| theintelhub.com | ||||||||||||
 | | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
| | | ||||||||||
|
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Intel Hub Update
Here’s my question about the email I published from the school principal. . . from ~Jean
Here’s my question about the email I published from the school principal. . . from ~Jean
Posted on October 18, 2012 by Jean
What is American, for heaven’s sake? Isn’t American the big stew of all sorts of people that has been simmering on the stove for the last couple hundred-plus years? If we are only going to study and ‘be’ Americans, what exactly are we going to be? What does that mean?
Are we not going to be able to study the other cultures that are a part of our country? Are we going to have, instead, a manufactured culture, similar to the lies we have been living in the false matrix? We think we understood our religion, our so-called American history, and so on, but we find now that it has all been a big lie. With what does this apparently well-meaning, but to my mind shallow-thinking principal want to replace this false history? Does he even know that much of our history is false?
While we may understand that we are going into a time of Unity, what exactly does that mean? Does Unity mean that everything and everyone is the same? How can that be? Does this principal mean we are to ignore these differences? Why?
Why is it necessary?
What about the celebration of the extraordinary diversity that is a part of America? Is that to be destroyed as we all behave only like—Americans? What about the benefits that come to us as a country from this extraordinary diversity? Are we to throw them away, too, for this American country that he so blithely calls for, a country that he seems to convey will not have this diversity, since we will all be behaving like these nebulous people called Americans?
Do you see what I’m trying to convey here?
I can see that we don’t want to dwell on the negatives of skin color that our controllers have taught us—but does this writer have any idea at all that we have been deliberately taught this on purpose to control and divide us? Or does he really mean, perhaps, that the glorious variety of skin colors that are common to us as Americans are to be treated like they don’t actually exist? I know I don’t! Instead, I must wonder why he doesn’t call for them to be celebrated!
What about the wonders of language? While in many countries, children grow up bi- and even tri-lingual, do we want our children to only speak “American”—and miss out on the mysteries and subtleties of other languages? I don’t! I really don’t! This lack of knowledge would also play a part in locking us once again into the very parochial world that is so much of America today, where people have really no idea of the truth of what is going on all over the planet.
While I think this principal is well-intentioned, what I’m trying to convey is that like so many Americans, I think he has failed to give his words adequate thought before he put them out there. I think we are so used to feel-good pap like this, that we haven’t yet awakened to the truth of what it really is. The first time ’round, these words sound really good, but if we stop to consider them beyond their superficial impact, what do they really mean to us?
Here’s my own answer with which you are quite free to disagree: Not much!
What it sounds like this principal really really wants is perhaps a return to the dream-state, based largely on lies, when America was supposed to be a really great place. When, I want to ask, are we going to come together to create the ‘real’ America, an America based on the truths of who we really are as a people: a wonderful hodge-podge, patchwork quilt made of all kinds of cultures: brilliant, gifted people, who just happen to come in a huge variety of sizes, shapes, and colors!
Hugs,
~Jean
http://jhaines6.wordpress.com/
Are we not going to be able to study the other cultures that are a part of our country? Are we going to have, instead, a manufactured culture, similar to the lies we have been living in the false matrix? We think we understood our religion, our so-called American history, and so on, but we find now that it has all been a big lie. With what does this apparently well-meaning, but to my mind shallow-thinking principal want to replace this false history? Does he even know that much of our history is false?
While we may understand that we are going into a time of Unity, what exactly does that mean? Does Unity mean that everything and everyone is the same? How can that be? Does this principal mean we are to ignore these differences? Why?
Why is it necessary?
What about the celebration of the extraordinary diversity that is a part of America? Is that to be destroyed as we all behave only like—Americans? What about the benefits that come to us as a country from this extraordinary diversity? Are we to throw them away, too, for this American country that he so blithely calls for, a country that he seems to convey will not have this diversity, since we will all be behaving like these nebulous people called Americans?
Do you see what I’m trying to convey here?
