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Foreign Travelers Warned: Beware of Florida's New Shoot First Law
For Immediate Release: 09-27-2005 . . . Contact Communications: (202) 898-0792

Washington DC – The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence is beginning a public education effort to educate Florida tourists and potential Florida tourists that effective October 1, they face a greater risk of bodily harm within the state of Florida.

That is the date that the state’s new “Shoot First” law also known as the “Stand Your Ground” law, goes into effect.

Individuals who are unfamiliar with Florida’s roads, traffic regulations and customs, or who speak foreign languages, or look different than Florida residents, may face a higher risk of danger – because they may be more likely to be perceived as threatening by Floridians, and because they are unaware of Florida’s new law that says individuals who feel their safety is threatened or their possessions are at risk are legally authorized to use deadly force.

"We think people visiting Florida should be aware of this law, and act accordingly," said Sarah Brady, Chair of the Brady Campaign. "Visitors should be very careful about getting into an aggressive argument with anyone during their stay."


A website offering additional information about the law will go live on Wednesday morning, September 28 at www.shootfirstlaw.org

On Saturday, trained staff will begin to distribute educational materials on this subject to arriving passengers at Miami International Airport beginning Saturday, October 1. This effort may be extended to additional airports in the coming weeks, including Orlando. The material reads, in part:

"The “Shoot First" law is a new law in Florida that police, prosecuting attorneys and gun violence prevention advocates worry may lead to the reckless use of guns on the streets of Florida cities. Before the law was passed, Floridians could carry concealed guns in public places, but they could only use those guns as a last resort when safe avoidance of injury was otherwise not possible. The new law eliminates the duty to avoid the threat and, instead, allows the gun user to "shoot first" to eliminate the threat.

"It is not difficult to imagine likely situations in which individuals may use lethal force where they did not before. An argument on the highway, or a disagreement in a restaurant or nightclub, or a dispute over belongings in a public place such as a beach could lead to unnecessary use of force."

"The Florida 'Shoot First' law was passed over the strong objections of law enforcement officials and prosecutors."

The flyer suggests specific steps visitors should take: Avoid unnecessary arguments with local people; stay in their cars and keep hands in plain sight if involved in a traffic accident or near-miss; and maintain a positive attitude and avoid shouting or threatening gestures if someone appears to be hostile toward them.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 2:47 PM

 

More than 1,000 missing after South Asian storm
(S. Radha Kumar, Reuters, September 21, 2005)
At least 800 people remained missing in southern India on Wednesday and hundreds of fishermen were unaccounted for in Bangladesh after a severe storm in the Bay of Bengal killed 50 people, officials said. . . . Indian authorities said about 100,000 people were homeless after heavy rains this week caused floods in the coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh state, with strong winds uprooting thousands of trees and electricity poles. . . . They had earlier said more than 1,000 people were missing in the state, including scores of fishermen, but some of them had returned to shore. . . . "Of the over 1,000 missing people, 150-200 fishermen have been traced and are safe," top state disaster management official Shashank Goel told Reuters. . . . He said flood waters had started to recede as rains had eased in the region. . . . Most of the 50 killed in Andhra Pradesh were either electrocuted or died in house collapses, officials said. . . . In Bangladesh, leaders of the low-lying nation's fishing community said on Wednesday they had not heard from about 300 fishermen after the storm triggered high waves and heavy rain along the coast this week. . . . "We are expecting some of them to come back," Kabir Ahmed Sawdagar told Reuters from the coastal city of Cox's Bazar, adding that in the past fishermen reported missing had returned safely weeks after a storm. . . . But Golam Mustafa Chowdhury, president of the Fishing Trawlers Association in the coastal district of Barguna, said 31 trawlers with about 450 fishermen sank during the storm and he feared most of the men on them had drowned. . . . Other fishing groups said some missing fishermen had returned and others may have been pushed towards Indian waters. . . . On Wednesday, there was no electricity in about 100 towns and 1,300 villages on Andhra Pradesh's coast where rail, air and road traffic has been severely disrupted. . . . With flood waters beginning to recede, most train services were expected to resume by Thursday, railway officials said. . . . Cargo handling at Visakhapatnam port -- one of India's busiest -- had resumed after being suspended for two days due to the storm. . . . Hundreds of vehicles were stranded on a key highway linking eastern India with the south of the country and the airport in the port city of Visakhapatnam was closed for the second day as its runway was still partially waterlogged. . . . Rains had eased in most parts of the state on Wednesday but its largest river, the Godavari, had burst its bank in several areas and was threatening to spill over. Officials said they were worried about losses to sugarcane, chilli and paddy crops. . . . "Lakhs (hundreds of thousands) of acres of fields have got inundated," Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, Andhra Pradesh's chief minister, said after a aerial survey of flood-hit areas.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 10:24 AM

