Money Will Expand On Studies For Treatment, Bringing Us Closer To Identifying A Cure

WASHINGTON – July 31 –

Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) secured a major victory for veterans of the first Gulf War by garnering $8 million for Gulf War Illness (GWI) research in the Fiscal Year 2010 Appropriations bill that passed the House yesterday.

“This research will build on previous studies on Gulf War Illness.” Kucinich said. “This funding will take giant steps forward in identifying a treatment or a cure for Gulf War Veteran’s illness.”

In its landmark 454-page report delivered in November, the Congressionally-mandated Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans Illnesses at the Department of Veterans Affairs (RAC) reported that “Gulf War illness is real, that it is the result of neurotoxin exposures during Gulf War deployment and that few veterans have recovered or substantially improved with time.”

For the first time, the report identified several suspected causes and two known causes: exposure to pesticides and a drug given to troops to protect them from nerve gas.

“There are currently no effective treatments for these conditions. With research, we learn the true causes of GWI and the possibilities open up. We must continue to attack GWI and fund the research with an amount commensurate with the scope of the problem,” said Kucinich.

Kucinich’s request for funding received bipartisan support from Reps. Henry Brown, Holt, Filner, Michaud, Baldwin, C. Brown, Conyers, Edwards, Grijalva, Hall, Maloney, McDermott, D. Moore, G. Moore, Pascrell, Pingree, Ross, Sestak, Stark and Yarmuth.

commondreams.org

As the US feels the strain on its armed forces serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, the country’s defense secretary talks of plans to expand the Army by 22,000 soldiers.

Speaking at a Pentagon news conference with Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced that the military has reached a point where “its ability to continue to deploy combat units at acceptable fill rates is at risk.”

Gates argued that the goal of the increase is to ease the strain of deployment, as many troops have faced repeated lengthy rotations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“This is an important and necessary step to ensure that we continue to properly support the needs of commanders in the field, while providing relief for our current force and their families,” Gates explained.

The defense secretary said the increase will last three fiscal years, expanding US troop levels from the current 547,000 to a maximum of 569,000.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that a 30,000 increase in the number of US soldiers could add between $2 billion and $4 billion a year in costs.

This is while previous reports indicate that the US House of Representatives and Senate committees have passed bills that would funnel more money into the department in charge of foreign policy.

Under the bills, the State Department will receive about 25% more from what was spent in 2008 and nearly double the amount in 2005.

Meanwhile US President Barack Obama’s 2010 defense budget seeks to “rebalance military spending,” giving greater weight to funding irregular warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Under the new plans, the Pentagon may be forced to cut traditional weapons spending, and expand resources to protect ground troops and computer networks.

http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=101233&sectionid=3510203

As the Obama administration struggles to fix the economy, fifteen US states hit 10 percent unemployment, the US Labor Department says.

The department announced on Friday that unemployment topped 10 percent in 15 states across America and the District of Columbia for the month of June.

In Michigan, the jobless rate surpassed 15 percent. It is the first time in 25 years that any US state has been challenged with an unemployment rate so high, ever since 1984 in West Virginia.

The other 14 states are Alabama, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina and Tennessee.

The previous report in May recorded thirteen states and the District of Columbia surpassing a jobless rate of 10 percent. Alabama and Georgia joined the latest list in June.

The Federal Reserve this week projected that the national unemployment rate, currently at a 26-year high of 9.5 percent, will pass 10 percent by the end of this year.

Most Federal policymakers say it could take “five or six years” for the economy and the labor market to get back on a path of long-term health.

President Barack Obama’s top economic adviser, Lawrence Summers, said that the administration and other independent forecasters had underestimated job losses.

He said it was unclear why employers had shed so many workers in this downturn, the New York Times reported

http://www.presstv.com/detail.aspx?id=101016&sectionid=3510203

ATLANTA–11Alive has learned Cynthia McKinney has entered Gaza.

A spokesperson for the former Georgia Congresswoman issued a release just after midnight indicating she entered Palestinian territory Wednesday.

11Alive has obtained photos from a Palestinian support website which appear to show her there. Mckinney and the group of activists she is traveling with are reportedly delivering aid.

This would make McKinney’s third attempt to enter Gaza. Twice before she tried entering Gaza by boat and was turned back or detained by Israeli officials. According to the release from a McKinney spokesperson, the group entered by caravan from Egypt.

11Alive’s Brenda Wood spoke exclusively with McKinney last week in Washington after the former Representative was released from Israeli custody.

“Why didn’t you go the accepted route and take the humanitarian aid by land?” Wood asked.

