11 Society – Page 263 – Public Intelligence Blog

2011/06/132011/06/13

Whistle-Blowers of 1777 & Congressional Intent

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Autonomous Internet, Civil Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, Government, IO Impotency, Law Enforcement, Officers Call

The Whistle-Blowers of 1777

Stephen M. Kohn

New York Times, 12 June 2011

The tension between protecting true national security secrets and ensuring the public’s “right to know” about abuses of authority is not new. Indeed, the nation’s founders faced this very issue.

. . . . . . .

Later that month, without any recorded dissent, Congress enacted America’s first whistle-blower-protection law: “That it is the duty of all persons in the service of the United States, as well as all other inhabitants thereof, to give the earliest information to Congress or any other proper authority of any misconduct, frauds or misdemeanors committed by any officers or persons in the service of these states, which may come to their knowledge.”

. . . . . . .

Nearly two centuries later, the Supreme Court justice William O. Douglas, praising the founders’ commitment to freedom of speech, wrote: “The dominant purpose of the First Amendment was to prohibit the widespread practice of government suppression of embarrassing information.”

Read full article…..

Phi Beta Iota: This is not about Barack Obama–he sold out, get over it. This is about a two-party tyranny that hides its prostitution to Wall Street behind secrecy–chasing down whistle-blowers benefits both these parties all those they have shaken down for kick-backs. This is about a system that is inherently corrupt, in which 63 of 65 parties–and all Independents–are shut out, disenfranchised, and cheated.

2011/06/12

Howard Rheingold’s Pick: Information Curation

03 Economy, 04 Education, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Collective Intelligence, Commercial Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence

My top pick today:

Maria Popova: In a new world of informational abundance, content curation is a new kind of authorship

NiemanJournalismLab,10 June 2011

EXTRACT: The point is that new tools in general, and Twitter in particular, greatly challenge the binary dichotomy of attention as something that is either given or taken away, distracted. Instead, these tools allow us to direct attention to destinations where it can be sustained with more concentration and immersion.

2011/06/122011/06/12

Long-Term Implications of Netanyahu Over Obama

02 Diplomacy, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Impotency, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests

editor spinney time — Chuck Spinney Recommends...

Attached herewith is an important essay on the long term implications of Netanyahu – Obama spectacle of late May. The Author, William R. Polk, has kindly given granted me permission to distribute it.

Read preliminary comment and full text of William Polk's

Obama and Palestine

What will make Obama willing to move on the issue?

Also by William Polk:

Journal: William Polk AF Trip Report August 2010

Journal: William Polk on Afghanistan Non-Strategy Plus Consolidated Journal, Review, and Reference Links for Afghanistan

2011/06/122011/06/12

Worth a Look: Peak Soil, Food Shock, Biodynamics

01 Agriculture, 01 Poverty, 03 Environmental Degradation, 11 Society, Civil Society, Earth Intelligence, IO Deeds of Peace, Methods & Process, Worth A Look

Peak Soil

Oil is what most of us think of as a strategic resource, yet in the long run it is soil which is the more important. Even so, people’s eyes tend to glaze over when talk turns to soil conservation, maybe because it’s so much easier to see the immediate relevance of rising gas prices and climate change in these days of peak oil. So while public attitudes on climate change have shifted dramatically over the past few years, a crisis in global agriculture remains hidden: we are, and have long been, using up the supply of topsoil we rely on to grow our food.

Food Shock

New “Food Shock” Report Released by OffTheGridNews.net Reveals Disturbing U.S. Food Supply Trends

THOMSON, IL–(Marketwire – April 2, 2011) – The world's food supply is shrinking and as it does the price of food continues to climb, reaching record levels and leaving most of the global population in a state of emergency. This isn't an opinion created out of thin air; it's a strong message that has been researched and delivered by the United Nations. In an article published on Bloomberg.com on March 31, 2011 a representative from the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization surmised that world food production would have to increase by 70 percent by 2050 to meet the increasing demand from an expanding global population that is expected to eclipse the 9.1 billion mark by 2050, a dramatic rise from the 6.9 billion that make up today's world population.