 

Bird flu could cause global economic catastrophe
(Geoffrey Lean, The Indepnednet, 18 September 2005)
Bird flu threatens to cause a "catastrophic" economic crash in Britain and around the world, unprecedented in modern times, according to new research. . . . Two studies from Nottingham University and the Bank of Montreal in Canada show that a flu pandemic - described by the World Health Organisation last week as inevitable - would slash at least £95bn from British GDP, extinguish at least 900,000 jobs and create a global depression to rival that of the 1930s. . . . They come as world leaders attending the United Nations summit last week began to recognise the scale of the potential threat from the influenza virus, codenamed H5N1, which has reached the borders of Europe. . . . Bird flu, which originated in China and South-east Asia, is being spread by migrating wildfowl, infecting domestic poultry. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation warned this month that it will reach every continent. Last week Russia reported a third outbreak among chickens in Chelyabinsk in the Urals, on Europe's doorstep. . . . So far about 60 people are known to have died from the virus, about half of those infected. Experts fear that it will mutate to spread rapidly among people, killing tens - perhaps hundreds - of millions worldwide. Last week Dr Lee Jong-wook, director-general of the World Health Organisation, said the mutation was inevitable and "just an issue of timing". Publicly the Government says that more than 50,000 people are likely to die in Britain, but privately it is preparing for up to 750,000 deaths. Earlier this year Professor Hugh Pennington, one of the country's experts, said that the British death toll could reach two million. . . . The study used a giant computer model of the British economy. It found that even a relatively mild pandemic, with 50,000 deaths, would cut Britain's GDP by a staggering 8 per cent or £95bn, cost 941,000 jobs, and "affect every aspect of life in Britain". . . . Professor Thea Sinclair, who led the research, says that a more serious pandemic, killing hundreds of thousands or millions of Britons, would have "truly catastrophic" effects on the economy.

[NOTE: Click the title link above for the full story]

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 12:15 PM

 

Russia warns U.S. against new nuclear doctrine
(Reuters, 13 September 2005)
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov warned the United States on Tuesday against any change of its defence doctrine to allow pre-emptive use of atomic weapons, saying it would prompt others to seek nuclear arms. . . . A draft revision of the U.S. Defense Department's nuclear operations doctrine was made available at the weekend, outlining the use of nuclear weapons to pre-empt an enemy's attack with weapons of mass destruction. . . . "Lowering the threshold for use of atomic weapons is in itself dangerous," Ivanov told a news conference ahead of a NATO defence ministers meeting in Berlin. . . . "Such plans do not limit, but in fact promote efforts by others to develop (nuclear weapons)," said Ivanov, who was speaking through an interpreter. . . . According to the document, combatant commanders could request approval from the president to use nuclear weapons under a variety of scenarios, such as to pre-empt an enemy's use of weapons of mass destruction against the United States, multinational or alliance forces or civilian populations. . . . A Defense Department spokesman said at the weekend the document had not yet been given to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. It is due to be signed within the next few weeks by the director of the Joint Staff, the spokesman said. . . . The unclassified document was available on numerous Web sites such as GlobalSecurity.org, (Full Document in PDF format) a defense policy Web site. A Pentagon site, however, listed the document as unavailable.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 7:16 AM

 