“The aid isn’t getting isn’t getting in,” McKinney said. “And the aid that does get in is certainly disproportionate to the need.”

Stay with 11Alive and 11Alive.com for the latest on this developing story.

By RHONDA COOK, LARRY HARTSTEIN
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sunday, July 05, 2009

Cynthia McKinney’s mom said she’s learned that her daughter is on the way home.

Leola McKinney said a friend who contacted the U.S. Embassy in Israel reported that the former congresswoman was released from Israeli custody and taken to Ben Gurion International Airport.

“We finally got word that she was released,” Leola McKinney said late Sunday afternoon. “We don’t know what time she is supposed to fly out. All we know is that they took her to the airport.

“I would be more relieved when I know she’s on the flight,” Leola McKinney added. “But I am relieved that she’s away from there.”

McKinney had been in custody since Tuesday, when she and 20 others were swept up by the Israeli Navy while allegedly trying to sail through a navy blockade. The group says it was attempting to deliver humanitarian supplies to Gaza.

McKinney and the rest of her group could have been released soon after they were taken into custody but they refused to sign a document admitting they violated Israel’s blockade, according to McKinney’s parents. The group was due to appear in an Israeli court Sunday.

Leola McKinney said she had no information about the court hearing.

Leola McKinney said she had not spoken with her daughter since shortly after she was taken into custody.

Cynthia McKinney and other members of the “Free Gaza Movement ” left Cyprus Tuesday on the Greek-registered ship Arion.

Their ship was stopped when they tried to pass through the Israeli Navy’s security blockade at Ashdod. The group was taken into custody and their ship was seized. Israel officials promised to deliver by ground all of the humanitarian supplies that were on the boat.

Family, friends and supporters say Cynthia McKinney believed she was in international waters and was free to pass.

“The Israelis hijacked us because we wanted to give crayons to the children of Gaza,” Cynthia McKinney said in a recorded statement delivered via telephone and posted on the internet site YouTube [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkPvzSZRuDo].

The office of the Consulate General of Israel in Atlanta said in a statement released Friday, “According to Israeli law Ms. McKinney and her fellow crew members were suggested to sign a form acknowledging their deportation… Since Ms. McKinney has refused to do so, she is expected to appear before an Israeli judge on Sunday, July 5, and afterwards be returned home as soon as possible.”

Civil rights leader the Rev. Joseph Lowery, head of the Atlanta-based Coalition for the People’s Agenda, said he and others have spoken by phone with the Consulate General of Israel.

“Whatever happened, there was no harm done,” Lowery said. “She was not carrying munitions, but medicine. We hope Israel will show compassion and release her and let her go on to deliver the much-needed medicine to the Gaza Strip. … If she were carrying guns, that would be a different thing. [But] she was carrying humanitarian aid.”

Israeli officials blame McKinney and her group for the controversy, saying they were looking for confrontation to attract publicity. The officials note that Palestinian Authority and the rest of the international community had agreed to the off-shore blockade to prevent arms smuggling into Gaza. Gaza is controlled by Hamas, which is classified by the U.S. and European Union as a terrorist organization.

Leola McKinney said the trip would have received no “publicity if they had been allowed to deliver supplies to Gaza. They [Israel] made an issue out of it by taking the boat and escorting them into Israel.”

Billy McKinney, Cynthia McKinney’s father and a former state legislator, said his daughter was only trying to show “the devastation in Gaza… Anybody who has a humanitarian spirit would not want to see those people live in those conditions.”

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/stories/2009/07/05/mckinney_israel.html

Dr. Paul has the cure for America’s ills By Eric S Margolis / Washington

Republican Congressman Ron Paul became a hero to many Americans last year when he ran for president against the political establishment.  The 11-term Texas congressman is the most respected and admired American politician around the world after Barack Obama.

Representative Paul is a vocal critic of America’s foreign wars; he sits on the powerful House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Dr Paul invited me to Washington to address his weekly luncheon in his office on Capitol Hill on the intensifying wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  A group of independent-minded Republican congressmen attended.

During last year’s presidential race, I called Paul, “the only candidate who is telling Americans the truth about foreign affairs”.  I came to respect and admire Paul’s courage, honesty, and refusal to accept special interest money.

Speaking of today’s US Congress, Dr Paul observes: “Special interests have replaced the concern the Founders had for the general welfare.”

In fact, Representative Paul has been a model of the legislators envisaged by America’s founding fathers: men of high moral standards and intellect dedicated to the nation’s wellbeing.

