*This overview is compiled from incidents reported to the Office of Border Patrol and is not intended to reflect all Border Patrol enforcement actions. Most arrests and seizures fail to meet the requirements for mandatory reporting to the Office of Border Patrol.

Reported on April 23, 2009

Laredo Sector – Border Patrol agents seized 277 pounds of cocaine valued at $8,864,000 near Laredo, Texas. Six unidentified individuals were observed carrying the suspected narcotics bundles. Agents responded to the area and located foot sign indicating the subjects had returned to Mexico. Agents and a Border Patrol canine searched the area and discovered five duffle bags containing ten individually wrapped bundles of cocaine.

Rio Grande Valley Sector – Border Patrol agents seized 4,498 pounds of marijuana valued at $3,598,400, a 1999 Peterbilt tractor-trailer, and arrested a United States Citizen (USC) at the traffic checkpoint near Falfurrias, Texas. The subject presented himself and the tractor-trailer for inspection, and a Border Patrol canine alerted to the trailer. A search of the trailer revealed 360 bundles of marijuana concealed in 16 cardboard bins.

Tucson Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Nogales, Arizona. Records checks revealed subject was previously convicted of first degree felony homicide by vehicle in the State of Georgia and was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment.

Tucson Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Guatemala near Sierra Vista, Arizona. Records checks revealed the subject was previously convicted of statutory rape in the State of Georgia, and had an active arrest warrant for probation violation.

Yuma Sector – Border Patrol agents rescued an illegal alien from Honduras near Yuma, Arizona. The subject attempted to abscond from agents by jumping into the Colorado River and fell into distress. Agents rescued the subject from the river.

Reported on April 24, 2009

Del Rio Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Guatemala near Carrizo Springs, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States and had been convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child in the State of Texas.

El Paso Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Santa Teresa, New Mexico. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States and had been convicted of rape in the State of Washington.

Tucson Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested 49 illegal aliens and seized two vehicles in Nogales, Arizona. Five of the subjects were arrested during a vehicle stop, which led to the discovery of 44 additional subjects located in a stash house.

Reported on April 25, 2009

Laredo Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Honduras near Laredo, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States. During processing, the subject also admitted to being a Mara Salvatrucha 13 gang member.

Rio Grande Valley Sector – Border Patrol agents seized 1,235 pounds of marijuana valued at $988,000, a 1993 Chevrolet Astro van, and recovered a 2005 Ford F-250 after locating the abandoned vehicles near the river in Abram, Texas.

San Diego Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested three illegal aliens from Mexico, two USCs, and seized 109 pounds of marijuana valued at $87,120 and a 2008 Nissan Rogue near Tecate, California. Agents observed three illegal aliens cross the international border carrying suspected bundles of narcotics towards a waiting vehicle. After the three individuals loaded the bundles into the vehicle, they continued north on foot and were subsequently arrested. The vehicle left the area, and agents conducted a vehicle stop. The driver failed to yield, but agents stopped the vehicle by successfully deploying a Controlled Tire Deflation Device.

Reported on April 26, 2009

Del Rio Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Brackettville, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States and had been convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child in the State of Texas.

Del Rio Sector – Border Patrol agents rescued three individuals who were in distress on Lake Amistad near Del Rio, Texas. Agents pulled one individual to safety after his canoe overturned and rescued two others who were stranded on an island in the lake.

El Centro Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Calexico, California. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States. During processing, the subject was identified as an active member of the Border Brothers gang.

El Paso Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Deming, New Mexico. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States and had been convicted of attempted murder in the State of New York.

Laredo Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from El Salvador near Laredo, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject was previously deported from the United States. During processing, the subject also admitted to being a Mara Salvatrucha 13 gang member.

Reported on April 27, 2009

Del Rio Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from El Salvador near Eagle Pass, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States. During processing, the subject admitted to being a Mara Salvatrucha 13 gang member.

El Centro Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Ocotillo, California. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States and had been convicted of lewd and lascivious acts with a child in the State of California.

El Paso Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near Deming, New Mexico. Records checks revealed the subject was previously removed from the United States and had been convicted of voluntary manslaughter in the State of California.

Reported on April 28, 2009

Del Rio Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from El Salvador near Eagle Pass, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject had previously been removed from the United States. During processing, the subject was also identified as a member of the Mara Salvatrucha 13 gang.

El Paso Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near El Paso, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject had an extensive criminal history and was previously removed from the United States. During processing, the subject also admitted to being a Los Paisas gang member.

El Paso Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Mexico near El Paso, Texas. Records checks revealed the subject has previously been removed from the United States on numerous occasions. The subject also had an extensive criminal history, including a conviction for involuntary manslaughter and an outstanding warrant of arrest for failure to appear in the State of California.

Rio Grande Valley Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from Panama near Hidalgo, Texas. During the arrest, the subject became combative and struck an agent. The subject was subdued and taken into custody. Records checks revealed the subject was previously deported from the United States as an aggravated felon with a narcotics conviction.

Reported on April 29, 2009

Grand Forks Sector – Border Patrol agents arrested an illegal alien from El Salvador near Crookston, Minnesota. Records checks revealed the subject is a registered sex offender and he previously served 86 months in prison for a drug conviction and 68 months for a sex offense.

Rio Grande Valley Sector – Border Patrol agents seized 1,398 pounds of marijuana valued at $1,118,400, a 1996 Kenworth tractor-trailer, and arrested a USC at the traffic checkpoint near Falfurrias, Texas. The subject presented himself for inspection, and a Border Patrol canine alerted to the trailer. A subsequent search revealed marijuana concealed in a false compartment in the trailer.

San Diego Sector – Border Patrol agents seized $399,990 in U.S. currency, a 2001 Volkswagen Golf, and arrested a national of Mexico near San Clemente, California. Agents observed the driver acting suspiciously on Interstate 5 and conducted a vehicle stop. The subject consented to a search of his vehicle, which revealed numerous bundles of U.S. currency concealed in the rear quarter panels of the vehicle.

Tucson Sector – Border Patrol agents seized 2,231 pounds of marijuana valued at $1,784,520, a loaded .45 caliber semi-automatic handgun, and arrested 22 illegal aliens near Rio Rico, Arizona. While conducting patrol duties, agents heard approximately 40 rounds of automatic weapon fire approximately one mile from their location. The group of illegal aliens was located shortly thereafter, and a search revealed the weapon and the narcotics.

*********************************************************************************************************************

	Border Patrol Auxiliary Homeland Security Begins At Home (New) Arizona Meeting May 2nd 10am to 2pm Three Points, AZ. VFW 10254 Hwy 286

PRESS RELEASE

(FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE)

Border Patrol Auxiliary To Establish

A Tucson Chapter

Organizational Meeting To Be Held May 2nd

Tucson, AZ. The Border Patrol Auxiliary, (http://www.BPAUX.org) a non political, not-for-profit association dedicated  to secure borders, safer communities and disaster preparedness will be holding an organizational meeting for a new Tucson Area Chapter on Saturday May 2nd 2009, 10:00 AM -2:00 PM at the Three Points VFW Post 10254.

The meeting is open to prospective members and will feature presentations by BPAUX national leadership on the organizations efforts to assist Border Patrol in securing the US border with Mexico. BPAUX was formed to provide a non-political alternative to existing citizen watch groups and is made up largely of current and former military, law enforcement personnel and ordinary Americans interested in secure borders and safer communities. 

"Many of us have also participated in other citizen watch group efforts but for BPAUX this is not about illegal immigration or drug smuggling per se in as much as it is about actually helping secure our borders and provide for a safer environment for our families. If you secure the border, the challenges of illegal immigration and smuggling largely disappear. BPAUX acts as a citizen force multiplier for the Border Patrol. Our Special Agents undergo DHS approved citizen watch group training, Professional Rescuer Search and Rescue Training and advanced firearms qualifications. We also assist local ranchers in securing their property." stated Carl Braun, Co-Founder and National Leader. 

