Tuesday, October 31, 2017

American Chemical Society Investigates How Much Halloween Candy Would Need To Be Eaten To Reach A Lethal Dose

Image result for kid in Trump Halloween maskAlmond Joy Halloween Snack Size Bars - 12 bag case
Trick or Treaters wearing Trump masks are most likely to OD on Halloween candies.

One of the more macabre bits of research to be undertaken by the American Chemical Society recently (WSJ, Oct. 28-29, p. A2) sought to answer the question: 'How much  Halloween Candy Would It Take To Kill Someone?'  It turns out not as much as you'd think - especially if you can imagine a greedy kid in a Trump mask who pigs out after collecting the equivalent of about 8 bags of snack size Almond Joy bars or the equivalent in other candies. 

Sixty years ago when I made my last Halloween rounds that wasn't a problem - because mostly all you received was candy corn, e.g.



We thought the stuff was terrific with the Trick or Treat colors, but usually could never consume more than a few ounces at a time. It all tasted the same, you know. Kids today don't have that problem because the diversity of goodies they get - mainly in fun size candy bars - is designed to encourage binge eating.

Anyway, the conclusion of the ACS study is that any kid - even one with a greed head disposition wearing a Trump mask - would have to gobble up a gluttonous amount to put his or her life at risk. What is the gluttonous amount of candy that could deliver such a toxic dose?

The first thing the ACS needed to decide on was a standard for lethality. The choice was the "lethal dose at 50 percent" or LD50 for short - created in 1927 as a gauge for drug potency. Also known as the ;median lethal dose"  it assesses the threshold at which 50 percent of a sample population would be killed by consuming  x milligrams of the potential toxic substance per kilogram
of body weight.

None other than Hans Plugge, a toxicologist at Verisk 3E - a company in Bethesda, MD, helped the ACS come up with its lethality estimates for Halloween candy.  He used the current scientific literature in tandem with the known LD50 for the sucrose content of Halloween candy. It turns out sucrose amounts to 29.7 grams per kilograms of weight  for the person. (Or 13. 5 g per pound of weight.)

Since the bags of Almond Joy snack bars we bought to dole out weigh in at 569 grams each, with 33 "fun bars" in each, the LD 50 dose  computed by the ACS formula would amount to 891 g for a 30 kg (66 lb.) kid.   This means the kid would only have to eat 1.75 bags or about 57 bars to hit the LD50 mark. Believe me, looking at the bag's bar contents this would not be that difficult to do for a gluttonous kid, say who also fancies greed and over -consumption and has a thing for Dotard masks..

This elicits the question of how many of these Almond Joy snack bars I'd have to gobble to reach that  50 percent lethal dose.   Since I weigh in at 90 kg, the total sucrose mass consumed would need to be 90 kg x 29.7 g / kg =   2, 673 grams. Doing the math this translates into about 4.7 bags of Almond Joy or 268 fun bars.

I know absolutely I could do it, but knowing what it'd do to my a1c there's no way in hell I would remotely try. Unless maybe I planned to go around  wearing a Dotard mask.

If 50 percent of test subject trick or treat gobblers would be killed at the LD50 level, then all would be wasted at the LD100 level. The ACS, of course, could never conduct such actual experiments in their labs - patiently waiting over the "gobbling time"  until half the test kids cash in - so these figures must be predicated on estimates.

What we DO know is the less sugar the average human consumes, the better for his or her health. Once you get diabetes, the jig is up: you get itchy sores on your skin, your eyesight goes (diabetic retinopathy) , and the kidneys, heart and other organs are vulnerable.  The a1c blood test is the key measure, and you want it below 5.5 if possible. From 5.6 to 6.2 you are borderline or pre -diabetic.

The recommended daily amount of sugar for adult women is 25 grams, and for men, 36 grams. The real amount consumed by adults? About 82 grams per day.  For kids, even minus the Halloween candy, it's probably twice that.

To stay within the American Heart Association's limits, kids ought to ration out their stash, eating no more than two fun size bars per day.

Those kids wearing Trump masks will likely refuse because they want to emulate their greedy idol.

Monday, October 30, 2017

Cartoonist Scott Adams Sings an Ode To Dotard's Tweets As 1st Indictment Comes Down

Image result for Scott Adams images
"Hey, I think I'll ditch Dilbert and Use Twitter Troll instead!"

It's really iritating to see a creative guy with some artistic talent (Scott Adams, creator of the 'Dilbert' comic  strip) come to the point of admiring garbage.  It's in some ways analogous to seeing a prof praising Dotard's tweets as fine literature or one's  mechanical engineer  relative demoted to running a landfill.  But how else explain Adams' recent gushing WSJ piece:  "The Power of the Presidential Tweet" wherein he actually writes:

"I'm often impressed by how much work President Trump gets out of his tweets"

Going on to give a number of useless examples, which merely confirm Dotard is an ignorant, half-educated twit. At least Scott is correct when he writes "most are forgettable" - as retweets (but I emphatically disagree they are all "harmless") But then he dives off the deep end by writing

"The good ones are entirely different, and many are gems of persuasion".

Huh? Gems of persuasion? What blend of MJ has this guy been mixing with his vodka cocktails?   NONE of them are "gems of persuasion" but rather regurgitated (most from FAUX News) dreck, and toxic verbal detritus.  Recall back on Saturday, March 4th, Dotard erupted on Twitter when he  launched a series of tweets that began at 5.35am. In one he wrote: “Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!”

Far from showing any "humor" or "persuasion" it showed an unhinged nitwit. None of his other alleged "masterpieces" were any better quality, and why should they have been given any communication medium that reduces thought to 140 characters is more verbal cartoon than adult, rational communication.