U.S. super power status shattered
(Abid Mustafa, Aljazeera.com, 9/14/05)
In the wake of the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina and Bush's inept response to the unfolding humanitarian crisis in New Orleans, the myth of America's super power status has been shattered. . . . A country that prides itself on its achievements in space, its high-tech weaponry and its ability to pulverize nations has by all accounts delivered a third world response to alleviate the painful suffering of its own people- So much so that America has finally swallowed its pride and asked the EU and NATO for emergency assistance, requesting blankets, first aid kits, water trucks and food for the victims of the hurricane. . . . This is the same America that claims the higher moral ground over other nations because America believes it is the harbinger of human rights and equality. The world witnessed the awful treatment of poor, black Americans who constituted the vast majority of the victims of the hurricane. . . . Forget about America fighting two simultaneous wars in the global arena or its grandiose desire to reshape the Middle East. America's inability to cope with disaster at home and its commitments in Iraq and Afghanistan has laid bare American exceptionalism and has exposed its strategic vulnerability before the whole world. . . . This has become America's tipping point and how President Bush deals with the effects of Katrina at home balanced against American obligations overseas, especially in the Muslim world will determine the fate of his presidency and America's position in the world. . . . The effect on the American economy has been equally disastrous. Standard and Poor's estimated that damage from Hurricane Katrina could climb to as much as $50 billion, once damage to infrastructure such as roads and bridges is taken into account. The Port of New Orleans is one of the Southern U.S.'s busiest ports and a major oil distribution gateway. The port handles 20% of U.S. exports and will be out of action for several weeks. Katrina has also shut down 92 percent of Gulf oil production and 83 percent of Gulf natural gas production, according to U.S. government data. The Gulf region accounts for about 25 percent of total U.S. oil production. . . . To finance the recovery effort the U.S. government will have to borrow more money from international creditors. This will not only add to the burgeoning U.S. trade deficit which stood at $US650 billion in 2004, but also renders the U.S. dollar more vulnerable to a huge sell off. The implications could be more catastrophic than the depression of the 1930's. . . . The situation in Iraq and Afghanistan looks no better for President Bush and his corporate supporters. After having spent $500 billion dollars, America is nowhere near to controlling the oil wells of Iraq or the Caspian region. . . . The ferocity of the resistance in Iraq and Afghanistan is not only out of control but threatens to derail the upcoming elections in both countries. . . . A withdrawal from Iraq may well encourage the EU and Russia to finish America's project of reshaping the Middle East and controlling the region's vast oil and gas supplies. But perhaps the biggest danger to U.S. hegemony comes from the emergence of the Caliphate which would spell the end to Western or Eastern domination of Muslim lands. . . . In the coming days, America's friends and foes will be watching this tipping point. The outcome is no longer in Bush's hands.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 7:11 AM

 

Bush Approves Nuclear First Strike Option
(Walter Pincus, Washington Post, September 11, 2005)
The Pentagon has drafted a revised doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons that envisions commanders requesting presidential approval to use them to preempt an attack by a nation or a terrorist group using weapons of mass destruction. The draft also includes the option of using nuclear arms to destroy known enemy stockpiles of nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. . . . The draft, dated March 15, would provide authoritative guidance for commanders to request presidential approval for using nuclear weapons, and represents the Pentagon's first attempt to revise procedures to reflect the Bush preemption doctrine. A previous version, completed in 1995 during the Clinton administration, contains no mention of using nuclear weapons preemptively or specifically against threats from weapons of mass destruction. . . . Titled "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" and written under the direction of Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the draft document is unclassified and available on a Pentagon Web site. . . . The first example for potential nuclear weapon use listed in the draft is against an enemy that is using "or intending to use WMD" against U.S. or allied, multinational military forces or civilian populations. . . . The draft says that to deter a potential adversary from using such weapons, that adversary's leadership must "believe the United States has both the ability and will to pre-empt or retaliate promptly with responses that are credible and effective." The draft also notes that U.S. policy in the past has "repeatedly rejected calls for adoption of 'no first use' policy of nuclear weapons since this policy could undermine deterrence."

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 10:21 AM

 

Genocide arrest of Catholic priest
(BBC NEWS, 8 September 2005)
Several Rwandan priests and nuns have been convicted of participating in the killing of some 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus. . . . Rwandan prosecutor Emmanuel Rukangira told the BBC that Father Theunis had incited Rwandans to commit genocide by republishing articles from extremist publication Kangura in his Dialogue magazine. . . . Former Kangura editor Hassan Ngeze has been sentenced to life in prison by the United Nations court set up to try those responsible for the genocide. . . . Mr Rukangira said Father Theunis would be tried by the Gacaca village courts set up to deal with genocide suspects. . . . Some members of the Catholic hierarchy in Rwanda had close ties to extremist politicians and aided Hutu militias in the run-up to the 1994 killings. . . . Thousands of Tutsis were slaughtered after seeking sanctuary in churches. . . . In 2001, a Brussels court convicted two Rwandan Catholic nuns for their roles in the genocide. . . . In the 11 years since the genocide, some Rwandans have converted to Islam, saying the churches let them down.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 10:02 AM

