Peligrosa desinformación sobre la radiación resultante de fusiones nucleares

http://www.rebelion.org/noticias/ecologia_social/2011/3/peligrosa-desinformacion-sobre-la-radiacion-resultante-de-fusiones-nucleares-124914

 

John LaForge

CounterPunch

 

Traducido del inglés para Rebelión por Germán Leyens

Se ha informado ampliamente sobre las emisiones de radiación que se han propagado a California, y más allá, provenientes del destruido complejo de seis reactores en Fukushima, Japón. Lo que es peor en términos de percepción ciudadana, es que las nubes de desinformación circulan aún más rápido.

Las consecuencias del desastre en Japón elevadas al cubo –terremotos, un tsunami y la eyección de radiación– apenas se pueden exagerar con más de 22.000 personas supuestamente muertas o desaparecidas, una contaminación generalizada por isótopos longevos como el cesio y un primer cálculo de 250.000 millones de dólares en daños.

Sin embargo, dentro de la tormenta de radiación que se extiende fuera de control, día tras día, desde los reactores destruidos de Japón y sus estanques secos de desechos ardientes de combustible, es importante tomar nota de la tormenta de arrullos reconfortantes pero erróneos sobre exposición “segura”, “inofensiva” y “menos que peligrosa”.

No hay ningún nivel de exposición a la radiación, por pequeño que sea, que resulte inofensivo. Toda agencia federal que regula la contaminación radioactiva está de acuerdo.

Cualquier exposición aumenta el riesgo de cáncer

El Consejo Nacional de Protección contra la Radiación dice: “…todo incremento la radiación produce un aumento gradual del riesgo de cáncer”.

La Agencia de Protección del Medio Ambiente (EPA) dice: “…cada exposición a la radiación plantea un cierto riesgo, es decir que no existe ningún nivel bajo el cual podamos decir que una exposición no plantea ningún riesgo”. El Departamento de Energía dice sobre los “bajos niveles de radiación” que: “…el principal efecto es un aumento muy ligero en el riesgo de cáncer”. La Comisión Reguladora Nuclear dice: “todo aumento de la radiación plantea algún riesgo de cáncer… todo aumento en la dosis, no importa lo pequeño que sea, conduce a un aumento del riesgo”. La Academia Nacional de Ciencias, en sus “Efectos biológicos de la radiación ionizante VII”, dice: “…es improbable que exista un umbral para la inducción de cánceres…”

En pocas palabras: “Ya no se puede hablar de un nivel ‘seguro’ de dosis”, como dijeron el doctor Ian Fairlie y el doctor Marvin Resnikoff en su informe “Ninguna dosis es demasiado baja” según el Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Pero cuando los representantes de agencias gubernamentales, universidades o industrias dicen que “la cantidad de radiación no llegó a un nivel peligroso”, se conduce al oyente a pensar erróneamente que existe un determinado nivel que está libre de riesgo.

El ocultamiento o el disimulo de la dispersión de radiación provino desde muy pronto de funcionarios del gobierno y de las compañías que informaron de “la descarga de gas de hidrógeno”, y afirmaron que no existe “peligro para la salud”. Incluso cuando explosiones de gas de hidrógeno destruyeron parte de los cuatro reactores repitieron la promesa de la seguridad.

“De hecho”, escribe la antropóloga medioambiental Barbara Rose Johnston en el Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists del 18 de marzo, “el hidrógeno liberado es vapor de agua de tritio, un emisor [de radiación] de bajo nivel que puede ser absorbido por el cuerpo humano simplemente mediante la respiración o al beber agua contaminada”.

El principal portavoz del gobierno japonés, secretario jefe del gabinete, Yukio Edano, ha sido uno de los peores transgresores. El 21 de marzo Edano pidió al público que no reaccionara de forma exagerada ante los informes de alimentos contaminados por radiación; no dañarán en nada vuestra salud”, informó la BBC.

Se han encontrado espinacas con un nivel de yodo radioactivo de 27 veces el límite establecido por el gobierno en la ciudad de Hitachi, más de 80 kilómetros al sur de los reactores afectados.

Mentiras totales, pereza abrumadora

El 17 de marzo, cuando según las informaciones los niveles de radiación eran 300 veces superiores a lo normal al sur de Fukushima, el escritor de Associated Press Eric Talmadge, informó sin comentario alguno de lo que dijeron los funcionarios: “Se necesitarían tres años de constante exposición a estos niveles más elevados para aumentar el riesgo de cáncer para una persona”. Es una mentira total, por supuesto de “funcionarios”, pero también muestra la pereza abrumadora de AP, ya que la información sobre exposiciones a bajas dosis está fácilmente disponible en los sitios en la web de los organismos antes mencionados.

El doctor Chris Busby, fundador del Comité Europeo sobre Riesgo de Radiación, y científico jefe en la Campaña de Radiación a Bajo Nivel declaró el 16 de marzo: “No se puede creer en las palabras tranquilizadoras sobre exposiciones a la radiación emitidas por el gobierno japonés. Se basan en un modelo de riesgo errado que la propia Comisión Internacional sobre Protección Radiológica (ICRP) ha admitido que no se puede aplicar en situaciones de accidentes.”

Este modelo de radiación de la ICRP es la base de y domina toda la legislación actual sobre exposición a la radiación. No obstante, informa el doctor Busby: “El concepto básico de dosis de radiación es generalmente reconocido como errado para muchos tipos de exposición interna relevantes para la actual emergencia”.

Los responsables del control de la industria trabajan para corregir los errores. Mary Olson, del Servicio de Información y Recursos Nucleares, escribe: “La radiación tiene un riesgo, no una certeza, de daño al ADN a cualquier nivel de exposición. Una emisión de un radionúclido que por casualidad llega con tu sándwich a tu estómago –una exposición tan ínfima que jamás se podría medir– tiene la capacidad de iniciar lo que se podría convertir en un cáncer fatal.”

Los gobiernos han establecido límites a la exposición por radiación “permisibles,” “admisibles” y “legales” porque los reactores no pueden operar sin emitir o tirar gases y líquidos contaminados. La exposición a esta radiación, mediante operaciones rutinarias o fusiones nucleares parciales –digamos en la leche, agua potable, o vegetales– nunca es segura. Sólo está permitida por la ley.

John LaForge trabaja en Nukewatch, un grupo que vigila la industria nuclear en Wisconsin y edita su boletín noticioso trimestral.

Fuente: http://www.counterpunch.org/laforge03232011.html

Historia de otra manipulación mediática

http://www.rebelion.org/noticias/videos_rebeldes/2011/3/historia-de-otra-manipulacion-mediatica-124246

Las ejecuciones no fueron por negarse a disparar contra los manifestantes

YouTube

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El negocio de la desinformación y la propaganda en la guerra mediática

http://www.rebelion.org/noticias/videos_rebeldes/2011/3/el-negocio-de-la-desinformacion-y-la-propaganda-en-la-guerra-mediatica-124245

Vídeo sobre ejecuciones de soldados y policías en Libia

RT

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Libya: Media Manipulation

http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/09-03-2011/117135-libya_media-0/

09.03.2011

As the journalists continue to follow the events in Libya, so does the public. Our new interactive format, which allows our readers to comment on the articles, has seen Pravda.Ru over the past few weeks receive numerous interesting comments from those who have been interested in this situation, which we are happy to synthesize below.

Let one thing be perfectly clear: those who manufactured those Libyan flags from the time of King Idris, those who are arming, aiding and abetting the «rebels» (terrorists according to the western media referring to the same types of actions in other countries) are responsible for what is going on. Suppose the western media is misleading us?

«He’s gotta go,» says David Cameron, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom about Muammar Al-Qathafi. The thing is, who has done more for his people? From President Obama, surprisingly, the same call. Yet the Libyan is not a protagonist who is dying for his own war to become a hero, because his disastrous policies at home are making him unpopular.

Unlike David Cameron, Muammar Al-Qathafi has invested in his people; he has not slashed education funding, he has increased literacy rates from 10 to around 85%; maybe those who support the flags from the pre-Qathafi era would like to have a reminder of the statistics from those times, because for sure those who fabricated these flags and transported them across the Tunisian and Egyptian borders will send Libya and the Libyans back into the dark ages from which Muammar Al-Qathafi freed them.

