GlaxoSmithKline Fined for ‘Bad Paperwork’ After 14 Die in Illegal Vaccine Trial

GlaxoSmithKline, the world’s second largest drug maker was fined $93,000 for what the Associated Press and other Main Stream Media outlets in the United States are calling “paperwork errors” (here). Unfortunately, the paperwork in question had to do with the recruitment of poor children of illiterate parents into a vaccine trial that some say, claimed the lives of fourteen infants.

Judge Marcelo Aguinsky also fined two of the trials investigators $70,000 each for their role in the deception because the consent forms that are required by law in Argentina were signed by illiterate parents and in some cases by adults who had no custodial rights over the children.

GSK and Argentine Health Officials state that there are no links between the experimental vaccine and the death of the fourteen babies in the drug trial. A spokesperson for ANMAT, Argentina’s equivalent to the United State’s FDA, even went so far as to claim that “All of these patients had been given a placebo – that’s to say, something that appeared to be the vaccine but that had no active ingredients. The vaccine is safe.”

Infowars

Prototypical Fascism in Contemporary Dutch Politics

In the Netherlands, Geert Wilders and the PVV are more than the prototype of contemporary fascism. They are its selling model, and they sell well. … The PVV does not use physical violence, but its rhetoric is at times highly combative. It carries the same message as early twentieth century fascist violence: that only the PVV is tough enough to save the nation from hostile threats. Such militant rhetoric can give its supporters the idea that violence is justified, and regrettably it has done so in the recent past.

The PVV is a fascist party. The PVV exhibits political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline and victimhood. The PVV is a nationalist and anti-Islam party working in uneasy collaboration with a minority government of traditional elites. The PVV is a party
striving to unite, energize and purify the Dutch community. The PVV is a party that is willing to abandon democratic liberties in order to protect the community from alien threats. The PVV is not a party of militants, nor a party violently pursuing internal cleansing and external expansion. But the PVV is a party that employs militant rhetoric and that proposes exclusionary policies, e.g. to deny Muslims freedom of religion and to ban the Qur’an. Paxton’s “short handle” of fascism fits the PVV very well.

The PVV is a fascist party and its leader Geert Wilders is a fascist.

Click here to read the bachelor's thesis (PDF)

Henk Bovekerk blog

Japanese Government working on cyberweapon

The Japanese Defense Ministry is in the process of developing a computer virus capable of tracking, identifying and disabling sources of cyber-attacks, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned. The development of the virtual cyberweapon was launched in 2008. Since then, the weapon has been tested in a closed network environment.

Cyberweapons are said to already be in use in countries such as the United States and China. However, in Japan there is no provision on the use of cyberweapons against external parties in existing legislation on foreign attacks. With this in mind, the Defense Ministry and Foreign Ministry have begun legislative consideration regarding the matter, according to sources.

The most distinctive feature of the new virus is its ability to trace cyber-attack sources. It can identify not only the immediate source of attack, but also all "springboard" computers used to transmit the virus. The virus also has the ability to disable the attacking program and collect relevant information. 

The Daily Yomiuri

Israeli Checkpoint Cruelty

"Animals. Animals. Like the Discovery Channel. All of Ramallah is a jungle. There are monkeys, dogs, gorillas. The problem is that the animals are locked they can't come out. We're humans. They're animals. They aren't humans we are." - Israeli border police (you can find at 5:03 of this video)

US Army To Release Range Of Gaming Accessories

The US Army already uses XBox controllers to pilot its unmanned UAV drones and ground-based robots - so perhaps it's not surprising that they're coming full circle?

According to reports, the US Army is about to release a range of gaming accessories, weapons and headsets designed for use with first-person shooters, calling on gamers to "equip yourself with pride".

The US Army will sell three branded rifles for use with PS Move games, including a sniper rifle, a green Commando Assault rifle and an 'Elite' assault gun decked out in handy camouflage. The Army has also unveiled a Bluetooth headset for PS3 and PC, a backpack, a wired headset for XBox and a pair of 3D headphones.

"On the battlefield, often the key to winning isn’t firepower but communication," the product page for the headphones reads. "Any seasoned first person shooter player knows all too well that a sure path to defeat is being unable to hear clear signals from your squad or the approaching enemy and having to shout for teammates to hear you."