I can see that we don’t want to dwell on the negatives of skin color that our controllers have taught us—but does this writer have any idea at all that we have been deliberately taught this on purpose to control and divide us? Or does he really mean, perhaps, that the glorious variety of skin colors that are common to us as Americans are to be treated like they don’t actually exist? I know I don’t! Instead, I must wonder why he doesn’t call for them to be celebrated!
What about the wonders of language? While in many countries, children grow up bi- and even tri-lingual, do we want our children to only speak “American”—and miss out on the mysteries and subtleties of other languages? I don’t! I really don’t! This lack of knowledge would also play a part in locking us once again into the very parochial world that is so much of America today, where people have really no idea of the truth of what is going on all over the planet.
While I think this principal is well-intentioned, what I’m trying to convey is that like so many Americans, I think he has failed to give his words adequate thought before he put them out there. I think we are so used to feel-good pap like this, that we haven’t yet awakened to the truth of what it really is. The first time ’round, these words sound really good, but if we stop to consider them beyond their superficial impact, what do they really mean to us?
Here’s my own answer with which you are quite free to disagree: Not much!
What it sounds like this principal really really wants is perhaps a return to the dream-state, based largely on lies, when America was supposed to be a really great place. When, I want to ask, are we going to come together to create the ‘real’ America, an America based on the truths of who we really are as a people: a wonderful hodge-podge, patchwork quilt made of all kinds of cultures: brilliant, gifted people, who just happen to come in a huge variety of sizes, shapes, and colors!
Hugs,
~Jean
http://jhaines6.wordpress.com/
Remaking Our World
Remaking Our World – thanks to D. – and so beautiful said. ~J
Posted on October 17, 2012 by Jean
by Tangerine Bolen on Wednesday, October 17, 2012 at 10:22am ·
Many of my friends and probably some of my family think that I am too political. Too serious. (I have a wild, goofy streak, don’t worry!:). It’s tiring to always talk about serious things, to see posts again and again that are about some battle we’re in. So, what are we fighting for?
We are fighting to restore decency and sanity to our world. We are working to expose just how much corporations have come to control and shape our lives and destinies. We are fighting to not be slaves to these entities that human beings have created – entities to which we have managed to transfer so much power that individuals, on our own, cannot stand up to them, even as they remake our world, and have too much control over our lives, our hopes, our options. We are fighting to ensure you have rights – such as a 40 hour work week, paid vacation, maternity leave (every other industrialized nation pays for maternity leave – they are pro-family in action, not in words). We are fighting for the right to not be funneled into pre-determined and increasingly shrinking options – the lucky ones ending up lawyers, doctors, or other professionals with a ton of graduate school debt if you’re not fortunate enough to come from a wealthy family that can pay extraordinary tuition fees and cover the cost of living while you are getting a higher education. We are fighting to allow those of you who do choose to become doctors and lawyers to take the path you most believe in, NOT saddled with enormous debt – such as fighting corporate abuses, or working to defend civil liberties against abusive governments, or serving in low-income health clinics, to help people, to do good in the world – and to be able to afford to do so.
We are working for a world where our options are wider, and healthy, and sane, so that, if you are called to be an artist, or a musician, or a social worker or a teacher, or a policeman – you can survive. You can be safe. You can have a roof over your head and even, if you work hard, manage to save. You can put your kids through college with a little scrimping and saving. You can bring beauty into the world, you can remind us of soulfulness, of hope and stillness and wonder, you can help keep the world alive by your presence here – and you can survive, playing these roles of keepers of our society, sharers of beauty, thought-stimulators, sharers of soul.
We are working for a world where human beings manage to overcome our rampant greed, our conditioned competitiveness, our sick addiction to a kind of power that is destroying us. We are working to bring power back to the people, to individuals and their families, so that you, and your children, your loved ones and friends feel as if they have some measure of control over your destinies – some hope to do more than be funneled into those pre-determined slots (unless you’re happy there, and that is fine too). We are working to remind you of how great you are, how much you have to give, how much you have inside of you – things that cannot be bought, sold defined or made small and valueless in a monetized, corporatized world. We are working to restore value to things that do not make money – the things that make humanity great, the things that make the struggle of life, and the fact of death – an end to all of this for each of us – worthwhile. We are working to allow everyone everywhere to have their most basic needs of safety and survival met, so that, beyond that, each of us has the power and ability, if we so choose, to rise up inside of ourselves and be everything we hope to be, everything we dream, (or at least a good measure of it) while we are here, for such a short time, on this exquisitely beautiful planet, so that when we do die, we can die knowing that we lived. We lived, fully. We lived, whole.