He reminds me in many ways of the fiercely upright senators of the early Roman Republic.  The Roman Senate served as the model for the United States Senate.

Paul, a physician, used to deliver babies on Mondays and Saturdays while serving in office.

The 74-year-old doctor from Texas electrified young Americans with his grassroots campaign, providing voters a real alternative to the Republicans and Democratic establishment which often appears to be one party with two factions.

Paul’s clear, cool voice challenged all the government and media propaganda about Afghanistan and Iraq. Dr Paul is also waging a  determined battle against the runaway spending and soaring national debt being promoted by the Obama White House and Congressional Democrats.

Paul and his fellow libertarian Republicans advocate individual rights, strict adherence to the US Constitution, limited government, and free enterprise. They oppose   American global domination, “nation-building”, and all foreign wars not waged in the direct defence of American territory.

Paul opposes US involvement in other nation’s internal affairs.  As anti-Iranian hysteria gripped the nation last month, Paul was the only House member who voted against a bill condemning Iran for its recent election.  That’s real courage.

“There is no area in which Republicans have further strayed from our traditions than in foreign affairs,” writes Paul. He dismisses claims by pro-Israel neoconservatives that “we have to either fight them over there or over here” as a “false choice”. America has no business policing the world.  US foreign policy is undermining America’s national security, says Dr Paul.

Only Congress, he insists, has the right to declare war, not the president.  Congress cravenly abandoned this right during the buildup to the Iraq War that was fuelled by the Bush administration’s shameless lies and  war-mongering by the US media.

Dr Paul’s amiable manner and lack of the bloated self-importance that so typifies Washington bigwigs conceals a very keen intellect and depth of knowledge.  He also has one of the capital’s sharpest foreign affairs staff chiefs, Daniel McAdams.  It is a relief to find key decision-makers in Washington who actually understand the outside world.

As I talked with Dr Paul, it occurred to me that he and his fellow libertarians are the potent remedy that the dreadfully sick Republican Party so desperately needs. Paul’s Liberty Caucus will hopefully form the core around which a vigorous, new party grows that addresses America’s real needs.

President George Bush and the neocons almost destroyed the Republican Party, as this columnist predicted before the  2003 invasion of Iraq.  What’s left of the Republicans has become a rump dominated by Christian religious fundamentalists, Southerners, and war-loving neoconservatives. No longer a place for a moderate, New York Republican like myself.

Republicans have also been suffering a series of lurid sex scandals that have made its members look both extremely hypocritical and awfully stupid.  Meanwhile, extreme right-wingers like the odious Rush Limbaugh and former speaker Newt Gingrich are vying to become the party’s voice.

Dr Paul and his fellow libertarians offer Republicans and Americans a real alternative to the dumbed-down Republicans and to the wildly spending Democrats whose expanded Afghanistan war and reckless economic policies are leading the nation into growing danger.

AE911Truth to Speak in Washington DC

We’re off to Washington DC! And we need your help…

AE911Truth flies to DC July 11th with a team of five to produce these events:

1. Sign Up Architects at Our AIA Booth

We will host a 10′ x 10′ exhibit booth at the DC Convention of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) – July 14, 15, and 16. We will be speaking to several hundred architects over the three-day period and giving them DVDs and brochures.  We hope to sign up at least one hundred more architects on our website!  Consider flying/driving to DC and helping us in our booth if you are in the area. You would need to competently convey the essential points of the explosive evidence at the 3 World Trade Center high-rises – while wearing professional attire. To find out more or RSVP, contact Dave Slesinger at 410-499-5403 and/or davidslesinger (at) yahoo.com.

We will also host room #141 in the Convention Center where our new 30-minute version of 9/11: Blueprint for Truth – Companion Edition will be playing every hour on the hour followed by live Q&A.  We are making major inroads into the building professional community with these AIA conventions.  The reverberations throughout the country, from San Francisco, where we started, to DC and beyond, have been and will be deep and penetrating.  The AIA is already supporting us, though silently, by deliberately approving the AE911Truth booth at their events.  We have also already been approved for the November AIA Richmond, Virginia event.  We are all feeling that the dam of official denial might be about to break.

2. Speak at Busboys and Poets

On Thursday night 7/16 we will be speaking at 6pm and at 8pm at an unusual restaurant designed for this kind of event, called “Busboys and Poets.” See details below. Send the poster below to all your contacts in the area and let them know to bring their friends as well. We also hope to attract dozens of architects from the convention.