Biodynamic Agriculture

Biodynamic agriculture is a method of organic farming that treats farms as unified and individual organisms,^[1] emphasizing balancing the holistic development and interrelationship of the soil, plants and animals as a self-nourishing system without external inputs^[2] insofar as this is possible given the loss of nutrients due to the export of food.^[3] As in other forms of organic agriculture, artificial fertilizers and toxic pesticides and herbicides are strictly avoided. There are independent certification agencies for biodynamic products, most of which are members of the international biodynamics standards group Demeter International.

2011/06/12

Cynthia McKinney: From Libya with Love and Dismay

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, Government, IO Impotency, IO Multinational, IO Sense-Making, Media, Military, Misinformation & Propaganda, Officers Call, Policies, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests

Phi Beta Iota: Cynthia McKinney has integrity, and is committed to transparency and truth. Most of what the public is viewing and reading about Libya is a manufactured lie. What NATO is doing in attacking Tripoli is illegal, immoral, and a war crime by any standard. As we have previously shown, this is about oil, water, and gold (the paper gold market is about to crash, Libya has a great deal of real gold that has not been tainted with titanium by the New York banks).

Below the line is a lengthy post from Cynthia McKinney in Tripoli, with many links and some photographs.

Continue reading “Cynthia McKinney: From Libya with Love and Dismay”

2011/06/112011/06/11

TED: Deliberate Food Poisoning in America

01 Agriculture, 03 Economy, 06 Family, 07 Health, 09 Justice, 11 Society, Civil Society, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence, Government, Law Enforcement, TED Videos

In 1990 new proteins were engineered into the American food supply. Other countries don't allow it. Walmart, Kraft and Pepsi actually formulate different food for export. America has highest cancer rates in the world.

Robyn O'Brien gives us information and patterns she has assembled and synthesized about how our food “industry” makes us sick (allergies, cancer, etc., etc.), raises our health care costs, weakens our global competitiveness, etc. and what we can do about it.

Robyn O'Bryan at TED (2nd Time: Patriotism on a Plate)

Phi Beta Iota: Industry–which operates on public incorporation commissions–lacks integrity because the government lacks integrity, as does the media in a corporate state. We have had a failure of integrity across the entire US system of systems (see Paradigms of Failure).

Review (Guest): The Unhealthy Truth–How Our Food Is Making Us Sick – And What We Can Do About It

Food Industry’s Erin Brockovich–Unhealthy Truth

2011/06/102011/06/10

Critique of Western “Model” & “Plans” for Arabia

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Commerce, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, International Aid, IO Deeds of War, Military, Misinformation & Propaganda, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Peace Intelligence, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)

Under the cover of democracy

US and its allies assist will be using neoliberal economic policies to make sure new Arab governments stay in line.

Joseph Massad

Al Jazerra, 08 Jun 2011

EXTRACT:

two criminals — Click on Image to Enlarge

But as US action around the world aimed at eliminating the recently won right to self-determination for the peoples of Asia and Africa under the guise of “Western democracy” fighting “totalitarian communism”, which left a trail of millions murdered by the US and its allies (starting with Korea and moving to the Congo, to Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, and from Guatemala to Brazil to Argentina, Uruguay, El Salvador, and Chile, to Southern Africa and the Middle East), the cruel US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan in the last decade have hardly changed this anti-democratic trend. Yet two important victories are always touted by supporters of US foreign policy on the democratic front: namely, the fall of the Soviet Union and the ensuing “democratisation” of Eastern Europe, and the end of Apartheid in South Africa. The US hopes that its policies in both places will guide it to achieve similar ends for those uprisings of the Arab world that it cannot crush.

Joseph Massad is Associate Professor for Modern Arab Politics and Intellectual History at Columbia University in New York.

Read complete lengthy historical and moral review….