Critics claim ministers are breaking an election promise that the ID scheme would be voluntary by insisting that anyone who renews a passport will also have to get an ID card and be entered on the national register.

But Mr Clarke rejected this charge last night to laughter and jeers of derision from the opposition.

“Passports are voluntary documents,” he insisted. “No one is forced to renew a passport if they choose not to do so.”

Invertebrates refuse backbones.

So, from this final statement by Dumbo, I infer that there must be no legal requirement for me to have a passport in order to leave this country and return. Otherwise, once again, HMG are stating that I will be under confinement within the UK mainland unless I comply with their ‘voluntary’ ID card scheme.

A quick search on the UK Passport  Service site reveals no page detailing any legal requirement for holding a passport in order to leave the country. Hmmm… I wonder. Don’t you?

MPs back identity card proposals

Government plans to force all passport applicants to get an identity card have been backed by MPs, overturning an earlier defeat in the House of Lords. Peers have twice defeated the plans, which they say break Labour’s election promise that the initial ID scheme would be voluntary.

But Home Secretary Charles Clarke said passports were “voluntary documents” that no-one was forced to renew.

The Identity Cards Bill will return to the House of Lords on Wednesday.

The vote, which Labour won by 310 votes to 277, sets the stage for a constitutional clash between the Commons and the Lords. […]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4803930.stm

Charles Clarke is a beast of a man. He knows you cannot travel on an expired passport. He knows that if you loose your passport, that you must replace it if you want to travel.

This is a perfect example of how ID cards will be used to control you. You are not obliged to have one, but if you refuse, you cannot open a bank account, post a package, travel on the underground with a pass, etc etc.

This is pure evil, and this statement about passports being voluntary documents just shows how evil the whole proposal is. It is based on lies at its very foundation, and lies are being used to force through its introduction.

This is why people say that democracy is broken; with monsters, murderers, liars and enslavers at the helm every single time, no one in their right mind thinks that democracy in its current form is a good thing.

So. Americans are now outraged that Murder Inc. wants to make it illegal to report that Murder Inc. is doing illegal stuff.

Someone on a forum sowhere had the AUDACITY to say:

Soon, a spew of British websites were set up to post reports Americans sent in :P

To which came the blistering reply:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,,1329858,00.html

the last time the british tried to tell the americans to get rid of bush, there was a torrent of abuse about bad teeth and mind your own fucking business you limey loosers. the brits were right of course, now you have more dead in iraq, patriot act passed again, and the further dismantling of your constitution and your democracy.

“Have you not noticed that Americans don’t give two shits what Europeans think of us? Each email someone gets from some arrogant Brit telling us why to NOT vote for George Bush is going to backfire, you stupid, yellow-toothed pansies … I don’t give a rat’s ass if our election is going to have an effect on your worthless little life. I really don’t. If you want to have a meaningful election in your crappy little island full of shitty food and yellow teeth, then maybe you should try not to sell your sovereignty out to Brussels and Berlin, dipshit. Oh, yeah – and brush your goddamned teeth, you filthy animals.
Wading River, NY”

So, dont expect the brits to come rushing to help you break the laws that you voted for in a childish fit of pique.

Every country gets the government it deserves. Britian is in the grips of a police state powergrab. We are busy. Clean up your own dogshit.

POW! POW! POW! POW! POW!

Oyster data use rises in crime clampdown
Staff and agencies
Monday March 13, 2006

Police hunting criminals are increasingly seeking information from electronically stored travel records, such as those created by users of the popular Oyster card in London.

Figures disclosed today show a huge leap in police requests to Transport for London, which operates the Oyster cards used to travel on buses, trains and the underground.

Just seven information requests were made by police in the whole of 2004, compared with 61 requests made in January this year alone…

http://technology.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,1730002,00.html

This was bound to happen of course.