3. Speak to Congresspeople

Here is where we need you the most! On both Monday 7/13 and Friday 7/17 we will be speaking individually to your Congressional Representatives and Senators. We have several appointments already and expect to have a couple of dozen appointments. The key is that you have to be there! Some of you may be able to drive or even fly out to DC to attend a meeting with your representative on these dates. And we will be there with you to make the 10- or 15-minute presentation at the appointment. We’ve done this a few times already and have it down now. The trick is that you have to be there as a constituent for us to have access. As soon as you have successfully made an appointment, call Dave Slesinger at 410-499-5403 and/or email him at davidslesinger (at) yahoo.com.

Don’t worry about the schedule. Just make the appointment for any time on these two days that you can be there physically. Chances are you will only be able to make an appointment with a staffer. That’s OK! You can call them and ask for a 15-minute appointment because you are bringing a representative of over 700 Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth — some of whom live in their district — who are all calling upon Congress for real investigation of the destruction of the 3 World Trade Center high-rises on 9/11. And that you believe it is a matter of grave importance to the United States that this new explosive evidence be brought to their attention immediately.

AE911Truth DC Flyer

AE911Truth PDF Flyer for DC
(Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader)

Forward this link to DC-area people with high-speed Internet who might want to download the high-resolution file for printing:

http://www.ae911truth.org/downloads/DC_AE_Event.pdf

ATLANTA, Ga. (July 3, 2009) — Former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, who was taken into custody by the Israeli Navy on Tuesday with 20 others while trying to sail through a navy blockade to deliver humanitarian supplies to Gaza, has refused Israel’s initial offer to release her from custody. According to her supporters in Atlanta, McKinney refused the offer because she would have been required to sign an admission of guilt that she violated Israel’s blockade.

“At issue is the fact that Ms. McKinney was in international waters” when the Israeli Navy stopped the group’s boat, according to a statement from the Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery and the Atlanta-based Coalition for the People’s Agenda.

Israel disagrees, insisting that the Palestinian Authority and the rest of the international community long ago agreed to the off-shore blockade to prevent arms smuggling into Gaza.

The office of the Consulate General of Israel in Atlanta issued its own statement Friday, saying, “According to Israeli law Ms. McKinney and her fellow crew members were suggested to sign a form acknowledging their deportation, however since Ms. McKinney has refused to do so, she is expected to appear before an Israeli judge on Sunday, July 5th and afterwards be returned home as soon as possible.”

McKinney did not address any of that in a message posted on youtube.com that she delivered by telephone from Israel.

“The Israelis hijacked us because we wanted to give crayons to the children of Gaza…. We have not committed any crime. We have been detained,” McKinney said.

She said she wants the world to “see how we have been treated just because we wanted to deliver humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.”

Soon after Israel seized McKinney and the others and their boat, the government promised to deliver all of the humanitarian supplies that were on the boat, but would deliver them by the ground routes into Gaza that Israel has been permitting international aid groups to use.

McKinney and the twenty others associated with the U.S.-based “Free Gaza Movement” boarded the Greek-registered ship “Arion” Tuesday in Cyprus and tried to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza by sea, by going through the Israeli Navy’s security blockade.

The Israeli Navy stopped them and took them and their boat into custody at Ashdod.

“I admire her courage. I might differ with her strategy sometimes,” said Dr. Lowery with a smile, speaking at his Atlanta home Friday evening.

Lowery and other civil rights activists met with the Consulate General’s office by conference call, urging McKinney’s immediate release, without conditions.

“We wanted to express our concern…. Here in her home community, we are concerned for her safety. And since she’s on a mission of mercy and not munitions, we think they ought to let her come home.”

The Israeli government says McKinney was on a mission of confrontation, seeking publicity.

“Well, I’m sure they have a good argument for their action…. But nevertheless, she was carrying food and medicine to heal the sick and wounded. And I think that’s a good thing. And I would hope that in the spirit of compassion and mercy and ministry, that they’ll let her come on back home.”

So as it stood as of Friday night, the Israeli justice system will not decide before Sunday what to do with McKinney and the others.

McKinney speaks to family

The father of detained former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney said he spoke briefly with her on Thursday. McKinney and 20 other passengers were on a ship bringing supplies to Gaza in defiance of an Israeli blockade when it was intercepted Tuesday. They are presently in custody. “She just said she was all right, and that was about it,” Billy McKinney of Atlanta said.

Anguish over mass Israeli arrests

‘They kidnapped the passengers and tore the Greek flag off the boat’

Speaking from prison yesterday, former US Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, who also remains locked up, outlined what had happened to the vessel.