We are working to save this planet from a collective sickness that is destroying it – and far more quickly than most of you would like to admit (because it requires radical change of all of us). We are working to turn humanity away from rapacious consumption of resources, to fundamentally change the predominant economic system – capitalism – which is based on several, majorly false premises – and to restore sanity to this equation. The world is not made of constant, incessant growth. Only cancer tumors and unchecked algae are. The world is made of an ebb and flow, life and death, growth and recession – a tide that defines everything, except our sick, sick form of monetary exchange – a system that, while it has shown some benefits, has become a monster that is eating us all alive, destroying this planet, and destroying any chance you or your children have at autonomy, at shaping a meaningful destiny.
This is a great reminder of what drives those of us who work for change: http://vimeo.com/22439234
We are working to restore hope and wonder to our world. To be reminded of our small place in an incredible universe. To be reminded that we are meant to do better than what we are doing, to be bigger than who we’ve collectively become, to move forward, reaching for what is highest in each of us, together and alone. We are made of the dust of stars and between buildings and politics and bills and wars and hate we have forgotten that of which we are made.Why do we fight to right our world? We want to live, to be fully and completely alive. And we want you to be fully and completely alive too. And this requires of all of us that we restore justice to our systems, that we refuse – absolutely refuse – to be small. That we rise up. That we reach for individual and collective integrity, possibly as we’ve never, ever done as a species before. That we make small choices, every single day, while we face such broken systems, that change those systems in small ways. By BEING better. By choosing to be so. By not judging others, by being compassionate and honest and authentic – in every way you can, little by little, as we fundamentally undermine and remake broken systems to reflect what is greatest in us. Not overnight. But step by step by step, we overcome the collective darkness we’ve made, we overcome the sense of having to claw your way to the top, we overcome turning our backs on the great devastation that deeply sick powers are wreaking on our world. Little by little, in every way that each of us can, by the choices you make, by where you put your attention, by WHO you choose to be – your presence here – together we reach for something higher, we honor what is best and brightest in all of us.
Together, we must remake ourselves, and our world. And we ask all of you to honor those who work so hard on your behalf, risking and sacrificing so much to stand up to systems that insist on enslaving us, so that we can help to restore rightness and good and sanity and justice and hope to this world. We ask you to understand this. Activists become marginalized in part because humanity itself does not wish to have to truly change, to truly rise above our systems, our religions, our politics, our addictions, and so, people who are working so hard to do this are relegated to the margins. And it is time to restore honor to this arena, to recognize the value of those who work so tirelessly on your behalf to right our world. No one is perfect. We are all fallible. We are all human. We are all in this together. We ALL have to work harder, no matter where we are in life. And I encourage you to decide to reach for something higher and to, in your daily lives, make choices that help pave the way for a paradigm shift for humanity. Because we can do better than this. We ARE better than this. We are made of stars and dust and light and blood and bones and hope and skin. We are made of spirit and soul and all the dreams we are capable of dreaming in between. And I want to dream bigger than this. I want to dream a dream with you that begins to take shape as we are alive. I want to see our hope, our determination, our reason and tolerance and compassion and understanding of harmony with this planet to become a tide that sweeps across nations and cultures and religions and all divides so that we see the unbreakable bonds that bind us in our struggle for survival, in our hopes for more than just surviving while we are alive. I believe that we can do this, and I ask everyone to believe with me.