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Let another thing be perfectly clear: the western media is misleading us and is trying to hide the interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign member of the UNO. Let us see some of the many comments from – and a presentation of several points raised by – our readers…

1. Why did the Libyan «revolution» not start in the capital, Tripoli, but rather in the separatist region of Cyrenaica?

2. Is it important that Cyrenaica is the oil-rich region?

3. How come the terrorists in Libya are referred to as «rebels» yet in other countries in the region they are «terrorists»?

4. How come the authorities of any sovereign nation have the right to impose law and order after armed insurrection, but Muammar Al-Qathafi apparently does not (according to Western media)? What does any civilised nation do when rebels burn buildings, kill women and children (oh didn’t the western media publicise this?) and slaughter and torture unarmed civilians? In most countries the authorities have the right to react.

In the case of Libya, it is facing an armed insurrection fuelled by interfering foreign powers, marauding gangs of terrorists aiming to settle tribal scores, all for the right price.

5. How is it possible that the poorly equipped «rebels» «now have access to more sophisticated equipment» (SKY News). Where did it come from?

6. How to explain the fact that Dutch and British special forces have been detained operating inside Libya?

7. Why does SKY News concentrate on the same screaming child in a Libyan hospital, every single day, a child who seems to be screaming because he is more afraid of a syringe than due to any injury? Is it correct to manipulate public opinion using images of children?

8. Why does the same news channel show a man with a flesh wound from «heavy weaponry» while the bullet is visible on the surface of his skin? Why is Dominic Waghorn reporting the «truth» when last Summer he came to Portugal to hide it?

9. Why did the western media report that civilians had been bombed, and then Saif Al-Islam Qathafi entered a Sky News vehicle, saying for them to take him where they wanted, and the SKY crew was unable to find the areas they had said his «regime» forces had bombed?

10. Why did the BBC lie about an air strike that never existed?

11. Why did the BBC admit that the Libyan Air Force had been purposefully not hitting human targets? Then say Muammar Al-Qathafi is a «dictator» «slaughtering his own people»?

12. Why has the western media been saying that Muammar Al-Qathafi has been throwing the full force of his military options against «unarmed civilians» when it is obvious the civilians are heavily armed and he has not yet even started to use all the weaponry at his disposal?

13. Allaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahu Akhbar!!   Allaaaaaaaaaahu Akhbar! God is great! Where have we heard this before? And now from the er…rebels.

14. Why is the unrest always worse after Friday prayer service? Are we seeing another CIA-Mujaheddin type alliance? The type that saw the launch of the Taleban in Afghanistan?

15. Why is it that whenever there is a western camera present, someone unfolds one of those idiotic flags from the time when the people of Libya were illiterate and oppressed?

16. How come Muammar Al-Qathafi turns up wherever and whenever he wants in Tripoli?

17. Has Muammar Al-Qathafi disrespected the UNO by using lies to attack sovereign nations outside the auspices of the UN? No.

18. Libya is a «carbon copy» of brutal, bloody aggression of NATO on Yugoslavia
and Serbia. Looking at those people running away from Libya to Tunisia in their thousands and western media again doing same thing, telling us that they are running away from «Gadhafi’s regime» not from a threat of NATO intervention and their bombs but just like what happened with the Albanians from Kosovo, the aggressor is intervening on «humanitarian grounds».

19. Gadhafi has to be put on trial for Genocide and violation of human rights but GW Bush, Tony Blair and Greschner should receive the «Nobel peace prize»,

20. When the West waged its genocidal 1st war for the conquest of Kuwait and Iraq, the hundreds of thousands of third country nationals that fled from Iraq did so not because of having had to suffer any hardship due to Iraqi rule, but rather because of starvation and acholera epidemic resulting from an inhuman total blockade imposed by NATO (food items and chemicals–employed—in–water–treatment–plants were especially prohibited).

21. The WESTERN MAINSTREAM media has completely FORGOTTEN about the human right to life of all the Libyan civilians unopposed to Gaddafi who are being massacred or maimed by the foreign insurgents just to terrorise the remaining populace and make a point. Just as this very same media cared not a fig about the thousands of apolitical innocent civilians that were brutally executed (by stoning, electrocuting etc.) by the Bush & Hillarity-backed Taliban within days of having overran almost three-fourths of Afghanistan with NATO weaponry in the late 1990’s.

22. Few other countries live in such a social comfort, as Libyans do. They have free health care system and treatment. Their hospitals are provided with the best medical equipment in the world. The education in Libya is free of charge. Talented youth have an opportunity to study abroad at the expense of Libya. After getting married, a couple can get more than 60 thousands dinar (50 thousand dollars) of financial help. State credits are non-interest-bearing, and often the principal is written off as well. Automobile’s prices are considerably lower, than in Europe and affordable for everyone. Petrol costs 18 cent, and bread 4 cent. Libyans have been provided a very good environment as regards social and job-security, and their general educational level (both males and females can be seen pursuing all branches of university education) is better than that in so-called very affluent Arab countries like Saudi Arabia.

23. When a DUTCH helicopter carrying several mercenary Dutch soldiers including a jingoistic woman, (allegedly on a sabotage-cum-espionage mission to undermine Libyan national defence right in the hometown of the leader Col. Gaddafi ) were captured by Libyan defenders, the DUTCH government finally acknowledged that its warship:- the TROMP, has indeed been lurking in the high sea off SIRTE and the captured helicopter had lifted-off from there.

24.  When will the world understand the US modus operandi. Befriend, Praise, Infiltrate, Subvert, Destroy. It has become cliché and yet people still fall for it. It is true there is an upper limit to intelligence but stupidity knows no bounds. Let it be a warning to all those who believe that the US/Israel and other Zionist minions can be trusted allies. The process, preparing the world for the invasion of Libya, is so reminiscent of the one prior to the Iraq war, that only those severely challenged can fail to see it.

25. Surely the Libyan armed forces have shown restraint, more than aggression. Let’s face it, they could raze the cities and towns if they wanted. They have been going in, causing limited damage to the terrorists and have pulled back out again limiting the human and material damage.

26. But when price increases in major Libyan cities sparked a wave of discontent, imperialism seized the opportunity. They concluded that it was time to get rid of Gaddafi, an always uncomfortable leader.

The riots in Tunisia and Egypt, protests in Bahrain and Yemen have created very favorable conditions to instigate demonstrations in Libya. It was no accident that Benghazi emerged as the hub of the rebellion. Major transnational oil companies operate in Cyrenaica, the ends of pipelines and gas pipelines are located there.

The National Front for the Salvation of Libya, an organization financed by the CIA, was activated. It is instructive that it was the city to see the rapid emergence in the streets of the old monarchy flag and portraits of the late King Idris, the tribal chief Senussi crowned by England after the expulsion of the Italians. A «prince» Senussi suddenly appeared to give interviews.

27. In relationship to the status of women in Libya, «The delegation indicated that women were highly regarded in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, and their rights were guaranteed by all laws and legislation. Discriminatory laws had been revoked.» (Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review, Human Rights Council, Jan. 4, 2011, p. 4)

Many thanks to our readers for making Pravda.Ru the interactive and interesting alternative must-read on the Net!

Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey

Pravda.Ru

Inside Job: how bankers caused the financial crisis

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/feb/17/inside-job-financial-crisis-bankers-verdicts

 

The film Inside Job brilliantly exposes the corruption in US banking that led to the 2008 crash. We ask four bankers for their verdict on this damning indictment of their world

Peter Bradshaw reviews Inside Job

• Phillip Inman and Patrick Kingsley
• guardian.co.uk, Thursday 17 February 2011 21.00 GMT
• Article history
An aerial view of Wall Street, the heart of the global financial meltdown. Photograph: Cameron Davidson

When Michael Moore made his debut feature, Roger and Me, he set about vilifying the boss of General Motors, the now deceased Roger B Smith, for destroying his home town of Flint, Michigan. Charles Ferguson’s film Inside Job attempts to blame a wider cast list for the banking crash of 2008 and explains why so little has been done to reform the financial world or bring criminal prosecutions against the main protagonists.

