposed by Mr. Bush, but making it clear that the American troop commitment should not be open-ended. The recommendations of the group, formed at the request of members of Congress, are nonbinding. (more…)

According to Seymour Hersh’s latest New Yorker shocker, the CIA has found no evidence of a secret Iranian nuclear weapons program. The White House, given a draft assessment in the fall, has been “hostile” to the agency’s report.

Now why would that be? Why no sighs of relief? Why no, “Thank you guys,” and pats on the back for all their careful intelligence work?

I think the answer’s obvious to anyone who’s been paying attention. Dick Cheney and his neocon acolytes who still dominate Middle East policy (David Wurmser, Elliott Abrams, Stephen Hadley, Stephen Cambone, Eric Edelman, Elizabeth Cheney, with Abram Shulsky, David Addington and John Bolton in supporting roles) have a certain view of what constitutes good intelligence. It’s at variance with the view more widely held among those of us in what they dismiss as the “reality-based community.” That includes many intelligence professionals. (more…)

The latest tool being added to the warfighting efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan looks quite old-fashioned. Think weather balloons or blimps.

But Lockheed Martin Corp.’s tethered aerostat surveillance systems, which are equipped with sensors for continuous surveillance, detection and communications for multiple missions, offer the Army and its soldiers a birds-eye view of the action in real-time.

The Bethesda, Md., company won a $77.5 million contract to supply more aerostats, sensors, ground stations and mooring systems to Iraq and Afghanistan. Delivery of the Persistent Threat Detection Systems, which are built and tested at the defense giant’s Akron, Ohio, facility, will begin in the next few months, the company said. (more…)

If you enhance your workout with the new Nike+ iPod Sport Kit, you may be making yourself a surveillance target.

A report from four University of Washington researchers to be released Thursday reveals that security flaws in the new RFID-powered device from Nike and Apple make it easy for tech-savvy stalkers, thieves and corporations to track your movements. With just a few hundred dollars and a little know-how, someone could even plot your running routes on a Google map without your knowledge.

The Nike + iPod gives runners real-time updates about the speed and length of their workouts via a small RFID device that fits into the soles of Nike shoes, and broadcasts workout data to a small receiver plugged into an iPod Nano.

While this setup sounds convenient and cool, it didn’t sit well with Scott Saponas, a computer science graduate student at the University of Washington in Seattle. After enjoying his Nike+ iPod for a few months, Saponas began to suspect there might be other, more nefarious uses for the gear. (more…)

China is considering forcing internet users to provide their real names and ID card numbers when opening a blog.

Advocates of the idea argue that blog anonymity has encouraged widespread libel and slander.

Opponents say blogging is flourishing for the very reason that people are free to express themselves.

China has one of the most repressive internet regimes in the world, censoring content and imprisoning some people for what they put on the web. (more…)

Mankind will need to venture far beyond planet Earth to ensure the long-term survival of our species, according to the world’s best known scientist, Professor Stephen Hawking.

Returning to a theme he has voiced many times before, the Cambridge University cosmologist said today that space-rockets propelled by the kind of matter/antimatter annihilation technology popularised in Star Trek would be needed to help Homo sapiens colonise hospitable planets orbiting alien stars.

And he disclosed his own ambition to go into space. “Maybe Richard Branson will help me,” he said, a reference to the space tourism plans of Virgin tycoon Sir Richard Branson, using the privately built SpaceShipOne to take people into space from 2008. (more…)

Officials investigating the tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales, have reportedly uncovered the identity of the suicide victim whose blood was mixed up with samples taken from her driver Henri Paul.

It is now known that the blood, previously thought to be Paul’s and which was used to prove the chauffeur was three times over the legal drink-driving limit, belonged to somebody else.

Forensic pathologist Professor Dominique Lecomte faces an investigation over the mix-up after it emerged in September (06) that she confused the identity numbers of the bodies, reports Contactmusic.

Paul was at the wheel of the Mercedes Benz when it crashed inside a Paris, France tunnel, killing him, Diana and her lover Dodo Fayed. He was originally said to have been heavily intoxicated at the time. (more…)

The pound has hit a 14-year high against the dollar amid speculation that the Bank of England will raise interest rates in the New Year.
In early Thursday trading in Europe, the pound hit $1.956, its highest level against the dollar since 1992.

Interest rate rises are now more likely in early 2007 after the Nationwide said house prices rose strongly in November.

UK interest rates are currently at 5%, after this month’s quarter-point rise to help curb inflation (more…)