Perhaps the epitome of "verbal looseness"  was embodied in his  reckless December tweet on expanding U.S.  nuclear capacity, e.g.

"We need to strengthen and expand nuclear capacity until the world comes to its sense regarding nukes."

What the hell was he yapping about anyway? Expand nuclear capacity? Is he nuts, ignorant or just stupid? As a number of strategic analysts have pointed out, including staff from The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the U.S. already has just under 5,000 nuclear warheads in its active arsenal and more than 1,550 deployed strategic warheads. This is more than enough to turn the world to ash about six times over.

Meanwhile the clueless media, especially on TV, kept showing the tweet on large HD screens in bold relief as they scratched their heads. WHY give this degenerate's expulsions any attention at all? They aren't worthy of being put up on the walls of a dump rest room on Skid Row.

But does one really need an I.Q. higher than a hamster's to grasp that tweets  (and most texts) are an inappropriate medium for making nuclear policy?  Must it really be spelled out for the likes of Scott Adams - or is he that much in Dotard's deranged wheel house that his brains are scrambled? Inquiring minds want to know.

Then there was the Dotard tweet attack on Mika Brzezinski ,  with the twisted little maggot at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue unleashing his unseemly vitriol on a woman who merely expressed an opinion on his chronic chaos and inability to focus..See the rant here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhhXtCkt9CE

Most recently Dotard, true to form,  barked in tweets over the weekend about the "Dems evil political witch hunt" in respect of the Mueller Trump -Russia investigation. Less than 24 hrs. later we've learned Paul Manafort (Trump's campaign chair)  has been the one charged -indicted along with his sidekick Rick Gates. Manafort's been charged with 12 counts including funneling $75 million through offshore accounts and laundering $18 million. Once that news erupted this a.m., a pall of utter silence finally descended on Trump Twitterdom.  With good reason, as even Dotard's lawyer Ty Cobb would have warned him "when you're in a hole,  stop digging".

While it is true Manafort has been charged with a series of "paper crimes",  they are not in any way minor charges, Failure to register as a foreign agent (when lobbying) is serious as is failing to faithfully complete federal financial forms. Any one of these  - such as money laundering -could earn Manafort up to 20 years in the tank.   The skinny - according to legal specialist Jan Crawford on CBS this morning - is that sitting in an FBI office and being grilled and informed about the penalties, will get a normal guy to crack.  If he cracks it generally loosens his lips to blab on others, to save his own heinie.  This is what could open the floodgates to bring down the rest of Trump's cabal.

Scott Adams should take notice as a confirmed Dotard groupie.

The Trump attacks on the Dems and Bob Mueller's investigation merely herald the latest of an ongoing barrage of tweets directed at assorted targets, including Hillary Clinton, San Juan's Mayor, NFL players, Bob Corker, John McCain, ESPN's Jemele Hiil, Frederica Wilson and numerous others. In the entirety the Dotard's contemptible tweets have represented an ongoing degradation in the level of civil discourse which has now shown up in how Americans perceive the nation's political scene.

According to a University of Maryland- Washington Post poll - conducted nine months into Trump's presidency - 7 in 10 Americans concur that the current divisions are the biggest since the Vietnam War. In addition, 6 in 10 agree that Trump's presidency is making the U.S. political system more dysfunctional.  This dysfunction has manifested as a widespread distrust particularly in Dotard who is now regarded as an "idiot" by nearly one -third of citizens.

This didn't happen by coincidence but seeing Trump's endless stream of disgusting, disparaging tweets which are neither humorous nor persuasive in contrast to Mr. Adams' nauseating ode to the Twitter Troll.  In truth no poll should be needed to expose the starkly pessimistic view of the U.S. most of its citizens have as well as the rest of the civilized world.  That world wonders what bottom pit we've descended into. A pit revealing a rampant distrust of the nation's political leaders and especially the "leader" who's often compared to a clown or an imbecile.

After all, since the Dotard's arrival in January there has been nearly a perfect correlation between the low quality, frequency of his tweets and the increasing American belief that politics has reached a dangerous low point. Of course this would be the case given the nature of the "presidential tweet" as the most debased and crass form of communication - lacking any semblance of decorum. Worse, many now believe we've reached a new normal. A normal in which truth is no longer accepted as a fundamental value, given how Dotard's compulsive, pathological lying has undermined it at every turn and with each tweet.  Does Scott Adams value truth? One wonders given most of his strips concern a cynical and clueless CEO (with 'devil horn -shaped' hair) who incessantly lies to his employees (like Dilbert) in order to protect his misbegotten company at all costs.

As one WSJ writer put it (Oct. 27-28):

"Adams op-ed quickly reveals the value-free of his boundless adulation for Trump by what it doesn't say. There is no mention of the word 'truth'. There is a single use of the word 'true' but only in the context of whether one can imagine a world in which Jemele Hill is 'bad' for ESPN.."

And, of course, Jemele Hill represented another target for attack by the impostor in chief.

Another writer with letter appearing on the same page:

"Missing from Scott Adams' ode to Trump's persuasiveness is any evidence that Mr. Trump has yet to actually persuade anyone.. Despite 1,000-plus tweets since the election, the president's approval rating hovers below - not above-  his election margin."

Instead of being nonplussed at how much "work" Trump is getting out of his tweets, Adams ought to be worried at how much vitriol, dissension and hate is expelled - and which is ripping this nation's seams apart.  Perhaps when Scott Adams is finished cranking out 'Dilbert' comic strips he has another promising venture to look forward to:  Dotard J. Pussygrabber's hagiographer.