If you really want to have an Oyster card, (and TFL gives you a good reason to use one; bus fares are £1 with Oyster instead of £1.50 when you pay cash for example) you must:

• Make sure you have an anonymous Oyster card; you can buy them for £3
• NEVER fill your Oyster with your credit card or debit card, use only cash. If you update Oyster with a card that is connected to you, your Oyster will be connected to you via the details on the card.
• Never use someone elses Oyster. If they are a criminal, and you use their card, the police might swipe you coming off or getting on the underground*.

*Now, the last one is not true…yet, but you can guarantee that in the future the police will have realtime access to Oyster touc-ins and touch-outs. That means that when a criminal gets onto a bus, they can tell the driver not to open the doors until they get there. The same with the trains. They can tell the driver to stay in the tunnel until they get to the next station where they can sweep the whole train.

This little piggy deployed marksmen
This little piggy should stay schtumm
This liilte piggy creates a load o’ grief
This little piggy comes undone
‘cos this little piggy taped Lord Goldsmith as they spoke on the phone

President Bush is facing criticism both abroad and at home. But that doesn’t mean that the British government is going to weaken its relationship with Washington. After Britain got into the Second World War, the British people began to learn a lot about the USA. Prior to the war, Hollywood was the only American institution that people knew a great deal about.

The American government had pursued an isolationist policy for many years and so I suppose it didn’t make much sense to be deeply interested in what Washington was thinking when every day the headlines were dominated by Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin.

How different from the situation this week when the American President, though nominally supported by us, is in fact cruelly isolated.

Last week President Bush made a trip to Asia, which had a strange atmosphere to the point of being weird. He turned Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, into a kind of ghost town. The reason why could be found in a Punjabi opinion poll. 3% thought the USA was a trusted partner for Pakistan, while 60% didn’t even support the war on the Taliban and al-Qaeda.

Oblivious to opinion polls and the eerie silence, President Bush gently urged Pakistan’s President Musharraf to get his agents into al-Qaeda and bring the terrorists to justice.

He also recommended a strong dose of American style democracy for Pakistan, apparently convinced that once the government of Pakistan did what the man in the street wanted all would be well – even though the man in the street had made his feelings towards the United States clear enough by keeping the same streets empty during the President’s visit. […]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4794164.stm

The contrast between ordinary BBQ writing and the writing of invited guests or people who are allowed to write whatever they feel, like the producer of Newsnight climbing down from his ‘Bittorrent is PeadoTerror’ shill piece is astonishing.

The sound of real thought, real history clear analysis and proper context is quite refreshing is it not?

Did anyone read reports about the streets of Islamabad being empty?

Hmmmmmmmmmm!

‘UFO sighting really took my breath away’

By Carron Taylor

WAS it a bird? Was it a plane? No, it was a shining silver pyramid, according to two colleagues who spotted a UFO in the skies of Putney last week.

Michelle Medhat was sitting at her office desk last Wednesday morning when she glanced out of the window and spotted a glimmering silver object in the sky.

“I thought what the hell is that?’ There were no clouds in the sky at all and 100 per cent visibility.

“The sun was hitting the object and you could see it was turning very slowly.

“I did get a feeling there was something strange about the thing,” she said.

Entranced, Michelle signalled to her colleague Peter Gardiner, 53, to take a look.

He said: “At first I thought it was a big piece of rubbish or a clear tarpaulin sheet.

“But then it glistened and it was shiny. It had a strange pattern of movement. It was a significant size, possibly the size of a roof or even a house.”

The pair watched it for a couple of minutes, rotating in the distance and heading towards Wandsworth Town. Then, as soon as it had appeared it vanished.

Michelle said if it was a piece of rubbish it would have caused severe damage when it came down, because of its size and density.

“I can’t explain it and therefore I’m calling it a UFO. It took my breath away. It did feel weird.

“The more I looked at it I realised there was something not quite right. It wasn’t moving like anything I’ve ever seen before,” she said.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence (MoD) said it had not been notified of any sighting of the pyramid.

“The MoD does not have any expertise or role in respect of UFO/flying saucer’ matters or to the question of the existence or otherwise of extraterrestrial lifeforms, about which it remains totally open-minded.”

