The U.S. and EU have agreed to launch negotiations on what would be the world's largest free trade deal. Such an agreement would be the basis for the creation of an economic NATO and would include trade in goods, services and investment, as well as cover intellectual property rights. There are concerns that the U.S. could use these talks to push the EU to loosen its restrictions on genetically modified crops and foods. In addition, the deal might serve as a backdoor means to implement ACTA which was rejected by the European Parliament last year. A U.S.-EU Transatlantic trade agreement is seen as a way of countering China’s growing power and is the foundation for a new global economic order.
In his recent State of the Union address, President Barack Obama officially announced that the U.S. would launch talks on a comprehensive Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership with the European Union (EU). A joint statement issued by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and U.S. President Obama explained that, “Through this negotiation, the United States and the European Union will have the opportunity not only to expand trade and investment across the Atlantic, but also to contribute to the development of global rules that can strengthen the multilateral trading system.” In a separate speech, European Commission President Barroso also emphasized that, “A future deal between the world's two most important economic powers will be a game- changer. Together, we will form the largest free trade zone in the world. So this negotiation will set the standard – not only for our future bilateral trade and investment, including regulatory issues, but also for the development of global trade rules.”
The decision to pursue a free trade deal was based on the recommendations put forth by the High Level Working Group on Jobs and Growth which was created to deepen U.S.-EU economic integration. In their final report, they called on leaders from both sides to, “initiate as soon as possible the formal domestic procedures necessary to launch negotiations on a comprehensive trade and investment agreement.” According to U.S. and EU officials, talks could start in June with the hopes of completing a deal by the end of 2014. The proposed trade pact would include removing import tariffs, dismantling hurdles to trade in goods, services, and investment, as well as harmonizing regulations and standards. It would also cover intellectual property protection and enforcement. This could be used as an opportunity for a backdoor implementation of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). It was a result of public pressure associated with risks to internet freedom and privacy which lead to ACTA being rejected by the European Parliament in July of 2012. There have already been attempts to use Canada-EU trade negotiations to sneak in parts of ACTA.
>>159 (続き) Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch Director, Lori Wallach cautioned how U.S.-EU talks, “are aimed at eliminating a list of what multinational corporations call 'trade irritants' but the rest of us know as strong food safety, environmental and health safeguards.” She went on to say, “European firms are targeting aspects of the U.S. financial reregulation regime, our stronger drug and medical device safety and testing standards and more.” Wallach further added, “U.S. firms want Europe to gut their superior chemical regulation regime, their tougher food safety rules and labeling of genetically modified foods.” In a press release, Earth Open Source warned that, “An EU-U.S. free trade deal would obliterate EU safeguards for health and the environment with regard to genetically modified (GM) crops and foods.” Research Director Claire Robinson pointed out, “If the new trade agreement goes through, it will be illegal under World Trade Organisation rules for the EU to have a stronger regulatory system for GMOs than the U.S. system.” This is disturbing considering that in many cases, GM foods in the U.S. do not require any special regulatory oversight or safety tests.
Overshadowed by the proposed U.S.-EU trade deal is ongoing Canada-EU negotiations on a Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). Despite talks being in their final stages, both sides still have some important gaps to be bridged before a deal can be reached. Thomas Walkom of the Toronto Star acknowledged that, “Europe’s real interest in negotiating a trade deal with Ottawa was to demonstrate to the Americans that a trans-Atlantic free trade pact was possible.” He noted, “EU negotiators will be even more reluctant to make concessions to Canada for fear of weakening their bargaining hand with the Americans.” Walkom argued that, “Canada is under more pressure to make a deal while Europe is under less.” He concluded that. “A Canada-EU deal seems inevitable. But now, with America in the mix, the terms for Canada may be even less favorable than expected.” The Globe and Mail recently reported that the EU is demanding additional concessions from Canada before any agreement can be signed. In order to wrap things up, a desperate Canada may be willing to give up even more. This was a bad deal from the start and it would be in their best interest to just walk away from CETA.