Huffington Post

Bang To The Beat

BigMixUpTV

George Michael Blasts Christian Group Who Prayed For His Death

George Michael has launched a tirade of criticism on Twitter against a Christian group who prayed for his death whilst he battled life-threatening pneumonia last month.

The openly gay singer, who was taken ill at AKH hospital in Vienna, Austria last November, has been criticised by religious group Christians For A Moral America, who suggested the former Wham! star was suffering from AIDS and that he deserved to die because of his sexuality.

Taking to Twitter after 'a few glasses of vino' last night, George called the group "c**ksucking b***ards". He wrote: "Did you know that while I was fighting for my life in Austria there were a bunch of those lovely American 'Christian' organisations, who call themselves 'Christians for a Moral America', who were actually taking the time to pray for me to die?"

Huffington Post

Turkish ex-army chief held in jail for trial

A Turkish court has ordered a former armed forces chief to be remanded in custody overnight pending trial over charges of bidding to overthrow the government. General Ilker Basbug is the highest ranking officer to be caught up in the so-called Ergenekon network, an ultra-nationalist group accused of conspiring against the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

State prosecutors have been investigating allegations that Turkey's military launched websites to spread propaganda against Erdogan and his governing Justice and Development Party (AKP). Basbug told the court on Thursday he rejected the allegations, according to broadcaster NTV, describing the Turkish Armed Forces as one of the most powerful in the world. "We can say it is really tragicomic to accuse somebody who commands such an army of forming and directing a terrorist group," he was quoted as saying.

Al Jazeera English

Eve Arnold Died

The longevity of Eve Arnold's career as a photographer matched the heterogeneity of her work. Despite the success of her portraits of the rich and famous, Arnold, who has died aged 99, was equally well known for photographing "the poor, the old and the underdog". She said: "It's the hardest thing in the world to take the mundane and try to show how special it is."

In fact she achieved the reverse, showing us the often pathetic and banal in the lives of the glitterati she always shot without the benefit of artificial lights, as well as how ordinary daily lives, from Afghanistan to Zululand, were never mundane. As the war photographer and Magnum co-founder Robert Capa put it: "[Arnold's work] falls metaphorically between Marlene Dietrich's legs and the bitter lives of migratory potato pickers."

Eve Arnold obituary on The Guardian - Slideshow on Magnum Photos

Rick Santorum: There is no Palestine

Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, who became second in the US state of Iowa's Republican presidential caucuses, says that Palestinians do not exist and there is no such country as Palestine.

“There are no Palestinians,” he told a questioner at a campaign event in Iowa. "All the people who live in the West Bank are Israelis. There are no Palestinians. This is Israeli land," he added.
Earlier in December, another Republican candidate, former speaker of the US House of Representatives, Newt Gingrich, called Palestinians an “invented” people with the aim of winning the Israeli lobby's support. Santorum criticized Gingrich's comments as “provocative,” at the time when he was considered a hopeless back-of-the-pack candidate and not being taken very seriously.
"The West Bank is part of Israel," which won it as "part of an aggressive attack by Jordan and others" in 1967. Israel doesn't have to give it back any more than the United States has to give New Mexico and Texas to Mexico, which was gotten "through a war," Santorum added.

PressTV - Rick Santorum's Top 10 Most Outrageous Campaign Statements

Sarkozy named in arms deal corruption scandal

Nicolas Sarkozy has been named by an investigation into an alleged party funding corruption scandal said to have led to the deaths of 11 French engineers in a Pakistan bomb attack. It is claimed Mr Sarkozy must have been aware of the establishment of a shell company suspected of diverting cash from arms sales commissions to fund the 1995 presidential campaign of then prime minister Edouard Balladur.

The commissions, paid as part of arms sales to Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, were not illegal under French law at the time, but channelling the money back to France was, and remains so. Magistrates also allege the subsequent freezing of the payments by President Jacques Chirac led indirectly to a bomb attack on a bus in Pakistan which killed 11 French engineers.

Mail Online

2012 & The End Of The World

Why (some) people think the world will come to an end during 2012. Grey's Blog

International websites banned in Belarus

Residents of Belarus are now forbidden from accessing foreign websites. Any citizen who breaks the new law is liable to face a fine of up to US$125.

All entrepreneurs and companies in Belarus will now have to register as part of the compliance for the new law. If the company or private individual offers commercial services, only local email, hosting and payment providers can be used. This vaguely authoritarian decree is excessively harsher than the US’ proposed SOPA law, which aims to clamp down on copyright infringement.

