On an August morning in 1978, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 racer, drive at breakneck speed through the heart of Paris early in the morning . The film was limited for technical reasons to 10 minutes; the course was from Porte Dauphine , through the Louvre, to the Basilica of Sacre Coeur.
No streets were closed, for Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit. The driver completed the course in about 9 minutes, reaching nearly 140 MPH in some stretches. The footage reveals him running real red lights, nearly hitting real pedestrians, and driving the wrong way up real one-way streets. Upon showing the film in public for the first time, Lelouch was arrested. He has never revealed the identity of the driver, and the film went underground. It's still a classic. Turn on your sound and enjoy.
Newly discovered documents reveal that in the months immediately following the purported 1947 UFO crash at Roswell, secret government studies began on a material that was previously unknown to science. The "memory metal" that was studied precisely matches some of the debris material reported by several witnesses to the crash. Evidence shows that -under military direction- these unique metal studies were undertaken by a contracted laboratory that possessed advanced technical capabilities that the U.S. government itself did not have at the time. A former high-level scientist employed by the involved laboratory has offered a confession that he was tasked to study the crashed UFO material. Information provided by two U.S. Air Force Generals also offers direct support for this discovery.
The documents suggest that after the crash, the US government attempted to develop a unique material that is today referred to as memory metal. This shape-recovery alloy was reported by several witnesses to the Roswell crash in the summer of 1947. The lightweight "morphing" material was able to be crumpled or deformed and then return itself instantly and seamlessly to its original state. The metallurgical discoveries that resulted from these studies were then "seeded" for further technology development to other government agencies (including NASA) and through a series of military contracts to universities and industry.
The laboratory contracted by Wright Patterson Air Force Base to perform these studies was Battelle Memorial Institute in Columbus, OH. It has been credibly reported that Wright Patterson Air Force Base was the very base where the Roswell UFO debris was flown after the crash.
The Party of NO has released its lunatics to attack the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor just as predicted. The loonies are lining up. Of course it is difficult to criticize a woman born to Puerto Rican parents and raised in the South Bronx who contracted diabetes at age 8, lost her father at age 9, and still managed to be #2 in her class at Princeton where she graduated Summa cum laude, and on the Law Review at Yale Law School. Not surprising, some of the Republican hatchet man are criticizing her lack of intellect!
At a lecture delivered at the University of California School of Law in Berkeley in 2001, Ms. Sotomayor said, "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." Rush Limbaugh and others of his ilk such as Karl Rove and Newt Gingrich have jumped on this statement and have called her a racist.
Here is the well known racist, Rush Limbaugh speaking about Ms. Sotomayor:
Not to be outdone, old and worn Newt Gingrich still clings to hopes of running for President in 2012 and continues to make foolish statements every time he gets a chance. Here is his retort:
The speech Ms. Sotomayor gave that day was a long one. We are posting the last portion of it to demonstrate how a sentence or two can be taken out of context and completely change the meaning and intent of the statement. Rush and Newt know better, but they have nothing more to do but make complete and utter fools of themselves.
Congratulations on your nomination, Ms. Sotomayor, you are very deserving. Mr. Oxycontin needs to crawl back into his racist hole and hibernate. Finally, the Republican Party should disband in the interest of humanity. They have led us into an unjustified war, have failed to protect the country when they were in power, have raided the treasury and left the economy in shambles, and have destroyed the very freedoms and liberties that many have fought for over the years.
"Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice O'Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O'Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.
Let us not forget that wise men like Oliver Wendell Holmes and Justice Cardozo voted on cases which upheld both sex and race discrimination in our society. Until 1972, no Supreme Court case ever upheld the claim of a woman in a gender discrimination case. I, like Professor Carter, believe that we should not be so myopic as to believe that others of different experiences or backgrounds are incapable of understanding the values and needs of people from a different group. Many are so capable. As Judge Cedarbaum pointed out to me, nine white men on the Supreme Court in the past have done so on many occasions and on many issues including Brown.