Together we make each other stronger, and together we WILL remake our world.
http://jhaines6.wordpress.com/
We are fighting to restore decency and sanity to our world. We are working to expose just how much corporations have come to control and shape our lives and destinies. We are fighting to not be slaves to these entities that human beings have created – entities to which we have managed to transfer so much power that individuals, on our own, cannot stand up to them, even as they remake our world, and have too much control over our lives, our hopes, our options. We are fighting to ensure you have rights – such as a 40 hour work week, paid vacation, maternity leave (every other industrialized nation pays for maternity leave – they are pro-family in action, not in words). We are fighting for the right to not be funneled into pre-determined and increasingly shrinking options – the lucky ones ending up lawyers, doctors, or other professionals with a ton of graduate school debt if you’re not fortunate enough to come from a wealthy family that can pay extraordinary tuition fees and cover the cost of living while you are getting a higher education. We are fighting to allow those of you who do choose to become doctors and lawyers to take the path you most believe in, NOT saddled with enormous debt – such as fighting corporate abuses, or working to defend civil liberties against abusive governments, or serving in low-income health clinics, to help people, to do good in the world – and to be able to afford to do so.
We are working for a world where our options are wider, and healthy, and sane, so that, if you are called to be an artist, or a musician, or a social worker or a teacher, or a policeman – you can survive. You can be safe. You can have a roof over your head and even, if you work hard, manage to save. You can put your kids through college with a little scrimping and saving. You can bring beauty into the world, you can remind us of soulfulness, of hope and stillness and wonder, you can help keep the world alive by your presence here – and you can survive, playing these roles of keepers of our society, sharers of beauty, thought-stimulators, sharers of soul.
We are working for a world where human beings manage to overcome our rampant greed, our conditioned competitiveness, our sick addiction to a kind of power that is destroying us. We are working to bring power back to the people, to individuals and their families, so that you, and your children, your loved ones and friends feel as if they have some measure of control over your destinies – some hope to do more than be funneled into those pre-determined slots (unless you’re happy there, and that is fine too). We are working to remind you of how great you are, how much you have to give, how much you have inside of you – things that cannot be bought, sold defined or made small and valueless in a monetized, corporatized world. We are working to restore value to things that do not make money – the things that make humanity great, the things that make the struggle of life, and the fact of death – an end to all of this for each of us – worthwhile. We are working to allow everyone everywhere to have their most basic needs of safety and survival met, so that, beyond that, each of us has the power and ability, if we so choose, to rise up inside of ourselves and be everything we hope to be, everything we dream, (or at least a good measure of it) while we are here, for such a short time, on this exquisitely beautiful planet, so that when we do die, we can die knowing that we lived. We lived, fully. We lived, whole.
We are working to save this planet from a collective sickness that is destroying it – and far more quickly than most of you would like to admit (because it requires radical change of all of us). We are working to turn humanity away from rapacious consumption of resources, to fundamentally change the predominant economic system – capitalism – which is based on several, majorly false premises – and to restore sanity to this equation. The world is not made of constant, incessant growth. Only cancer tumors and unchecked algae are. The world is made of an ebb and flow, life and death, growth and recession – a tide that defines everything, except our sick, sick form of monetary exchange – a system that, while it has shown some benefits, has become a monster that is eating us all alive, destroying this planet, and destroying any chance you or your children have at autonomy, at shaping a meaningful destiny.
This is a great reminder of what drives those of us who work for change: http://vimeo.com/22439234
We are working to restore hope and wonder to our world. To be reminded of our small place in an incredible universe. To be reminded that we are meant to do better than what we are doing, to be bigger than who we’ve collectively become, to move forward, reaching for what is highest in each of us, together and alone. We are made of the dust of stars and between buildings and politics and bills and wars and hate we have forgotten that of which we are made.Why do we fight to right our world? We want to live, to be fully and completely alive. And we want you to be fully and completely alive too. And this requires of all of us that we restore justice to our systems, that we refuse – absolutely refuse – to be small. That we rise up. That we reach for individual and collective integrity, possibly as we’ve never, ever done as a species before. That we make small choices, every single day, while we face such broken systems, that change those systems in small ways. By BEING better. By choosing to be so. By not judging others, by being compassionate and honest and authentic – in every way you can, little by little, as we fundamentally undermine and remake broken systems to reflect what is greatest in us. Not overnight. But step by step by step, we overcome the collective darkness we’ve made, we overcome the sense of having to claw your way to the top, we overcome turning our backs on the great devastation that deeply sick powers are wreaking on our world. Little by little, in every way that each of us can, by the choices you make, by where you put your attention, by WHO you choose to be – your presence here – together we reach for something higher, we honor what is best and brightest in all of us.