The Border Patrol Auxiliary has members across the US and a chapter in Puerto Rico. The organization was presented with a Congressional Citation on July 4th 2008 and leadership lectured to faculty at the Center for Homeland Defense and Security at the Naval Post Graduate School in 2008 as well. 

While not an agency or affiliate of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), BPAUX is sponsored by the Homeland Security Policy Institute Group, a not-for-profit "think tank" dedicated to open communications between the public and private sectors on issues of homeland security. 

"BPAUX is not a protest group but a citizen or neighborhood watch group focused on assisting Federal and local law enforcement in the accomplishment of their duties to make our communities safer. We have an excellent relationship with the authorities and a solid record of safety in the field." noted Roger Plank, Tucson Chapter Organizer. 

Those interested in learning more may attend the meeting on the 2^nd of May by reserving a seat. Send an email to roger.plank@bpaux.org .

The VFW will be providing a lunch at a nominal fee.

Mexico to start screening vehicles at border

Police change patrol tactics after seven officers slain

More Tijuana / The Border News

2:00 a.m. April 29 · View Comments
In The Union-Tribune on Page A16
Life in Tijuana now a little more low-key
Civic festivities were canceled, children stayed home from school, and family visits were suspended at the state prison as officials sought to fend off the spread of swine flu. Anxiety gripped residents across the city, although state officials said no cases had been confirmed in Baja California as of yesterday. Some people avoided traditional handshakes and embraces, others wore face masks, and many minimized trips outside the home.

TIJUANA, Mexico, 9:01 p.m. April 28 · View Comments
Attacks kill 7 Mexican police in Tijuana
Seven police officers were assassinated in about an hour's time in what authorities said Tuesday was a coordinated effort that followed months of relative calm in a border city stricken by drug-fueled violence. Two other officers and a convenience-store employee were injured.

TIJUANA, 12:40 p.m. April 28 · View Comments
In 45 minutes, 7 Tijuana police officers are gunned down
The municipal police department confirmed Tuesday morning the deaths of seven officers in a series of attacks spanning 45 minutes Monday night in various parts of the city.

TIJUANA, 2:00 a.m. April 28 · View Comments
In The Union-Tribune on Page B1
At least 5 officers shot dead in attacks
At least five municipal police officers were shot to death last night in different locations in Tijuana, a spokesman for the Baja California Attorney General's Office said. Another five were reportedly wounded; their conditions were not immediately known.

2:00 a.m. April 28 · View Comments
In The Union-Tribune on Page A1
WHO raises alert level for swine flu outbreak
The novel strain of swine flu that has gripped the globe not only infected more people from San Diego to Spain yesterday, but also started exacting an economic toll as stock markets fell and travelers reconsidered trips to Mexico and the United States.

2:00 a.m. April 28 · View Comments
In The Union-Tribune on Page A1
Concerns raised over impact on area trade
Concerns about swine flu and the measures being taken to slow its spread could take a toll on the binational economy of the San Diego-Tijuana region, already affected by the recession, long waits at the border and a rash of drug-cartel violence.

TIJUANA, 11:43 p.m. April 27 · View Comments
Five Tijuana police officers shot and killed
At least five municipal police officers were shot to death Monday night in different locations in Tijuana, a spokesman for the Baja California Attorney General's Office said. Another five were reportedly wounded; their conditions were not immediately known.

TIJUANA, 2:18 p.m. April 27 · View Comments
Under-17 soccer tournament in Tijuana canceled
The majority of cases of swine flu may be nearly 2,000 miles away in Mexico City, but soccer officials in Tijuana are taking no chances and canceled the remainder of the regional under-17 men's championships there.

TIJUANA, 9:39 a.m. April 27 · View Comments
Mexico suspends sports National Olympiad in Tijuana
The Mexican government has immediately suspended virtually all competitions of the National Olympiad scheduled in Tijuana and Mexicali through Saturday to prevent an outbreak of swine flu, Baja California's sports director announced Monday morning.

Swine flu prompts Mexico to shut down economy

Catherine Bremer
Reuters
Thursday, April 30, 2009

Source: The Progressive

A flu strain—a nasty mash-up of swine, avian, and human viruses—has infected 1,000 people in Mexico and the U.S., killing 68. The World Health Organization warned Saturday that the outbreak could reach global pandemic levels.

Is Smithfield Foods, the world’s largest pork packer and hog producer, linked to the outbreak? Smithfield operates massive hog-raising operations Perote, Mexico, in the state of Vera Cruz, where the outbreak originated. The operations, grouped under a Smithfield subsidiary called Granjas Carroll, raise 950,000 hogs per year, according to the company Web site.

On Friday, the U.S. disease-tracking blog Biosurveillance published a timeline of the outbreak containing this nugget, dated April 6 (major tip of the hat to Paula Hay, who alerted me to the Smithfield link on the Comfood listserv and has written about it on her blog, Peak Oil Entrepreneur):

Residents [of Perote] believed the outbreak had been caused by contamination from pig breeding farms located in the area. They believed that the farms, operated by Granjas Carroll, polluted the atmosphere and local water bodies, which in turn led to the disease outbreak. According to residents, the company denied responsibility for the outbreak and attributed the cases to “flu.” However, a municipal health official stated that preliminary investigations indicated that the disease vector was a type of fly that reproduces in pig waste and that the outbreak was linked to the pig farms. It was unclear whether health officials had identified a suspected pathogen responsible for this outbreak.

From what I can tell, the possible link to Smithfield has not been reported in the U.S. press. Searches of Google News and the websites of the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal all came up empty. The link is being made in the Mexican media, however. “Granjas Carroll, causa de epidemia en La Gloria,” declared a headline in the Vera Cruz-based paper La Marcha. No need to translate that, except to point out that La Gloria is the village where the outbreak seems to have started. Judging from the article, Mexican authorities treat hog CAFOs with just as much if not more indulgence than their peers north of the border, to the detriment of surrounding communities and the general public health. Get this:

De acuerdo con uno de los habitantes de la comunidad, Eli Ferrer Cortés, los desechos fecales y orgánicos que produce Granjas Carroll no son tratados adecuadamente, lo que genera contaminación del agua y del viento en la region.

My rough translation: According to one community resident, the organic and fecal waste produced by Granjas Carrol isn’t adequately treated, creating water and air pollution in the region. I witnessed—and smelled—the same thing in Hardin County, Iowa, a couple of years ago, another area marked by intensive industrial hog production. The article goes on to say that area residents have long complained of “fetid odors” in the air and water, and swarms of flies hovering around waste lagoons. Like their counterparts who live in CAFO-heavy U.S. areas, they also complain of respiratory ailments. Now, with 30 percent of the area’s residents now infected with the virulent flu bug, people are demanding that state and federal authorities inspect hog operations there. So far, reports La Marcha, the response has been: nada.

The Mexico City daily La Jornada has also made the link. According to the newspaper, the Mexican health agency IMSS has acknowledged that the orginal carrier for the flu could be the “clouds of flies” that multiply in the Smithfield subsidiary’s manure lagoons.

I’ll be in touch with contacts in Mexico as this story develops —and I’ll be curious to see whether the U.S. media explores the link with Smithfield’s Mexico operation.

Grist food editor Tom Philpott farms and cooks at Maverick Farms, a sustainable-agriculture nonprofit and small farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

Jim Kouri Go to Jim's Home Page  Law Enforcement Examiner

Wednesday night, while President Barack Obama held his televised press conference marking his first 100 days in office, the federal hate crimes bill passed in the House of Representatives by a vote of  249 to 175.