An official document, issued by the US Library of Congress, explains that even internet cafes in Belarus will have to comply, or face a misdemeanour charge:

Additionally, the Law states that the owners and administrators of Internet cafés or other places that offer access to the Internet might be found guilty of violating this Law and fined and their businesses might be closed if users of Internet services provided by these places are found visiting websites located outside of Belarus and if such behaviour of the clients was not properly identified, recorded, and reported to the authorities.

Memeburn

Nearly 1,000 serving British police officers have a criminal record

Forces across England and Wales employ policemen and women with convictions including burglary, causing death by careless driving, robbery, supplying drugs, domestic violence, forgery and perverting the course of justice.

Those with criminal records include senior officers, among them two detective chief inspectors and one chief inspector working for the Metropolitan Police. At least 944 currently serving officers and police community support officers (PCSOs) have a conviction, according to figures released by 33 of the 43 forces in England and Wales in response to Freedom of Information requests.

Many forces could not provide details of criminal records dating from before their staff joined the police, meaning the true figure will be significantly higher. The Metropolitan Police, Britain's largest force, came top with 356 officers and 41 PCSOs with convictions.

Telegraph

U.S. opened Pandora's box with drones

Modern warfare has entered a new era. Unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, can fly thousands of miles, conduct surveillance or target and kill individuals with precision. Unfortunately, this precision does not prevent collateral damage, the military term for unintended civilian deaths. Military experts predict this will be the pattern for future military conflicts.

Quite often, the drones are operated by personnel who are far removed from the conflict. They kill enemy combatants by day and go home at night to their families. A definite advantage is the fact that unmanned aircraft do not place any pilots at risk.

Now for the dark side. A disadvantage is that this type of warfare depersonalizes warfare and reduces it to just another video game. The warfare acquires an antiseptic quality that could make the decision to go to war more likely and acceptable. The popular perception is that, because of our advanced technology, the United States has a virtual monopoly on drones. According to CNN, nothing could be farther from the truth. Quoting the article, "As many as 50 countries are developing or purchasing these systems, including China, Russia, India, Pakistan, and Iran."

Zanesville Times Recorder

United States Air Force Capt. Bob operates a Predator unmanned aircraft system over Kandahar, Afghanistan, from Indian Springs, Nevada. (The Christian Science Monitor)

American and British Police Chiefs Step Up Repression in Bahrain

Two former police chiefs from the US and Britain have brought discernible Western “expertise” to the Bahraini force only weeks following their appointments – a surge in repression and state terrorism.

Former Miami police chief John Timoney and his British counterpart, John Yates, formerly commander at London’s Scotland Yard, were assigned last month by Bahrain’s royal rulers to “oversee reform” of the Persian Gulf kingdom’s security forces. Officially, the appointment of the American and Briton was to bring Western professional policing to the Bahraini force and specifically to upgrade the human rights record of Bahrain’s ministry of interior and National Security Agency.

The assignments were announced by King Hamad Al Khalifa following a report by an international commission of inquiry into widespread human rights violations in the US-backed oil kingdom since pro-democracy protests erupted there last February.

Human rights activists and several political sources say that state forces have dramatically stepped up violence towards protesters and targeting of the Shia community generally. The diminutive island state of less than 600,000 nationals is comprised mainly of Shia muslims (70 per cent) who are ruled over by a Sunni elite installed by Britain when the kingdom gained nominal independence in 1971. American and British government support for the unelected Al Khalifa monarchy is viewed by the majority of Bahrainis as being at odds with their claims for democratic rights.

Over the past year, Bahraini state forces have killed some 50 people; thousands have been maimed, wounded and detained, many of the latter tortured. Proportionate to its population, such state violence is comparable to what Washington and London have loudly denounced the Libyan and Syrian regimes for – indeed mounting a military invasion of the former and threatening to do so in the latter – under the guise of “protecting human rights”. By contrast, there is hardly a word of denunciation from Washington or London towards the Bahraini regime, which hosts the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet.

Global Research

Budapest protest against new Hungary constitution

Tens of thousands of people have been protesting in Budapest over Hungary's controversial new constitution, a day after it came into force. The country's governing Fidesz party pushed the law through parliament in April after winning a two-thirds majority in parliamentary elections.