 

Bush isn't a moron, he's a cunning sociopath
(Bev Conover, Serendipity, December 5, 2002)
If any of us are to have a future worth having, the world's leaders, the members of Congress, the US corporate media and people of all political persuasions who value freedom and democracy had better start seeing George W. Bush for what he is: a sociopath and a passive serial killer. . . . Psychiatrists tell us that all serial killers lack the emotions that make us human; that they have to learn to emulate those emotions in order to get by in society. . . . As governor of Texas, he set a record in signing death warrants — 154 in five years. He even made fun of the way convicted killer Karla Faye Tucker begged for her life. . . . "So when he was a kid, George W. enjoyed putting firecrackers into frogs, throwing them in the air, and then watching them blow up. Should this be cause for alarm? How relevant is a man's childhood behavior to what he is like as an adult? And in this case, to what he would be like as president of the United States." . . . All through the 2000 campaign and up to Sept. 11, 2001, the corporate media depicted Bush as an affable, tongue-tied bumbler — the kind of guy Joe Six-pack would like to have a beer with — turning a blind eye to his dark underside. It mattered not that he stocked his illicit administration with the worst of the worst: John Ashcroft, Donald Rumsfeld, Gale Norton, Paul O'Neill, Harvey Pitt, Thomas White, John Negroponte, Otto Reich and convicted Iran-contra felon Elliot Abrams who received a 1992 Christmas Eve pardon from George W.'s father. . . . Then, despite his peculiar behavior on Sept. 11, the corporate media and his handlers transformed him into a leader extraordinaire in the mold of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill rolled into one. . . . And as Bush had Afghanistan bombed back beyond the Stone Age to rid the world of Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, then switched to claiming it was the Taliban that had to go, then declared there was an "axis of evil" and it was really Saddam Hussein who was the "mother of all evil" and that war with Iraq was in the offing to get rid of Saddam, the corporate media cheered him on and to this day continues to beat the war drum. They have yet to consider that the passive serial killer needs to feed his lust for blood by sending others to put their lives on the line and do the killing for him. . . . In his Sept. 12 article, White House insiders: Bush is "out of control" Mike Hersh wrote, "Some among Bush's trusted White House staff fear what they are seeing and where Bush is taking us. His state of mind hauntingly reminds them of Richard Nixon's Final Days. They fear Bush is becoming Nixonesque . . . or worse. Although Bush lacks Nixon's paranoia, he may entertain even more dangerous notions." . . . But their desperate late night phone calls to trusted reporters has not seen the light of day in the corporate media. Yet, some of us outside the Beltway have long had an inkling of what we are dealing with. . . . "Bush is not an imbecile. He's not a puppet. I think that Bush is a sociopathic personality. I think he's incapable of empathy. He has an inordinate sense of his own entitlement, and he's a very skilled manipulator. And in all the snickering about his alleged idiocy, this is what a lot of people miss." . . . "He has no trouble speaking off the cuff when he's speaking punitively, when he's talking about violence, when he's talking about revenge," Miller told Whyte. "When he struts and thumps his chest, his syntax and grammar are fine. It's only when he leaps into the wild blue yonder of compassion, or idealism, or altruism, that he makes these hilarious mistakes." . . . In a speech last Sept. in Nashville, trying to strengthen his case against Saddam, Bush's script called for him to say, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." But the words that came out of his mouth were, ""Fool me once, shame . . . shame on . . . you," followed by a long pause, then, "Fool me — can't get fooled again!" . . . Said Miller, "What's revealing about this is that Bush could not say, 'Shame on me' to save his life. That's a completely alien idea to him. This is a guy who is absolutely proud of his own inflexibility and rectitude." . . . Another example, Miller said, occurred early in Bush's White House tenure when he said, "I know how hard it is to put food on your family." . . . According to Miller, "That wasn't because he's so stupid that he doesn't know how to say, 'Put food on your family's table' — it's because he doesn't care about people who can't put food on the table." . . . Miller told Whyte, "When he tries to talk about what this country stands for, or about democracy, he can't do it." . . . "He's a very angry guy, a hostile guy. He's much like Nixon. So they're very, very careful to choreograph every move he makes. They don't want him anywhere near protestors, because he would lose his temper," Miller said. . . . "I call him the feel bad president, because he's all about punishment and death," Miller told Whyte. "It would be a grave mistake to just play him for laughs." . . . A grave mistake, indeed.