Homeland Security Issues Alert On Mandatory Quarantine Procedures

BATF and FBI to forcibly detain Americans despite only 7 confirmed swine flu deaths in Mexico

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Wednesday, April 29, 2009

The Department of Homeland Security has sent out an alert to health care providers outlining how BATF, FBI, and U.S. Marshals will be called upon to impose mandatory quarantines in the event of a widespread swine flu outbreak in the U.S.

According to the report, “DHS Assistant Secretary Bridger McGaw circulated the swine flu memo, which was obtained by CBSNews.com, on Monday night. It says: “The Department of Justice has established legal federal authorities pertaining to the implementation of a quarantine and enforcement. Under approval from HHS, the Surgeon General has the authority to issue quarantines.”

The memo states, “U.S. Customs and Coast Guard Officers assist in the enforcement of quarantine orders. Other DOJ law enforcement agencies including the U.S. Marshals, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives may also enforce quarantines. Military personnel are not authorized to engage in enforcement.”

However, a separate Defense Department planning document on dealing with pandemics states that the Pentagon will use the forces at its disposal to assist in “quarantining groups of people in order to minimize the spread of disease during an influenza pandemic” and aid in “efforts to restore and maintain order.”

As we reported yesterday, so-called “involuntary isolation” is already being enforced in certain areas of the United States. The state’s health director in North Carolina, Dr. Jeffrey Engel, said that authorities were already involuntarily isolating patients who may have the swine flu virus. He refused to divulge the location of where the victims were being quarantined.

News reports such as this one from MSNBC are prevaricating around the contention that quarantines are a normal event that Americans should be comfortable with. In reality, there has only been one case of “involuntary quarantine” in the U.S. in the last 45 years.

“In 2007, Andrew Speaker, an Atlanta lawyer, was quarantined inside a hospital in Denver on suspicion of having extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis. It turned out that the CDC was incorrect and Speaker had a milder form of the disease,” states the CBS report.

The MSNBC report also falsely claims that quarantines will solely be handled on a state/local level, when in reality, Bush’s executive order 13375 outlines a federal response, and the DHS memo lists numerous federal authorities that will have powers of quarantine.

In addition, the Bush administration’s National Strategy For Pandemic Influenza, released in November 2005, states that the federal government will impose “quarantines” and “limitations on gatherings”.

With Time Magazine busy preparing Americans to accept enforced mass vaccination programs and telling them to “trust” the government and “forgive” them when the vaccines cause death and injuries, the prospect of mandatory quarantines will likely be the precursor for any such nationwide vaccination program. The vaccine to supposedly combat swine flu is being manufactured by Baxter International, who were caught red-handed last month attempting to release bird flu vaccines which were contaminated with the deadly avian flu virus itself.

Swine flu has caused the death of one toddler in the U.S. and in fact only seven of the supposed 159 fatalities in Mexico have been confirmed as swine flu - meaning the other 152 could have been due to any number of infectious diseases that routinely kill Mexicans in the thousands on a yearly basis.

The comparative threat of swine flu does not correlate with the feverish reaction of authorities, who in the initial stages of the outbreak refused to take any measures to contain it, such as closing the border with Mexico, but after the virus had already begun to spread, they were quick to prepare draconian control measures while hyping the inevitability of a pandemic.

Meanwhile, the hysteria whipped up by the media has spread faster than the actual virus itself.

The Swine Flu scare has boosted the stock market values of Big Pharma. Following initial reports from Mexico on the influenza outbreak, the demand for anti-flu drugs has skyrocketed.

Supported by media disinformation, an atmosphere of fear and intimidation has unfolded. Health “emergencies” have been declared in various parts of the US.

The most sought after influenza drugs are Tamiflu and Relenza. Treatment courses by the US government have been released from the national stockpile “to make sure health care providers are ready for any escalation in cases.”

Tamiflu is produced by the Swiss pharmaceutical giant Hoffman-La Roche on behalf of a US based biotech company Gilead Sciences, Inc. While the drug is produced by Roche, it was developed by Gilead Sciences Inc. which owns the intellectual property rights.

Former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was one of the major shareholders of Gilead Sciences. In 1997, Rumsfeld was appointed Chairman of Gilead Sciences, Inc., a position which he held until becoming Secretary of Defence in the Bush administration in 2001. Rumsfeld was on the Board of Directors from the establishment of Gilead in 1987.

Fortune Magazine in a report published at the height of 2005 bird flu crisis, described Gilead as one of the most politically connected companies in the biotech industry. Rumsfeld’s interests and/or holdings in Gilead following his resignation in 2006 are not known.

Stock Values

The share price of Gilead on the NYSE has risen substantially since the announcement of the Mexican swine flu outbreak (see graph):

 “The U.S. government released a quarter of its stockpiles of the drugs after declaring a national health emergency with 40 laboratory-confirmed cases of swine flu. Seven of those cases are in California, 28 in New York City, two each in Texas and Kansas, and one in Ohio.

Mexico raised the suspected death toll from its outbreak to 149 people — 20 of those confirmed as swine flu — and cancelled all schools until May 6. Nearly 2,000 people there have been hospitalized with serious cases of pneumonia.

Antiviral drugs are prescription medicines active against influenza viruses, including swine influenza viruses, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Swine influenza A viruses detected in the United States and Mexico appear resistant to two antiviral drugs — amantadine and rimantadine — but laboratory tests indicate the viruses are sensitive to Tamiflu, also known as oseltamivir, and Relenza, which is known as zanamivir.

The Tamiflu oral antiviral, approved in the U.S. to treat and prevent influenza A and B virus infection in people age one or older, is sold by F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd., which pays sales-related royalties to Gilead. Roche said it has 3 million packages of Tamiflu on standby — part of 5 million treatments donated to the U.N. health agency in 2006 — and can deliver the drug anywhere within 24 hours.” (San Francisco Business Times, 27 April 2009)

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A nearly two-year-old boy who has become the first death in the United States from the H1N1 swine flu had been receiving aggressive treatment for flu, a Houston health official said on Wednesday.

"It is important for everyone everyone to know that while the death occurred here in Houston ... this child is a resident of Mexico who traveled to Texas to visit family," said David Persse, director of emergency medical services for the city of Houston, adding that the child's family "are healthy and well and have not had any symptoms."

The boy who died lived in Matamoros, on the Mexican border with Texas, Persse said.

(Reporting by Chris Baltimore, editing by Jackie Frank)

Pentagon Poised To Resume Open Air Weapons Testing

By Sherwood Ross

Global Research, December 7, 2007
scoop.co.nz - 2007-12-04

Pentagon Appears Poised To Resume Open-Air Testing Of Biological
Weapons But Says It Has Received No Presidential Directive To Break
Moratorium

The Pentagon has denied President Bush issued a directive for it to
resume open-air testing of chemical and biological warfare(CBW) agents
that were halted by President Richard Nixon in 1969. Yet, the
Pentagon's stated preparations make it appear it is poised to do just
that.

Spokesperson Chris Isleib did not respond to a request for comment on
a passage from the Defense Department's annual report sent to Congress
last April that suggests the Pentagon is gearing up to resume the tests.

Resumption of open-air testing would reverse a long-standing
moratorium adopted after a public outcry against them following
accidents in the Sixties.

The Pentagon's annual report apparently calls for both the
developmental and operational "field testing of (CBW) full systems,"
not just simulations.

The Pentagon's report to Congress contains the following passage:
"More than thirty years have passed since outdoor live-agent chemical
tests were banned in the United States, and the last outdoor test with
live chemical agent was performed, so much of the infrastructure for
the field testing of chemical detectors no longer exists or is
seriously outdated. The currently budgeted improvements in the T&E
infrastructure will greatly enhance both the developmental and
operational field testing of full systems, with better simulated
representation of threats and characterization of system response."
"T&E" is an acronym for testing and evaluation.