1. Inside Job
2. Production year: 2010
3. Country: USA
4. Cert (UK): 12A
5. Runtime: 108 mins
6. Directors: Charles Ferguson
7. Cast: Matt Damon
8. More on this film

His villainous lineup includes bankers, politicians (many of whom were previously bankers), regulators, the credit ratings agencies and academics. When Glenn Hubbard, George Bush’s chief economic adviser and dean of Columbia Business School, is shown as a partisan advocate of deregulation, we have one of the movie’s punch-the-air moments. During the interview, Hubbard, who denies he was corrupted by his paid-for relationships with government, angrily barks: «You’ve got five minutes, mister. Give it your best shot.»

The spotlight has largely bypassed academics in the UK. There are plenty of economists who believed the banks understood what they were doing and supported deregulation. Whether they took large slugs of cash for writing poorly researched, cheerleading reports on the economic miracle in Iceland (pre-crash), as former US central banker Frederic Mishkin is found doing, is less clear. Over here, the relationship between academia and business appears to be more arm’s length, though London Business School dean Sir Andrew Likierman sits on the Barclays board, while Howard Davies, who argued for light-touch regulation while head of the Financial Services Authority, has become director of the London School of Economics. The UK’s chief villian, however, is probably the disgraced, but largely unpunished, banker Sir Fred Goodwin, the former boss of Royal Bank of Scotland, once the fifth-largest bank in the world.

In Inside Job, the name that keeps cropping up is Larry Summers, a friend of President Bill Clinton and more recently Barack Obama. Summers exemplifies the links between cheerleaders in academia, Wall Street, supine regulators and an ignorant Capitol Hill that Ferguson stresses were at the root of the problem. It helps that Summers looks like a mafia boss, but the difficulties in making the case against him are shown by the need to explain financial products like credit default swaps and how securitisation was used by banks to increase their borrowing.

Still, no matter how much it is explained, the general public is not going to understand. How does one go into battle yelling slogans about credit default swaps? The bankers know ignorance is their trump card. Maybe Inside Job will make us more savvy in time for the next crash.

Phillip Inman

The derivatives trader

«The film’s first half-hour was absolutely dead-on. The explanation of what happened was a chilling re-run of all the events that led up to the financial crisis. It also showed very accurately the denial by everybody inside or outside the industry that such a crisis was even occurring – even up to the last minute before Lehman’s bankruptcy.

I have an issue with some of the elements pursued in the rest of the film. One was the vilification of individual people. Chuck Prince, the CEO of Citigroup at the time of the crisis, may have been overpaid – but I don’t think he was particularly at fault. At worst he perhaps should have known more about what was going on, but really he’s just the nice old geezer at the top who shakes people’s hands at cocktail parties. There may be people lower down who knowingly did criminal things, but that is a different matter.

A weak point was the anti-free market and conspiratorial tone of the film. Yes, deregulation did go too far – particularly with the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, which might have prevented banks gambling with depositors’ money. But to imply that all deregulation in the last 20 years was a conspiracy perpetrated by an academic elite of economists in the pay of the banks is paranoid and absurd.

An oversight by the film was to ignore how risk managers at many banks knowingly failed to voice their fears about the way their companies operated. A risk manager once told me that to raise an issue that undermined the bank’s multi-billion-dollar profits would have been to «sign his own death warrant». This inability to challenge trading desks generating billions in phantom profits was endemic.

Inside Job clearly catches some of the anti-banker mood, and the public is quite right to be outraged at how banks refinanced at the taxpayers’ expense are paying outsized bonuses. Staff at banks such as RBS should be retained by longer-term incentive schemes such as the one being introduced at Barclays. But, as a free marketeer, I believe banks that have not taken public money should be able to do as they please within the law.»

Ian Hart was a Wall St derivatives trader, before becoming a head-hunter for, among other banks, Lehman Brothers. He now runs Sacred Microdistillery. sacredgin.com

The bank director

«This was a well-researched film that clearly explained the complexities of the crisis and the greed of bankers. It laid the blame squarely where it belongs – at the feet of bankers, of ratings agencies, of regulators – and it interviewed a lot of heavyweight people, such as Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Eliot Spitzer, Raghuram Rajan and Glenn Hubbard.

It will doubtless make many people – especially those who lost their jobs and savings – angry at not only what the banks did, but that many of the people responsible are still in their jobs, and that no one’s gone to prison. It beggars belief that ordinary taxpayers are facing higher taxes and spending cuts, while bankers walked away scot-free. The film shows that people who had bought a house they couldn’t afford are now living in a tent, whereas bankers have still got their jobs. Consumers enjoyed buying houses that ultimately they couldn’t afford, but mortgages were shoved down their throats without any care on the part of the bankers. In the old days, the bank would say: «We don’t think you can afford that mortgage, so we won’t lend you money.» The film showed how this kind of advice was thrown out of the window.

Unfortunately, it’s clear that for many investment banks business continues pretty much as normal and that another crisis is only a matter of time. Sure, there’s greater scrutiny of bonuses – but many bankers think they were not responsible personally for the crisis and they’re worth every penny they’re paid. Clearly they’re not.

I thought the film also brought out well the «capture» of regulators, politicians and academics who all became cheerleaders for the continued deregulation of finance that began under Ronald Reagan and that culminated in the great crisis. Massive re-regulation is required to ensure that finance is safely locked up in a straitjacket again.

Of particular interest is the dubious role played by academic economists, especially those in the US. Many were paid vast, undeclared sums to produce biased reports saying CDOs and other dodgy derivatives were safe and that Iceland was fine to be gambling with 10 times its annual GDP. The corruption of top US economists and their complete lack of awareness of what they had done was truly shameful.»

The broker

«The film was right that banking became synonymous with living the high life, with drug-taking, and basically being above the law. This culture filtered down from the top, and needs to be stopped and questioned a lot more. In Europe, we have tried to since the crisis. Where I work, we are compliant up to our eyeballs – be it drug checks, expenses checks, or simply the monitoring of all phonecalls and emails.

But it was too simplistic for the film to imply that we need more financial regulation. It’s not a black-and-white issue, and you can’t be that kneejerk: the UK is a service-based economy. I would love that to change, but right now, a lot of the GDP comes from people in and around finance. The City itself employs vast numbers of people – not just as bankers, but also on the periphery – and until we move away from that, and find other ways of employing these people, you can’t just shut down an industry. With very harsh regulation, that’s unfortunately what you risk. As a lot of these banks are global and flexible, they can just go overseas. HSBC’s been threatening for years to move its headquarters to Asia. For the UK, that would be a disaster. So I think the government has to tread a fine line between bringing in regulation bit by bit, and regulating all at once.

I’m one of the few women in banking and it’s really obvious watching Inside Job that this is the case. We see the French minister of finance [Christine Lagarde], there’s a woman from the Securities and Exchange Commission – but they’re few and far between. As they say in the film, banking is such an alpha-male society and it’s very hard for women to succeed within it and yet maintain some sense of femininity. If they had more women in banking, I really think there would be more sense of community, and perhaps things such as this crisis wouldn’t happen quite so often, because you wouldn’t have this sense of being part of a boys’ club.»

The investment banker

«Inside Job ignored the enormous level of consumption by ordinary people that drove debt levels so high. The film suggested it was the bankers and the politicians who were driving the collapse – and fair enough, there was some mis-selling of mortgages. But it wasn’t just mortgages: it was bank debt, credit-card debt, car loans. Blame the banker for providing the credit, but the consumer must also take some of the rap. If you talk to a sole trader, they’ll tell you that when times are good, put some money away for when times are bad. But the consumers just spent and spent, and assumed the good times would go on for ever.

Another angle missed by the film was the role of accounting firms. There is a huge amount of blame to be attributed to them. It was their responsibility to monitor the accounts of banks, and when they signed off a bank’s results, they were stating their confidence in the bank’s ability to trade solvently. The film ignored the failure of accountants to say anything. It talked about regulators and ratings agencies. But the accountancy firms are just as big as some of the larger banks and not to analyse their role in the crisis was a huge omission.