In the meantime, the indictment of one of Trump's campaign advisors - though the Trumpies deny any major influence- ought to have Dotard shutting down his Twitter account for now.  Oops, I see that silence didn't last long. The Twitter troll is at it again bawling: "Why aren't Crooked Hillary and the Dems the focus? There is no collusion????"  Attempting the red herring deflection engineered by Devin Nunes and FAUX news to steer the issues to the other side, via an HRC- uranium and Fusion GPS -Dem conspiracy, Don't hold your breath, Donald Dotard, Mueller will not be sidetracked or distracted by BS.

Friday, October 27, 2017

Parsing Key Aspects Of The JFK Assassination Documents Release

Image result for brane space, JFK files opened
JFK and Jackie in limo moments before he was killed by a head shot coming from the Grassy Knoll area.
Image result for brane space, JFK files opened
Lee Oswald killed by Jack Ruby on orders from mob-CIA Staff D conspirators.

With the release of the first batch of JFK assassination files late Thursday, it is important to try to get a grasp of what they mean- including future ones.  In this post, I parse the basics. While many may find their head spinning- I have made every effort to break down the most critical elements of what you will hear and see from the media - and why various aspects are important - or not.

1. The one important thing we learned thus far:

As Chip Reid reported on CBS Early Show, the FBI  had called the Dallas police the night before Oswald's murder and cited a memo from J. Edgar Hoover in which one reads:

"We received a call in our Dallas office from a man talking in a calm voice he was a member of a committee organized to kill Oswald. We at once notified the Chief Of Police and he assured us Oswald would be given sufficient protection.  

This morning we called the Chief of Police again warning of some effort against Oswald and he assured us adequate protection would be given. However, this was not done."

Why wasn't it done?    Why did Chief Jesse Curry give assurances to the FBI that weren't followed through?  The trope that the Dallas cops let their "friend" Jack Ruby into the basement because they knew him (Jack gave them free drinks at his Carousel Club) is pure bull pockey.  Former British Intelligence officer John Hughes-Wilson concurs with former Justice Dept. agent Walt Brown ('Treachery in Dallas', Chapter 'Blue Death) ',and author James Douglass ('JFK and the Unspeakable') that the Dallas cops were part of it.   They needed a backup plan - likely in concert with the Dallas mob - to stop Oswald so he wouldn't talk.  The "committee" in Hoover's memo then was likely made of an alliance between the mob and the Dallas cops. 

Before proceeding, let's appreciate that Hoover had no soft spots for Lee Harvey Oswald. The call to Curry to ensure his safety was entirely about keeping Lee alive to extract a confession from him as the sole assassin. Of course, J. Edgar was totally delusional as there was no way in hell Lee would do that - short of ripping out his nails and water boarding - and I doubt he'd do it then. No, he wanted his public say to clear things up at a public trial and no Hoover, LBJ or others were going to take that away. But that was precisely what cost him his life and the "committee" knew it.

To the point, the Dallas cops' original orders (likely from Dallas Mob boss Joe Civello) were to kill Oswald at the Texas Theater so there'd be no chance of his ever getting his say at a public trial.   Douglass (p. 292) makes it known that the Dallas cops who entered the theater approached Oswald (in his seat) "almost as if they were provoking the suspected police killer to break away from his seat ..which would have given Tippet's enraged fellow officers an excuse to kill him".

But Oswald did no such thing. He knew their game and he wasn't that stupid.  Nor did he attempt to fire any shots. Lee clearly and obviously knew by now he'd been set up as the patsy and the last thing he wanted to do was make these Dallas cops his judge, jury and executioners. No, he wanted to have his trial and his say, and let it be known how and why he'd been set up. So, rather than mindlessly react he expressly said: "I am not resisting arrest! Police brutality!" He never said "It's all over now" - those words were put into his mouth by the WC's cavalcade of faux witnesses, puppets and liars.

Hughes-Wilson cites his own source (p. 176, 'JFK - An American Coup  d 'Etat') who overheard two Dallas cops talking about how Oswald was to have been killed before he ever arrived at the station. One, in a snarling voice, said to the other (ibid.) "You were supposed to kill Lee....you stupid son of a bitch, then you go and kill a cop". Referring to the shooting of officer J.D. Tippet.

So there were snafus along the way. Even the best planned conspiracies can go awry, but in the JFK case the architects ensured there was always a back up plan. In this case, to recruit former Chicago mobster Jack Rubinstein, aka Ruby, to snuff Oswald. Mark North, using actual, released FBI files, documents many of Ruby’s Mob connections in his book, Act of Treason- including his reported “gangster connections in Dallas”, especially to Joseph Civello, the Mafia boss in Dallas. The same files disclose that Ruby, on October 26, 1963, “placed a 12 minute person to person call to Irwin S. Weiner at Weiner’s Chicago home”.

It is further noted that Weiner was a mob lawyer:


This dovetails with what most serious researchers already know, that Jack Ruby didn't just kill Oswald out of the goodness of his little heart to spare Jackie from having to testify.

The document trail unearthed by Mark North ('Act of Treason') is revelatory here, namely the FOIA -released files retrieved in the 1990s that showed Ruby had an outstanding  debt to Uncle Sam - owing more than $40,000 in back excise taxes to the federal government, plus $20,000 in other back taxes. A phone call (also documented)  then would have assured Ruby his tax problems would “disappear” if he performed one more job: offing Oswald. Given the mob link to ZR/Rifle, such a scenario would be totally logical. Few people today, unless they've  mined the document trail, are remotely aware of the extent to which the CIA and Mob worked hand in glove, especially on the ZR/Rifle Castro assassination operations.

We also know mobster Johnny Roselli was offed before he could provide any testimony to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) about Ruby's role.  Again, this was the only legitimate government investigation to ever come about - the Warren Commission being merely an artifact created by Lyndon Johnson - mainly to cover up his own tracks.