However, to understand takes time and effort, something that not all people are willing to give. For others, their experiences limit their ability to understand the experiences of others. Other simply do not care. Hence, one must accept the proposition that a difference there will be by the presence of women and people of color on the bench. Personal experiences affect the facts that judges choose to see. My hope is that I will take the good from my experiences and extrapolate them further into areas with which I am unfamiliar. I simply do not know exactly what that difference will be in my judging. But I accept there will be some based on my gender and my Latina heritage.
I also hope that by raising the question today of what difference having more Latinos and Latinas on the bench will make will start your own evaluation. For people of color and women lawyers, what does and should being an ethnic minority mean in your lawyering? For men lawyers, what areas in your experiences and attitudes do you need to work on to make you capable of reaching those great moments of enlightenment which other men in different circumstances have been able to reach. For all of us, how do change the facts that in every task force study of gender and race bias in the courts, women and people of color, lawyers and judges alike, report in significantly higher percentages than white men that their gender and race has shaped their careers, from hiring, retention to promotion and that a statistically significant number of women and minority lawyers and judges, both alike, have experienced bias in the courtroom?
Each day on the bench I learn something new about the judicial process and about being a professional Latina woman in a world that sometimes looks at me with suspicion. I am reminded each day that I render decisions that affect people concretely and that I owe them constant and complete vigilance in checking my assumptions, presumptions and perspectives and ensuring that to the extent that my limited abilities and capabilities permit me, that I reevaluate them and change as circumstances and cases before me requires. I can and do aspire to be greater than the sum total of my experiences but I accept my limitations. I willingly accept that we who judge must not deny the differences resulting from experience and heritage but attempt, as the Supreme Court suggests, continuously to judge when those opinions, sympathies and prejudices are appropriate.
There is always a danger embedded in relative morality, but since judging is a series of choices that we must make, that I am forced to make, I hope that I can make them by informing myself on the questions I must not avoid asking and continuously pondering. We, I mean all of us in this room, must continue individually and in voices united in organizations that have supported this conference, to think about these questions and to figure out how we go about creating the opportunity for there to be more women and people of color on the bench so we can finally have statistically significant numbers to measure the differences we will and are making.
I am delighted to have been here tonight and extend once again my deepest gratitude to all of you for listening and letting me share my reflections on being a Latina voice on the bench. Thank you."
The garbage food industry dovetails nicely with the medical-industrial complex. You spend the first 50 to 60 years of your life filling the garbage food merchants' coffers and then the rest of your life paying expensive doctors to hand you very expensive pills.
Some people aren't that lucky and don't make it that long. Other get smart and opt out. In case you have any doubts, this is what the typical American diet does to the human body. Your body. Here is the entire story in the full-length movie, SUPER SIZE ME. Sit back, get out the popcorn and enjoy!
For those who don't have the time to watch a full-length movie, we recommend this abbreviated version:
Yesterday, President Obama nominated his choice to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter. We thought it would be nice for you to get to know her BEFORE the Republicans launch their predictable smear campaign against her.
1. Judge Sotomayor would bring more federal judicial experience to the bench than any Supreme Court justice in 100 years. Over her three-decade career, she has served in a wide variety of legal roles, including as a prosecutor, litigator, and judge.
2. Judge Sotomayor is a trailblazer. She was the first Latina to serve on the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and was the youngest member of the court when appointed to the District Court for the Southern District of New York. If confirmed, she will be the first Hispanic to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court.
3. While on the bench, Judge Sotomayor has consistently protected the rights of working Americans, ruling in favor of health benefits and fair wages for workers in several cases.
4. Judge Sotomayor has shown strong support for First Amendment rights, including in cases of religious expression and the rights to assembly and free speech.
5. Judge Sotomayor has a strong record on civil rights cases, ruling for plaintiffs who had been discriminated against based on disability, sex and race.