"Either the military has resumed open-air testing already or they are
preparing to do so," said Francis Boyle, a University of Illinois
Professor of International Law who authored the implementing
legislation for the U.S. Biological Weapons Convention signed into law
by President George Bush Sr. and who has tracked subsequent
developments closely.

"I am stunned by the nature of this development," Boyle said. "This is
a major reversal of policy." The 1972 treaty against germ warfare,
which the U.S. signed, forbids developing weapons that spread disease,
such as anthrax, a pathogen that is regarded by the military as
"ideal" for conducting germ warfare.

"The Pentagon is fully prepared to launch biological warfare by means
of anthrax," Boyle charged. "All the equipment has been acquired and
all the training conducted and most combat-ready members of U.S. armed
forces have been given protective equipment and vaccines that
allegedly would protect them from that agent."

Open-air testing takes research into deadly agents out of the
laboratories in order to study their effectiveness, including their
aerial dispersion patterns, and whether they actually infect and kill
in field trials. Since the anthrax attacks on Congress in October,
2001, the Bush administration has funded a vast biological research
expansion at hundreds of private and university laboratories in the
U.S. and abroad involving anthrax and other deadly pathogens.

The anthrax attacks killed five people, including two postal workers,
injured 17 others and temporarily shut down the operations of the U.S.
Congress, Supreme Court, and other Federal entities.

Although a Federal statute permits the president to authorize open-air
testing of CBW agents, Boyle said this "does not solve the compliance
problem that it might violate the international Chemical Weapons
Convention and the Biological Weapons Convention as well as their
related domestic implementing legislation making such violations
crimes."

Boyle charged the U.S. is already "in breach" of both conventions and
also of U.S. domestic criminal law implementing them. In February,
2003, for example, the U.S. granted itself a patent on an illegal,
long-range biological-weapons grenade, evidently for offensive purposes.

Boyle said the development of anthrax for possible offensive purposes
is underscored by the government's efforts "to try to stockpile
anthrax vaccines and antibiotics for 25-million plus Americans to
protect the civilian population in the event there is any 'blowback'
from the use of anthrax in biowarfare abroad by the Pentagon."

"In theory," Boyle added, "you cannot wage biowarfare abroad unless
you can protect your civilian population from either retaliation in
kind, or blowback, or both." Under Project BioShield, Homeland
Security is spending $5.6 billion to stockpile vaccines and drugs to
fight anthrax, smallpox, and other bioterror agents. The project had
been marked by delays and operational problems and on December 12th
last year Congress passed legislation to pump another $1 billion into
BioShield to fund three years of additional research by the private
sector.

Boyle said evidence the U.S. has super-weapons-grade anthrax was
demonstrated in the October, 2001, anthrax mail attacks on Senators
Thomas Daschle(D-S.D.) and Patrick Leahy(D-Vt.) The strain of highly
sophisticated anthrax employed has allegedly been traced back to the
primary U.S. Army biological warfare campus at Ft. Detrick, Md. The
attacks killed five persons and sickened 17 others. A current effort
to expand Ft. Detrick has sparked widespread community opposition,
according to a report in the Baltimore Sun.

"Obviously, someone working for the United States government has a
stockpile of super-weapons grade anthrax that can be used again
domestically for the purposes of political terrorism or abroad to wage
offensive warfare," Boyle said.

The Associated Press has reported the U.S. Army is replacing its
Military Institute of Infectious Diseases at Ft. Detrick "with a new
laboratory that would be a component of a biodefense campus operated
by several agencies." The Army told AP the laboratory is intended to
continue research solely for defense against biological threats.

Undercutting the argument U.S. research is for "defensive" purposes is
the fact government scientists have been creating new strains of
pathogens for which there is no known cure. Richard Novick, a
professor of microbiology at New York University, has stated, "I
cannot envision any imaginable justification for changing the
antigenicity of anthrax as a defensive measure." Changing a pathogen's
antigenicity means altering its basic structure so that existing
vaccines will prove ineffective against it.

Biological warfare involves the use of living organisms for military
purposes. Such weapons can be viral, bacterial, and fungal, among
other forms, and can be spread over a large geographic terrain by
wind, water, insect, animal, or human transmission, according to
Jeremy Rifkin, author of "The Biotech Century"(Penguin).

Boyle said the Federal government has been plowing money into
upgrading Ft. Detrick, Md., and other CBW facilities where such
pathogens are studied, developed, tested, and stored. By some
estimates, the U.S. since 2002 has invested some $43 billion in
hundreds of government, commercial, and university laboratories in the
U.S. for the study of pathogens that might be used for biological
warfare.

According to Rutgers University molecular biologist Richard Ebright,
more than 300 scientific institutions and 12,000 individuals have
access to pathogens suitable for biowarfare and terrorism. Ebright
found that the Number of National Institute of Health grants to
research infectious diseases with biowarfare potential shot up from 33
in the 1995-2000 period to 497 by 2006.Ebright has stated the
government's tenfold expansion of Biosafety Level-4 laboratories, such
as those at Fort Detrick, raises the risk of accidents and the
diversion of dangerous organisms. "If a worker in one of these
facilities removes a single viral particle or a single cell, which
cannot be detected or prevented, that single particle or cell can form
the basis of an outbreak."

During the Cold War era, notably in the Fifties and Sixties, various
Government agencies engaged in open-air CBW testing on U.S. soil and
on naval vessels at sea to study the effects of weaponized pathogens.
U.S. cities, including New York, Chicago, and San Francisco, were
among the targets and sickness and even a number of deaths were
reported as a result.

According to an article titled "Lethal Breeze" by Lee Davidson in the
Deseret News of Salt Lake City of June 5, 1994, "In decades of secret
chemical arms tests, the Army released into Utah winds more than a
half million pounds of deadly nerve agents." Among them, he said, was
VX, a pinhead-sized drop of which can be lethal. The tests were
conducted at Dugway Proving Ground but Davidson said the evidence
suggests "some (agents) may have escaped with the wind."

Pentagon documents obtained by the News listed 1,635 field trials or
demonstrations with nerve agents VX, GA and GB between 1951 and 1969,
"when the Army discontinued use of actual nerve agents in open-air
tests after escaped nerve gas apparently killed 6,000 sheep in Skull
Valley," Davidson wrote. The Skull Valley strike also sickened a
rancher and members of his family.Boyle has previously charged the
Pentagon with "gearing up to fight and 'win' biological warfare"
pursuant to two Bush national strategy directives adopted in 2002
"without public knowledge and review." He contends the Pentagon's
Chemical and Biological Defense program was revised in 2003 to
implement those directives, endorsing "first-use" strike of chemical
and biological weapons in war.

The implementing legislation Boyle wrote that was enacted unanimously
by Congress was known as the Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of
1989. Boyle has written extensively on the subject. Among his
published works are "Biowarfare and Terrorism" and "Destroying World
Order: U.S. Imperialism In the Middle East Before and After September
11th," both from Clarity Press.

(Sherwood Ross is a free-lance writer and public relations consultant
and Director of Anti-War News Service. He was host of a radio talk
show in Washington, D.C., reported for the Chicago Daily News and
worked as a regular columnist for several wire services. Reach him at
sherwoo...@yahoo.com
)

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole
responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of
the Centre for Research on Globalization. The contents of this article
are of sole responsibility of the author(s). The Centre for Research
on Globalization will not be responsible or liable for any inaccurate
or incorrect statements contained in this article.

To become a Member of Global Research

The CRG grants permission to cross-post original Global Research
articles on community internet sites as long as the text & title are
not modified. The source and the author's copyright must be displayed.
For publication of Global Research articles in print or other forms
including commercial internet sites, contact: crgedi...@yahoo.com

www.globalresearch.ca contains copyrighted material the use of which
has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We
are making such material available to our readers under the provisions
of "fair use" in an effort to advance a better understanding of
political, economic and social issues. The material on this site is
distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior
interest in receiving it for research and educational purposes. If you
wish to use copyrighted material for purposes other than "fair use"
you must request permission from the copyright owner.