Thus it was that prospective HSCA witness Roselli had to also meet his cruel end, as described below by Gaeton Fonzi in 'The Last Investigation', p. 375:

"In July, 1976, Roselli had disappeared and in August, the month before the Committee (HSCA) was established, Roselli surfaced in the shallows off the Intracoastal Waterway in North Miami. He had been smothered to death and shot, then cut open from chest to navel. His legs had been hacked off and stuffed with his torso into a 55-gallon steel drum which was wrapped with heavy chain and moored to a weight in the water. The mooring broke when the gases from Roselli's decomposing body forced the drum to float to the surface."

The killers wanted to make damned sure there were no flapping gums.. They wanted to ensure Roselli never talked about Ruby's role - or his connections - to do with  eliminating Oswald.. Murdering witnesses does wonders to keep a conspiracy under wraps - while moron media blabbermouths and their useful idiot lackeys keep babbling about "tin foil hats."

2. The Oswald- Russia "Association":

Anyone who pays any attention in the coming days and weeks will hear a lot about the Oswald -Russian connection, or rather alleged connection. The problem as usual is that while the mainstream media pushes this stuff out it never takes the time for any critical analysis or history. No surprise then the public only gets a half-assed version and is left to deal with the releases piecemeal and in an uninformed context via unrelated formats. So here is what you need to know in advance concerning the soon to be hyped Oswald-Russia link:

The CIA originally confected the false narrative that Oswald was a "KGB -linked assassin"  hired to kill Kennedy. It was based on a supposed "Oswald" phone call to the Soviet Embassy in Mexico City with a KGB agent, Valeriy Kostikov. From this, and the visit of a fake Oswald to the Soviet Embassy (see the asset "masquerading" as Oswald in Mexico City in the photo below - right)


  A series of falsified cables was generated under the fake name "Lee Henry Oswald"* . These became part of a CI/SIG (Counter Intelligence Special Investigation Group) file on Oswald dating back to 1960, and as researcher Peter Dale Scott notes, has their handiwork all over the false trail.  The purpose, as noted by Scott, was clear:

"to incriminate him falsely as an apparent KGB assassin"

While the "Oswald as KGB assassin"  ruse was never used  or published in The Warren Commission Report, "it almost certainly contributed to the Warren Commission's determination to close the case as the work of a lone assassin" (Scott, Deep Politics, 113)   This is actually validated and was foreseen when one examined a key paragraph in the Katzenbach memo which readers can see in full here: http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?absPageId=756877 Note in particular paragraph (2):

"Speculation about Oswald's motivation ought to be cut off, and we should have some basis of rebutting thought that this was a Communist conspiracy".

This was also the primary directive for J. Edgar Hoover, and why he insisted the Dallas Police keep Lee Oswald alive after a death threat was called in to the Dallas FBI office.. Hence, Hoover's warning memo (see (1)) must be interpreted in the context, i.e. convicting Oswald as the one and only assassin, So there could be no loose ends pointing to conspiracy. LBJ wanted this too, as author Noel Twyman makes clear in his book, 'Bloody Treason'.  This is why he. ordered that the entire investigation be conducted by the FBI under the supervision of J. Edgar Hoover (his dear pal) and he ordered all other investigations, i.e. under federal government or local government be stopped. As Twyman puts it:

"This placed Johnson in virtual control of the investigation through J. Edgar Hoover."

This is why serious researchers, as opposed to lone nut buffs, regard the Warren Commission as an artifact or creature of Johnson, designed for no other purpose than to cover up his own role.  As one wit once put it: "To commit the perfect crime all that is necessary is to be in charge of the investigation that follows."  Johnson totally succeeded in doing that via his "Warren Commission", even getting Hoover to threaten disclosure of an Earl Warren incident if Warren refused to bestow his name cachet.

It is clear the Commission was driven to the lone assassin bunkum as the only safe alternative to the KGB assassin hypothesis. (For which Johnson had warned of the threat of nuclear war if pursued.)

This was reinforced after the Commission was informed  by CIA head Richard Helms** of the Kostikov -Department Thirteen connection ("Department Thirteen" was that KGB Section assigned to assassinations) . Earl Warren evidently became so spooked that he felt the only alternative to a possible nuclear  confrontation  was to find for the lone assassin theory. From then, all evidence, documents and tests became devoted to framing Oswald as the lone perp. It was either that or find him a KGB- hired contract killer, which many (including LBJ) felt would have led to war.

The point was that the CIA had compiled such a compelling false narrative and guilt trail using phony cables, photos  phone calls etc. that the Commission bit into it hook, line and sinker and never remotely considered (or seriously considered) the alternative: that a right wing based- military- intelligence operation had targeted Kennedy. One that included powerful forces enraged at his backing down (from invasion) during the Cuban Missile Crisis, his removal of Gen. Edwin Walker from command, his intent to pull out of Vietnam and his efforts at rapprochement with Fidel Castro..


-------------------------------
Footnotes (2):

* Scott conjectures that the false name of  'Lee Henry Oswald'  may have been used to deceive investigators into Kennedy's killing. It may also have been what agent James Jesus Angleton called a 'marked card' operation in which falsified information 'like a  bent card' is passed through an intelligence channel to see where it ends up.

**  Memo of 1/13/ 64 from Richard Helms to the Warren Commission Counsel J. Lee Rankin, CIA Document 509-803.


3, The "Oswald as Commie " myth:

The typical twaddle the corporate media and government lackeys have been trotting out for 50 years now, but which any reasonably intelligent person can disprove with just a modicum of effort and  investigation. "Oswald as communist" was actually the cover story for him to be used as a false defector to gain access into Russia. People first became aware of the CIA-ONI false defector program after the publication of 'The Cult of Intelligence' by Former CIA Agent Victor Marchetti- who  actually informed researcher Anthony Summers about this program as well, noting:


At the time, in 1959, the United States was having real difficulty in acquiring information out of the Soviet Union. The technical systems had, of course, not developed to the point they are at today, and we were resorting to all sorts of activities. One of these activities was an ONI (Office of Naval Intelligence) program which involved three dozen, maybe forty, young men who were made to appear disenchanted, poor American youths who had become turned off and wanted to see what communism was all about.