In the coming months, you can expect the anti-corporate globalization movement on both sides of the Atlantic to mobilize against the U.S.-EU trade agreement. It is big business and financial institutions who are pushing this deregulation agenda which threatens health, environmental and food safety standards. Just like NAFTA, the proposed U.S.-EU trade deal is also likely to include an investor-state dispute process which would give corporations the right to challenge government policies that restrict their profits. A trade agreement between the U.S. and EU is the building blocks for a new global trading system. If you combine NAFTA, the Trans-Pacific Partnership and a U.S, -EU Transatlantic trade deal, you have the makings for a global free trade area.
When DHS purchased 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition to be used domestically, inside the USA, and I said this looks like a government agency preparing for war with the American people, I was told, "That's crazy. The government would never do that." When DHS purchased 7,000 full-auto assault rifles to be used inside the United States, calling them "personal defense weapons" that could be used in urban warfare, I was once again told I was crazy for suggesting the government was arming up for war with the American people.
Now DHS has retrofitted 2,717 "Navistar Defense" armored vehicles for service on the streets of America. Click here to see pictures and specs for this vehicle from the manufacturer's website. These vehicles, which people who don't know any better might call "light tanks, " are specifically designed to resist mines and ambush attacks. They use bulletproof windows and are designed to withstand small arms fire, including smaller-caliber rifles such as .223 Remington.
The retrofit was completed in May, 2012, and these 2,700+ armored vehicles are now ready to deploy across the streets of America, reports Modern Survival Blog, the primary source for this story.
◇A domestic arms race Importantly, none of these armaments -- billions of bullets, thousands of full-auto assault rifles and thousands of armored assault vehicles -- are being purchased by the Pentagon for use in wars overseas. Instead, these are being purchased by DHS for use inside the United States... on the streets of America. This is a domestic department of the federal government that is clearly and unambiguously arming for war against the American people. This war will also involve the use of armed military drones attacking American citizens, which is exactly why the Obama administration now claims the legal authority to assassinate Americans on U.S. soil using militarized drones.
This is at the same time the American people are arming up like never before as well. U.S. ammunition manufacturers are currently producing over one billion rounds per week. All that ammo is flying off the shelves, with virtually nothing remaining in stock anywhere.
Magazine manufacturers like ProMag Industries are backordered for over a year, and gun manufacturers are anywhere from 6 months to 18 months behind schedule, desperately trying to keep up with customer demand that continues to grow. I called Desert Tactical Arms today anconfirmed their guns are running six months behind schedule. This is the company that makes the portable .338 Lapua and .50 BMG rifles favored by U.S. troops in activities such as so-called "hard target interdiction." (i.e. killing vehicles.)
As the government arms race continues to stockpile weapons and ammo in the hands of DHS, the American people are increasingly turning to large-caliber weapons for their own stockpiles. Just last week, I recently went shooting here in Texas where we had three .50 cal Barrett BMG rifles, plus two .338 Lapua magnum sniper rifles, all firing on some thick steel targets. The targets were decimated, and every single shooter in our group was able to put lead on target, even from long-range distances.
◇Holocaust deniers and DHS deniers Of course, there are people who deny DHS is engaged in an arms race, just as there are Holocaust deniers who deny Hitler ever took guns away from the Jews (before committing mass murder). Those deniers either claim that these purchases are not happening (but they are), or that the government is only buying such large quantities "to save money."
This is a distraction, of course. You don't "save money" buying things you don't need. Clearly, someone at the top of DHS believes the government needs these armored vehicles and full-auto assault rifles deployed on the streets of America.
But the bigger question -- and this is the question the mainstream media refuses to even ask -- is WHY does DHS need: • 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition • 7,000+ assault rifles • 2,700+ armored assault vehicles
Unless you're insane or a denier, the answer is clear: DHS is expecting a large-scale domestic conflict.
◇Why is DHS expecting a domestic war? So then, the commonsense question becomes: Why is DHS expecting a domestic war?