6. Judge Sotomayor embodies the American dream. Born to Puerto Rican parents, she grew up in a South Bronx housing project and was raised from age nine by a single mother, excelling in school and working her way to graduate summa cum laude from Princeton University, and to become an editor of the Law Journal at Yale Law School.
7. In 1995, Judge Sotomayor "saved baseball" when she stopped the owners from illegally changing their bargaining agreement with the players, thereby ending the longest professional sports walk-out in history.
8. Judge Sotomayor ruled in favor of the environment in a case of protecting aquatic life in the vicinity of power plants in 2007, a decision that was overturned by the Roberts Supreme Court.
9. In 1992, Judge Sotomayor was confirmed by the Senate without opposition after being appointed to the bench by George H.W. Bush.
10. Judge Sotomayor is a widely respected legal figure, having been described as "...an outstanding colleague with a keen legal mind," "highly qualified for any position in which wisdom, intelligence, collegiality and good character would be assets," and "a role model of aspiration, discipline, commitment, intellectual prowess and integrity."Judge Sotomayor is an historic, uniquely qualified nominee to the Supreme Court. Let's make sure we get a prompt, fair confirmation on her nomination.
Sources: 1. White House Statement, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51451&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=1
2. White House Statement, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51451&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=2
3. Cases: Archie v. Grand Cent. Partnership, 997 F. Supp. 504 (S.D.N.Y. 1998) and Marcella v. Capital Dist. Physicians' Health Plan, Inc., 293 F.3d 42 (2d Cir. 2002).
4. Cases: Flamer v. White Plains, 841 F. Supp. 1365 (S.D.N.Y. 1993), Ford v. McGinnis, 352 F.3d 382 (2d Cir. 2003), and Campos v. Coughlin, 854 F. Supp. 194 (S.D.N.Y. 1994).
5a. "Sotomayor's Notable Court Opinions and Articles," The New York Times, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51454&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=3
5b. Cases: Bartlett v. N.Y. State Board, 970 F. Supp. 1094 (S.D.N.Y. 1997), Greenbaum v. Svenska Hendelsbanken, 67 F.Supp.2d 228 (S.D.N.Y. 1999), Raniola v. Bratton, 243 F.3d 610 (2d Cir. 2001), and Gant v. Wallingford Board of Education, 195 F.3d 134 (2d Cir. 1999).
6. "Sonia Sotomayor: 10 Things You Should Know," The Huffington Post, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51452&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=4
7. "How Sotomayor 'Saved' Baseball," Time, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51455&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=5
8. "Sotomayor's resume, record on notable cases," CNN, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51453&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=6
9. "Sotomayor's resume, record on notable cases," CNN, May 26, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51453&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=7
10a. Judge Richard C. Wesley, a George W. Bush appointee to the Second Circuit. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51451&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=8
10b. "Sotomayor is Highly Qualified," The Wall Street Journal, May 9, 2009. http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51456&id=16226-8445154-lNb2eux&t=910c. Honorary Degree Citation, Pace University School of Law, 2003 Commencement
The tiny town of Hardin, Montana, is offering an answer to a very thorny question: Where should the nation put terror detainees if the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is shut down by the end of the year as President Obama has pledged?
Hardin, population 3,400, sits in the southeast corner of Montana, in the state's poorest county. Its small downtown is almost deserted at midday. The Dollar Store is going out of business. The Hardin Mini Mall is already shut. The town needs jobs -- and fast.
Hardin borrowed $27 million through bonds to build the Two Rivers Regional Correctional Facility in hopes of creating new employment opportunities. The jail was ready for prisoners two years ago, but has yet to house a single prisoner.
In the early 1990s at virtually the same time that General Motors was shredding all of its Electric Cars and selling its technology to the oil industry, Motor Development International (MDI) (www.mdi.lu) a French-based company headed by Guy Negre, was busy inventing the Air Car. A former aeronautics and Formula One racecar engineer, Mr. Negre has been working diligently with his son, Cyril, an engineer with Bugatti, and about thirty other engineers to bring the Compressed Air technology to market (CAT). To date, the company holds many patents in over 120 countries for their innovative Air Car vehicles.