]COMMENT by Lorenzo: And please note, that the above article was written in December of 2002! Just think about how increasingly insane Bush's actions are appearing today, as we continue to watch the horror of the poor people from New Orleans unfold without even a hint of compassion from our Beloved Dictator.]

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 12:42 PM

 

Why does the US need our money?
(BBC NEWS, 6 September 2005)
The Red Cross is appealing for people overseas to contribute money to its Hurricane Katrina Appeal. But why does the world's richest nation need handouts? . . . The world's only superpower has been forced to turn to aid agencies to speed up the humanitarian effort in the wake of Katrina. . . . Seemingly unable to draw on its wealth at short notice to immediately respond to the disaster, charities in other countries, such as the British Red Cross, are now launching appeals to raise money. . . . In addition half a million military ration packs worth an estimated £3m have been flown out from the UK and more are expected to follow. . . . The public in many countries are accustomed to providing aid to poverty stricken developing nations, but the need to provide assistance to the most opulent country in the world may leave many perplexed. . . . t is not a position the US is used to being in either. President George W Bush seemed to initially dismiss suggestions of receiving foreign assistance. . . . The gross national income of the US is $37,870 per capita, according to the World Bank. It is just $810 for tsunami-hit Indonesia and $200 for poverty-stricken Niger. . . . And, national wealth aside, Americans have a strong track record of generosity concerning disasters on their own soil. They gave $2bn following the 11 September attacks. . . . "But there are broader political questions about the response of the richest country in the world to such a disaster on its own soil. Hopefully they will be addressed in the fullness of time and lessons will be learned." . . . But will the British public be as keen to make donations as they were after recent disasters, such as the Asian tsunami and famines in Niger and Sudan? . . . Cathy Pharoah, a researcher at the Charities Aid Foundation, points out that it is difficult to predict how people will react because such devastation in such an affluent country is unprecedented in recent times. . . . READER RESPONSES: I will not be giving to this appeal. The United States is the richest country in the history of the modern world. They should be diverting their wealth into domestic social care programs not into imposing their economic will on the rest of the world. Maybe this will be the wake up call that the people of the US need. . . . Of cause people gladley gave after the tsunami, that is understadable. But surely there are enough people in USA that can charitable donations. Should the US government not spend it's own money helping these people? Even if it ment selling gold reserves. To ask other nations for help, and then retaining wealth makes my skin crawl. What % of the American defense budget is needed for aid I ask? . . . I can understand that aid agencies, such as the British Red Cross, can provide the physical help in terms of food parcels and staff on the ground. But why does this need to be paid for via charitable donations? Surely the US Government can transfer money to these agencies easily enough, rather than it needing to be raised by charitable donations. . . . A quick staw poll of people in my office shows up a feeling of disgust that the US can't free up enough funds. I don't think anyone here is planning on giving. . . . This is a disgrace. I am shocked by what happened to the people of New Orleans and surrounding area but to give to a country that obviously went to war for other motives and spent millions on this. A country that is the richest in the world and has the most resources. I will not be helping - Considering the country is reluctant to help the truly needy countries eradicate poverty.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 6:34 PM

 