For media inquiries: crgedi...@yahoo.com

) Copyright Sherwood Ross, scoop.co.nz, 2007

This is an interesting story. Of course, it doesn’t mention the fact that, back in February, Panasonic knew that a pandemic flu event was going to happen.

Via: Times Online:

The first known case of swine flu emerged a fortnight earlier than previously thought in a village where residents have long complained about the smell and flies from a nearby pig farm, it emerged last night.

The Mexican Government said it initially thought that the victim, Edgar Hernandez, 4, was suffering from ordinary influenza but laboratory testing has since shown that he had contracted swine flu. The boy went on to make a full recovery, although it is thought that at least 148 others in Mexico have died from the disease, and the number is expected to rise.

News of the infected boy is expected to create controversy in Mexico because the boy lived in Veracruz state, home to thousands of farmers who claim that their land was stolen from them by the Mexican Government in 1992. The farmers, who call themselves Los 400 Pueblos – The 400 Towns – are famous for their naked marches through the streets of Mexico City.

The boy’s hometown, La Gloria, is also close to a pig farm that raises almost 1 million animals a year. The facility, Granjas Carroll de Mexico, is partly owned by Smithfield Foods, a Virginia-based US company and the world’s largest producer and processor of pork products. Residents of La Gloria have long complained about the clouds of flies that are drawn the so-called “manure lagoons” created by such mega-farms, known in the agriculture business as Confined Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs).

It is now known that there was a widespread outbreak of a powerful respiratory disease in the La Gloria area earlier this month, with some of the town’s residents falling ill in February. Health workers soon intervened, sealing off the town and spraying chemicals to kill the flies that were reportedly swarming through people’s homes.

A spokeswoman for Smithfield, Keira Ullrich, said that the company had found no clinical signs or symptoms of the presence of swine influenza in its swine herd or its employees working at its joint ventures anywhere in Mexico. Meanwhile, Mexico’s National Organisation of Pig Production and Producers released its own statement, saying: “We deny completely that the influenza virus affecting Mexico originated in pigs because it has been scientifically demonstrated that this is not possible.”

According reports gathered on the website of James Wilson, a founding member of the Biosurveillance Indication and Warning Analysis Community (BIWAC), about 60 per cent of La Gloria’s 3,000-strong population have sought medical assistance since February.

“Residents claimed that three pediatric cases, all under two years of age, died from the outbreak,” wrote Mr Wilson. “However, officials stated that there was no direct link between the pediatric deaths and the outbreak; they said the three fatal cases were isolated and not related to each other.”

The case of the four-year-old boy was announced yesterday by Mexico’s Health Minister, Jose Angel Cordova, at a press conference that was briefly interrupted by an earthquake. “We are at the most critical moment of the epidemic. The number of cases will keep rising so we have to reinforce preventive measures,” he said, adding that in addition to the 149 deaths another 2,000 had been hospitalised with “grave pneumonia”, although at least half of that number had since made a full recovery.

Mr Cordova went on to say that there have been no new cases detected in La Gloria but epidemiologists want to take a closer look at pigs in Mexico as a potential source of the outbreak.

As the desease spread Greater Mexico City, usually a chaotic, traffic-snarled megatropolis of 22 million – where braised pork or carnitas, is prepared at taco stands on busy street corners – remained at a virtual standstill yesterday.

A majority of people are now wearing surgical masks and or plastic gloves in public. Airport terminals are deserted. Schools and government offices are closed and will remain so until at least early May – creating a childcare crisis for millions of working parents.

Many Mexicans are fearing the economic devastation caused by the health emergency as much as they are the prospect of swine flu. Adding to the misery, several countries including China have banned imports of live pigs and pork products from Mexico (and parts of the US) in spite of claims by farming trade groups that it is impossible to catch the virus from cooked meat.

Source: Natural News

Last week, when what is now called a "swine flu" was first reported to be infecting and killing some people in Mexico, health officials noted it was a strain of flu never before seen. In fact, it is technically incorrect to call this simply a "swine" flu. Analyses showed it's a mixture of swine, human and avian viruses, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Moreover, it is genetically different from the fully human H1N1 seasonal influenza virus that has been circulating globally for the past few years. Bottom line: the new flu virus contains DNA from avian, swine viruses (including elements from European and Asian viruses) and human viruses.

So did this curious mixture just develop naturally, out of the blue? Is it the result of inhumane farming practices, as the Humane Society of the United States (http://www.hsus.org/) has suggested, that exposes immune-compromised pigs to all sorts of animal and human feces?

Well, maybe. But let's go back and look at the facts to see if any other scenario could be possible.

First of all, there's the troublesome detail that the virus has elements that come from multiple continents. Then there's the fact that true swine flu is only rarely transmissible to humans -- this flu is spreading human-to-human, most likely because it contains DNA from human flu.

Could someone have deliberately mixed these viruses together? Is that possible? Absolutely.

Was this virus mixing being done artificially in the lab, or had it already been done? Yes.

Who was blending potentially viruses in labs? Were those horrible generic boogie men known to Americans far and wide as "terrorists" doing it? There's no proof of bioterrorism at work here yet. However, there is evidence the United States government has been working on concocting new flu virus blends.

So could the hysteria-provoking, new swine flu have escaped from a lab? Or was it deliberately released as some kind of test? When these kinds of questions are asked, the knee-jerk reaction of the mainstream media (MSM) is to giggle and talk about "conspiracy theories" and to joke about wearing tinfoil hats.

But here's the potential smoking gun, the facts that suggest a potential source of the pandemic could be CDC labs. And at the very least, this possibility deserves thoughtful examination and research.

The University of Minnesota Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) is hardly a place most Americans have heard about and, apparently, the Center's web site has news the MSM isn't familiar with, either. But information they published years ago has now taken on an urgent importance. CIDRAP, along with the Canadian newspaper Canadian Press (CP), revealed back in 2004 that the CDC was launching experiments designed to mix the H5N1 (avian) virus and human flu viruses. The goal was to find out how likely it was such a "reassortant" virus would emerge and just how dangerous it might be. Of course, it's logical to wonder if they also worked with the addition of a swine flu virus, too.

Here's some background from the five-year-old report by the University of Minnesota research center: "One of the worst fears of infectious disease experts is that the H5N1 avian influenza virus now circulating in parts of Asia will combine with a human-adapted flu virus to create a deadly new flu virus that could spread around the world. That could happen, scientists predict, if someone who is already infected with an ordinary flu virus contracts the avian virus at the same time. The avian virus has already caused at least 48 confirmed human illness cases in Asia, of which 35 have been fatal. The virus has shown little ability to spread from person to person, but the fear is that a hybrid could combine the killing power of the avian virus with the transmissibility of human flu viruses. Now, rather than waiting to see if nature spawns such a hybrid, US scientists are planning to try to breed one themselves -- in the name of preparedness."

And CDC officials actually confirmed the government had plans for the research. The CIDRAP News folks did a great job covering this important issue, which was apparently mostly ignored by the MSM back in 2004, and CIDRAP News wrote to the CDC for information. This e-mail produced an answer from CDC spokesman David Daigle who admitted the CDC was working on the project in two ways. "One is to infect cells in a laboratory tissue culture with H5N1 and human flu viruses at the same time and then watch to see if they mix. For the human virus, investigators will use A (H3N2), the strain that has caused most human flu cases in recent years," the CIDRAP story stated. This co-infection approach was described as slow and labor-intensive. However, it was a way to produce a new virus that appeared to be closer to what develops in nature.