He said it examined the reports of UFO sightings it received solely to establish whether what was seen might have some defence significance, namely whether there was any evidence the UK’s airspace might have been compromised by hostile or unauthorised air activity.

Michelle and Peter said there has been a lot of activity in the skies over Putney recently.

Michelle said they had seen several Chinook helicopters over the past week and believes something must be happening.

Chinooks are used to transport troops, artillery, supplies and equipment, but also used for operations such as medical evacuation, disaster relief and search and rescue.

When travelling to Putney, our reporter saw what looked to be three Apache helicopters travelling east.

A spokesman for the MoD said the helicopters were probably part of general aviation traffic over London and there was no specific activity or event they were involved in. He added such movements were “not unusual”.

Did you see the flying silver pyramid? Call the newsdesk on 020 8254 5409.

ctaylor@london.newsquest.co.uk

[…]
This is London Local

Chinooks are flying over that part of London regularly. They make a very distinctive sound, and you can tell they are coming when they are miles away.

As for this pyramid account, well, when I saw that logo above whilst trawling around (as one does) I just couldnt resist!

Further information: freedom of movement, and ka-tzetnik, and propiska, Economic and social liberals have a generally negative attitude towards identity cards on the principle that if society already works adequately without them, they should not be imposed by government, on the principle that “the government that governs best, governs least”. Some opponents have pointed out that extensive lobbying for identity cards has been undertaken, in countries without compulsory identity cards, by IT companies who will be likely to reap rich rewards in the event of an identity card scheme being implemented.

Very often, opposition to identity cards is born out of the suspicion that they will be used to track anyone’s movements and private life, possibly endangering one’s privacy; for instance, a person will probably not want others to know he or she is attending meetings with Alcoholics Anonymous. In countries currently using identity cards, there is no mechanism for this. However the proposed British ID card will involve a series of linked databases, to be managed by the private sector. Managing disparate linked systems with a range of institutions and any number of personnel having access to them is a potential security disaster in the making.[1]

Opponents have also argued that some nations require the card to be carried at all times. This is not necessarily impractical, as an ID is no more cumbersome than a credit card. However, opponents point out that a requirement to carry an identity card at all times can lead to arbitrary requests from card controllers (such as the police). Even where there is no legal requirement to carry the card, functionality creep could lead to de facto compulsion to carry.

Some opponents make comparisons with totalitarian governments, which issued identity cards to their populations, and used them oppressively.

• They point out that the issuing of unique biometric identities was taken to its logical conclusion within living memory by the Nazis (see Godwin’s Law), when they tattooed unique concentration-camp detainees numbers on the arms of people taken to be processed by the Final Solution.
• More recently, the apartheid-era government of South Africa used pass books as internal passports to oppress that country’s black population.

[…]

France

France has had a French national identity card since 1940, when it helped the Vichy autorities identify 76,000 for deportation as part of the Holocaust.

In the past, identity cards were compulsory, had to be updated each year in case of change of residence and were valid for 10 years, and its renewal required paying a tax. In addition to the face protograph, it included the family name, first names, date and place of birth, and the national identity number managed by the national INSEE registry, and which is also used as the national service registration number, as the Social Security account number for health and retirement benefits, for the access to the personal judiciary case, for taxes declarations.

Later, the laws were changed so that any official and certified document (even if expired and possibly unusable abroad) with a photograph and a name, issued by a public administration (or enterprise, such as railroad transportation cards, or student cards issued) can be used to prove one’s identity (such as the European driver’s licence, a passport, …). Also, controls of identy by the law enforcement forces (police, gendarmerie) can now accept copies of these documents, provided that the original is presented within two weeks. Any of these documents must be treated equally to proove one’s identity when accepting payments by checks, issuing a new credit (however credit cardsare now much more common and do not require such additional proof, as all French credit cards issued by banks include a processor requiring a four-digit code, the magnetic tape being almost never used).