Some of these people lasted only a few weeks. They were sent into the Soviet Union or into eastern Europe with the specific intention the Soviets would pick them up and ‘double’ them if they suspected them of being U.S. agents, or recruit them as KGB agents. They were trained at various naval installations both here and abroad , but the operation was being run out of Nag’s Head North Carolina.”

Oswald's bona fides as an intelligence asset - as opposed to a "run muck, loner psycho"-  were established by Military Science professor John Newman in his book, Oswald and the CIA. Therein he provided the documents showing three key CIA files for Oswald:  the OS-351-164 (office of security), the 201-289248 CI/SIG, and the 74-500. 


As Michael Parenti notes (The JFK Assassination  - Defending the Gangster State.):

Lee Harvey Oswald spent most of his adult life not as a lone drifter but directly linked to the U.S. intelligence community. All of his IQ tests show that he was above average in intelligence and a quick learner. At the age of eighteen in the U.S. Marines he had secret security clearance and was working at Marine Air Control in Atsugi Air Force Base in Japan, a top secret location from which the CIA launched U2 flights and performed other kinds of covert operations in China. The next year he was assigned to El Toro Air Station in California with security clearance to work radar. “

Lee Oswald then was no "commie" dupe but an intel operative. Most researchers who've delved into this in much more depth than superficial 'buffs' come away with the conviction Oswald was set up as part of ZR/Rifle. A classic decoy.  However,  with the plot now turned against Kennedy. Oswald was likely used as the dupe or decoy so the actual perps (likely Cuban exiles, and trained assassins - from the Army's Ft. Benning Assassin school) could escape .

The proof in the pudding was the letter ‘D’ – on the cover sheet of Oswald’s 201 file – indicating a  CIA Staff D  SIGINT or signals intelligence operation run in concert with the National Security Agency or NSA. As pointed out by Peter Dale Scott (Deep Politics Quarterly, Jan. 1994): “In 1961, when William Harvey headed Staff D, he was assigned the task of developing the CIA Assassinations Project, ZR/Rifle.


Footnotes (3)

Newman, op. cit., p. 169.

------------------------------------


4.  The "Oswald In Mexico City" Canard:

This trope gained most recent currency with the book: A Cruel and Shocking Act: The Secret History of the Kennedy Assassination by Philip Shenon, which I posted on previously (Oct. 28, 2013).Shenon   points to a statement Oswald purportedly made when at the Cuban Embassy in Mexico City and related by J. Edgar Hoover in declassified FBI files:

"He (Oswald) stormed into the Embassy, demanded the visa, and when it was refused him, headed out saying: 'I'm going to kill Kennedy for this.!"

So, basically, Shenon places his faith in one of the most ardent Kennedy haters of the era, J. Edgar Hoover. The same Hoover who possessed information about a proposed assassination plot on Kennedy from New Orleans' gangster Carlos Marcello in 1962 and who failed to disclose it. (See the documents presented in Mark North's book Act of Treason). 

Meanwhile, Shenon lets himself be played and led into a blind alley by a CIA determined to frame Oswald using the 'Oswald in Mexico City' fiction.

Shenon goes on to say that the "document then disappears" intimating that had it been circulated to the Dallas' authorities in timely fashion,  the assassination would have been prevented, Why? Because  "people in Mexico City knew Oswald was talking openly about killing President Kennedy.".

In a pig's eye.

Besides, what moron for an assassin "talks openly" about killing an American President at a foreign embassy?  One thing we do know: A moron Oswald wasn't.  An impostor seeking to frame a patsy-  to be set up to take the fall- would do so, however.

But perhaps the most cogent evidence there was no Oswald in Mexico City  - apart from the fact no photos exist (other than of an impostor) -is the following:  The primary witness was consulate officer Silvia Duran who denied even under torture by Mexican police that the man she saw was Lee Oswald. As Peter Dale Scott reports as well as HSCA investigator Gaeton Fonzi [4]  she was forced to undergo brutal torture for eight hours at the hands of Mexican police in an effort to try to get her to recant her original testimony.  I.e. that the Oswald she encountered at the Cuban Consulate in Mexico City was not the Oswald she'd seen arrested in Dallas. She'd insisted instead the man she saw was "blonde and short" (The Lopez Report, p. 190).

Ed Lopez, who sought to interview Duran again in the wake of her torture, found she was unable and broke down, weeping merely at the thought. She also feared reprisals  as a citizen of Mexico.

So be it. Now, ask yourselves this: If Oswald was indeed guilty and performing all the guilty acts Philip Shenon claims, why did the CIA find it necessary to go to such inordinate lengths to distort, hide and even concoct fake cables to paint Oswald as the bad guy?   Not to mention recruiting Mexican police to torture a woman for eight hours merely because she refused to lie about the person she observed. The Oswald in Mexico City fable, like so much else, must be regarded as specious and a concoction of the CIA and its Mexico City station chief (David Atlee Phillips). Or to use the words of John Newman in reference to a cable that surfaced within that episode "a whole cloth fabrication."





 Footnotes (4):



[4] Fonzi. op. cit., p. 409.



[5] Newman, op. cit. p. 408.