Together, we must remake ourselves, and our world. And we ask all of you to honor those who work so hard on your behalf, risking and sacrificing so much to stand up to systems that insist on enslaving us, so that we can help to restore rightness and good and sanity and justice and hope to this world. We ask you to understand this. Activists become marginalized in part because humanity itself does not wish to have to truly change, to truly rise above our systems, our religions, our politics, our addictions, and so, people who are working so hard to do this are relegated to the margins. And it is time to restore honor to this arena, to recognize the value of those who work so tirelessly on your behalf to right our world. No one is perfect. We are all fallible. We are all human. We are all in this together. We ALL have to work harder, no matter where we are in life. And I encourage you to decide to reach for something higher and to, in your daily lives, make choices that help pave the way for a paradigm shift for humanity. Because we can do better than this. We ARE better than this. We are made of stars and dust and light and blood and bones and hope and skin. We are made of spirit and soul and all the dreams we are capable of dreaming in between. And I want to dream bigger than this. I want to dream a dream with you that begins to take shape as we are alive. I want to see our hope, our determination, our reason and tolerance and compassion and understanding of harmony with this planet to become a tide that sweeps across nations and cultures and religions and all divides so that we see the unbreakable bonds that bind us in our struggle for survival, in our hopes for more than just surviving while we are alive. I believe that we can do this, and I ask everyone to believe with me.
Together we make each other stronger, and together we WILL remake our world.
http://jhaines6.wordpress.com/
RT: Deadline dismissed: US wants troops to remain in Afghanistan after 2014
OUR TROOPS NEED TO COME HOME AND STAY HERE!! When are our troops going to stop dying for these old men that are out for their own gain and don't care anymore about our military than they do about the people ??? If these so-called men want a war, be abliged to PUT THOSE MEN ON THE FRONT LINES. LET THEM FIGHT THEIR OWN BATTLES.
RT: Deadline dismissed: US wants troops to remain in Afghanistan after 2014
Posted on October 17, 2012 by Jean
Published: 17 October, 2012, 01:02
US Army soldiers attached to the 1st Squadron (Airborne) 91st US Cavalry Regiment 173d Airborne Brigade Combat Team, pay their respects to US Staff Sergeant Orion Sparks and Sergeant Jonathan Gollnitz during a memorial ceremony at Forward Operating Base (FOB) Shank near Puli Alam in Logar Province.(AFP Photo / Munir uz Zaman)
The United States’ post-9/11 actions in Afghanistan have already earned the operation the distinction of being America’s longest-running war, and promises on the verge of being shattered could cause an expected end to be still a ways in the future.
Despite repeated pleas from US President Barack Obama to conclude the war in Afghanistan by the end of 2014, a leading official with the State Department tells reporters this week that the United States is readying plans that will leave boots on the ground for the unforeseeable future, perhaps long after the Obama-insisted deadline comes and goes.
Marc Grossman, the State Department’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, reportedly told the press on Tuesday that upcoming negotiations in the region will iron out how and who will be left overseas after 2014 to allegedly engage in counterterrorism efforts and assist Afghans with military training.
According to a report published this week in Foreign Policy, Grossman says the State Dept. will soon start up a round of talks with overseas officials with the goal of establishing a game plan for how America will conduct itself after the war is considered over.
Josh Rogin with Foreign Policy writes, “the point of the upcoming negotiations is to agree on an extension of the US troop presence well past 2014, for the purposes of conducting counterterrorism operations and training and advising the Afghan security forces.”
Grossman adds that the State Dept. has already held meetings to discuss “how we will manage our forces going forward in Afghanistan,” and now must begin negotiations to figure out a number of factors, including who and how many troops will be left behind.
The why, of course, is to aid Afghans unable to fend against insurgency on their own after the US military formally walks away. Just last week, however, US Vice President Joe Biden said he opposes assisting the Afghans any further once the operation hits the 2014 deadline.