Opponents say it threatens democracy by removing checks and balances set up in 1989 when Communism fell. The EU and US had also asked for the law to be withdrawn. The dispute has cast doubt over talks on a new financing agreement with the EU and IMF, seen as vital for market confidence in the central European country.

Several centre-left opposition parties joined in the protests, held near a gala event organised by the government to celebrate the new constitution. The governing Fidesz party controls 68% of seats in parliament, but the streets now belong to the opposition. Nearly every day there are new demonstrations against one aspect or another of government policy - the new constitution, economic policy, the centralisation of the state media, or the closing of an opposition radio station.

Protesters chanted slogans denouncing the centre-right Prime Minister, Viktor Orban, and carried placards denouncing his "dictatorship" as officials arrived for the event. "Viktor Orban and his servants turned Hungary from a promising place to the darkest spot in Europe," said Socialist MP Tibor Szanyi, quoted by AFP news agency.

BBC News

German super-volcano about to blow

A sleeping super-volcano in Germany is showing worrying signs of waking up. It's lurking just 390 miles away underneath the tranquil Laacher See lake near Bonn and is capable of ejecting billions of tons of magma.

This monster erupts every 10 to 12,000 years and last went off 12,900 years ago, so it could blow at any time. Experts believe that if it did go off, it could lead to widespread devastation, mass evacuations and even short-term global cooling from the resulting ash cloud blocking the sun.

It’s thought that the volcano is similar in size and power to Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, which blew in 1991 and became the biggest eruption of the 20th century. It ejected 10 billion tons of magma, 20 billion tons of sulphur dioxide 16 cubic kilometres of ash and caused a 0.5C drop in global temperatures.

Volcanologists believe that the Laacher See volcano is still active as carbon dioxide is bubbling up to the lake’s surface, which indicates that the magma chamber below is 'degassing'.

Mail Online

Outlaw singing American anthem ‘inappropriately’

Legislation introduced to the Indiana Senate would make it a crime to stray from approved lyrical or melodic guidelines while performing the national anthem at any event sponsored by public schools and state universities. The bill was proposed by Sen. Vaneta Becker (R). She told The Indianapolis Star that it was inspired by a constituent who emailed her after being upset by a parody of the “Star-Spangled Banner.”

“Sometimes it’s just done in a joking manner,” Becker said. “But I don’t think the national anthem is something we ought to be joking around with.” The legislation would require performers to sign a contract agreeing to follow guidelines established by the State Department of Education. Those who failed to abide by the guidelines would be fined $25.

Additionally, schools would have to keep recordings of every performance for two years.

The Raw Story

Walnuts Are Drugs

Seen any walnuts in your medicine cabinet lately? According to the American Food and Drug Administration, that is precisely where you should find them. Because Diamond Foods made truthful claims about the health benefits of consuming walnuts that the FDA didn’t approve, it sent the company a letter declaring, “Your walnut products are drugs” — and “new drugs” at that — and, therefore, “they may not legally be marketed … in the United States without an approved new drug application.” The agency even threatened Diamond with “seizure” if it failed to comply.

The New American

UK to close borders, evacuate expats if euro collapses

As Eurozone nations sink ever deeper into crisis, the UK Treasury is working on a contingency plan for the single currency's collapse. It includes capital control measures that, under EU rules, require agreement from most of the Union members. Britain is also prepared to close its borders and evacuate expats and holidaymakers from the effected countries.

‫Testimony of a Palmach soldier

A Public hearing at Zochrot, a testimony given by Amnon Neauman, a 1948 Palmach soldier describing the occupation of the Negev villages. - Zochrot YouTube Page

2012 WARNING !!!

Happy 2012

RAP NEWS

The year we've all been waiting for - 2012AD (or 13.0.0.0.0, if you ask a Mayan) - is finally here. What will happen? Will we see the poles shift or a paradigm shift? Will a rogue Sumerian planet smash into our solar system, plunging us into serfdom under the iron fist of a race of gold-hungry aliens? Or are the aliens already here? Or are all these merely humanity's collective projections of itself as it careens towards an ever-accelerating super-connected cyber-reality - whatever that means... One thing's sure, if 2011 was a prelude of things to come, 2012 is going to be one hell of a year. Now that it has arrived, are we ready? Join your host Robert Foster and his guests, Terrence Moonseed and General Baxter, as they conduct an in-depth rap analysis into the future, and humanity's place in it. Happy New YERA!

The Juice Media