There was another, faster way CDC scientists could create the mix, too. Called reverse genetics, it involves piecing together a new virus with genes from the H5N1 and H3N2 viruses. Reverse genetics had already been used successfully to create H5N1 candidate vaccines in several laboratories, the CDC's Daigle wrote. "Any viable viruses that emerge from these processes will be seeded into animals that are considered good models for testing how flu viruses behave in humans... The aim will be to observe whether the animals get sick and whether infected animals can infect others," he revealed in his e-mail.

What's more, the CP reported the CDC had already made hybrid viruses with H5N1 samples isolated from patients in Hong Kong in 1997, when there was the first outbreak of that virus, dubbed the "Hong Kong flu". It is not clear if the results of that research were ever published. Back in 2004, Dr. Nancy Cox, then head of the CDC's influenza branch, would tell the CP only: "Some gene combinations could be produced and others could not."

The CP's report noted that the World Health Organization (WHO) had been "pleading" for laboratories to do this blending-of-viruses research. The reason? If successful, these flu mixes would back up WHO's warnings about the possibility of a flu pandemic. In fact, Klaus Stohr, head of the WHO's global flu program at the time, told the CP that if the experiments were successful in producing highly transmissible and pathogenic viruses, the agency would be even more worried -- but if labs couldn't create these mixed flu viruses, then the agency might have to ratchet down its level of concern.

The 2004 CIDRAP News report addressed the obvious risks of manufacturing viruses in labs that, if released, could potentially spark a pandemic. However, the CDC's Daigle assured the Minnesota research group the virus melding would be done in a biosafety level 3 (BSL-3) laboratory. "We recognize that there is concern by some over this type of work. This concern may be heightened by reports of recent lab exposures in other lab facilities," he told CIDRAP. "But CDC has an incredible record in lab safety and is taking very strict precautions."

Five years later, we must ask more questions. Were those safety measures enough? Was the CDC creating or testing any of these virus mixes in or near Mexico? What other potentially deadly virus combinations has the US government created? Don't US citizens, as taxpayers who funded these experiments, have a right to know? And for all the residents of planet earth faced with a potentially deadly global epidemic, isn't it time for the truth?

For more information:
"New flu is a genetic mix", http://www.reuters.com/article/dome...

"CDC to mix avian, flu viruses", http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/cidrap/co...

"CDC to conduct avian flu pandemic experiements", http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNe...

Source: Reuters

A container of flu virus samples packed in dry ice exploded on a Swiss train, injuring one person but posing no other risks to humans, police said on Tuesday. The box held vials of swine flu virus, although a different strain than the H1N1 variety that has caused about 150 deaths in Mexico and infected people in the United States, Canada, Spain and Britain.

A technician was transporting the container on Monday night to the Swiss national flu centre in Geneva, where scientists are developing a flu test for humans, police said.

One woman was hurt when the box exploded in reaction to the dry ice used to keep the samples cold.

After consulting virus specialists, the police decided to stop the St. Gallen to Geneva train before it entered the station in Lausanne.

The virus specialists confirmed that the samples being transported posed no risks to humans, police said.

Source: Fox 10 TV - Robert Brown

MOBILE, Ala. - A page showing fire, severe weather, and flooding, all disasters that can have an impact on a family, especially children. All of these disasters were featured in a coloring book on the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s website, designed to help children cope with disasters.

But one page has parents taking the colors away. It’s an illustration of the World Trade Center Towers in New York. One of the towers has smoke coming out of it while a plane looks to be heading towards the other.

“They like to color happy pictures not pictures like that I don’t think I would like to give my child these kids of pictures to color,said parent Brandy Greer.

Another parent, who was from New York, couldn’t believe the scene was in something intended for such young minds. She said she thinks the picture might actually scare a child, since most might now understand the horror of 9/11.

“I think there could be better solutions, for a small child that’s coloring. How would they color that to be honest? That’s not something I’d put in a coloring book, she said.

Read entire article

100 Days of the Poser Presidency

Virginia: The jihad candidate

"From Fairfax To Richmond, 'The Jihad Way?,'" by Marc Fisher in his Washington Post blog, April 29 (thanks to James):

Esam Omeish's campaign web site is fairly typical for a candidate for state delegate. The big issues for his Fairfax County district are traffic congestion, growth issues and public education.

But Omeish, who is running for the Democratic nomination in the 35th district, covering an area from Vienna west to Monument and Leehigh, is no ordinary candidate. He's a surgeon with a classic immigrant success story, having arrived in this country as a young boy who spoke no English, yet rose up through the Fairfax school system to attend Georgetown University.

And Omeish is also a Muslim fundamentalist rabble-rouser whose videotaped rants urging crowds of demonstrators to adopt "the jihad way" led to his resignation from Virginia's state Commission on Immigration just 24 hours or so after Gov. Tim Kaine appointed him to the panel last fall.

Oddly enough, Omeish's campaign site somehow manages not to mention any of his activities on behalf of his brethren in the Middle East. But the evidence is all over the web. Here's the full speech Omeish gave at a Jerusalem Day rally in December, 2000, in which he says that "We, the Muslims of the Washington metropolitan area, are here today in sub-freezing temperatures to tell our brothers and sisters in Palestine that you have learned the way, that you have known that the jihad way is the way to liberate your land. And we by standing here today... we are telling them that we are with you, we are supporting you, and we will do everything that we can, insha'allah, to help your cause."

Here's another speech, from a rally in front of the Israeli embassy, also in 2000, in which Omeish said "We need to congratulate our brothers and sisters in Palestine for their bravery, for their giving up their lives.... They have spearheaded the effort to bring victory upon the believers in Palestine."

A candidate who speaks with great pride and zest to an audience of fellow Muslims about people "giving up their lives..for the sake of the Muslim honor" should also be someone who happily delivers the same message to the Virginia voters he hopes will choose him for public office. But there is not a word in Omeish's campaign literature about this great passion of his life.

After these video recordings were revealed and Omeish stepped down from his appointment to the immigration commission, he said he never promoted violence and accused his critics of perpetrating a "smear campaign." Cheering on "the jihad way" "was related to giving support to people who are under occupation and who are under severe conditions of repression," Omeish said at the time. "It was not a call for violence. It was never any condoning of terrorism or any violent acts."...

Of course. Read it all. Is a call to jihad when spoken by a Muslim in a Western country and noticed by the media ever a call to violence? I don't think so.

Feeling the heat from veterans groups, pro-life organizations, conservatives, and even Democratic members of Congress, President Barack Obama’s Secretary for Homeland Security Janet Napolitano was forced to make a slight about-face regarding a controversial intelligence report issued by her department for law-enforcement agencies, including federal-state "Fusion Centers." In a string of media appearances in mid-April, Secretary Napolitano half-apologized for a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) report that has drawn severe criticism for targeting conservative political opponents and associating them with dangerous terrorists.

The DHS document that stirred up the political firestorm is a leaked ten-page report entitled “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment.” The most harshly criticized section of the report concerns the finger of suspicion it points at military veterans. The report, which was distributed to law-enforcement agencies nationwide, warns:

The possible passage of new restrictions on firearms and the return of military veterans facing significant challenges reintegrating into their communities could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks.

“Returning veterans,” the report continues, “possess combat skills and experience that are attractive to rightwing extremists.” It warns that the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis “is concerned that rightwing extremists will attempt to recruit and radicalize returning veterans in order to boost their violent capabilities.”

What is the basis for this DHS concern? The “Rightwing Extremism” report states: “After Operation Desert Shield/Storm in 1990-1991, some returning military veterans — including Timothy McVeigh — joined or associated with rightwing extremist groups.”