America's Ugly Reality Exposed
(ason DeParle, The New York Times, 04 September 2005)
The white people got out. Most of them, anyway. If television and newspaper images can be deemed a statistical sample, it was mostly black people who were left behind. Poor black people, growing more hungry, sick and frightened by the hour as faraway officials counseled patience and warned that rescues take time. . . . What a shocked world saw exposed in New Orleans last week wasn't just a broken levee. It was a cleavage of race and class, at once familiar and startlingly new, laid bare in a setting where they suddenly amounted to matters of life and death. Hydrology joined sociology throughout the story line, from the settling of the flood-prone city, where well-to-do white people lived on the high ground, to its frantic abandonment. . . . In the middle of the delayed rescue, the New Orleans mayor, C.Ray Nagin, a local boy made good from a poor, black ward, burst into tears of frustration as he denounced slow moving federal officials and called for martial law. . . . Even people who had spent a lifetime studying race and class found themselves slack-jawed. . . . "This is a pretty graphic illustration of who gets left behind in this society - in a literal way," said Christopher Jencks, a sociologist glued to the televised images from his office at Harvard. Surprised to have found himself surprised, Mr. Jencks took to thinking out loud. "Maybe it's just an in-the-face version of something I already knew," he said. "All the people who don't get out, or don't have the resources, or don't believe the warning are African-American." . . . "It's not that it's at odds with the way I see American society," Mr. Jencks said. "But it's at odds with the way I want to see American society." . . . Last week it was how others saw American society, too, in images beamed across the globe. Were it not for the distinctive outlines of the Superdome, the pictures of hovering rescue helicopters might have carried a Somalian dateline. The Sri Lankan ambassador offered to help raise foreign aid. . . . Anyone who knew New Orleans knew that danger lurked behind the festive front. Let the good times roll, the tourists on Bourbon Street were told. Yet in every season, someone who rolled a few blocks in the wrong direction wound up in the city morgue. . . . Unusually poor (27.4 percent below the poverty line in 2000), disproportionately black (over two-thirds), the Big Easy is also disproportionately murderous - with a rate that was for years among the country's highest. . . . Once one of the most mixed societies, in recent decades, the city has become unusually segregated, and the white middle class is all but gone, moved north across Lake Pontchartrain or west to Jefferson Parish - home of David Duke, the one-time Klansman who ran for governor in 1991 and won more than half of the state's white vote. . . . No one was immune, of course. With 80 percent of the city under water, tragedy swallowed the privilege and poor, and traveled spread across racial lines. . . . But the divides in the city were evident in things as simple as access to a car. The 35 percent of black households that didn't have one, compared with just 15 percent among whites. . . . "The evacuation plan was really based on people driving out," said Craig E. Colten, a geologist at Louisiana State University and an expert on the city's vulnerable topography. "They didn't have buses. They didn't have trains." . . . As if to punctuate the divide, the water especially devastated the Ninth Ward, among city's poorest and lowest lying. . . . "Out West, there is a saying that water flows to money," Mr. Colten said. "But in New Orleans, water flows away from money. Those with resources who control where the drainage goes have always chosen to live on the high ground. So the people in the low areas were hardest hit." . . . Outrage grew as the week wore on, among black politicians who saw the tragedy as a reflection of a broader neglect of American cities, and in the blogosphere. . . . "The real reason no one is helping is because of the color of these people!" wrote "myfan88" on the Flickr blog. "This is Hotel Rwanda all over again." . . . "Is this what the pioneers of the civil rights movement fought to achieve, a society where many black people are as trapped and isolated by their poverty as they were by legal segregation laws?" wrote Mark Naison, director of the urban studies program at Fordham, on another blog. . . . With months still to go just to pump out the water that covers the city, no one can be sure how the social fault lines will rearrange. But with white flight a defining element of New Orleans in the recent past, there was already the fear in the air this week that the breached levee would leave a separated society further apart. . . . "Maybe we can build the levees back," said Mr. Carter. "But that sense of extreme division by class and race is going to long survive the physical reconstruction of New Orleans."

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 3:21 PM

 