The current identity cards are now issued free of charge, and non-compulsory. Legislation has been published for a proposed compulsory biometric card system, which has been widely criticised, including by the “National commission for computing and liberties” (Commission nationale de l’informatique et des libertés, CNIL), the national authority and regulator on computing systems and databases. Identity cards issued since 2004 now includes biometric information (a digitized fingerprint record, a numerically scanned photograph and a scanned signature) and various anti-fraud systems embedded within the plastic-covered card.

The next generation of the French green card, named “Carte Vitale”, for the Social Security benefit (which already includes a chip and a magnetic tape with currently very few information) will include a numeric photograph and other personal medical information in addition to identity elements. It may then become a substitute for the National identity card.

[…]

United States

Main article: Identity documents in the United States

There is no true national identity card in the United States of America, in the sense that there is no federal agency with nationwide jurisdiction that directly issues such cards to all American citizens. All legislative attempts to create one have failed due to tenacious opposition from libertarian and conservative politicians, who regard the national identity card as the mark of a totalitarian society. Driver’s licenses issued by the various states (along with special cards issued to non-drivers) are often used in lieu of a national identification card and are often required for boarding airline flights or entering office buildings. Recent (2005) federal legislation that tightened requirements for issuance of driver’s licenses has been seen by both supporters and critics as bringing the United States much closer to a de facto national identity card system.

[…]

Hong Kong

See also Hong Kong Permanent Identity Cards

Hong Kong has a long history of identity document, from paper document to recently smart card. It has not yet aroused much controversy from its first issue.

Compulsory identity document was first issued in 1949, the year the establishment of People’s Republic of China. The issue of identity documents was to halt large influx of refugees and control the border from mainland China to then-British colony Hong Kong. The exercise was completed in 1951. Although the registration was compulsory, it was not required to bring the document in public area.

The identity document was replaced by a typed identity card with fingerprint, photograph and stamp from 1960. Another replacement was taken in 1973 and new card was with photograph but no fingerprint. Stamp colour was to identify permanent residents from non-permanent.

From 24th October, 1980, it is compulsory to take the identity card in public area and produce it to a policeman when asked. This law was to halt waves of illegal immigrant to the city.

In 1983, the issue of identity card was digitalised to reduce forgery and from 2003 a smartcard embedded identity card replaced the old digital cards.

The issues of card is in general giving more desire effects than harms. It helps to reduce the crime rates in the region and provide fast access to mainland China and Macau.

[…]

Others

According to Privacy International, as of 1996, around 100 countries had compulsory identity cards. They also stated that “virtually no common law country has a card”.

For the people of Western Sahara, pre-1975 Spanish cards are the main proof that they were Saharaui citizens as opposed to recent Moroccan colonists. They would be thus allowed to vote in an eventual self-determination referendum.

Some Basque nationalist organizations are issuing para-official identity cards (Euskal Nortasun Agiria) as a means to reject the nationality notions implied by Spanish and French compulsory documents. Then, they try to use the ENA instead of the official document.

[…]

Countries with compulsory identity cards

Note: the term “compulsory” may have different meanings and implications in different countries. Often, a ticket can be given for being found without one’s identification document, or in some cases a person may even be detained until the identity is ascertained. In practice, random controls are rare, except in police states.