“The fact is we went there for one reason: to get those people who killed Americans, al-Qaida. We’ve decimated al-Qaida central. We have eliminated Osama bin Laden. That was our purpose,” Mr. Biden said during last week’s debate against Paul Ryan, the GOP running mate vying for an Executive Branch position under Republican Party nominee Mitt Romney.“And in fact, in the meantime, what we said we would do, we would help train the Afghan military. It’s their responsibility to take over their own security. That’s why, with 49 of our allies in Afghanistan, we’ve agreed on a gradual drawdown so we’re out of there by the year — in the year 2014.”
“It is the responsibility of the Afghans to take care of their own security,” Mr. Biden added. “We are leaving in 2014, period, and in the process, we’re going to be saving over the next 10 years another $800 billion. We’ve been in this war for over a decade. The primary objective is almost completed. Now all we’re doing is putting the Kabul government in a position to be able to maintain their own security. It’s their responsibility, not America’s.”
Earlier this week, officials with NATO confirmed that allied troops composed in part with US soldiers will remain in Afghanistan after the 2014 deadline, but strictly in an advisory role.
http://jhaines6.wordpress.com/
Despite repeated pleas from US President Barack Obama to conclude the war in Afghanistan by the end of 2014, a leading official with the State Department tells reporters this week that the United States is readying plans that will leave boots on the ground for the unforeseeable future, perhaps long after the Obama-insisted deadline comes and goes.
Marc Grossman, the State Department’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, reportedly told the press on Tuesday that upcoming negotiations in the region will iron out how and who will be left overseas after 2014 to allegedly engage in counterterrorism efforts and assist Afghans with military training.
According to a report published this week in Foreign Policy, Grossman says the State Dept. will soon start up a round of talks with overseas officials with the goal of establishing a game plan for how America will conduct itself after the war is considered over.
Josh Rogin with Foreign Policy writes, “the point of the upcoming negotiations is to agree on an extension of the US troop presence well past 2014, for the purposes of conducting counterterrorism operations and training and advising the Afghan security forces.”
Grossman adds that the State Dept. has already held meetings to discuss “how we will manage our forces going forward in Afghanistan,” and now must begin negotiations to figure out a number of factors, including who and how many troops will be left behind.
The why, of course, is to aid Afghans unable to fend against insurgency on their own after the US military formally walks away. Just last week, however, US Vice President Joe Biden said he opposes assisting the Afghans any further once the operation hits the 2014 deadline.
“The fact is we went there for one reason: to get those people who killed Americans, al-Qaida. We’ve decimated al-Qaida central. We have eliminated Osama bin Laden. That was our purpose,” Mr. Biden said during last week’s debate against Paul Ryan, the GOP running mate vying for an Executive Branch position under Republican Party nominee Mitt Romney.“And in fact, in the meantime, what we said we would do, we would help train the Afghan military. It’s their responsibility to take over their own security. That’s why, with 49 of our allies in Afghanistan, we’ve agreed on a gradual drawdown so we’re out of there by the year — in the year 2014.”
“It is the responsibility of the Afghans to take care of their own security,” Mr. Biden added. “We are leaving in 2014, period, and in the process, we’re going to be saving over the next 10 years another $800 billion. We’ve been in this war for over a decade. The primary objective is almost completed. Now all we’re doing is putting the Kabul government in a position to be able to maintain their own security. It’s their responsibility, not America’s.”
Earlier this week, officials with NATO confirmed that allied troops composed in part with US soldiers will remain in Afghanistan after the 2014 deadline, but strictly in an advisory role.
http://jhaines6.wordpress.com/
Sistine Chapel THIS IS BRILLIANT!
Subject: Sistine Chapel THIS IS BRILLIANT!
|
NDAA critic stranded in Hawaii after turning up on no-fly list
NDAA critic stranded in Hawaii after turning up on no-fly list
Posted on October 17, 2012 by Jean
Published: 17 October, 2012, 20:15
Image from tullyspage.blogspot.com
Wade Hicks was en route to a US Navy base in Japan to see his wife when armed military guards informed him that they had other plans. Hicks, an American citizen with no criminal record, had just been put added to a federal no-fly list.