“We were in international waters on a boat delivering humanitarian aid to people in Gaza when the Israeli Navy ships surrounded us and illegally threatened us, dismantled our navigation equipment, boarded and confiscated the ship,” she said.

McKinney, who was a Green Party nominee for US President, told of her frustration at being kept in detention without any assistance from the US government.

“All of us on board were then taken off the ship and into custody, and brought into Israel and imprisoned. State Department and White House officials have not affected our release or taken a strong public stance to condemn the illegal actions of the Israeli Navy,” she added.

http://www.cyprus-mail.com/news/main.php?id=46568&cat_id=1

Cynthia McKinney Remains Imprisoned in Israel After Gaza-Bound Boat Is Seized

Former U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney and several other human rights activists remain in an Israeli prison after refusing to sign a deportation form that they claim is self-incriminating.

Former U.S. lawmaker and Green Party presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney and several other activists remained in an Israeli prison Thursday after refusing to sign a deportation form that they claim is self-incriminating.

In a press release from the Green Party, McKinney said the form states that the Spirit of Humanity, a Greek-flagged relief boat carrying 21 activists, medical supplies, cement, olive trees and children’s toys en route to Gaza, was violating the Israeli blockade and trespassing the country’s territorial waters.

“We were in international waters on a boat delivering humanitarian aid to people in Gaza when the Israeli Navy ships surrounded us and illegally threatened us, dismantled our navigation equipment, boarded and confiscated the ship,” she said in a statement, adding that they were immediately taken into custody.

“Immigration officials in Israel said they did not want to keep us, but we remain imprisoned,” she said.

“State Department and White House officials have not effected our release or taken a strong public stance to condemn the illegal actions of the Israeli Navy of enforcing a blockade of humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians of Gaza, a blockade that has been condemned by President Obama.”

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/07/02/cynthia-mckinney-remains-imprisoned-israel-gaza-bound-boat-seized/

MTV’s “The Hills” Stars Heidi Montag & Spencer Pratt on Alex Jones Tv:

Waking Up to The NWO!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyMA8WnRRrs

Speidi back on Alex Jones Tv:

“Why 9/11 was an Inside Job!”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rTRthWYERs

Congress recently passed Obama’s war funding billH.R. 2346 Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2009, which according to GOP.gov is a $105.8 billion spending bill.  RawStory.com quoted Ron Paul, who stated the bill includes a $108 billion asset exchange with the International Monetary Fund.

GOP.gov confirms the actual amount:

Last week, Democrats in the House and Senate came to a conference agreement on the final language for the Conference Report. The agreement provides billions in non-defense funding, including $108 billion to expand the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) loan programs, which was not included in the House bill. The $108 billion was agreed to by the President in April when he and other members of the G-20 created a plan to increase IMF supplemental funding by tenfold and broaden the role of the Fund.

We can only assume the $108 billion is separate from the $105.8 billion.  The $108 IMF funding is described as a buy back, or loan guarantee.

According to Thomas.gov the IMF funds are to help Pakistan, although the IMF has come under fire as being the actual cause of global poverty by both Progressive–like Senator Bernie Sanders who voted to strip the IMF funding–and Republicans such as Ron Paul.

Republican Jim DeMint tried to strip out the IMF funding in the Senate bill by introducing Amendment 1138:

The DeMint amendment failed although Robert Bennett voted for the amendment.  Orrin Hatch did not vote.  There were 30 nays and 64 yeas.

sources for more information:

Senate Vote On Passage: H.R. 2346: Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2009

House Vote on Conference Report: H.R. 2346: Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2009

Information on how to contact your elected officials

There are several reports stating the policies in NAFTA that devastated Mexico where championed by the World Bank and IMF:

Press release: World Bank and IMF share in blame for Mexico’s crisis: From the 50 Years Campaign on Mexico Crisis 6 January, 1995

How the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Undermine Democracy and Erode Human Rights:Five Case Studies

John Perkins author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, has done a number of interviews where he claims the money being loaned out by the IMF and World Bank is used for infrastructure projects that go to companies like Halliburton, Halliburton’s subsidiary KBR, and Bechtel.  The ruling elite in the country take a cut for accepting the offer, and then the citizens of the country are left holding the debt.

Progressive John Pilger has made 35 documentaries from 1970 to 2006.  His films have been distributed in the UK, Australia and Canada, but have not been released in the US.  Pilger’s 2006 documentary The New Rulers of the World takes a look at the effect the World Bank and IMF had on Indonesia.

John Pilger’s documentary War by other Means examines the World Bank.