The film was very much in the style of Michael Moore – they’d clipped and edited the interviews to twist slightly what was said in them – but it was also very watchable, succinct and very good at simplifying a chain of events. And the accusation that the worlds of academia and politics were complicit in the crisis was completely valid. There is a lot of cronyism out there, and people who criticised regulation did end up in the Obama government. There’s a gentleman’s club, and they all look after each other.»

Interviews by Patrick Kingsley. The interviewees above wished to remain anonymous.

‘Anonymous’ targets the brothers Koch, claiming attempts ‘to usurp American Democracy’

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/27/anonymous-targets-the-brothers-koch-claiming-attempts-to-usurp-american-democracy/

By Stephen C. Webster
Sunday, February 27th, 2011 — 1:32 pm

 

 

The decentralized protest group «Anonymous» has a new target: no, it’s not a middle eastern dictator, a major bank or even a bit player in the military-industrial complex.

It’s none other than tea party financiers Charles and David Koch, who were being targeted, an open letter stated, for their attempts «to usurp American Democracy.»

«Koch Industries, and oligarchs like them, have most recently started to manipulate the political agenda in Wisconsin,» an announcement posted to anonnews.org declared.

«Governor Walker’s union-busting budget plan contains a clause that went nearly un-noticed. This clause would allow the sale of publicly owned utility plants in Wisconsin to private parties (specifically, Koch Industries) at any price, no matter how low, without a public bidding process,» they explained. «The Koch’s have helped to fuel the unrest in Wisconsin and the drive behind the bill to eliminate the collective bargaining power of unions in a bid to gain a monopoly over the state’s power supplies.

The group, which was responsible for taking MasterCard Worldwide offline for an entire day — along with numerous other organizations that plotted against secrets outlet WikiLeaks — said it would now be «actively seeking vulnerabilities» in Koch industries.

«In a world where corporate money has become the lifeblood of political influence, the labor unions are one of the few ways citizens have to fight against corporate greed,» the release added. «Anonymous cannot ignore the plight of the citizen-workers of Wisconsin, or the opportunity to fight for the people in America’s broken political system. For these reasons, we feel that the Koch brothers threaten the United States democratic system and, by extension, all freedom-loving individuals everywhere.»

They added that if one would like to withdraw their unknowing support for the brothers Koch, an array of products would need to be boycotted — and not just by Americans, but people world-wide.

«Anonymous hears the voice of the downtrodden American people, whose rights and liberties are being systematically removed one by one, even when their own government refuses to listen or worse – is complicit in these attacks,» they continued. «We are actively seeking vulnerabilities, but in the mean time we are calling for all supporters of true Democracy, and Freedom of The People, to boycott all Koch Industries’ paper products. We welcome unions across the globe to join us in this boycott to show that you will not allow big business to dictate your freedom.»

In the US, those products were listed as Vanity Fair, Quilted Northern, Angel Soft, Sparkle, Brawney, Mardi Gras and Dixie. For Europe, they were Demak’Up, Kitten Soft, Lotus / Lotus Soft, Tenderly, Nouvelle Soft, Okay Kitchen Towels, Colhogar, Delica, Inversoft and Tutto.

All were produced by the «Georgia-Pacific» company, and all bear the logo seen above.

The Koch’s, who’ve seen their libertarian cause raised to a full-blown rightwing boogyman status, were principle financiers of Wisconsin’s Republican Governor, Scott Walker.

Among his first items of business as the state’s governor was attempting to crush public worker unions by making it illegal for them to organize into a union. And while he’d been saying throughout the affair that this was not an attempt to bust unions, a front group for the Koch brothers had one of its spokesmen at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), who plainly stated that their goal was to take the unions out «at the knees.»

Walker was humiliated last week by a gonzo journalist with The Buffalo Beast, who managed to get him on the phone by pretending to be David Koch. During the conversation, the governor admitted to considering sending agent provocateurs into the throngs of protesters to try and stir up trouble. He also appeared to accept an offer for a flight to California, where he was to be shown «a good time» by the tea party financier.

«Anonymous» was calling their latest project «#OpWisconsin». They asked that supporters begin boycotting the Koch paper products right away.

Revealed: Air Force ordered software to manage army of fake virtual people

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/18/revealed-air-force-ordered-software-to-manage-army-of-fake-virtual-people/

By Stephen C. Webster
Friday, February 18th, 2011 — 3:07 pm

These days, with Facebook and Twitter and social media galore, it can be increasingly hard to tell who your «friends» are.

But after this, Internet users would be well advised to ask another question entirely: Are my «friends» even real people?

In the continuing saga of data security firm HBGary, a new caveat has come to light: not only did they plot to help destroy secrets outlet WikiLeaks and discredit progressive bloggers, they also crafted detailed proposals for software that manages online «personas,» allowing a single human to assume the identities of as many fake people as they’d like.

The revelation was among those contained in the company’s emails, which were dumped onto bittorrent networks after hackers with cyber protest group «Anonymous» broke into their systems.

In another document unearthed by «Anonymous,» one of HBGary’s employees also mentioned gaming geolocation services to make it appear as though selected fake persons were at actual events.

«There are a variety of social media tricks we can use to add a level of realness to all fictitious personas,» it said.

Government involvement

Eerie as that may be, more perplexing, however, is a federal contract from the 6th Contracting Squadron at MacDill Air Force Base, located south of Tampa, Florida, that solicits providers of «persona management software.»

While there are certainly legitimate applications for such software, such as managing multiple «official» social media accounts from a single input, the more nefarious potential is clear.

Unfortunately, the Air Force’s contract description doesn’t help dispel their suspicions either. As the text explains, the software would require licenses for 50 users with 10 personas each, for a total of 500. These personas would have to be «replete with background , history, supporting details, and cyber presences that are technically, culturally and geographacilly consistent.»

It continues, noting the need for secure virtual private networks that randomize the operator’s Internet protocol (IP) address, making it impossible to detect that it’s a single person orchestrating all these posts. Another entry calls for static IP address management for each persona, making it appear as though each fake person was consistently accessing from the same computer each time.

The contract also sought methods to anonymously establish virtual private servers with private hosting firms in specific geographic locations. This would allow that server’s «geosite» to be integrated with their social media profiles, effectively gaming geolocation services.

The Air Force added that the «place of performance» for the contract would be at MacDill Air Force Base, along with Kabul, Afghanistan and Baghdad. The contract was offered on June 22, 2010.

It was not clear exactly what the Air Force was doing with this software, or even if it had been procured.

Manufacturing consent

Though many questions remain about how the military would apply such technology, the reasonable fear should be perfectly clear. «Persona management software» can be used to manipulate public opinion on key information, such as news reports. An unlimited number of virtual «people» could be marshaled by only a few real individuals, empowering them to create the illusion of consensus.

You could call it a virtual flash mob, or a digital «Brooks Brothers Riot,» so to speak: compelling, but not nearly as spontaneous as it appears.

That’s precisely what got DailyKos blogger Happy Rockefeller in a snit: the potential for military-run armies of fake people manipulating and, in some cases, even manufacturing the appearance of public opinion.

«I don’t know about you, but it matters to me what fellow progressives think,» the blogger wrote. «I consider all views. And if there appears to be a consensus that some reporter isn’t credible, for example, or some candidate for congress in another state can’t be trusted, I won’t base my entire judgment on it, but it carries some weight.

«That’s me. I believe there are many people though who will base their judgment on rumors and mob attacks. And for those people, a fake mob can be really effective.»

It was Rockefeller who was first to highlight the Air Force’s «persona» contract, which was available on a public website.

A call to MacDill Air Force Base, requesting an explanation of the contract and what this software might be used for, was answered by a public affairs officer who promised a call-back. No reply was received at time of this story’s publication.

Other e-mails circulated by HBGary’s CEO illuminate highly personal data about critics of the US Chamber of Commerce, including detailed information about their spouses and children, as well as their locations and professional links. The firm, it was revealed, was just one part of a group called «Team Themis,» tasked by the Chamber to come up with strategies for responding to progressive bloggers and others.

«Team Themis» also included a proposal to use malware hacks against progressive organizations, and the submission of fake documents in an effort to discredit established groups.