Finally, let's not get over-excited as only 2,800 files of more than 30,000 have been released by the due date.  The spooks, as I predicted earlier, were going to invoke the specious excuse of "national security concerns" which is total codswallop given these files are over fifty years old.  It is evident to me that they are concealing connections that were operative in Kennedy's assassination that they do not wish to have uncovered, like between the Dallas cops, the Mob and CIA, NSA (in Staff D operation).  They are aware of the blowback that would explode even now 50 years in the future and that was one reason why LBJ originally wanted to keep all files under wraps until 2049 - by which time all who knew or cared about the assassination would likely have died. 

What you can be sure of in the days and weeks to come is that the mainstream media still has not gotten its act together on the one true conspiracy to come along, and which they remain committed to trying to skewer - even as they mock the 60 percent of the public who accepts a conspiracy in the case. Let's just remind ourselves here that the only valid gov't investigation (the HSCA) DID find for a conspiracy in its conclusion.

Something that is too often overlooked!

See also:

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/article181380611.html

Too Many Coming To Colorado Are Ruining The State

Denver traffic
Traffic on I-25  near Denver not long ago. Projected revenue for more roads is less than half what's needed by 2040.

Scene in a typical neighborhood in Colorado Springs, ca. 2002.


Smog days becoming more and more common in Denver, rents and home prices now among the highest in the nation, ever increasing density of people - with clogged ERs, roads and schools and water resources tapped to the limit. Not to mention that, according to a recent Denver Post report, the Colorado Dept. Of Transportation (CDOT) has projected revenue needs of over $46 b through 2040, more than double the $21.1 b it expects to actually collect.

What gives? Too many people moving into the state. It's just become too damned popular, but one can understand why. In a way. Many come as retirees as an alternative to a hot, humid place like Florida. Many are mountain lovers and this state boasts the highest average altitude in the nation. Others arrive because of the state's legalization of pot - opting to live in a state where they won't be hounded for their pot habits.  Many other families are moving here  from anti-MJ "flyover" states because the state's  cannabis oil business (the oil cannabidiol-  known as "Charlotte's Web")  offers them hope for afflicted kids,  e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2014/12/colorado-promised-land-for-marijuana.html

Thus, parents move here seeking relief for kids suffering from Dravet syndrome - a rare form of epilepsy which completely disables a child's language and social skills.

Other new workers move here because of more jobs in tech, banking, and the MJ industry - speaking of which a lot of these newcomers just want the freedom to go into an MJ retail store and buy some weed without being hassled. Alternatively, they want the freedom to go to medical marijuana stores and have some option besides opioid pain killers.

Since 2007, 800,000 more people from outside have moved here They've encountered clogged highways, limited and expensive housing as well as soaring water rates. In respect of the first, far from expanding the existing highway system to accommodate more vehicles CDOT barely has enough revenue to maintain the roads it has, far less the 20,000 extra miles (needed to construct)  to accommodate 2.2 million people in another 20 years.  The I=25, the main highway from Denver to Colorado Springs,  already regularly hits massive traffic jams with just minor accident..  Add in a local festival for a side burg (like in Larkspur in June )  and traffic can be backed up indefinitely and the wait for it move can last minutes t hours on  75 mph stretch.

If traffic congestion is a huge gripe, housing costs easily rival them. Typical rents for small 2 bedroom apartments in Denver now approach $1,900 a month.  Meanwhile, Denver Post data (Business, Aug. 20, p. 4K) shows that about 6 in every 10 new homes started  in metro Denver carried a price tag between $400,000 and $600,000. A record low 28 percent were priced under $400,000.  And as the piece noted, "calling a $400,000 home attainable" is a stretch. 

According to the state demographer Elizabeth Garner, there are fewer new (rental) units than in the past despite the fact that housing construction hasn't picked up since the Great Recession.  According to Garner, quoted in the Denver Post:

"Even though people think we're doing a lot of building it's not as much as they think we are."

The lack of housing, creating a shortage of supply, has radically driven up costs even orcing many who've moved to Denver to look foor housing 67 miles away in Colorado Springs. So now our housing prices are shooting up too. (We regularly receive up to two notices a week from realtors begging to buy our place "on the spot, hard cash".  Of course, we just laugh and tear them up. Selling our place even for "hard cash"  would then put us behind the eight ball to get another place.)

For perspective, for much of the 1990s and early 2000s home building kept pace with growth.  In that span the state was building 40,000 to 60,000 housing units per year. But last year despite record demand, just 30,000 units were built.   On the more positive side, there are efforts in many municipalities to encourage higher density and afforidable housing.

Earlier this year state lawmakers approved a measure aimed at stimulating the state's languid condominium market. This entailed backing off on holding builders to account for condo building errors, i.e. faulty materials employed, and other problems.  The argument from the  construction lobby was that so long as stringent regs are in place,  builders won't take any risks, units won't get built.

Pressure on scarce water resources is another problem Let's fact it, the trouble with people flocking to the natural beauty of our state is that the more who move in, the harder it is to preserve nature - or provide the necessary water.   means the state will either have to develop expensive new water delivery systems - which will have to be paid for by higher utility bills - or find other means of enhancing efficient water use. A 344- page draft released in December, 2015,  lists potential delivery projects costing $18-20 billion. It also mentions the possibility of innovations such as "toilet to tap" systems whereby sewer water can be re-used, e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2014/11/thanks-to-frackers-well-soon-be.html

This would conform with the Colorado Water Plan's  mandate that Colorado residents must "re -use all available waste water as a pre-condition before state officials accept new trans-mountain projects".

The major obstacles to this innovation according the draft, include:

- The huge costs of water cleaning using multiple filter cleaning systems

- The legal obligations in Colorado to deliver water downstream

- The disposal of the contaminants purged from waste water - mainly thousands of gallons a day of super -concentrated salty mixes that must then be injected into deep wells or buried. The mixture is so toxic it can destroy skin on contact.