• Argentina: Documento Nacional de Identidad. Issued at birth. Updated at 8 and 16 years old. Small booklet, dark green cardboard cover. The first page states the name, date and place of birth, along with a picture and right thumb print. It’s a hand written form, and the newer models have a adhesive laminate for the first page. Next pages issue address changes, wish to donate organs, military service, and vote log. Half of the pages have the DNI (a unique number), perforated through the first half of the book. Prior to DNI was the Libreta Civica (“Civic booklet”), for women, and the Libreta de Enrolamiento (“Enrollment Booklet”), for men. A few years ago there was a big scandal with the electronic DNIs that were going to be manufactured by Siemens, and it was decided that no private corporation could control the issuing of national identity. The federal police also have an identity that is valid sometimes instead of the DNI, which many people prefer to carry because after the loss of DNI there is a long process (caused only by bureaucratic reasons) in which the person is limited in some situations which require the DNI. Random controls cannot be made without a judge’s order, except in situations such as military border checkpoints.
• Belgium: State Registry (in Dutch, French and German) (first issued at age 12, compulsory at 15)
• Brazil: Carteira de Identidade. Compulsory to be issued and carried since the age of 18. It’s usually issued by each state’s Public Safety Secretary, or sometimes by the Armed Forces. There is a national standard, but each state can include minor differences. The front has a picture, right thumb print and signature. The verse has the unique number (RG, registro geral), expedition date, name of the person, name of the parents, place and date of birth, and other info. It’s green and plastified, officially 102 × 68 mm[3], but the lamination tends to make it slightly larger than the ISO 7810 ID-2 standard of 105 × 74 mm, resulting in a tight fit in most wallets. Only recently the driver’s licence received the same legal status of an identity card in Brazil. There are also a few other documents, such as cards issued by the national councils of some professions, which are considered equivalent to the national identity card for most purposes.
• Chile: (Carnet de identidad; First issued at age 2 or 3, compulsory at 18)
• China(mainland):(First issued at school age, compulsory at 16)
• China(Hong Kong SAR) : Immigration Department (Children are required to obtain their first identity card at age 11, and must change to an adult identity card at age 18)
• Estonia: id.ee (in Estonian), [4] (in English)
• Germany: Personalausweis (in German) It is compulsory at age 16 to possess either a “Personalausweis” or a passport, but not to carry it. While police officers and some other officials have a right to demand to see one of those documents, the law does not state that you are obliged to submit the document at that very moment, but that you have to be able to submit it at all (bring it to the police station/municipal office the next day, or know where it is and can show it to the police at your home, etc.) You may only be fined if you do not possess an identity card or passport at all, if your document is expired or if you EXPLICITLY REFUSE to show ID to the police.
• Indonesia: Kartu Tanda Penduduk (KTP)
• Israel: Teudat Zehut (first issued at age 16, compulsory at 18)
• Italy: Carta d’Identità
• Hungary: [5] (in Hungarian) It is compulsory to possess and carry either an ID card or a passport from the age of 14. A driving license can be also used for identification from the age of 17.
• Madagascar: Kara-panondrom-pirenen’ny teratany malagasy (Carte nationale d’identité de citoyen malagasy). Possession is compulsory for Malagasy citizens from age 18 (by decree 78-277, 1978-10-03).
• Malaysia: MyKad. Issued at age 12 and updated at 18.
• Netherlands: Ministry of Justice and Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations While it is not compulsory to possess an identity card, every person over 14 years of age must always carry, and be able to submit, identification (i.e., an identity card, passport, driver’s licence or aliens’ document).
• Poland: Dowód osobisty (compulsory at 18) The relative law is roughly similar to German one.
• Portugal: Bilhete de Identidade (compulsory at 10, can be issued before if needed)
• Romania: Carte de identitate (compulsory at 14)
• Singapore: National Registration Identity Card. It is compulsory for all citizens and permanent residents to apply for the card from age 15 onwards, and to re-register their cards for a replacement at age 30. It is not compulsory for bearers to hold the card at all times, nor are they compelled by law to show their cards to police officers conducting regular screening while on patrol, for instance. Failure to show any form of identification, however, may allow the police to detain suspicious individuals until relevant identification may be produced subsequently either in person or by proxy. The NRIC is also a required document for some government procedures, commercial transactions such as the opening of a bank account, or to gain entry to premises by surrendering or exchanging for an entry pass. Failure to produce the card may result in denied access to these premises or attainment of goods and services. Immigration & Checkpoints Authority
• Slovenia: Osebna izkaznica compulsory at 18, can be issued to citizens under 18 on request by their parent or legal guardian.
• Spain: Documento Nacional de Identidad (DNI) compulsory at 14, can be issued before if necessary (to travel to other European countries, for example). It is to be replaced by Electronic DNI.

Also Croatia, Egypt, Greece, Luxembourg, Portugal and Thailand.