HBGary was also behind a plot by Bank of America to destroy WikiLeaks’ technology platform, other emails revealed. The company was humiliated by members of «Anonymous» after CEO Aaron Barr bragged that he’d «infiltrated» the group.

A request for comment emailed to HBGary did not receive a reply.

Why Almost Everything You Hear About Medicine Is Wrong

http://www.newsweek.com/2011/01/23/why-almost-everything-you-hear-about-medicine-is-wrong.html

 

(Page 1 of 2)

Illustration by Jacob Thomas

If you follow the news about health research, you risk whiplash. First garlic lowers bad cholesterol, then—after more study—it doesn’t. Hormone replacement reduces the risk of heart disease in postmenopausal women, until a huge study finds that it doesn’t (and that it raises the risk of breast cancer to boot). Eating a big breakfast cuts your total daily calories, or not—as a study released last week finds. Yet even if biomedical research can be a fickle guide, we rely on it.

But what if wrong answers aren’t the exception but the rule? More and more scholars who scrutinize health research are now making that claim. It isn’t just an individual study here and there that’s flawed, they charge. Instead, the very framework of medical investigation may be off-kilter, leading time and again to findings that are at best unproved and at worst dangerously wrong. The result is a system that leads patients and physicians astray—spurring often costly regimens that won’t help and may even harm you.

Joe Raedle / Getty ImagesGallery: Medical Breakthroughs: The Good and the Bad

Breakthroughs and Breakdown

It’s a disturbing view, with huge im-plications for doctors, policymakers, and health-conscious consumers. And one of its foremost advocates, Dr. John P.A. Ioannidis, has just ascended to a new, prominent platform after years of crusading against the baseless health and medical claims. As the new chief of Stanford University’s Prevention Research Center, Ioannidis is cementing his role as one of medicine’s top mythbusters. “People are being hurt and even dying” because of false medical claims, he says: not quackery, but errors in medical research.

This is Ioannidis’s moment. As medical costs hamper the economy and impede deficit-reduction efforts, policymakers and businesses are desperate to cut them without sacrificing sick people. One no-brainer solution is to use and pay for only treatments that work. But if Ioannidis is right, most biomedical studies are wrong.

In just the last two months, two pillars of preventive medicine fell. A major study concluded there’s no good evidence that statins (drugs like Lipitor and Crestor) help people with no history of heart disease. The study, by the Cochrane Collaboration, a global consortium of biomedical experts, was based on an evaluation of 14 individual trials with 34,272 patients. Cost of statins: more than $20 billion per year, of which half may be unnecessary. (Pfizer, which makes Lipitor, responds in part that “managing cardiovascular disease risk factors is complicated”). In November a panel of the Institute of Medicine concluded that having a blood test for vitamin D is pointless: almost everyone has enough D for bone health (20 nanograms per milliliter) without taking supplements or calcium pills. Cost of vitamin D: $425 million per year.

Ioannidis, 45, didn’t set out to slay medical myths. A child prodigy (he was calculating decimals at age 3 and wrote a book of poetry at 8), he graduated first in his class from the University of Athens Medical School, did a residency at Harvard, oversaw AIDS clinical trials at the National Institutes of Health in the mid-1990s, and chaired the department of epidemiology at Greece’s University of Ioannina School of Medicine. But at NIH Ioannidis had an epiphany. “Positive” drug trials, which find that a treatment is effective, and “negative” trials, in which a drug fails, take the same amount of time to conduct. “But negative trials took an extra two to four years to be published,” he noticed. “Negative results sit in a file drawer, or the trial keeps going in hopes the results turn positive.” With billions of dollars on the line, companies are loath to declare a new drug ineffective. As a result of the lag in publishing negative studies, patients receive a treatment that is actually ineffective. That made Ioannidis wonder, how many biomedical studies are wrong?

Discriminação Religiosa nos Meios de Comunicação

Tiago Damas

 

A discriminação religiosa nos nossos meios de comunicação é mais frequente do que imaginamos. Subtil, mas presente.
Demasiadas vezes vemos titulares dizendo que «Islamistas  assassinaram…» ou «Islamistas puseram uma bomba…», tal como no passado dia 20, por exemplo, em que a RTP publicou um artigo com o seguinte titulo: «Rebeldes Islamicos da Tchechenia atacam parlamento» . Esta referência ao «Islamismo» quando se fala de ataques violentos não só é injustificada, como também é uma ofensa à população muçulmana.
É importante fazer a comparação com o mesmo tipo de actos violentos que vemos nos países ocidentais «cristãos».
Por exemplo, quando se fala de um atentado da ETA em Espanha, ou quando se fala um cidadão norte-americano que entrou por uma escola dentro e matou 10 pessoas e feriu outras 20, ou assassinou membros de partidos e ideologias opostas;  quando se fala de um grupo considerado terrorista na America Latina (onde a religião está muito presente mesmo em grupos insurgentes), como as FARC, ninguém se atreve a dizer que «cristãos assassinaram 20», ou «cristãos sequestram estrangeiros» ou «rebeldes cristãos sequestram navios e pedem resgate».
Então porque falamos de «atentados islamistas»?
Existem inúmeras interpretações do Coran, logo, não diferenciar as fações mais extremistas do Islão, com o resto dos crentes religiosos islamicos seria o mesmo que não diferenciar a OPUS DEI da maioria de religiosos católicos.
Talvez, ao verificar tais declarações, poder-se-a compreender mais facilmente porquê Portugal e todos os países da União Europeia tenham decidido abster-se de votar em resoluções, apresentadas na assembleia Geral da ONU, tais como «Esforços Globais para a eliminação de todas as formas de racismo, discriminação racial, xenofobia e discriminação relacionada», ou «Inadmissibilidade de certas praticas que contribuem para fomentar certas formas contemporâneas de racismo, discriminação racial, xenofobia e discriminação relacionada».  Nesta ultima resolução, somente um País votou contra – a saber – Estados Unidos.

OPT: Easing of Gaza blockade fails to reverse housing crisis

http://unispal.un.org/unispal.nsf/47d4e277b48d9d3685256ddc00612265/03dbc45a81df0b6a85257800004e3ceb?OpenDocument

JABALIA, 21 December 2010 (IRIN) – Farid Batch and his brother Wasfi live about 500m from their old houses in Jabalia, north Gaza. The homes of four Batch brothers once stood next to each other overlooking a grove of olive and lemon trees but all that is left are the concrete foundations and a tangle of wire and metal.

Since the orchards and all four houses were levelled during Israel’s last military operation in Gaza, two years ago in January, Farid and Wasfi have been living in neighbouring apartments in a large residential block. Their rent is paid by one-off grants from the Ministry of Public Works in Gaza and the UN Development Programme (UNDP), but from January, they will have to cover the cost themselves.

Wasfi recently found a job driving an ambulance for 1,400NIS (US$387) a month and thinks he will be able to afford to rent a place for his family of 11.

Farid, an unemployed carpenter and father of seven, has no idea where his family will be living from January.

“I owned my home and the 600m of land it stood on. When I have the money, I’ll rebuild it but there is no money in Gaza now,” Farid said. “All the building material we need is here but the gravel, cement and steel that come through the tunnel from Egypt are about 10 times the prices before the blockade. Without money, I can’t think about rebuilding.”

Israel tightened its blockade on Gaza in June 2007 when militant group Hamas came into power.

Trade improving

It has been six months since this blockade was eased following international pressure on the Israeli government. While imports into Gaza have increased and exports of Gazan strawberries and carnations are slowly resuming, only a fraction of the material needed to rebuild the homes and infrastructure is coming through the border from Israel, according to various reports.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in its November Humanitarian Update that although the relaxation of the blockade had resulted in a greater variety of consumer goods available in the markets, with consumer items making up the majority (72 percent) of imported goods, ongoing restrictions on basic construction materials, impediments to the movement of people as well as exports, continued to limit both economic revival and a significant improvement in the humanitarian situation.

“Critically needed housing reconstruction projects and upgrades to damaged infrastructure continue to be limited by restrictions on the entry of basic construction materials, particularly cement, gravel and steel bars,” OCHA said.