 - Safety and monitoring: This entails installing water monitoring and testing systems sensitive enough to track a wide array of pathogens (including E. Coli. cryptosporidium etc), suspended particles and hard to remove specialty chemicals (i.e. tossed out contraceptives, diet pills, laxatives, anti-depressants.

We then come to air quality, and Denver is now seeing more and more smog days on account of a number of environmental factors, including traffic congestion and temperature inversions in the atmosphere.  Air quality has long been a concern, especially at high elevations, where a little pollution can go a long way.   Higher population bears directly - not only on water access but air quality. According to Tony Robinson, who chairs the political science department at the University of Colorado- Denver:

"The Rocky Mountain West was not meant to be a highly populated area. There simply is not enough water in the West to sustain the kind of growh rates going on."

And, of course, we oldsters are getting a lot of the blame for growth too. According to the same Post report,  quoting Lieutenant Governor Donna Lynne:

"Even though people talk a lot about the influx of millennials, the population that is really growing and that we're really concerned about is the over-65 population."

The report goes on to state that between 2000 and 2025 the number of people retiring in the state is expected to increase by 74 percent.   This compares to a projected 27 percent increase in the work force over the same period.  Then warning:

"By 2030, the state's senior population is expected to increase by 508,000 or 68 percent over current levels."

This begs the question of why this is so bad.  After all, seniors eat less, and go out less - imposing less strain on public transport and highways. Also, they have no kids to clog up more schools.  BUT they still cough up property taxes to pay for the bond issues (like in the coming election here in the Springs for Disrrict 11 schools, Prop. 3E) that supports district school expansion and refurbishing.

Well, the problem as noted in the Post, appears to be that we "make less and have less to spend in retirement".  In other words, we don't go out and buy loads of useless crap to stuff into our closets, dens and garages.  (Or more prefab storage units)  We do use more health-medical services (as I have to treat my prostate cancer ) but that is to be expected.  As you get older shit happens. You deal with it.

What the state really needs to be doing is rethinking its tax policy especially getting rid of the absurd TABOR  ("Taxpayers' Bill of Rights") that passed in 1992.  TABOR inherently limits state spending (even during large population growth-influx) based on an insane formula   spending limits are fixed by the general condition that the rate of increase in state budget spending cannot exceed the rate of population growth (dp/dt) and the rate of inflation (di/dt) for any given year. Thus, in general:


dS/dt < dp/dt + di/dt

In addition, TABOR fixes a "baseline" for spending growth each succeeding year by tailoring it to the rate of growth in the prior year. Thus, say if the rate of growth dG/dt was -2% (as it was in 2001-2002) with the recession following 9-11, then the total rate of spending growth for the next fiscal year cannot exceed:

dG/dt + dp/dt + di/dt

Say the state spending budget was $800 million in a given year, and $700 million in the prior fiscal year. The real rate of increase in spending is therefore:

(100/ 700) x 100% = 14%

If the TABOR baseline for that particular fiscal (net) population growth (those entering the state  minus those exiting) is 3%. Then:

(dG/dt + dp/dt + di/dt) = [-2% + 3% + 3%] = 4%

This means that a difference of: 14% - 4% = 10% of the state budget spending increase must be returned as refund to the taxpayers. In other words, six-tenths or 60% of the 14% by which the state "over-spent" must be returned.

Given this deplorable parasite buried in state tax law it's no wonder it can't get ahead, whether on roads, home building or much else.

If you plan to come to Colorado to live, for any reason, be sure you're aware of our water limitations, many of which are directly linked to water-intensive fracking that places profits and business above human resources.  Also, I advise not coming unless and until TABOR is repealed, which I don't see happening anytime soon. The persistence of TABOR means critical resources will always fall short of what's needed to match the state's population growth. Visit yes, but don't come here to live.

See also:

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2017/08/fracking-craze-resumes-and-youd-be-wise.html

Thursday, October 26, 2017

How A Minority Of Gun Extremists Distorts U.S. Crime Rates And Gun Laws

 Image result for brane space, Caleb Medley

"The Founders could no more have conceived of semi-automatic or automatic weapons when they wrote the Second Amendment, than they could have conceived of space ships."  - Steve Schmidt Republican strategist


The horrific Vegas mass shooting again brought to the fore the lax gun laws to which we're all subject. In this case,  how a $200 previously unheard of accessory ("bump stock")  converted two semi-automatic weapons into effective (not "simulated")  automatic ones.  By way of that actual conversion, there were 600 casualties  (59 deaths) or what you'd find in a combat scenario.  In the wake of  that mass murder by a psycho named Stephen Paddock we heard the usual vanilla babble about "thoughts and prayers", but no genuine proposals to halt the madness.

Left unsaid is how this madness is enabled by a minority of mostly white, male conservative gun extremists determined to take the whole nation hostage as the price of their specious perceptions of "freedom".   No surprise then that a relatively tiny group of gun obsessives and "gun liberty" extremists could have been harnessed by the NRA for the purpose of legislative obstruction.. Why? Well, to strike fear into any politicians, any legislators who might want to vote for sane gun regulations.  That includes banning bump stocks, and all semi-automatic weapons by which a conversion (to automatic) can be made.

It's mind boggling that when one learns of the facts concerning gun ownership in the U.S., one's whole outlook changes. It is then possible to see the level of how the larger society is held hostage by a minority. That includes how its social dynamic is distorted in multifold ways, from suicide and homicide rates to the abnormal frequency of mass shootings.  How warped as a society have we become since the 2nd amendment was perverted by a small, loud gun lobby (the NRA) that has our lawmakers' cojones encased in cement?