Countries with non-compulsory identity cards or no identity cards

Austria, Canada (“Certificate of Canadian Citizenship”), Finland, France, Japan, the Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland have non-compulsory identity cards.

• Sweden has recently started issuing national identity cards, but they are by no means compulsory. Most Swedes have not even seen one. Commonly people use their driving licences as ID, or a ID issued by banks or the post. Some big companies and authoritys also issue ID cards to their employees which are usually accepted inside Sweden as identification.

Denmark, Norway, the United States, the Republic of Ireland and Iceland have no official national identity cards.

Note: As noted above, certain countries do not have national ID cards, but have other official documents that play the same role in practice (e.g. driver’s license for the United States). While a country may not make it de jure compulsory to own or carry an identity document, it may be de facto strongly recommended to do so in order to facilitate certain procedures.

[…]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ID_Card

One to watch:

http://www.infowarsmedia.com/video/shows/030106_camps_free_30min_bb.mov

Alex Jones right on target, and ‘on fire’.

A link from this broadcast:

News Analysis/Commentary, Peter Dale Scott,
New America Media, Feb 21, 2006

Editor’s Note: A recently announced contract for a Halliburton subsidiary to build immigrant detention facilities is part of a longer-term Homeland Security plan titled ENDGAME, which sets as its goal the removal of “all removable aliens” and “potential terrorists.” Scott is author of “Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina” (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003). He is completing a book on “The Road to 9/11.” Visit his Web site at http://www.peterdalescott.net.

The Halliburton subsidiary KBR (formerly Brown and Root) announced on Jan. 24 that it had been awarded a $385 million contingency contract by the Department of Homeland Security to build detention camps. Two weeks later, on Feb. 6, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced that the Fiscal Year 2007 federal budget would allocate over $400 million to add 6,700 additional detention beds (an increase of 32 percent over 2006). This $400 million allocation is more than a four-fold increase over the FY 2006 budget, which provided only $90 million for the same purpose.

Both the contract and the budget allocation are in partial fulfillment of an ambitious 10-year Homeland Security strategic plan, code-named ENDGAME, authorized in 2003. According to a 49-page Homeland Security document on the plan, ENDGAME expands “a mission first articulated in the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798.” Its goal is the capability to “remove all removable aliens,” including “illegal economic migrants, aliens who have committed criminal acts, asylum-seekers (required to be retained by law) or potential terrorists.” […]

http://news.pacificnews.org/

A BBQ misleader says:

Media are becoming democratised, and a global conversation is emerging.

Note how the word ‘democracy’ is used in this context; as a force for good, shifting power from the center to the masses.

This is of course, totally wrong.

Media are becoming Anarchized. Democracy is second tier to very epitome of centralized power, the dictatorship; what is happening on the web is that anyone can do whatever they like, without any group consensus or control. That is Anarchy, not Democracy, and it’s a good thing.

There is no ‘global conversation’ this is just new labour doubletalk.

The democratisation of media is also, fundamentally, about the people we once called mere consumers. Their role is evolving from a passive one to something much more interactive, but they are blessed (or cursed, depending on one’s viewpoint) with an unprecedented variety of voices and services.

How can a thing that brings you every possible point of view be a bad thing? If you are a paternalist with access to BBQ as a platform it is a VERY bad thing, because your voice is diminished, and your words ridiculed as everyone can see that the emperor has no clothes, just as I am doing right now. Note how he says that consumers ‘role’ is evolving from passive to interactive, and not active. Interactive means consuming BBQI. It means consuming full stop. Blogging, using Google News..its all about being active. Interactive means passive. And of course, that is what these patricians want; passive consumption in another arena.

The democratisation of media creation, distribution and access does not necessarily foretell that traditional media are dinosaurs of a new variety. If we are fortunate, we’ll end up with a more diverse media ecosystem in which many forms – including the traditional organisations – can thrive.