David K. Rehbein, national commander of the 2.6 million-member American Legion, was understandably concerned by the DHS slur against America’s military veterans, casting them in the negative stereotype favored by leftists in the media and Hollywood. In a letter to Secretary Napolitano, Commander Rehbein wrote:

The American Legion is well aware and horrified at the pain inflicted during the Oklahoma City bombing, but Timothy McVeigh was only one of more than 42 million veterans who have worn this nation’s uniform during wartime. To continue to use McVeigh as an example of the stereotypical “disgruntled military veteran” is as unfair as using Osama bin Laden as the sole example of Islam.

Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the Democratic chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, voiced similar concerns. In an April 14 letter to Secretary Janet Napolitano, he wrote he was “dumbfounded” by the contents of the report. “I am disappointed and surprised that the department would allow this report to be disseminated” to law-enforcement agencies, he said. “This report appears to raise significant issues involving the privacy and civil liberties of many Americans — including war veterans,” Chairman Thompson cautioned. “As I am certain you agree, freedom of association and freedom of speech are guaranteed to all Americans — whether a person’s beliefs, whatever their political orientation, are ‘extremist’ or not.”

On April 16, Secretary Napolitano made the rounds of the morning TV shows, in an attempt to quell the growing outrage. “To the extent veterans read it as an accusation … an apology is owed,” she conceded during an on-air interview on FOX News. “This was an assessment, not an accusation,” Napolitano continued. “It was limited to extremists — those who seek to commit violence within the United States. And all this was meant to do was to give law enforcement what we call ‘situational awareness.’”

Situational awareness? Awareness about what situation, precisely? This “intelligence” report admits that it contains no concrete evidence. It states:

The DHS/Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) has no specific information that domestic rightwing terrorists are currently planning acts of violence, but rightwing extremists may be gaining new recruits by playing on their fears about several emergent issues. The economic downturn and the election of the first African American president present unique drivers for rightwing radicalization and recruitment.

Nevertheless, the DHS report claims that “lone wolves and small terrorist cells embracing violent rightwing extremist ideology are the most dangerous domestic terrorism threat in the United States.”

The report employs the word “rightwing” 50 times, and in nearly every instance (47 times), it is in the context of “rightwing extremism,” “rightwing extremist,” “rightwing terrorist,” or “rightwing terrorist and extremist.” Tellingly, the report doesn’t bother to define any of these politically charged terms, a major dereliction of due diligence in such an important matter. It is similarly shoddy in using terms favored by left-wing extremists to describe their opponents on the right, such as “antigovernment,” “hate-oriented,” “paranoid,” “dangerous,” and “violent.”

The closest the DHS report comes to offering a definition is this troubling description:

Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.

The DHS report sloppily (or, perhaps, cleverly and maliciously) demonizes millions of law-abiding Americans, conflating them with violent, criminal groups such as Neo-Nazis and “white supremacists” simply because they adhere to political beliefs at variance with those of the administration. By repeatedly associating “rightwing,” “extremism,” “terrorism,” “violence,” “threat,” “dangerous,” and “white supremacist” with those who oppose abortion, gun control, socialism, government bailouts, and amnesty for illegal aliens, the DHS is reinforcing a left-wing trope aimed at criminalizing and silencing politically incorrect expression and dissent.

The DHS report is doubly troubling because it comes quick on the heels of a similar federal-state law-enforcement bulletin out of Missouri targeting conservatives, libertarians, gun rights advocates, pro-life activists, and others. Much of the criticism of Napolitano and the DHS report has failed to draw the disturbing connection between the DHS “Rightwing Extremism” report and “The Modern Militia Movement,” a report issued in February by the Missouri Information and Analysis Center (MIAC), a branch of the state’s Highway Patrol. MIAC is what is known as a “fusion center,” one of 58 such federal-state-local law-enforcement centers nationwide sponsored by DHS.

The MIAC report turned into an especially hot potato when it became known that it specifically named political candidates and political parties, implying that they and their supporters should be viewed as potential terrorists, and/or threats to law enforcement. The MIAC report states:

You are the Enemy: The militia subscribes to an antigovernment and NWO [New World Order] mind set, which creates a threat to law enforcement officers. They view the military, National Guard, and law enforcement as a force that will confiscate their firearms and place them in FEMA concentration camps. [Bold emphasis in original.]

The MIAC report then states: “Militia members most commonly associate with 3rd party political groups. It is not uncommon for militia members to display Constitutional Party, Campaign for Liberty, or Libertarian material. These members are usually supporters of former Presidential Candidate [sic]: Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin, and Bob Barr.”

Like Secretary Napolitano, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon initially defended his agency’s report. However, as a public backlash against the report built during the last weeks of March, he reversed course. Van Godsey, the director of the fusion center that produced the report, was replaced on April 6. His superior, Department of Public Safety Director John Britt, was placed on administrative leave pending an investigation of the report.

Missouri State Rep. Jim Guest told The New American he is especially concerned that the MIAC illustrates the growing problem of increased intrusion by the federal government into state police functions. He hopes to uncover the sources of the politicized “intelligence” in the MIAC report and the exact nature of Missouri’s relationship to DHS at the MIAC fusion center.

Investigate DHS

Members of Congress should be looking into this matter as well. The dangerous precedents established by the DHS and MIAC reports should not be allowed to pass simply because Secretary Napolitano was forced by public pressure to issue a halfhearted apology. She would not even have done that had the DHS report remained secret. Listed as “UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY (U//FOUO),” the DHS report tells law-enforcement recipients it “is not to be released to the public, the media, or other personnel.” Likewise, the MIAC report prohibits distribution to those outside law enforcement.

With nearly 60 of these DHS federal-state fusion centers nationwide, there is good reason to suspect that other similar reports attacking Americans’ constitutionally guaranteed rights have been issued or are being developed for dissemination.

This kind of political targeting is very dangerous and underscores why the U.S. Constitution strictly circumscribes federal policing and reserves the vast majority of police powers to the states. The Founding Fathers wisely recognized that gradual encroachment by the federal government could lead to nationalization and the eventual use of a national police force to impose tyranny. While it may be true that corruption and abuse of police powers at the state and local levels will always be a concern as well, the magnitude of the danger pales in comparison to the menace posed by a centralized agency with police authority over the entire nation. The DHS-sponsored fusion centers are further evidence that the DHS is the lead agency of what is rapidly becoming a de facto national police force.

There is an additional facet of the DHS and MIAC reports that begs to be exposed: the strange and alarming symbiosis between the federal government (especially the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security) and certain private left-wing groups. We might ask, for instance, how the DHS arrived at its conclusion that “the most dangerous domestic terrorism threat in the United States” comes from individuals and cells “embracing violent rightwing extremist ideology.”

According to the DHS report, this assessment is based on information “from law enforcement and nongovernmental organizations.” Who are these unnamed NGOs? That is not too difficult to figure out. As we have noted previously in these pages and in our online articles, the wording in the government reports is very similar to what we find in diatribes against conservatives issued by hard-core left-wing groups such as the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and the Political Research Associates (PRA).

However, the connection goes beyond the mere filtration of biased verbiage by these above-mentioned groups into official bulletins; they and other organizations have been working closely with the Department of Justice (DOJ) since the Clinton administration officially targeted “rightwing” opponents. The SPLC and ADL websites boast about their workshops in which they train hundreds of federal and state law-enforcement personnel in the dangers emanating from “rightwing” threats.

The most important of the nongovernmental groups impacting the DHS and DOJ in this regard is the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), which is usually described by the elite media as “nonpartisan” and “balanced.” It is probably accurate to view the CFR’s April 21, 2008 Backgrounder report, entitled “Militant Extremists in the United States,” as the document that kicked off the current round of official government warnings of a new “rightwing” menace.