Let's start out by recitation of some hard facts:

- Super owners are those I call "gun extremists" who own up to 17 guns apiece

- This lot comprise just 3 percent of the whole adult population.

- Nearly HALF of the planet's civilian- owned guns are in the hands of Americans.

Let's parse this further. From the above and doing the relevant math (e.g. U.S. population etc.) 4.2 percent of the world's population owns half the planet's guns. But in fact, this lot comprises 3 percent of the whole U.S. adult population (which is 4.2 % of the world's population) so that nearly half of  the planet's civilian- owned guns are owned by Americans and nearly three fourths of these are "super owners".  Try to process that for a few minutes.

Some further facts:

1- Of the 134 mass shooters who have preyed on Americans since 1966 only 3 were women.

2- Mass shootings are therefore a 98 percent male enterprise.

3- Firearms are used in close to 70 percent of homicides.

4- Super owners are most likely to be white, male and conservative.

Republican gun owners insist that "the right to own guns is essential to their sense of freedom".

But who is fooling whom?  If their "freedom" is dependent on owning or carrying a weapon - presumably for protection - then how free are they really?  It's a delusion. Anyone who absolutely needs a security appendage to secure his or her "freedom" is not truly free. They are victims of a freedom delusion, a fantasy.

Also, do they really need AR-15s, Uzis, and AK-47s for protection?  All through most of the nation's history the standard weapons for protections have been single shot pistols, like revolvers (e.g. .38 special) or at most a .45 automatic or shotgun. NO one in the late fifties or 60s owned anything like the weapons today, nor did they need them for any "protection:" or "freedom".  So what exactly is different today? Do we have space aliens ready to land and invade homes? Why the need for so much firepower? When you think about it, there really isn't any "need" to have such weapons, exceeding what standard gun owners had in the late 50s, early 60s.

Any such "reasons" offered, e.g. "Well, my home might be invaded by a gang of Crips or Bloods" is pure bull pockey.

The excuse of "protection" then falls through the cracks. It's a red herring.  A redirection of argument to a specious basis for which the person can better respond.

What is the real reason then for this subset of white males to own so many guns?   Part of it is frankly to be part of a white man gun culture.  This culture revolves around activities that glorify assorted guns and shooting them. For example, going to gun shows to collect more guns, or taking the family to machine gun shoots, e.g.
Image may contain: one or more people and text

Those joining this gun culture and its activities reinforce each others' deformed perceptions that: a) guns are essential for protection, b) guns are key to having a good time, and c) if the choice of guns used for (a) and (b) is removed then one de facto loses his freedom.  Which is obvious bollocks.

The subtext rationale for this minority affinity  can only be the projection of dominance and power - or more bluntly - the projection of WHITE male power through physical domination. Even the most lame lightweight loser "Woody Allen" type - but loaded with racial animus and fear - can access mighty power with an AK -47 against any more muscular black man .  All this weakling whitey has to do is curl his finger against the trigger and pop pop pop ....problem solved.  So, rather than having to go through the time and trouble  to train or body build for physical strength or advantage, the white fatty or the Woody Allen type can simply buy a gun and 'Voila!' -  the ultimate equalizer is available.

What a feeling of unsurpassed power then for the average little fearful whitey to hold a gun and be convinced he has the power of life and death. This then is also the reason so many of these insecure guys feel they have to pack heat when they go out in public, whether to churches or bars or restaurants.

Of course, they will argue back that it's got nada to do with any insecurity or projection of white dominance but rather "freedom". To which I again call bull pockey.   As Shayl my psychologist niece put it the other day: "It's all about securing their freedom from the fear of being confronted by a stronger black man."  Bingo!

Again, to validate this we can return to the hard numbers I displayed earlier, and ask what they mean. In short, they disclose the vast majority of Americans - indeed people across the globe - never need or feel they need a gun for protection.  Indeed, as I posted before, a gun in the house makes a person more vulnerable to deadly violence.

For every time a gun is used in self-defense in a home, there are 7 assaults or murders, 11 suicide attempts and 4 accidents involving guns in or around the home. Making the last more likely: 43% of homes with both guns and kids have at least one unlocked firearm.  To see a recent case to do with what I'm referencing here, go to:
http://www.salon.com/2013/04/09/new_jersey_4_year_old_accidentally_shoots_6_year_old_in_head_ap/


Six times more women are shot by husbands, boyfriends and ex-partners than murdered by male strangers. A woman’s chances of being killed by her domestic abuser increase more than 7 times if her home has a gun in it.

The unholy truth is that most shootings are  NOT ideological, terror-based or random but rather domestic (in people's homes) - either suicides or one spouse (usually male) killing the other after a fiery argument.   Assaying all mass shootings between 2009 and 2015, the Huffington Post found that 70 percent occurred in the home. Of these, 57 percent involved a family member or current or former intimate partner. 81 percent of the victims were women and children. These killings were not done by 'crazies'  or Islamic terrorists but usually normal people who simply lost it in the midst of a heated argument and reached for the weapon nearest and dearest - a gun.

Firearms currently claim an average of 93 lives per day in the United States - more than half by suicide.  Guns are responsible for more deaths than vehicle crashes or even terrorism.

Self- defense by using guns? Give me a break! As reported recently in The New England Journal Of Medicine accidental deaths (e.g. a kid shooting another) were 30 percent more common than self protection homicides. In addition, suicides involving firearms were 37 times more common than any self defense scenarios.

It is time, methinks, that we cease allowing three freaking percent of our populace to control the social dynamics of our entire nation. It is high time gun sanity prevail over the gun extremism and obsession of a tiny minority.

Those like Caleb Medley, who suffered a head wound in the Aurora massacre and is still trying to get his shattered life back, would be grateful for any measure that can stop the senseless bloodletting.