I've asked this question of many of my contacts, and what I keep hearing is that an economic collapse is fast approaching, and DHS is likely going to use all this equipment to try to maintain government power during the chaos and riots that are sure to follow the economic collapse. This equipment will all be needed to "maintain order on the streets," I'm told.
But that's only one possible scenario. Another scenario involves the criminally-run government announcing a nationwide gun confiscation scheme (just as Sen. Feinstein says she wants), then attempting to defend itself against the inevitable civil war that will result. The most likely outcome here is that DHS will only be able to control the areas that have been forcibly disarmed such as Chicago and New York City. They will be utterly unable to hold rural territories where freedom-loving Americans have already decided to fight back against tyranny no matter what the cost. Yet a third scenario could involve government anticipation of a nuclear attack from North Korea followed by a "Red Dawn" land invasion from China or Korea. And DHS is here to fight for freedom and defeat the communists. (And if you believe that, I have a bridge to sell ya... far more likely is that DHS wants to welcome in the communists!)
◇This domestic war machine was built by claiming it was for terrorists Keep in mind that DHS was created by President Bush in response to the 9/11 terror attacks. In fact, since 2001, the U.S. federal government has built a domestic war infrastructure by claiming it was all being constructed to protect us from the terrorists.
Now, in 2013, the government has "flipped the script" on who the threat is. According to Janet Napolitano, head of DHS, the real threat to America is now returning veterans and gun owners. So the feds have this massive armament infrastructure and spy grid lockdown over the entire population, and it turns out it was all built not for terrorists but for YOU.
The terrorists are nowhere to be found in all this, by the way. Every single terror plot halted by the FBI is a terror plot that was literally dreamed up, planned and nearly carried out by the FBI. TSA has caught exactly zero terrorists trying to sneak through airport security.
The "war on terror" is and always has been a complete hoax. The purpose of the hoax was to provide a cover story for the building up of a massive domestic military force to be used against the American people when the time comes.
That's what we are really seeing with the purchase of ammo, automatic weapons and armored assault vehicles. This is why cable barriers are being erected on highways across the country. And this is why DHS has recently begun redacting the requested quantities from its public bid documents... in order to make sure the public can no longer learn how much it's stockpiling weapons and ammo.
◇But none of this is real, right? Astonishingly, the vast majority of Americans remain completely unaware of any of this. For those mainstream sheeple, anything that doesn't appear on CNN must not be real.
So DHS really isn't buying 1.6 billion rounds of ammo, 7,000+ assault rifles, or 2,700+ armored mine-resistant assault vehicles. All of us who are reporting these purchases are "conspiracy theorists," we're all told, even though what we're reporting on is absolutely true. Remember this: Former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs has now publicly admitted he was ordered by the White House to deny the existence of the U.S. militarized drone program even while the program existed and was known to be real. Denial has always been a key tactic for any government preparing to do something unethical or criminal.
But I've been told by some seemingly convincing people that none of this is real. It's all just a bad dream, you see, and soon you will wake up and find yourself in the land of the free, where there isn't poison in the crops and there isn't mercury in the vaccines. The President love you, and corporations are all ethical. Senators are humanitarians who put the good of the country ahead of their own selfish greed. The FDA stops censoring the truth about nutritional therapies and the USDA outlaws GMOs.
That's the delusional world that 90% of Americans believe they live in, and they even believe that as long as they just "believe" something, then reality doesn't even matter. Belief IS reality, according to the "Law of Attraction" followers, and if you just believe the government is good, then your belief will make it so.
That's a fascinating bit of self-hypnosis, because DHS doesn't care what you believe. It is stockpiling guns, ammo and armored vehicles for some very real reason. This isn't their imagination: it's hardware.
And hardware is rarely accumulated in such large quantities unless it is deemed necessary for some specific purpose. It seems that the American people -- delusional or otherwise -- may soon discover what purpose DHS has in mind. (That's final.)
Accountability is polluted with executive branch exemptions from law and the Constitution and with special legal privileges for corporations, such as the Supreme Court given right to corporations to purchase American elections.