French writer Jules Verne predicted in his book of 1860, “Paris in the 21st Century”, that the transportation system would be using compressed air. MDI has finally developed a way to make this prediction work. Zero Pollution Motors will manufacture and sell the compressed air vehicle in the US. It is estimated that the car will cost between $15,000 and $20,000.
Nice call, GM!
HOW IT WORKS
So, while GM was destroying a technology that could have helped the world in the interest of "greed", France was developing the World's Cleanest Car. To drive the world's cleanest car is no longer wishful thinking. The Compressed Air Vehicle is the first affordable and accessible clean car. It brings us our dream: to drive pollution-free and free of fuel dependency.
At Lower Speeds: Since the Compressed Air Vehicle is running exclusively on compressed air, it emit only air -- zero pollution. The air expelled from the tailpipe is actually cleaner than the air used to fill the tank. This is because before compression, the air is run through carbon filters to eliminate dirt, dust, humidity, and other urban air impurities that could hamper the engine's performance.
At Higher Speeds: At speeds over 35 mph, the CAV uses small amounts of fuel - either gasoline, propane, ethanol or bio-fuels to heat air inside a heating chamber as it enters the engine. This process produces emissions of only 0.141 lbs of CO2 per mile. That is up to 4 times less than the average vehicle and more than two times less than the cleanest vehicle available today. (Toyota Prius '07 emissions: 0.34 lbs of CO2 per mile. source: www.hybridcard.com.
For more than seven years, the American people have debated just who was actually behind the attacks on the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. We have the government-sponsored 19 hijackers and a few boxcutters theory. We have the Israeli false flag theory, and all kinds of questions in between. However, in thinking about all the information that has been forthcoming, it occurred to me that we can learn a whole lot about the attacks by simply asking new CIA director, Leon Panetta, to investigate. Here is the theory:
The conservative French newspaper, Le Figaro, reported in 2001 that Osama bin Laden spent the period of time between July 4 and July 14, 2001, at the American Hospital in Dubai where he underwent surgery.
During his stay in the hospital, he met with a CIA official. While on the World's "most wanted list", no attempt was made to arrest him during his two week stay in the hospital, shedding doubt on the Administration's resolve to track down Osama bin Laden.
Defense Secretary Rumsfeld stated that it would be difficult to find him and extradite him. Its like "searching for a needle in a stack of hay". But the US could have ordered his arrest and extradition in Dubai that July. But then they would not have had a pretext of waging a war.
"Having taken off from the Quetta airport in Pakistan, bin Laden was transferred to the hospital upon his arrival at Dubai airport. He was accompanied by his personal physician and faithful lieutenant, who could be Ayman al-Zawahari--but on this sources are not entirely certain--, four bodyguards, as well as a male Algerian nurse, and admitted to the American Hospital, a glass and marble building situated between the Al-Garhoud and Al-Maktoum bridges.
Each floor of the hospital has two "VIP" suites and fifteen rooms. The Saudi billionnaire was admitted to the well-respected urology department. As early as March, 2000, 'Asia Week,' published in Hong Kong, expressed concern for bin Laden's health, describing a serious medical problem that could put his life in danger because of "a kidney infection that is propagating itself to the liver and requires specialized treatment". According to authorized sources, bin Laden had mobile dialysis equipment shipped to his hideout in Kandahar in the first part of 2000.
While he was hospitalised, bin Laden received visits from many members of his family as well as prominent Saudis and Emiratis. During the hospital stay, the local CIA agent, known to many in Dubai, was seen taking the main elevator of the hospital to go to bin Laden's hospital room. A few days later, the CIA man bragged to a few friends about having visited bin Laden. Authorised sources say that on July 15th, the day after bin Laden returned to Quetta, the CIA agent was called back to headquarters."