Before the blockade, consumer items accounted for 45 percent of all imports, and construction materials the balance, according to OCHA.

The report said additional steps were needed to more broadly reactivate Gaza’s crippled economy and restore livelihoods. “Such steps must include lifting the internal access restrictions on land and sea and the removal of restrictions on the import of building materials.”

Smuggled materials

In the meantime, construction materials smuggled from Egypt are used for limited rebuilding in the strip.

In early December, Gaza’s Ministry of Public Works re-opened a high-rise block with 36 flats, not far from where the Batch brothers now live in East Jabalia.

Neil Jebb, who leads the UN’s shelter cluster in Gaza, said: “From 20 June to now, a lot more glass, doors, windows and bathroom fittings have been coming through from Israel but they are little good without walls. If you’ve lost your home and you’re poor, the easing of the blockade has had almost no impact.”

The Israeli government has approved only 7 percent of the building plans for UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) projects in Gaza, including schools, medical centres and housing units.

Restrictions applied by European and American donors on international agencies forbidding the use of materials brought through the tunnels mean UN agencies are powerless to rebuild the homes of thousands of vulnerable families.

Jebb says the blockade is having a greater negative impact on the international agencies in Gaza than on Hamas.

“I’m not very optimistic donors will change their policies – we could be two to three years down the line without any change in our access to basic building materials. As long as these donor policies are in place, the Ministry of Public Works will lead the reconstruction effort using material from Egypt.”

For Farid Batch, and thousands of others whose homes are still in ruins, whether bricks and steel come from Egypt or Israel, Hamas or the UN, is irrelevant. His urgent priority is finding somewhere for his family to live. “The most basic human need is to have a roof over your head but I have no idea if we will have a home in January. This is a crisis.”

pg/at/mw

Nigeria charges Dick Cheney in Halliburton bribery case

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40555171/ns/world_news-africa/

By JON GAMBRELL

The Associated Press

updated 12/7/2010 4:05:28 PM ET 2010-12-07T21:05:28

LAGOS, Nigeria — Nigeria’s anti-corruption agency on Tuesday charged former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney over a bribery scheme involving oil services firm Halliburton Co. during time he served as its top official, a spokesman said.

The charges stem from a case involving as much as $180 million allegedly paid in bribes to Nigerian officials, said Femi Babafemi, a spokesman for the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

Halliburton and other firms allegedly paid the bribes to win a contract to build a $6 billion liquefied natural gas plant in Nigeria’s oil-rich southern delta, he said.

Terrence O’Donnell, a lawyer representing Cheney, denied the allegations.

«The Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission investigated that joint venture extensively and found no suggestion of any impropriety by Dick Cheney in his role of CEO of Halliburton,» O’Donnell’s said in a statement sent to The Associated Press. «Any suggestion of misconduct on his part, made now, years later, is entirely baseless.»

The Halliburton case involves its former subsidiary KBR, a major engineering and construction services firm based in Houston. In February 2009, KBR Inc. pleaded guilty in U.S. federal court to authorizing and paying bribes from 1995 to 2004 for the plant contracts in Nigeria.

KBR, which split from Halliburton in 2007, agreed to pay more than $400 million in fines in the plea deal.

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Halliburton spokeswoman Tara Mullee Agard said the company had not seen the new charges Tuesday, but insisted the company had nothing to do with the project.

Babafemi said Halliburton, its Nigerian subsidiary, Halliburton CEO David J. Lesar, former KBR CEO Albert «Jack» Stanley and current KBR CEO William Utt all face similar charges in the case. The spokesman said each charge in the 16-count indictment carried as much as three years in prison.

Heather L. Browne, a KBR spokeswoman, said in a statement that Utt joined the firm in 2006, two years after prosecutors say the bribery case concluded.

«The actions of the Nigerian government suggest that its officials are wildly and wrongly asserting blame in this matter,» Browne’s statement read. «KBR will continue to vigorously defend itself and its executives, if necessary, in this matter.»

Stanley pleaded guilty in 2008 to federal bribery charges for his role in the scheme. He is scheduled to be sentenced in federal court on Jan. 19.

Nigeria, a major oil supplier to the U.S., long has been considered by analysts and watchdog groups as having one of the world’s most corrupt governments. Federal prosecutors in the U.S. have filed a series of charges over the construction of the Bonny Island liquefied natural gas plant under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. That law makes it unlawful for companies doing work in the U.S. to bribe foreign government officials or company executives to secure or retain business.

Cheney resigned as Halliburton’s CEO in 2000 to run as former President George W. Bush’s vice president. Babafemi declined to comment when asked how likely it was that Cheney would be extradited to Nigeria over the charges.

«We are following the laws of the land. We want to follow the laws and see where it will go,» the spokesman said. «We’re very convinced by the time the trial commences, we’d make application for appropriate court orders to be issued.»

There could be political calculations at play in the new charges. Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan faces a coming primary election in the nation’s ruling party against former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.

Critics have tried to connect Abubakar to this bribery case in the past and the charges come as the election looms. Abubakar has denied any involvement.

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Perlas informativas del mes de noviembre 2010

http://www.rebelion.org/noticias/mentiras_y_medios/2010/12/perlas-informativas-del-mes-de-noviembre-2010-118248

Pascual Serrano

Rebelión

InternacionalShakira, el cava y Haití 

Mientras en Haití mueren de cólera por beber agua contaminada, Shakira mostrará su solidaridad brindando con cava. No es broma, lo leímos en El Mundo el 5 de noviembre. La cantante colombiana protagonizará el spot publicitario navideño de Freixenet, “aunque será mediante su faceta filantrópica y solidaria” porque no cobrará nada y el dinero se destinará a Haití. Ahora todos podremos beber cava tranquilos mientras vemos en televisión los muertos por cólera en Haití.

Twitter y Bill Clinton

Tanto denunciaron que Chávez perseguía Twitter y la libertad en internet y ahora resulta que es Bill Clinton quien ha prohibido que se utilice durante sus discursos. Lo leímos en Los Angeles Times el 17 de noviembre.

Disidente

El 20 de noviembre titula la BBC: “Disidente cubano excarcelado: ‘La libertad te hace olvidar 25 años de cárcel'». Cuando lees el texto descubres las razones por las que el propio “disidente” explica que estaba en prisión en Cuba: «Sustraje unas armas, varias. Me encarcelaron y volví a salir. Cuando pude volví a sustraer otras armas. Queríamos rebelarnos contra el régimen castrista. Tenía 19 años pero era muy consciente». Si hiciera yo eso en España, ¿me llamarían disidente?

El malo presiona

Todas las informaciones sobre los incidentes entre las dos Coreas presentan a Corea del Norte como agresora. Es curiosa esta pequeña clave muy esclarecedora que apareció en la noticia de El País el 24 de noviembre: “el régimen de Kim Jong-il está presionando a la comunidad internacional para que regrese a la mesa de negociaciones sobre el desmantelamiento de su programa nuclear”. No serán tan malos los coreanos del norte si lo que pretenden es que los “buenos” se sienten a negociar con ellos el desmantelamiento de su programa nuclear.

Insurgentes moderados

Cómo se nota que, ante la imposibilidad de terminar con los talibanes en Afganistán, ahora el objetivo es llegar a un acuerdo con ellos y para eso es necesario suavizar la terrible imagen que los medios presentaron de los talibanes. Un pie de foto de El País el 24 de noviembre fue el siguiente: “El presidente Karzai, durante la reunión con insurgentes moderados el pasado octubre en Kabul”. Ahora son “insurgentes moderados”.

Titular no confuso

El 24 de noviembre el corresponsal de El Periódico escribía esto sobre los incidentes entre las dos coreas: “El origen del conflicto es confuso. Corea del Norte rebatió que fuera la primera en disparar y aseguró que solo respondió a una provocación. La postura de Pyongyang no es completamente descabellada. Seúl reconoció después que antes del incidente efectuaba maniobras militares y ensayos balísticos en la isla, aunque apuntando al oeste y no al norte”. A pesar de ello, después en la redacción lo tenían todo muy claro y le titularon: “Corea del Norte reta al mundo con el peor ataque al sur en años”.