After being escorted off his plane during a routine re-fueling stop on the Pacific Island of Oahu, Hicks, 34, was left stranded in Hawaii this week. In an interview, he suggests that his opposition to a newly-created law that allows for the indefinite detention of US citizens at military prisons without charge or trial could be to blame for his mistreatment.
“I was very, very vocal about the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and I did contact my representative” about it, Hicks tells talk show host Doug Hagmann. “I do believe that this is tied in some way to my free speech and my political view.”
According to Hicks, he has little reason to believe otherwise. He tells Hagmann that he formerly worked as a contractor for the US Department of Defense and has undergone extensive background checks in order to obtain an enhanced license that allows him to carry a concealed firearm. Hicks says he also holds on to a special identification card issued by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the US Homeland Security Department sub-agency that administers pat-downs and screenings at airports across the country. An investigation carried out by Hagmann has led him to locating no criminal history for the man whatsoever.
In fact, the only “dirt” the host has managed to dig up on Hicks, he writes, is his occasionally vocal identification as an American patriot.
Hicks, says Hagmann, “appears to be a law abiding member of society.” He adds, however, that preliminary research has led him to link the man as being “an outspoken ‘patriot’” who is “openly critical of the NDAA,” a bill US President Barack Obama signed into law on December 31 despite openly acknowledging that he had “serious reservations” about provisions that allow the military to indefinitely detain anyone on mere suspicion of ties with terrorists. Hicks also tells the radio host that he is critical of the government’s handling of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and says, “I think the evidence I’ve seen warrants a new investigation, and I’m very vocal about it as well,”
“He is a former talk-show host of a small, local radio station known for its ‘patriotic bias.’ He is a member of ‘Patriots for America’ and the Mississippi Preparedness Project. He is openly vocal about the erosion of our rights – and it certainly looks like he has been proven correct. Is that now a crime worthy of being denied the ability to travel freely within the United States?” Hagmann writes.
The Mississippi Preparedness Project, according to the group’s official website, strives “to encourage and train others to prepare for any situation, whether it be political or disruptions in the infrastructure and civil structure of the communities in which we live and work.”
“We intend to prepare and train for all foreseeable aspects of personal preparedness including Political, Basic and Emergency Medical, Food and Water Storage, Equipment, Local, State and Nationwide Communications, Personal, Home and Community Defense,” their mission statement continues.
Hicks’ incident occurred on October 14 when a military plane Hicks had boarded to visit his wife, a lieutenant in the US Navy, stopped in Oahu to refuel. Although he had no issues with gaining admittance to the aircraft during the first leg of his trip, things went amiss in Oahu.There two heavily-armed officers entered the plane and escorted him to a small interrogation room at a military base and told him that he had showed up on the US “no-fly” list, despite having boarded a flight earlier that day in San Francisco where he had been subjected to military-sanctioned security screenings reportedly more stringent than the TSA treatment. He was hoping to visit his wife of only eight months when the mishap unraveled.
“They have given me no reason. They just basically are telling me, ‘You can’t fly because we said so,’” Hicks tells Hagmann this week. “They didn’t know how I even left Travis Air Force Base.”
“I said, ‘If I could find a way off the island, I could leave’? They said, ‘Yes, as long as you don’t fly.”
Hicks adds that he has since met with a Navy lawyer in Hawaii who attempted to resolve the case with so far no avail. He reports that the attorney reached out to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement hoping that the incident has been the result of a case of mistaken identity, but, “They said, ‘No, we have the right person that is in our database. His social security [number] matches and his birth date matches.’”
“I have no idea how long I’m going to be stranded in Hawaii or if I’m going to be able to leave out of here on an aircraft,” Hicks adds. “Try to get back from Oahu . . . It’s a long swim and it’s a long boat ride.”