Why would be fortunate for us? It would be fortunate for YOU because you will keep your artificially created position. It would be bad for everyone else, because we would be compelled to continue consumption of the lies spread by BBQ, as this country is turned into a mini Soviet Union, and embarks on another insane war.

For my part, the most exciting aspect of this change is in the emerging conversation.

‘For your part’ means, “please adopt my catchphrase”. No Sale.

Ill leave it to you to read the rest of it; it is contradictory to say the least. Each example he gives in a list of the “…most important tools in today’s evolving media sphere.” – blogs, wikis, podcasts, web mashups – are all things in which people are being active and not passive. People are being active by creating these resources and they are being active by turning away from BBQ as their sole source of information. Note also how he calls this the ‘evolving media sphere’ making a connection with what he is involved with ‘the media’ and what he is being superceeded by, the blogosphere, the web and software developers.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4789852.stm 

THE NEW TERRORISTS – ARE YOU ONE? DOWNLOAD MUSIC? BLOCK TRAFFIC? WRITE A BAD CHECK?

Posted By: Rayelan
Date: Sunday, 15 January 2006, 6:12 p.m.

The reclassification of terrorism is spreading across this country. A bill just BARELY defeated in Oregon would have made you a terrorist if you download music, block traffic or write a bad check. Want to know what the punishment would have been? Read on…

This Madness Is Spreading Nationwide!!

Excerpts from a recent interview of
Dr Walter Belford
by PT Shamrock

DWB – For instance Senate bill 742 in Oregon, which was narrowly defeated by just three votes, would have classified terrorism as a plethora of completely unrelated actions.

Downloading music, blocking traffic, writing a bad cheque or any form of protest, none of which has anything to do with terrorism. All these ‘offences’would be punishable by life in prison unless you agreed to attend a “forest labour camp” for 25 years of enforced labour.

I understand that a made over version of Senate bill 742 will be reintroduced in late 2006 with another name and with some minor adjustments and will probably pass the second time around. Then it will naturally, spread nationwide.

Not even Communist China or Stalinist North Korea put people in labour camps for writing a bad cheque, but this was nearly implemented in the ‘land of the free’. Debtor’s prisons were supposed to have been banned more than 150 years ago! Explain to me what does writing a cheque with insufficient funds have to do with fighting terrorism? Nothing I tell you, absolutely nothing!

Understand and know that this was an actual bill and there are similar ones around the nation that are also being drawn up by your so-called representatives in government.

DWB – If you think Oregon is bad, try Wisconsin! Wisconsin is crazy about control. It takes fingerprints when a police officer pulls you over for a broken taillight. And blood specimens if they suspect you are intoxicated or on drugs. Wisconsin has the honour of sponsoring the Super National ID legislation which will also be a Pan American Union Card, i.e. an international ID as the US merges with Canada and Mexico.

PTS – What else is Wisconsin infamous for?

DWB – A man was sent to prison for five years for “paper terrorism.” He sent too many papers in a complaint he had with the government.

DWB continues – In Rhode Island, governors proposed a bill that would have outlawed criticism of the government, defining it as anarchy under World War One era rhetoric.

In the UK there is a very active advert campaign presently that encourages anyone to report “any suspicious” behavior from their neighbors, etc. to the authorities. What “suspicious” means is left entirely up to the person who would report someone. So if you had a neighbor that was angry with you for any real or imagined reason, you’d be reported and your name will remain on numerous government databases forever! Your name will never be deleted from those government databases.

…

Couldn’t find the “real” article and don’t really have time to find all the dates/actual instances of all the mentioned things in this article, but it really is quite ridiculous… I wonder if one day not paying a parking meter will land me in a forced labour camp (because, after all, parking fees are all about private property, which is the most important thing of all…).

>>> “Documents From the US Espionage Den” is a legendary series of Iranian books containing classified US documents that were found in the American Embassy in Tehran when it was taken over by revolutionaries. These books are very hard to come by in the US, and until now there has been no concerted effort to post them. The National Security Archive is integrating individual documents into their electronic reading books on various topics, but we’re interested in posting the whole set, volume by volume. As a first step, we’re offering a smattering of the documents via the files above. We beseech anyone with access to the books – either the bound volumes or scanned versions of the English-language portions – to please get in touch.