Herederos

Para consolidar la imagen de que algunos presidentes son elegidos por mera vía sucesoria y no electoral hay que recurrir a expresiones como esta de El País el 24 de noviembre: “Trinidad Jiménez mantuvo una cena con el vicepresidente chino Xi Jinping, virtual heredero del actual líder chino, Hu Jintao”. En cambio nunca dirían que el vicepresidente español o estadounidense es el virtual heredero de Zapatero u Obama.

Ocho meses

Lo leímos en Público el 26 de noviembre en un breve de pocas líneas. Han pasado ocho meses de las elecciones en Iraq y ahora es cuando el presidente encarga al primer ministro que forme gobierno. La noticia importante fue el anuncio de que se celebraban elecciones, después a los medios les dejó de importar si esas elecciones servían para algo.

Jubilación en Bolivia

Mientras aquí se habla de aumentar la edad de jubilación y privatizar servicios, los medios evitan contarnos que no es igual en el resto del mundo. En Bolivia, tan menospreciada por nuestros analistas y políticos, el gobierno ha decidido bajar la edad de jubilación de 65 a 58 años para que puedan cobrar los más pobres. No sólo eso, Evo Morales también prevé nacionalizar los planes de pensiones privados de bancos como BBVA y Zurich. Lo supimos gracias a La Vanguardia el 26 de noviembre. De forma que cuando se quita el BBVA y se pone el estado boliviano en lugar del español la edad de jubilación puede bajar en lugar de subir.

Ataque internacional

Las reacciones a Wikileaks ha provocado muchas perlas. Una de ellas la vimos en El País el 30 de noviembre. La secretaria de Estado Hillary Clinton afirmó, al hacerse público que Estados Unidos tenía a sus diplomáticos de la ONU dedicados a vigilar al resto de los países, que se trataba de “un ataque a la comunidad internacional”. Pero el ataque no es lo que hacían sus diplomáticos sino descubrirlo.

Desestabilizar con cotilleos

Un ejemplo más de la coordinación de la Unión Europea. Según el ministro de Exteriores alemán las revelaciones de wikileaks son “cotilleos y chismorreos”, y según su homólogo italiano son “el 11-S de la diplomacia europea” y acusó a wikileaks de querer “desestabilizar el mundo”. Las leímos en El País el 30 de noviembre. Podría hacer la UE un comunicado consensuado donde se dijese que las filtraciones son intento de desestabilizar el mundo mediante cotilleos.

España

Por el IVA El 17 de noviembre todos los medios españoles titulaban que “la subida del IVA hace caer el consumo un 1’1%” (Telecinco, EITB, regionales de Vocento, El Mundo…). Me pregunto por qué todos achacan a la subida de impuesto el que la gente consuma menos. Podría haber sido la congelación de las pensiones, la bajada del sueldo de los empleados públicos, el aumento del trabajo precario, la suspensión del Estado del chequé bebé, la disminución de las ayudas a la dependencia. Sin embargo, ningún medio se planteó que alguna de esas decisiones gubernamentales, criticadas desde la izquierda, pudiera afectar a la bajada del consumo.

Prisa y Telecinco

Lo comentaba la sección de “visto/dicho/oído” de Público el 26 de noviembre. Ya era coincidencia que una vez formalizada la compra de Cuatro (Prisa) por Telecinco, El País Semanal (Prisa) comenzase a trabajar en un reportaje sobre el programa de televisión Sálvame (que se emite en Telecinco).

Cada tres meses

Leo en Público el 26 de noviembre que las empresas telefónicas han pactado un código de “buenas prácticas” por el que “no llamarán en tres meses al consumidor que manifieste no tener interés en una propuesta comercial y limitarán los horarios a los menos intrusivos”. Me parece una burla, si plantean esa “buena práctica” no es por respeto al consumidor, sino porque se han puesto de acuerdo en que ninguno lo hará. Por otro lado, si el ciudadano ha manifestado que no tiene interés, la ley establece que no se le debe volver a llamar no esperar tres meses ni limitar los horarios.

* Perla comercial

Veo a toda página en El País el 5 de diciembre un anuncio de leche Puleva. Es eslogan es “¡Girar y listo!”. La novedad y su argumento de venta es “Nuevo tapón, más fácil de abrir. Al girarlo, el tapón rasga el precinto de garantía de aluminio del envase”. Eso es todo lo que nos cuentan de la leche, al final su supuesta ventaja con respecto a otras leches no es ni que sea mejor, ni más sana, el descubrimiento por el que debemos elegir esa marca es porque lleva un tapón que se gira y se abre la caja.

Pascual Serrano es periodista. Acaba de publicar el libro «Traficantes de información. La historia oculta de los grupos de comunicación españoles». Foca. Noviembre 2010

Www.pascualserrano.net
Rebelión ha publicado este artículo con el permiso del autor mediante una licencia de Creative Commons, respetando su libertad para publicarlo en otras fuentes.

Periodista de El Paìs que ataca a Venezuela y Cuba conspiraba con los golpistas en el 2002

http://www.argenpress.info/2010/12/periodista-de-el-pais-que-ataca.html

Jean-Guy Allard

Juan Jesús Aznárez, el autor de un texto publicado este miércoles primero de diciembre por el diario madrileño El País, denigrando a Cuba y Venezuela a partir de un documento de Wikileaks, era corresponsal del periodico en Caracas en los días del golpe de Estado del 2002 y frecuentaba con asiduidad la Embajada española, la de Estados Unidos y al golpista Pedro Carmona.

Lo cuenta José Manuel Fernández, asesor parlamentario de Izquierda Unida de España, en un texto publicado hace meses en un blog madrileño.

Añade Fernández una terrible anécdota: Aznárez “coincidió en vísperas del golpe de Estado con el enviado de El Mundo, en el aeropuerto caraqueño de Maiquetía, y le confió que «Chávez se va a enterar quién es Jesús de Polanco, que siempre logra lo que quiere. Dentro de unos días hablamos».

El referido Jesús de Polanco, es el fundador del grupo Prisa, dueño del diario El País. Falleció en 2007.

Fernández completa el retrato señalando que Juan Jesús Aznárez, mantenía entonces estrechos contactos con el embajador de España, Manuel Viturro, con el embajador de Estados Unidos, Charles Shapiro, y con al presidente de Fedecámaras Pedro Carmona Estanga, el “líder” del fracasado intento de poner fin a la Revolución bolivariana.

El texto de Aznárez publicado por El País y titulado “Los espías cubanos actúan por libre en Venezuela y despachan con Chávez” intenta demostrar que no son los cientos de funcionarios de inteligencia estadounidenses que se activan en Venezuela que agraden el país sino que ellos son víctimas de la curiosidad de “un equipo bajo control cubano”. Una afirmación que carece por cierto de fundamento.

Sin embargo, la colaboración servil de El País con los golpistas ha sido ilustrada de manera inequívoca por la actuación de la jefa de su oficina en Caracas, Ludmila Vinogradoff, asesora y amiga personal del magnate Gustavo Cisneros.

Irónicamente, para el diario madrileño Cuba, Venezuela y los demás países del Sur agredidos por el gigantesco aparato de inteligencia norteamericano deben quedarse de brazos cruzados ante las operaciones masivas de injerencia, penetración, espionaje, subversión y desestabilización que desencadena Washington a golpes de miles de millones de dólares para provocar el derrocamiento de sus gobiernos.

Álvarez había dado otra demostración de la objetividad con la cua se trabaja en Prisa cuando se trata de los amigos de Hugo Chávez, el 24 de mayo de 2005 publicó otra obra inmortal en el mismo diario bajo el título «La red de amigos de Cuba» y el antetítulo «El régimen cubano cuenta, gracias a las simpatías políticas o a la penetración de sus servicios secretos, con una amplia plataforma de vigilancia y apoyo en España».

En él atacaba al prestigioso sitio web Rebelión como “la punta de lanza de una defensa a ultranza de la causa» de la Revolución cubana.