According to the study, written by CFR staffer Holly Fletcher, the main domestic security danger to the United States comes from “hate groups motivated by ultra-conservative ideals that are often anti-Semitic and racially motivated.” Fletcher shows a telling dependence on the SPLC, citing them as an authority several times. She writes, for example, that “right-wing extremists are still considered the most dangerous to the United States, says the SPLC.” And, she writes, “Left-wing and environmental extremist groups are not hate groups, according to the SPLC, because they do not espouse rhetoric that targets specific groups that have a defining characteristic.”

Surprise, surprise, the CFR/SPLC line is precisely the attitude adopted by the DHS! When the furor erupted over the DHS “Rightwing Extremism” report, the DHS and its media shills pointed to a DHS report issued in January entitled “Leftwing Extremism.” This supposedly showed that the department is being impartial and even-handed. However, the DHS “Leftwing Extremism” report is far from impartial. It follows the CFR/SPLC lead, falsely claiming that left-wing extremists are comparatively benign because they adhere to a “nonviolent, ‘no-harm’ doctrine” that leads them to simply target property for vandalism, rather than attacking people. The DHS report does not specifically mention the SPLC, but it is most likely referring to them when it quotes a “prominent civil rights organization” on the danger of military veterans being recruited by “violent neo-nazis, skinheads, and white supremacists.” The DHS-sponsored MIAC report specifically references SPLC as one of its sources.

Congressional and state investigations should probe this alarming evidence indicating that hard-core left-wing activist groups have become grafted onto government agencies and are abusing federal and state police powers to target their political opponents.

Mounting Legal Opposition

Private legal efforts to redress the DHS abuses are already underway. The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, announced on April 17 that it had filed a federal lawsuit against DHS Secretary Napolitano. The suit charges that her department’s “Rightwing Extremism Policy,” as reflected in the DHS Intelligence Assessment “Rightwing Extremism,” violates the civil liberties of combat veterans as well as American citizens by targeting them for disfavored treatment on account of their political beliefs.

Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the law center, stated, “Janet Napolitano is lying to the American people when she says the Report is not based on ideology or political beliefs. In fact, her report would have the admiration of the Gestapo and any current or past dictator in the way it targets political opponents. This incompetently written intelligence assessment, which directs law enforcement officials across the country to target and report on American citizens who have the political beliefs mentioned in the report, will be used as a tool to stifle political opposition and opinions. It will give a pretext for opponents of those Americans to report them to police as rightwing extremists and terrorists. You can imagine what happens then.”

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan on behalf of nationally syndicated conservative radio talk-show host Michael Savage, Gregg Cunningham (president of the pro-life organization Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, Inc.), and Iraq War Marine veteran Kevin Murray. The law center claims that Napolitano’s DHS has violated the First and Fifth Amendment constitutional rights of these three plaintiffs by attempting to chill their free speech, expressive association, and equal protection rights. The lawsuit further claims that the Department of Homeland Security encourages law-enforcement officers throughout the nation to target and report citizens to federal officials as suspicious right-wing extremists and potential terrorists because of their political beliefs.

U.S. Border Fence "Panel 1936 Hole" Defending Our Border

Submitted by: Dave Bertrand

Traffic Alert USA

April 28^th, 2009

The U.S. Border Patrol agent in a Chevy Tahoe patrol truck arrived to our location on the border to confirm, the word had been put-out over his radio that Minutemen and Border Patrol Auxiliary (BPAUX) personnel were in position along the California stretch, a breeding ground for drug smugglers and illegal aliens waiting to cross. Each mission requires Border Patrol Auxiliary communications section to contact the U.S. Border Patrol (Sector) with vehicle description and proposed locations for the border watch. Often enough, Border Patrol agents provide intel to help serve the overall mission.

“Keep your eye on panel 1936” the agent instructed us, an opening in the old metal fence that separates the United States from Mexico. “I just had a group pass through there this morning and more are expected,” he said. I wanted to shake his hand, as I have often done in the past, but with the potential flu pandemic scare and knowing that these brave agents are hands-on with illegal aliens, I elected to just say “thanks for your service.”

Each fence panel has a number, and “1936” was just east of our position. From our location, we had a perfect view of the hill. The only physical recognition that divides the U.S. from Mexico (at the top of the hill) is a U.S. flag on a pole.

The fence is old....it has several miles of gaps, plenty of holes and new holes are made all the time. Illegal aliens wait for nightfall, but today the push was on, by the spotters seen standing on top of the hill. More groups were arriving from the south, and the five groups we were holding back, eventually had to make their move. All five groups were apprehended by U.S. agents, of which several individuals carrying large backpacks were carrying drugs.

Groups, backing-up at the border is an inconvenience for the Mexican border ranchers that facilitate their movement with intel provided by trained spotters with radios and binoculars. BPAUX teams routinely intercept their communications effectively, as we did this past weekend.

Thursday night was a washout due to fog, but U.S. Border Patrol agents were successful. Camp Vigilance, the home to the Minutemen and Border Patrol Auxiliary (BPAUX), located just north of the border, began seeing volunteers from several states arriving on Friday for a complete shutdown of the border in that area of California. Additional BPAUX operations will begin in Arizona, beginning May 2nd.

Teams of BPAUX volunteer agents and Minutemen were assigned to selected “hotspots” in and around the border. 24-hour shifts were consistent throughout the weekend watch, and together.....they effectively stopped groups from entering by repositioning volunteer units back and forth to secure gaps in the fence. The frustration on the Mexican side was obvious, and two different assaults by drug smugglers, using rocks, caused vehicle damage, but no injuries. A direct conflict was aborted immediately when volunteers had to respond in defense with weapons raised at eye level. The rock throwers ran back into Mexico.

On the return trip to Arizona, the U.S. Border Patrol was busy with checkpoints at several undisclosed locations. As I pulled up to one aggressive checkpoint, with all windows down for the agents to easily see inside, I was asked if I was a U.S. Citizen. I responded in the affirmative and he replied, “thank you.”

I was about to pull ahead when he quickly said, “Hold it!” I looked forward as a black man in handcuffs was being escorted directly in front of my vehicle. I looked at the agent with slight puzzlement, and he just said, “See….it’s not just Mexicans that come across, he’s Haitian!”

As I drove east on Interstate 8, I thought to myself of that typical “La Raza” line about those “poor undocumented workers just looking for a better life,” and the fact that I can’t even cough-up enough money right now for a ticket to Haiti, let alone a night in their hotels, which I have had to pay as much as $100 a night in Port-au-Prince in a previous life, and here I am looking at a Haitian man arrested, circumnavigating Florida through California to receive the benefits of amnesty, which our out-of-control congress will likely pass soon if we don’t get on the stick.

Mexicans are usually charged a fee of $1,500 to $3,000 to be escorted into the United States. It is likely, the Haitian man paid as much as $10,000 dollars, plus his airline ticket to Mexico City, to only be arrested at a U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint. 

As I proceeded east, I also had to wonder if that last lunch I had at the interstate exit would put me in the hospital soon, or even dead, since nobody in Washington has time to worry about our border crisis and the potential flu pandemic. However, scaring thousands of Americans in New York City with a nifty unannounced flyover by Airforce One and two F-16 jet fighters in trail, is par for the course, while many Americans wonder if the flu scare is just hype for something else coming our way.

The more ridiculous it gets everyday, the more I realize the need for every patriot from coast to coast to be prepared, knowledgeable, and ready. The border crisis is not going away, the government will continue to spread gloom and doom, and in the end, you will be standing in a line, begging for that vaccination and anything else the goons in Washington can dream up. It’s time to wake-up and realize the fun and games are over, it’s time to get our country back on track, and it begins by demanding border security and no amnesty for the 30 million plus illegal aliens in our country. Otherwise, a worse (predicted) pandemic flu crossing the border will kill most of us, and maybe that is what THEY want, while bringing-in martial law…Katrina style.