Public Intelligence Blog – Page 2600 – The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.

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Haiti To Become Full Associate Member Of African Union

Osun Defender (Nigeria), 8 December 2012

The black race is gradually coming together. Where other world groupings are primarily motivated by strategic, security, political and economic interests, Africans wherever they are can count also on their common history of being black.

Haiti currently has the status of Member Observer with the African Union and submitted to that organization, a formal request for the status of full Associate Member of the Union of Heads of State and Government of Africa, a status that will be effective starting from January 2013.

In January 2011, the Libyan leader Muammar Kaddafi who was killed by NATO in October of the same year asked the following question to delegates who were attending an international conference for the African Diaspora from around the world that he had convened in Tripoli.

“Why shouldn’t people of black descent leaving outside the African mother continent be allowed to have a referendum to decide if they wanted to be part of Africa or not.”

As we know there are many countries out of Africa, particularly in the Caribbean’s Islands, where black people constitute the majority. Even Brazil itself is getting closer to such category.

The admission of Haiti to the African Union is a significant milestone of bringing together the black family of Africans as a people.

May this reunion of Haiti with the mother continent be a strong motivation for other nations with black majorities to see in such strong relationship a source for future prosperity of respective populations either in Africa or concerned countries?

People from the South – where most Blacks are – , have in the past strongly counted on their cooperation with the North for their development. Though the latter is still dominant, there are clear signs that the tides are shifting. The more the former will find in themselves the resources to uplift their populations the better.

Source: INFO NIGERIA

Continue reading “Dolphin: Haiti Moves Up in African Union — World Routing Around the USA? + RECAP”

2012/12/082012/12/08

Berto Jongman: Interview with Dennis Meadows on Limits to Growth Today

Earth Intelligence

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‘Limits to Growth' Author Dennis Meadows ‘Humanity Is Still on the Way to Destroying Itself'

In 1972, environmental guru Dennis Meadows predicted in his seminal study “The Limits to Growth” that the world was heading toward an economic collapse. Forty years on, he tells SPIEGEL ONLINE that nothing he has seen since has made him change his mind.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Professor Meadows, 40 years ago you published “The Limits to Growth” together with your wife and colleagues, a book that made you the intellectual father of the environmental movement. The core message of the book remains valid today: Humanity is ruthlessly exploiting global resources and is on the way to destroying itself. Do you believe that the ultimate collapse of our economic system can still be avoided?

Meadows: The problem that faces our societies is that we have developed industries and policies that were appropriate at a certain moment, but now start to reduce human welfare, like for example the oil and car industry. Their political and financial power is so great and they can prevent change. It is my expectation that they will succeed. This means that we are going to evolve through crisis, not through proactive change.

Read full interview.

2012/12/082012/12/08

Penguin: Larry WIlkerson Skeptical About Politicization (aka Fabrication) of Syrian Chemical Weapons Reports

Corruption, Government, Media, Military

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Former Powell adviser ‘skeptical’ of ‘politicized’ US intelligence on Syria

RT, 08 December, 2012

Syria will never use chemical weapons against its own people, Lawrence Wilkerson, a retired US Army Colonel who was Chief of Staff to Colin Powell told RT. Instead, the reality is that US is “preparing the ground to intervene in Syria.”

An act which would lead to a conflict “that would take at least a decade to settle – and there aren't going to be too many victors at the end of that decade, just losers,” Wilkerson says, as Washington's ultimate aim is to overthrow the Iranian leadership.

Simultaneously, some members of Congress are talking about “impeachment” of the US president for not consulting Congress before involving the country in conflicts.

RT: You were Colin Powell's chief of staff when the decision was made to invade Iraq. In 2003, Powell made a speech that laid out the case for that war. Let's take a listen to what he said. You helped prepare that speech, and have since described it as the biggest mistake of your life. Why?

wilkerson-staff-secretary-colin.n — Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell (AFP Photo / Chip Somodevilla)

Lawrence Wilkerson: Primarily because we – to the American people, to the international community and of course to the members of the US Security Council – presented that speech… it was not accurate, it was not true, it was not valid. We did not know that, but it was not just an intelligence failure. It was also the massive politicization of intelligence by the leadership in Washington.

RT: We're currently seeing very similar rhetoric in the US in relation to Syria. Will it end in war again?

LW: I would be highly skeptical of any of the intelligence rendered by the $140-billion-plus US intelligence community as to weapons of mass destruction in possession of another country. Period.

Read full article.

Continue reading “Penguin: Larry WIlkerson Skeptical About Politicization (aka Fabrication) of Syrian Chemical Weapons Reports”

2012/12/082012/12/08

Patrick Meier: UN, Social Media, HUMINT, and Geospatial Decision-Support –a REAL Revolution in Intelligence Affairs

Crowd-Sourcing, Geospatial

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How the UN Used Social Media in Response to Typhoon Pablo

Our mission as digital humanitarians was to deliver a detailed dataset of pictures and videos (posted on Twitter) which depicted the damage and flooding following the Typhoon. An overview of this digital response is available here. The task of our United Nations colleagues at the Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), was to rapidly consolidate and analyze our data to compile a customized Situation Report for OCHA’s team in the Philippines. The maps, charts and figures below are taken from this official report (click to enlarge).