Steven Aftergood of the Project on Government Secrecy (part of the Federation of American Scientists) gave an excellent introduction to these publications in 1997:

Many people will recall that when Iranian revolutionaries seized the U.S. embassy in Teheran in 1979, they acquired a large cache of classified U.S. government documents, some of which had been shredded and painstakingly reassembled, which they proceeded to publish. What no one seems to have noticed, however, is that they never stopped publishing!

By 1995, an amazing 77 volumes of “Documents from the U.S. Espionage Den” (Asnad-i lanih-‘i Jasusi) had been collected and published by the “Muslim Students Following the Line of the Imam” (Center for the Publication of the U.S. Espionage Den’s Documents, P.O. Box 15815-3489, Teheran, Islamic Republic of Iran, tel. 824005). Each volume contains original documents along with Farsi translations and, for no extra charge, an inflammatory introductory essay. [Read the full article here]

In a frequently referenced 1987 article on the subject, Edward Jay Epstein wrote:

…Iranian students seized an entire archive of CIA and State Department documents, which represented one of the most extensive losses of secret data in the history of any modern intelligence service. Even though many of these documents were shredded into thin strips before the Embassy, and CIA base, was surrendered, the Iranians managed to piece them back together. They were then published in 1982 in 54 volumes under the title “Documents From the U.S. Espionage Den”, and are sold in the United States for $246.50. As the Teheran Embassy evidently served as a regional base for the CIA, The scope of this captures intelligence goes well beyond intelligence reports on Iran alone. They cover the Soviet Union, Turkey, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq. There are also secret analysis of arcane subjects ranging from the effectiveness of Israeli intelligence to Soviet oil production. [Read the full article here]

It turns out that in keeping with the times, the majority of the “Espionage Den” volumes have been scanned and are available on CDs sold in Iran. A Memory Hole reader had an Iranian friend buy the two-volume set, which he kindly gave to us. The major down side is that while the CDs contain 68 volumes of “Espionage Den” in Farsi (totalling over 10,000 pages), they contain only two PDF files of the original English-language documents (totalling a meager 400 pages). Adding to the frustration, the English material is presented in completely random order. Each page is usually from a completely different document than the page before and after it. We’re posting them as they appear on the CD (although broken down into five files instead of two, since the original files were so huge). If some enterprising reader wants to create an index, we’ll happily post it here.

Most of these documents are labeled “Confidential” or “Secret” and remain classified to this day.

Acrobat/PDF files

Part One (88 pages | 7.7 meg)

Part Two (88 pages | 7.8 meg)

Part Three (84 pages | 8.6 meg)

Part Four (70 pages | 7 meg)

Part Five (70 pages | 6 meg)

[…]

http://www.thememoryhole.org/espionage_den/

I remember watching a documentary about the amazing students who put together the millions of shredds of documents left behind when the ameicans were routed. They sat on the floor, carefully sifting through the strips of paper. As it says above, the completed reconstructions were published in books. Now you can understand a little bit more why Iranians call america The Great Satan. If you had read of the dastardly deeds done to them and their country, you would be as full of disdain as they are.

I have always wanted a copy of the documents they managed to reconstruct; its a pity that todays rock lusting ‘give us hamburgers’ Iranian students don’t have the zeal and common sense that their predecessors did – can you imagine the job they could be doing with the internet to show the world just what the hell is being done to them yet again?

Check it out:

http://www.thememoryhole.org/espionage_den/photos.htm

Golf ball dishes, Radios (and presumably crypto tools), Teletypes, periodic antennae – they really hit the motherlode!

UPDATE 2013

The venerable Memory Hole has been offline for years. Luckily, we made a copy of these fascinating documents, assembled them into a single 400 page PDF and stored them on Scribd where you can download them into your e-reader for perusal at your leisure. At the time of this update, they have been downloaded or read over eleven and a half thousand times.