Related articles
After being escorted off his plane during a routine re-fueling stop on the Pacific Island of Oahu, Hicks, 34, was left stranded in Hawaii this week. In an interview, he suggests that his opposition to a newly-created law that allows for the indefinite detention of US citizens at military prisons without charge or trial could be to blame for his mistreatment.
“I was very, very vocal about the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and I did contact my representative” about it, Hicks tells talk show host Doug Hagmann. “I do believe that this is tied in some way to my free speech and my political view.”
According to Hicks, he has little reason to believe otherwise. He tells Hagmann that he formerly worked as a contractor for the US Department of Defense and has undergone extensive background checks in order to obtain an enhanced license that allows him to carry a concealed firearm. Hicks says he also holds on to a special identification card issued by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), the US Homeland Security Department sub-agency that administers pat-downs and screenings at airports across the country. An investigation carried out by Hagmann has led him to locating no criminal history for the man whatsoever.
In fact, the only “dirt” the host has managed to dig up on Hicks, he writes, is his occasionally vocal identification as an American patriot.
Hicks, says Hagmann, “appears to be a law abiding member of society.” He adds, however, that preliminary research has led him to link the man as being “an outspoken ‘patriot’” who is “openly critical of the NDAA,” a bill US President Barack Obama signed into law on December 31 despite openly acknowledging that he had “serious reservations” about provisions that allow the military to indefinitely detain anyone on mere suspicion of ties with terrorists. Hicks also tells the radio host that he is critical of the government’s handling of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and says, “I think the evidence I’ve seen warrants a new investigation, and I’m very vocal about it as well,”
“He is a former talk-show host of a small, local radio station known for its ‘patriotic bias.’ He is a member of ‘Patriots for America’ and the Mississippi Preparedness Project. He is openly vocal about the erosion of our rights – and it certainly looks like he has been proven correct. Is that now a crime worthy of being denied the ability to travel freely within the United States?” Hagmann writes.
The Mississippi Preparedness Project, according to the group’s official website, strives “to encourage and train others to prepare for any situation, whether it be political or disruptions in the infrastructure and civil structure of the communities in which we live and work.”
“We intend to prepare and train for all foreseeable aspects of personal preparedness including Political, Basic and Emergency Medical, Food and Water Storage, Equipment, Local, State and Nationwide Communications, Personal, Home and Community Defense,” their mission statement continues.
Hicks’ incident occurred on October 14 when a military plane Hicks had boarded to visit his wife, a lieutenant in the US Navy, stopped in Oahu to refuel. Although he had no issues with gaining admittance to the aircraft during the first leg of his trip, things went amiss in Oahu.There two heavily-armed officers entered the plane and escorted him to a small interrogation room at a military base and told him that he had showed up on the US “no-fly” list, despite having boarded a flight earlier that day in San Francisco where he had been subjected to military-sanctioned security screenings reportedly more stringent than the TSA treatment. He was hoping to visit his wife of only eight months when the mishap unraveled.
“They have given me no reason. They just basically are telling me, ‘You can’t fly because we said so,’” Hicks tells Hagmann this week. “They didn’t know how I even left Travis Air Force Base.”
“I said, ‘If I could find a way off the island, I could leave’? They said, ‘Yes, as long as you don’t fly.”
Hicks adds that he has since met with a Navy lawyer in Hawaii who attempted to resolve the case with so far no avail. He reports that the attorney reached out to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement hoping that the incident has been the result of a case of mistaken identity, but, “They said, ‘No, we have the right person that is in our database. His social security [number] matches and his birth date matches.’”
“I have no idea how long I’m going to be stranded in Hawaii or if I’m going to be able to leave out of here on an aircraft,” Hicks adds. “Try to get back from Oahu . . . It’s a long swim and it’s a long boat ride.”
Related articles
- Hicks to appeal terrorism conviction (news.smh.com.au)
- Hicks charge ruled invalid (theage.com.au)
- Hicks conviction could be overturned (dailytelegraph.com.au)
- Hicks could be cleared after US court decision (abc.net.au)
- Hicks demands damages (theage.com.au)
- Hicks set to appeal conviction (bigpondnews.com)
- Options for Hicks to clear name (news.ninemsn.com.au)
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