The Constitution is polluted with corrupt legal interpretations from the Bush and Obama regimes that have turned constitutional prohibitions into executive branch rights, transforming law from a shield of the people into a weapon in the hands of government. Waters are polluted with toxic waste spills, oil spills, chemical fertilizer run-off with resulting red tides and dead zones, acid discharges from mining with resulting destructive algae such as prymnesium parvum, from toxic chemicals used in fracking and with methane that fracking releases into wells and aquifers, resulting in warnings to homeowners near to fracking operations to open their windows when showering.
The soil’s fertility is damaged, and crops require large quantities of chemical fertilizers. The soil is polluted with an endless array of toxic substances and now with glyphosate, the main element in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide with which GMO crops are sprayed. Glyphosate now shows up in wells, streams and in rain.
Air is polluted with a variety of substances, and there are many large cities in which there are days when the young, the elderly, and those suffering with asthma are warned to remain indoors. All of these costs are costs imposed on society and ordinary people by corporations that banked profits by not having to take the costs into account. This is the way in which unregulated capitalism works. Our food itself is polluted with antibiotics, growth hormones, pesticides, and glyphosate.
Glyphosate might be the most dangerous development to date. Some scientists believe that glyphosate has the potential to wipe out our main grain crops and now that Obama’s Secretary of Agriculture, Thomas Vilsack, has approved genetically modified Roundup Ready alfalfa, maintaining sustainable animal herds for milk and meat could become impossible.
Alfalfa is the main forage crop for dairy and beef herds. Genetically modified alfalfa could be unsafe for animal feed, and animal products such as milk and meat could become unsafe for human consumption.
On January 17, 2011, Dr. Don Huber outlined the dangers of approving Roundup Ready alfalfa in a letter to Secretary of Agriculture Vilsack. Huber requested that approval be delayed until independent research could evaluate the risks. Vilsack ignored Huber’s letter and ten days later deregulated Roundup Ready alfalfa on January 27, thus accommodating Monsanto’s desire for monopoly profits that come from the company’s drive to control the seed supply of US and world agriculture by approving Roundup Ready alfalfa.
Who is Don Huber, and why is his letter important? Huber is professor emeritus at Purdue University. He has been a plant pathologist and soil microbiologist for a half century. He has an international reputation as a leading authority. In the US military, he evaluated natural and manmade biological threats, such as germ warfare and disease outbreaks and retired with the rank of Colonel. For the USDA he coordinates the Emergent Diseases and Pathogens Committee. In other words, he is high up in his scientific profession.
You can read online what Huber told the Secretary of Agriculture. Briefly, the outcome of many years of Roundup Ready GMO corn and soybeans has been a decline in nutritional value, the outbreak of new plant diseases resulting in widespread crop failures, and severe reproductive problems in livestock, with some herds having a spontaneous abortion rate that is too high to maintain a profitable business. Glyphosate is a powerful biocide. It harms beneficial soil organisms, altering the natural balance in the soil and reducing the disease resistance of crops, thus unleashing diseases that devastate corn, soybean, and wheat crops, and giving rise to a new pathogen associated with premature animal aging and infertility. These developments, Huber told the Agriculture Secretary, “are threatening the economic viability of both crop and animal producers. ” The evidence seems to be real that genetically modified crops have lost their genetic resistance to diseases that never previously were threats. There is evidence that the new pathogen is related to a rise in human infertility and is likely having adverse effects on human health of which we are still uninformed. Like fluoride, glyphosate might enter our diet in a variety of ways. For example, the label on a bottle of Vitamin D says, “Other ingredients: soybean oil, corn oil.”
Monsanto disputes Huber’s claims and got support for its position from the agricultural extension services of Iowa State and Ohio State universities. However, the question is whether these are independently funded services or corporate supported, and there is always the element of professional rivalry, especially for funding, which comes mainly from agribusiness.