Many questions arise.
Why was bin Laden not arrested as he was among the Most Wanted?
Who was the CIA agent who met with bin Laden and what did they discuss?
When that CIA agent reported back to headquarters, to whom did he report?
Dick Cheney?
Is it possible that the CIA agent was just finalizing preparations for the attack which was to come in less than two months?
GOVERNOR PLANS TO COMPLETELY ELIMINATE WELFARE FOR FAMILIES
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is proposing to completely eliminate the state’s welfare program for families, medical insurance for low-income children and Cal Grants cash assistance to college and university students.
The proposals to sharply scale back the assistance that California provides to its neediest residents came in testimony by the administration this afternoon at a joint legislative budget committee hearing. It followed comments by the governor earlier today that he would be withdrawing a proposal to help balance the budget with billions of dollars of borrowing and replacing it with program reductions.
The proposals would completely reshape the state’s social service network, transforming California from one of the country’s most generous states to one of the most tightfisted. The proposals are intended to help close a budget deficit estimated at $21.3 billion.
Dick Cheney swears that waterboarding is not torture. International and American law says it is. After World War II, we executed Japanese soldiers who waterboarded American and British soldiers. We have heard right-wing wimp Shawn Hannity rant on and on about how waterboarding is not torture and that he would agree to be waterboarded for charity. We're still waiting.
Chicago radio host Erich "Mancow" Muller decided he'd get himself waterboarded to prove the technique wasn't torture.
It didn't turn out that way. "Mancow," in fact, lasted just six or seven seconds before crying foul. Apparently, the experience went pretty badly -- "Witnesses said Muller thrashed on the table, and even instantly threw the toy cow he was holding as his emergency tool to signify when he wanted the experiment to stop," according to NBC Chicago.
"The average person can take this for 14 seconds," Marine Sergeant Clay South told his audience before he was waterboarded on air. "He's going to wiggle, he's going to scream, he's going to wish he never did this."
Approximately 7.6 million people die from cancer each year according to an article titled "ACS Report Focuses on Global Cancer Toll" which was published by the American Cancer Society. Now, as we sit helplessly by and watch public figures like Farrah Fawcett, Amy Mickelson, Steve Jobs, Lance Armstrong, Nelson Mandela, Ted Kennedy suffer from this horribly insidious disease, how long must it be before the U.S. Government owns up to the fact that they know a cure exists and releases the information to the general public?
The 1975 report of the federal government began its discussion of medical marijuana by stating "Cannabis is one of the most ancient healing drugs." The report further noted: "One should not, however, summarily dismiss the possibility of therapeutic usefulness simply because the plant is the subject of current sociopolitical controversy."
The list of medical uses of cannabis from historical references includes:
Interestingly, relief of many of the symptoms marijuana was used for in these illnesses are many of the same symptoms that have been proven in modern research. This should not be surprising unless we want to assume that all of the experience of thousands of years did not have some factual basis.
HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN MEDICINE
It is well known that a man named Rick Simpson in Canada, discovered that Hemp Oil with THC is successful in killing cancer cells and removing the symptoms of cancer. A member of the Royal Canadian Lodge, he was instrumental in making his own medicine and in curing dozens of members of his lodge and the local townspeople, many of whom were suffering from the devastating effects of various types of "incurable" cancer. Here is a short 8-minute video where Rick Simpson provides his public service by showing you how to prepare your own medicine:
Lately you can't find a day that goes by without watching another violent police beating of a civilian. Our local police look more and more like the military, and harsh treatment is becoming the rule, instead of the exception. Here's a video of a police chase that ends with the suspect's vehicle being overturned and the suspect being thrown clear and lying unconscious by the side of the road. Watch the heroic actions of the police as they take this dangerous unconscious suspect into custody. Thankfully, five of them have been fired.
