Australian counterterrorism forces detained 15 people Thursday in a series of suburban raids after receiving intelligence that the Islamic State movement was planning public beheadings in two Australian cities to demonstrate its reach.
About 800 federal and state police officers raided more than a dozen properties across 12 Sydney suburbs as part of the operation — the largest in Australian history, Australian Federal Police Deputy Commissioner Andrew Colvin told the Associated Press. Separate raids in the eastern cities of Brisbane and Logan were also conducted.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that the plan involved kidnapping randomly selected members of the public off the streets in Sydney and Brisbane, beheading them on camera, and releasing the recordings through Islamic State's propaganda arm in the Middle East.
Phi Beta Iota: It is worth noting that none of the regional countries including Jordan is ready to provide ground troops. They are all — without exception — sucking the USA in to be the target. On a positive note, for the first time in 50 years, there is a break in the ranks of the “insiders.” This is a very positive development. Any and all US activity — from mediocre intelligence support to repressive regimes to air strikes to boots on the ground — should be forbidden by the public — sadly, big money wants this war and is paying to make the public stupid in time for the 2014 elections. We are reminded of Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy, John Lennon, the Dixie Chicks. All right and all righteous in their time. All were also assassinated or marginalized for daring to confront the national security state that is formed and operated by traitors the FBI dares not go after. Can the Director of the FBI reconnect with his oath of office and his integrity and start making some inroads against traitors? We are not holding our breath.
What kind of country goes around bombing people with no strategic purpose and with little motive other than to “flex muscles” and “show toughness”? This answer also seems clear: one that is deeply insecure about its ongoing ability to project strength (and one whose elites benefit in terms of power and profit from endless war). … Is it even possible to imagine more potent evidence of systemic media failure than that (or systemic success, depending on what you think the media’s goal is)? But in terms of crazed irrationality, how far away from that false belief is the current fear on the part of Americans that there are ISIS sleeper cells “living in the United States”? … For those who keep running around beating their chests talking about the imperative to “destroy ISIS”: will that take more or less time than it’s taken to “destroy the Taliban”?
“You're still a superpower,” a top diplomat from one of America's most dependable Middle Eastern allies said to me in July of this year, “but you no longer know how to act like one.” He was reflecting on America's position in the world almost halfway into President Barack Obama's second term. Fresh in his mind was the extraordinary string of errors (schizophrenic Egypt policy, bipolar Syria policy), missteps (zero Libya post-intervention strategy, alienation of allies in the Middle East and elsewhere), scandals (spying on Americans, spying on friends), halfway measures (pinprick sanctions against Russia, lecture series to Central Americans on the border crisis), unfulfilled promises (Cairo speech, pivot to Asia), and outright policy failures (the double-down then get-out approach in Afghanistan, the shortsighted Iraq exit strategy).
The mass layoffs of older journalists around the world has had one benefit: there are plenty of experienced hands ready to train the next generation and provide institutional memory at innovative ventures. Some of these oldtimers, who aren’t busy teaching (or taking public relations jobs — but that’s a story for another time), are busy founding and running nonprofits dedicated to doing hard-driving, investigative reporting. These include: 100 Reporters, Global Journalism Investigative Network, Forum for African Investigative Reporters, Investigative Reporters and Editors, Investigative News Network, SCOOP, and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. All of these organizations are benefitting from experienced editors and reporters downsized from traditional media outlets and committed to helping the next generation — and learning from them, too.
• Lack of intelligence as well as Intelligence
• Intelligence begins at home, but should be deployed away
Given the resources available to US – and British – intelligence agencies, it seems strange that the attraction, influence, finance, and military strength, of the extremist group which calls itself Islamic State (Isis) came as such a surprise.
Major CDC Cover-up on Connection of Vaccines and Autism is About to Blow Open Like Mount Vesuvius
This story about a very big cover-up on the link between vaccines and autism committed by the CDC has been making the rounds on alternative media for the last ten days. The implications to be seen in this story so far are like the loud rumblings of a volcano about to blow. But if this volcano of a cover-up does blow open very soon into the mainstream, as is most likely – since alternative media outlets have reported on massive lawsuits being planned – given the connection, in this case to African-American children, this promises to rain down on the public a greater-than-ever-before awareness of corporatist-government collusion and corruption occurring on a massive, never-seen-before scale. Until now, the identity of the CDC whistle-blower was kept a secret, but his name is now out (highlights are mine):
Bellingcat will bring together both critically acclaimed and emerging citizen investigative journalists using open source information to investigate, collaborate, and report on worldwide issues that are being underreported and ignored.
Open source information, which is information freely available to anyone through the Internet—think YouTube, Google Maps, Reddit—has made it possible for ANYONE to gather information and source others, through social media networks. Think the Syrian Civil War. Think the Arab Spring.