World Wide Depression Feared
(Sorcha Faal, 3 September 2005 . . . a view from a Russian writer)
United States Losses Nears 2 Trillion US Dollars, Global Oil Markets in Chaos and US Military Leaders Prepare to Seal Borders . . . Russian Financial Experts are reporting today that the losses to the United States economy due to their catastrophic storm damage is now over $500 Billion dollars, and will soon approach, on a world-level, over $2 Trillion. . . . As American oil reserves have fallen by over 17% since 1990, according to their Department of Energy statistics, the loss of Louisiana’s reserves, which total about one quarter of the United States total reserves (22%), coupled with the devastation wrecked upon the Gulf of Mexico production facilities, have resulted in such catastrophic shortfalls that the Strategic Reserves of both the European Union and Japan are having to be drawn upon . . . To the almost complete destruction of the United States Southern Regions oil production capability we can read in these reports: From the Itar-Tass News Service in their article titled "Hurricane Katrina ruins 58 oilrigs in Gulf of Mexico" and which says, "Hurricane Katrina ruined 58 oilrigs in the Gulf of Mexico, a representative of the American Petroleum Institute said on Friday. He said 30 oilrigs could not be restored. Apache Oil Company, which announced the loss of eight oilrigs producing about 7,200 barrels of oil and 12.1 million cubic meters of gas a day, suffered large damages. American experts said that total losses in the oil production have amounted to daily 7.44 barrels since August 26. The Gulf of Mexico was supplying up to 30% of all U.S. crude and one-fourth of natural gas to the American market." . . . From the Associated Press News Service in their article titled "90 percent of Gulf of Mexico oil production blocked" and which says, "Ninety percent of the Gulf of Mexico's normal daily oil production is blocked from market today because of offshore platform evacuations forced by Hurricane Katrina. The U-S Minerals Management Service said 423 of the 819 staffed production platforms in the Gulf are shut down, delaying production of one-point-36 (m) million barrels of oil, or 90-point-four percent of the region's normal daily production of one-point-five (m) million barrels." . . . Also according to these reports, the greatest concerns facing the American Military Leaders is not to the saving of peoples lives, but has been instead to the saving of their entire countries economy and way of life, that is except for their elite citizens, and as we can read as reported by the NBC News Service in their article titled "Superdome evacuation halted" and which shockingly says: "At one point Friday, the evacuation was interrupted briefly when school buses rolled up so some 700 guests and employees from the Hyatt Hotel could move to the head of the evacuation line — much to the amazement of those who had been crammed in the stinking Superdome since last Sunday." . . . Even more appalling that these actions of these American Military Leaders was their continuing their plans for the total 'Lockdown' of their citizens during this crises . . . No longer do these Americans ever have to speculate as to what it is like to live under a Fascist Military Regime as their newspapers, radios and televisions are filled with the sounds and images of what life is truly like under Military rule. Where once these great American people were the 'Saviors' of not only their own fellow countrymen during times of disaster, they were also the Saviors of the world, but which under their Military Leaders are not even wanted anymore, and as we can read from their own Federal Emergency Management Authority in their directive titled "First Responders Urged Not To Respond To Hurricane Impact Areas Unless Dispatched By State, Local Authorities" . . . This order from their Military Leaders to their citizens to 'NOT RESPOND' defies explanation . . . one can only liken the brutality of such Military Leaders as these to those produced under the Nazi Germany and Soviet Communist Regimes, where common sense and human compassion were senselessly slaughtered upon the alter of Total State Control. . . . But sadly these American, these once great people, are not fighting to defend their weakest citizens, leading one to wonder what their reactions would be if the masses of their refugees were white skinned, and to which their Military Leaders were quick to remove from New Orleans as we previously evidenced. But instead of defending others they are instead crying to their Military Leaders for more Military control, and as we can read as reported by the Guardian Unlimited News Service in their article titled "Criticism of Bush mounts amid chaos" and which says: "United States President George Bush arrived on Friday night in the ravaged Gulf Coast region amid mounting criticism of his handling of the crisis and a prediction by one senator that the death toll in Louisiana alone could top 10 000 people. As thousands of people sat on the streets of New Orleans, having spent their fourth day waiting to be rescued, the city fell deeper into chaos, with gangs roaming the city and corpses rotting in the sun. Kathleen Blanco, the Democrat Governor of Louisiana, threatened looters with a shoot-to-kill policy. . . . "These troops are battle-tested. They have M16s and are locked and loaded," she said. "These troops know how to shoot and kill, and I expect they will." Plumes of thick black smoke rose after an explosion rocked an industrial area hit hard by Katrina, and an apartment complex in the city centre was also in flames. The explosion was later said to have taken place in a chemical storage facility. Stunned residents stumbled around bodies that lay rotting and untouched. . . . Today hundreds of thousands of starving and homeless refugees roam the American Heartland, but as the world has seen from countless examples throughout history of those living under Fascist Military Rule, these Americans have totally subjugated themselves to believing that their solutions lie in giving money to their elites and trusting in their Military to restore and keep order. It is almost as if these strange people have forgotten what their country was founded for in the first place and the words of warning passed on to them from their First President, George Washington, and who had warned them: "Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." . . . Today the world watches in horror as this ‘Fearful Master’ shows its true face.