No hay la menor duda, para cualquier observador de las actividades de inteligencia de Estados Unidos, como a la propia lectura de los documentos de Wikileaks que enseñan el modus vivendi de la monstruosa estructura diplomática de Estados Unidos que la salida al publico de las llamadas filtraciones ha sido piloteada desde adentro por los “corresponsales” de la compañía.

El País, que encabeza desde años campañas de difamación contra los gobiernos progresistas de América latina no iba a perder la menor oportunidad de recuperar el escándalo Wikileaks para seguir con sus ataques a todo lo que suena socialismo en este continente que sigue llevando huellas fatales del colonialismo español.

El periódico que en el curso de los años se ha identificado de manera siempre más cruda con el poder imperial de Estados Unidos, las transnacionales hispanas y la peste falangista del Partido Popular, pertenece al Grupo Prisa, un gigantesco cartel mediático que extiende sus tentáculos desde la capital de España a toda América Latina.

Al recibir de Julian Assange, el fundador de Wikileaks, de manera algo sorprendente, el privilegio de manejar las decenas de miles de documentos secretos del Departamento de Estado, el diario entendió que le tocaba la tarea de orientar el escándalo a favor de sus intereses de corporación multinacional y de los que le proveen protección y asistencia.

Dueño del País, el Grupo Prisa se ha convertido en los últimos años en un monstruo internacional de la comunicación que controla más de MIL emisoras en España, Estados Unidos, México, Panamá, Costa Rica, Colombia, Panamá, Argentina y Chile, con cerca de 30 millones de oyentes.

En Colombia, Prisa controla el potente grupo Radio Caracol como en México, detiene a Radiópolis y Televisa. Mientras en los propios Estados Unidos cuenta con GLR Networks con unas 60 emisoras afiliadas. Prisa está ahora presente en 22 países con más de 10 000 trabajadores.

Ya se sabe que El País y los otros cuatro gigantes de la prensa comercial que recibieron copia del material almacenado por Wikileaks avisaron al Departamento de Estado con antelación de la publicación en estos días de este material explosivo.

Ted Koppel: Olbermann, O’Reilly and the death of real news

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/12/AR2010111202857.html?hpid=topnews

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Discussion Policy
By Ted Koppel
Sunday, November 14, 2010
To witness Keith Olbermann – the most opinionated among MSNBC’s left-leaning, Fox-baiting, money-generating hosts – suspended even briefly last week for making financial contributions to Democratic political candidates seemed like a whimsical, arcane holdover from a long-gone era of television journalism, when the networks considered the collection and dissemination of substantive and unbiased news to be a public trust.

Back then, a policy against political contributions would have aimed to avoid even the appearance of partisanship. But today, when Olbermann draws more than 1 million like-minded viewers to his program every night precisely because he is avowedly, unabashedly and monotonously partisan, it is not clear what misdemeanor his donations constituted. Consistency?

We live now in a cable news universe that celebrates the opinions of Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, Chris Matthews, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly – individuals who hold up the twin pillars of political partisanship and who are encouraged to do so by their parent organizations because their brand of analysis and commentary is highly profitable.

The commercial success of both Fox News and MSNBC is a source of nonpartisan sadness for me. While I can appreciate the financial logic of drowning television viewers in a flood of opinions designed to confirm their own biases, the trend is not good for the republic. It is, though, the natural outcome of a growing sense of national entitlement. Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s oft-quoted observation that «everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts,» seems almost quaint in an environment that flaunts opinions as though they were facts.

And so, among the many benefits we have come to believe the founding fathers intended for us, the latest is news we can choose. Beginning, perhaps, from the reasonable perspective that absolute objectivity is unattainable, Fox News and MSNBC no longer even attempt it. They show us the world not as it is, but as partisans (and loyal viewers) at either end of the political spectrum would like it to be. This is to journalism what Bernie Madoff was to investment: He told his customers what they wanted to hear, and by the time they learned the truth, their money was gone.

It is also part of a pervasive ethos that eschews facts in favor of an idealized reality. The fashion industry has apparently known this for years: Esquire magazine recently found that men’s jeans from a variety of name-brand manufacturers are cut large but labeled small. The actual waist sizes are anywhere from three to six inches roomier than their labels insist.

Perhaps it doesn’t matter that we are being flattered into believing what any full-length mirror can tell us is untrue. But when our accountants, bankers and lawyers, our doctors and our politicians tell us only what we want to hear, despite hard evidence to the contrary, we are headed for disaster. We need only look at our housing industry, our credit card debt, the cost of two wars subsidized by borrowed money, and the rising deficit to understand the dangers of entitlement run rampant. We celebrate truth as a virtue, but only in the abstract. What we really need in our search for truth is a commodity that used to be at the heart of good journalism: facts – along with a willingness to present those facts without fear or favor.

To the degree that broadcast news was a more virtuous operation 40 years ago, it was a function of both fear and innocence. Network executives were afraid that a failure to work in the «public interest, convenience and necessity,» as set forth in the Radio Act of 1927, might cause the Federal Communications Commission to suspend or even revoke their licenses. The three major broadcast networks pointed to their news divisions (which operated at a loss or barely broke even) as evidence that they were fulfilling the FCC’s mandate. News was, in a manner of speaking, the loss leader that permitted NBC, CBS and ABC to justify the enormous profits made by their entertainment divisions.

On the innocence side of the ledger, meanwhile, it never occurred to the network brass that news programming could be profitable.

Until, that is, CBS News unveiled its «60 Minutes» news magazine in 1968. When, after three years or so, «60 Minutes» turned a profit (something no television news program had previously achieved), a light went on, and the news divisions of all three networks came to be seen as profit centers, with all the expectations that entailed.

I recall a Washington meeting many years later at which Michael Eisner, then the chief executive of Disney, ABC’s parent company, took questions from a group of ABC News correspondents and compared our status in the corporate structure to that of the Disney artists who create the company’s world-famous cartoons. (He clearly and sincerely intended the analogy to flatter us.) Even they, Eisner pointed out, were expected to make budget cuts; we would have to do the same.

I mentioned several names to Eisner and asked if he recognized any. He did not. They were, I said, ABC correspondents and cameramen who had been killed or wounded while on assignment. While appreciating the enormous talent of the corporation’s cartoonists, I pointed out that working on a television crew, covering wars, revolutions and natural disasters, was different. The suggestion was not well received.

Phone cancer report ‘buried’

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article1655012.ece

2007

Daniel Foggo

T-MOBILE, the mobile phone giant, has been accused of “burying” a scientific report it commissioned that concluded handsets and masts contribute to cancer and genetic damage.

The report argued that officially recommended limits on radiation exposure should be cut to 1/1000th of those in force. The suggestion has not been taken up by the company or by regulators.

Campaigners claimed T-Mobile’s handling of the report was part of a wider pattern of behaviour by the industry in its efforts to keep discussion of the health risks off the agenda.

The Ecolog Institute, which has been researching mobile phone technology since 1992, was paid by T-Mobile to evaluate evidence on its potential dangers.

But Dr Peter Neitzke, one of the authors of the report, has accused T-Mobile, which has about 17m British customers, of diluting the findings by commissioning other studies from which it knew “no critical results or recommendations were to be expected”.

Guidance from the Health Protection Agency states that, while there is no conclusive evidence phones or masts jeopardise health, the technology has been in existence for only a relatively short time. It recommends that caution should be exercised in siting masts and using phones a lot, particularly where children are affected.

The Ecolog study, drawn up in 2000 and updated three years later, has only been published in Germany and was unknown to British campaigners until it was recently leaked to the Human Ecological Social Economic project (HESE), which examines the effect of electromagnetic fields on health.

Andrea Klein, a member of HESE, said: “T-Mobile tried to dilute and bury it.”

Ecolog’s report, which analysed dozens of peer-reviewed studies, stated: “Given the results of the present epidemiological studies, it can be concluded that electromagnetic fields with frequencies in the mobile telecommunications range do play a role in the development of cancer.

“This is particularly notable for tumours of the central nervous system.”

Neitzke said that once T-Mobile realised the likely outcome of his study it commissioned further research.

The phone company said: “It was the aim of T-Mobile to engage four different institutes with the same questions to guarantee an independent and objective discussion. All the institutes and people involved are well known and respected experts.”