SI
SI
discoversearch

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor.  We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community.  If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.
Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Skeeter Bug who wrote (181086)2/2/2009 4:43:51 PM
From: Broken_ClockRead Replies (1) | Respond to of 306849
 
BC, i don't think he does that. if he does, though, my level of concern will start to head in the direction of "bushevic alert."
===

If your alarm isn't flashing, I suggest you check the batteries. I wonder if the Obama Kool Aid gang still denies Obama's campaign speech about a Civilian National Security Force? Total denial seems to be the operative mindset. Can't blame Bush for this one. Time to face facts, this is Bush III presidency.

infowars.com

Defense Department Announces Civilian Expeditionary Workforce
Steve Watson
Infowars.net
Friday, Jan 30th, 2009

The Defense Department has established a "civilian expeditionary workforce" that will see American civilians trained and equipped to deploy overseas in support of worldwide military missions.
The move is seen by some as an initial step towards fulfilling president Obama’s promise to form a civilian national security force as powerful as the U.S. military.
The intent of the program “is to maximize the use of the civilian workforce to allow military personnel to be fully utilized for operational requirements,” according to a Defense Department report.
The program was officially implemented one week ago, on the 23rd January, when Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England signed Defense Department Directive 1404.10 (PDF), which provides a summation of the duties the workforce will undertake.
The directive, which is effective immediately, states that civilian employees of the DoD will be asked to sign agreements stating that they will deploy in support of military missions for up to two years if needed.
Workforce members, who are divided into different designations under the directive, will serve overseas in support of humanitarian, reconstruction and, if necessary, combat-support missions.
"If the employee does not wish to deploy, every effort will be made to reassign the employee to a nondeploying position." the DoD report states.
While the directive suggests that the DoD will at first seek volunteers to serve in the civilian workforce, section 4, subsection (e) paragraph (2) states:
Management retains the authority to direct and assign civilian employees, either voluntarily, involuntarily, or on an unexpected basis to accomplish the DoD mission.
In addition, the directive states that all workforce members will be subject to physical and psychological testing, both before and after deployment.
The directive refers several times to the civilian workforce as a component of the "Total Force", which it describes as "The organizations, units, and individuals that compromise the DoD resources for implementing the National Security Strategy." This "Total Force" includes active, reserve and retired military personnel in addition to DoD civilian employees.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Back in July 2008, Barack Obama, then the presidential front runner, called for a "civilian national security force" as powerful as the U.S. military.
"We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded," Obama told a Colorado Springs audience.
The comments that were ignored by the vast majority of the corporate media but were found to be troubling by some independent journalists who compared the idea to the formation of the Nazi Hitler Youth.
Fears of "youth brigades" or civilian stasi style units increased following Obama’s appointment of Rahm Emanuel to chief-of staff.
In his book, "The Plan: Big Ideas for America," Emanuel writes: "It’s time for a real Patriot Act that brings out the patriot in all of us. We propose universal civilian service for every young American. Under this plan, all Americans between the ages of 18 and 25 will be asked to serve their country by going through three months of basic training, civil defense preparation and community service."
The book also notes, "Some Republicans will squeal about individual freedom, ruling out any likelihood that they would let people opt out of universal citizen service."
Emanuel is also an enthusiastic supporter of the United States Public Service Academy Act, a lobbying group founded in 2006 in order to promote the foundation of an American public service academy modeled on the military academies - a youth corps whose students would be trained in "civilian internship in the armed forces".
Furthermore, in a rediscovered 2006 audio clip of an interview with Ben Smith of the New York Daily News, Emanuel outlined the agenda for compulsory military-style training, essentially a domestic draft, aimed at preparing Americans for a chemical or biological terrorist attack.
When controversy arose over the program last November, the use of the word "required" to describe the program was removed from Obama’s change.gov website and replaced with "community service" type terminology.
Though the civilian expeditionary workforce program is restricted to DoD employees, similar programs have already been established for public sector workers.
One such program has seen hundreds of police, firefighters, paramedics and utility workers recently trained and dispatched as "Terrorism Liaison Officers" in Colorado, Arizona and California to watch for "suspicious activity" which is later fed into a secret government database.



To: Skeeter Bug who wrote (181086)2/2/2009 4:47:33 PM
From: Broken_ClockRespond to of 306849
 
More Bushevic policies in place to stay. But hey, we're closing Gitmo....we'll just torture them a little further from home after we illegally kidnap them.

infowars.com

Obama preserves rendition two days after taking office
Jeremy Gantz
Raw Story
February 2, 2009
Two days after taking the helm of a country ready for change after eight years of George W. Bush, President Obama has allowed one controversial "War on Terror" tactic to remain in place: rendition.
Despite frequent condemnation of the practice around the world, rendition — the secret capture, transportation and detention of suspected terrorists to foreign prisons in countries that cooperate with the U.S. — remains in the CIA’s playbook, thanks to a Jan. 22 executive order issued by President Obama.
Other executive orders shuttered the CIA’s secret prisons and banned the harsh interrogation techniques that have been termed torture. And in his most widely noticed break with his predecessor, Obama signed an order to close Guantanamo Bay’s prison within one year.
But rendition will remain. Obama and his administration appear to believe that the rendition program was one piece of the Bush administration’s war on terrorism that it could not afford to discard, the Los Angeles Times reported.
An administration official told the newspaper anonymously: "Obviously you need to preserve some tools — you still have to go after the bad guys. The legal advisors working on this looked at rendition. It is controversial in some circles and kicked up a big storm in Europe. But if done within certain parameters, it is an acceptable practice."
A D V E R T I S E M E N T

The momentous decision by Obama and his young administration appeared in a small provision of one executive order, which states that instructions to close the CIA’s secret prison sites "do not refer to facilities used only to hold people on a short-term, transitory basis."
Under that language, the Soviet-era black site used by the CIA between 2002 and 2004 and revealed by Raw Story in 2007 would remain open. Intelligence officials signaled the facility would no longer be used after it received broad public attention in the Polish press.
In late 2007, the U.S. House voted to effectively end CIA renditions. But that prohibition, part of a $50 billion Iraq funding bill, was never passed in the Senate. Also in 2007, Congress apologized for the wrongful detainment of Canadian citizen Maher Arar, who was "rendered" to Syria, where he was tortured into making a false confession.
Obama’s decision to continue rendition on an apparently limited basis revives questions about the tactic’s effectiveness — not to mention legality.
"The reason we did interrogations [ourselves] is because renditions for the most part weren’t very productive," a former senior CIA official told the Los Angeles Times anonymously.
But surprisingly, Human Rights Watch — the worldwide watchdog group that vehemently opposed Bush-era secret detentions facilities and torture tactics — supports Obama’s decision to continue the practice of rendition.
"Under limited circumstances, there is a legitimate place" for renditions, Tom Malinowski, the Washington advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, told the Los Angeles Times. "What I heard loud and clear from the president’s order was that they want to design a system that doesn’t result in people being sent to foreign dungeons to be tortured…"
But the former CIA official wasn’t quite so optimistic.
"In some ways, [rendition] is the worst option," the former official said. "If [the prisoners] are in U.S. hands, you have a lot of checks and balances, medics and lawyers. Once you turn them over to another service, you lose control."