This map is the first ever official UN crisis map entirely based on data collected from social media.

One of my main priorities now is to make sure we do a far better job at leveraging advanced computing and microtasking platforms so that we are better prepared the next time we’re asked to repeat this kind of deployment. On the advanced computing side, it should be perfectly feasible to develop an automated way to crawl twitter and identify links to images and videos.

social media reports — Click on Image to Enlarge

My colleagues at QCRI are already looking into this. As for microtasking, I am collaborating with PyBossa and Crowdflower to ensure that we have highly customizable platforms on stand-by so we can immediately upload the results of QCRI’s algorithms. In sum, we have got to move beyond simple crowdsourcing and adopt more agile micro-tasking and social computing platforms as both are far more scalable.

Visit Original (one additional graphic).

Continue reading “Patrick Meier: UN, Social Media, HUMINT, and Geospatial Decision-Support –a REAL Revolution in Intelligence Affairs”

2012/12/08

SchwartzReport: Bill Moyers and Former FCC Commissioner — Big Media Dumbs Down Democracy, Internet at Very Beginning of Its Possibilities

IO Impotency, Media

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Former FCC Commissioner: Big Media Dumbs Down Democracy

By Bill Moyers, Moyers & Company

05 December 12

EXTRACT 1:

Moyers: The argument we hear in rebuttal is “Well look, we don't have to worry about monopoly today, we don't have to worry about cartels today, because we have the Internet, which is the most democratic source of opinion, expression and free speech that's available to us. You and Moyers are outdated because of your concerns about broadcasting and newspapers and all of this.”

Copps: I don't buy that argument at all. The Internet has the potential for all of that. The Internet has the potential for a new town square of democracy, paved with broadband bricks. But it's very, very far from being the reality. The reality is – and you don't have to really look too closely – throughout history, we've seen every means of communication go down this road toward more and more consolidation. Wouldn't it be a tragedy if you took this potential of this open and dynamic technology, capable of addressing just about every problem that the country has – no problem that we have doesn't have a broadband component to its solution somewhere along the line – and let the biggest invention since the printing press probably as communication goes, morph into a cable-ized Internet? That's what I think is happening. Most of the news generated on the Internet, is still coming from the newspaper newsroom, or the TV newsroom. It's just there's so damn much less of it because of the consolidation that we've been through, because of the downsizing, and because of a government that has been absent without leave from its public interest responsibilities for many, many years – a better part of a generation now.

EXTRACT 2:

Moyers: On this particular decision now under consideration, the relaxation of some rules prohibiting further concentration, what can ordinary people do?

Copps: Well, they can get involved. It can become a grassroots movement. I spent 40 years in Washington, working on policy with the belief that you can do some good things from the top down, and I still believe that. But the real systemic reforms and the substantive reforms in this country, from abolition to women's rights and civil rights, and labor rights and all that, came from the bottom up. And I think there's enough frustration out there that it's possible to build on that right now.

Read full transcript.

2012/12/072012/12/07

Dolphin: Autism Up, Sperm Down

07 Health, Commerce, Corruption, Earth Intelligence, Government, Idiocy

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Connecting the dots….isn't that what intelligence is supposed to do?

Why Is Autism So Drastically on the Rise? An Environmental Horror Story

An investigation into the relationship between environmental poisons and human health is riveting — and terrifying.

If horror is your genre, environmental writer Brita Belli’s The Autism Puzzle, is the book for you. Her terrifying look at the chemicals we eat, drink and breathe is guaranteed to make your hair stand on end.

We should thank her for it.

Statistics released earlier this spring by the Centers for Disease Control revealed that one in 88 U.S. born toddlers has an autism spectral disorder—from the less severe Asperger’s Syndrome to the so-called classical form of the ailment. Worse, it’s not just a North American phenomenon; Belli also reports a 57 percent spike in Asia and Europe.

Read full article.

Russian men: an endangered species?

Continue reading “Dolphin: Autism Up, Sperm Down”

2012/12/072012/12/07

Michel Bauwens: Rebirth of the Guilds

Economics/True Cost, P2P / Panarchy

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220px-Michel_Bauwens_crop — Michel Bauwens

Essay of the Day: Rebirth of Guilds

A return to guilds as an organizing force for the worker of the future will bring with it another medieval institution: a return of ownership of means of production to the individual. In our surveys of distributed workers over the years, we have noted a consistent finding. Workers report that the technology they have in their home offices is more advanced and sophisticated than what their employers provide in the central office.

Dr. Charles Grantham, Norma Owen and Terry Musch have written a five part article series reconsidering the Guilds as an appropriate form for current organisations in the p2p age:

“This series of blogs traces the history of guilds and the modern forces driving their re-emergence: failure of industrial institutions, technology that speeds up learning, a search for intimate community and the de-evolution of power from the central state. Further, the need for social change is discussed along with a prescription of the functions these new guilds can perform, and those they cannot. We conclude this series with a brief discussion of how modern guilds can offer ownership of the means of social preservation to workers of the future.”

EXTRACT

Driving Forces

There are several forces, which are driving the rebirth of guilds as a way of organizing talent pools. While there are a myriad of social, economic and political pressures on the 21st Century global economy. We feel four are of particular interest.

Continue reading “Michel Bauwens: Rebirth of the Guilds”