The Purdue University extension service was more circumspect. On the one hand it admits that there is evidence that supports Huber’s claims: “The claim that herbicides, such as glyphosate, can make plants more susceptible to disease is not entirely without merit. Research has indicated that plants sprayed with glyphosate or other herbicides are more susceptible to many biological and physiological disorders (Babiker et al., 2011; Descalzo et al., 1996; Johal and Rahe, 1984; Larson et al., 2006; Means and Kremer, 2007; Sanogo et al., 2000; Smiley et al., 1992). . . . Although some research indicates there is an increase in disease severity on plants in the presence of glyphosate, it does NOT necessarily mean that there is an impact on yield.”
On the other hand, the Purdue extension service maintains its recommendation for “judicious glyphosate use for weed control.” However, one of Huber’s points is that weeds are developing Roundup resistance. Use has gone beyond the “judicious” level and as glyphosate builds up in soil, its adverse effects increase. A submission to the Environmental Protection Agency by 26 university entomologists describes the constraints that agribusiness has put on the ability of independent scientists to conduct objective research. The submission, in which the scientists are afraid to reveal their names because of the threat of funding cutoffs, is included as an item in one of the bibliographical references below. Here is the statement: “The names of the scientists have been withheld from the public docket because virtually all of us require cooperation from industry at some level to conduct our research. Statement: Technology/stewardship agreements required for the purchase of genetically modified seed explicitly prohibit research. These agreements inhibit public scientists from pursuing their mandated role on behalf of the public good unless the research is approved by industry.
As a result of restricted access, no truly independent research can be legally conducted on many critical questions regarding the technology, its performance, its management implications, IRM, and its interactions with insect biology. Consequently, data flowing to an EPA Scientific Advisory Panel from the public sector is unduly limited.” Monsanto is not only sufficiently powerful to prevent any research other than that which it purchases with its funding, but also Monsanto succeeded last year in blocking with money and propaganda the GMO labeling law in California. I would tell you to be careful what you eat as it can make you ill and infertile, but you can’t even find out what you are eating.
You live in America, which has “freedom and democracy” and “accountable” government and ”accountable” corporations. You don’t need to worry. The government and responsible corporations are taking good care of you. Especially Obama, Vilsack, and Monsanto.
もう間もなく、露・仏・スイスの専門家によるパレスチナのアラファト議長の死因についての詳細な 検査結果が出るね。ロシア側への依頼は、アッバス議長らの強い希望によるものでした。 「ポロニウム-210」での毒殺が濃厚でした。また今回の訪露では、イスラエルとの和平交渉について も話し合われるとのこと。ネタニヤフは好戦的で、和平を拒否する右派陣営内にいながら、米・イス ラエルの右派が進める好戦的な戦略が、イスラエルを国家破壊に追い込み兼ねないことを察知して、 入植地の撤退やパレスチナ国家の建設などの安定化策を進めようとしています。ネタニヤフの他にも シャロン元首相が同様のことをしていましたが、2006年に脳卒中で倒れて、植物状態になリ引退しま した。チャベス同様、右派による陰謀説があり、シャロンは倒れる直前、重要な入植地を除く西岸の 3分の2から撤退して、残りをパレスチナ国家として成立させる策を進めていたことが関係者の証言で 最近明らかになったそうです。和解を焦るネタニヤフが交渉に選んだのは、シャロンが自分の後継者 として育てたツィピィ・リブニです。彼女は諜報機関の出身で、今は中道リベラル政党「ハトアヌ」 の党首です。彼女は、オルメルト政権の外相だった2006年に、米国ブッシュ政権がけしかけ、イスラ エルにやらせたレバノンのヒズボラとの戦争で、イスラエルが国家破壊に追い込まれた際に、戦争を 停戦に持ち込んで国を救った人物とのことです。彼女は外交・諜報力や交渉能力が高い政治家だそう で、選挙に弱く一度も政権をとれていないとのこと。そこで今回、ネタニヤフはリブニを連立政権に 招き入れ、パレスチナ和平担当をさせようとしていると報じています。 ★As long as Netanyahu is Israel's PM, Livni will have to deal with the Palestinians his way http://www.haaretz.com/news/israeli-elections-2013/israeli-elections-news-features/in-first-coalition-deal-livni-set-to-be-named-justice-minister-1.504556