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 9:09 PM

 

IEA chief warns of worldwide energy crisis
(Reuters, 3 September 2005)
The head of the West's energy watchdog said in an interview on Saturday that Hurricane Katrina could spark a worldwide energy crisis if damage to U.S. refineries led to a big increase in U.S. purchases of European petrol. . . . "If the crisis affects oil products then it's a worldwide crisis. No one should think this will be limited to the United States," Claude Mandil, head of the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) told German daily Die Welt. . . . "They are already buying gasoline in Europe. If the refineries are damaged, that will only increase. Then this will become a worldwide crisis very quickly." . . . Mandil told the paper that high oil prices represented a risk for global economic growth and urged consumers to alter their behaviour to save more energy and limit the fallout. . . . Poor countries were bound to suffer most from a recent surge in energy prices, which has been aggravated by Katrina and the shortages it has caused, he said. . . . On Friday, the IEA launched a rescue plan to ease those shortages, saying its 26 members would release two million barrels per day of oil over a 30-day period. . . . U.S. gasoline prices have spiked by nearly a fifth over the past week, pushing up fuel prices around the world.

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posted by LoZo 10:37 AM

 

Has Katrina begun the final collapse of the USA?
(Michael C. Ruppert, September 2, 2005)
The Bush administration is horribly mismanaging relief efforts along the Gulf Coast. Several things are now becoming clear. It is unlikely that New Orleans will ever be significantly rebuilt. When we talk about collapse as a result of Peak Oil, New Orleans is an exemplary - if horrifying - glimpse of what it will look like for all of us. In the case of New Orleans, however, it's happening about two or three times as fast as we will see it when Peak Oil becomes an unavoidable, ugly, global reality. How long? Months. If we’re lucky, a year. . . . How low can human beings sink? Keep watching the news. It's not the first time civilizations have collapsed. This has all happened many times before. This behavior is not new. What is new -- but is now dying -- is our enshrined belief that there were to be no consequences of our reckless consumption and destruction of the ecosystem. What is now dying a horrible death is America's grotesque global arrogance, brutality and cupidity. . . . As a result of Katrina, Saudi Arabia has finally admitted that it cannot increase production. Many of us knew they’ve been lying for at least two years. The Energy Information Administration has just admitted that global demand has been outstripping supply for several months before Katrina. Nice time to start telling the truth. Nature is finally calling everybody's bluff. . . . Gulf energy production has four main components: drilling and production, pipeline delivery to shore, refinery capacity, and then delivery to the rest of the nation. We have heard precious little about the damage to Louisiana's Port Fourchon which is the largest point at which energy passes from sea to land in the region. It is heavily damaged and mostly inoperable for now . . . As one astute and great researcher put it, "How will the oil companies even find their workers or tell them where to report for work?" Where will the workers live? Where will they buy groceries? How will they get to and from work if the gasoline they’re supposed to produce isn’t there? The Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP) is also much more seriously damaged than press accounts disclose. It's here that supertankers from overseas (used to) offload. They have no place else to do it. They’re too big. I have seen video of LOOP damage which doesn’t look anything like the minimal damage that's been reported. OK, so when the port is fixed what about the damaged pipelines running to shore? How many boat anchors have been dragged over them? In how many places are they ruptured, crushed or broken? . . . As many as twenty offshore rigs have now been confirmed as adrift, capsized, listing or sunk. Each rig may have as many as eight wells. Where’s the money coming from to replace them? How long will that take? . . . Bottom line: my assessment is that New Orleans is never going to be rebuilt and that US domestic oil production will never again reach pre-Katrina levels. The infrastructure is gone, the people are gone, and the US economy will be on life support very, very quickly. If people are griping at $5.00 gasoline what will they do when it's $8.00? $10.00? Start shooting (the wrong people)? How difficult is it to rebuild in that kind of social climate? And if US oil production does not soon exceed pre-Katrina levels then the US economy is doomed anyway. It's a catch-up game now. I think it’s quite likely that the Bush administration is responding so ineptly in part because it is in a complete crisis mode realizing that the entire United States is on the brink of collapse and there's very little they can do about it. The Bush administration doesn’t know how to build things up, only blow them up. They aren’t worrying about New Orleans because they’re frantically triaging the rest of the nation and deciding what can be saved elsewhere. . . . Go ahead. Tell me we’ve all been wrong about Peak Oil, about climate collapse, and the metastatic corruption of our government and economic system. Now it's an easy bet and one that we will not have to wait long to settle. I'll take your wager. . . . As New Orleans is showing us, and as Groucho Marx once said, "You bet your life!"

. . . Read more!


posted by LoZo 4:22 PM