ACTION ALERT: Texas Anti-NDAA Bill Heads to House Floor
P.A.N.D.A. People Against The NDAA
March 26, 2013
You don’t mess with Texas. At least, that’s precisely what State Rep. Lyle Larson is saying with HB 149.
HB 149 is designed to counter the indefinite detention provisions, sections 1021 and 1022, of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act. These sections authorize the indefinite military detention, without charge or trial, of anyone who commits a “belligerent act,” or is suspected of terrorism, and violate over 13 provisions of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. the law has also been condemned by retired members of the Armed Forces, a current U.S. Congressman, Federal Judge Katherine B. Forrest, conservative pundit Rush Limbaugh, and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Rep. Larson’s bill, once amended, will protect the people of Texas from indefinite military detention and extrajudicial assassination without charge or trial. However, we have to get it through Committee first.
It’s time to bring the pressure. One call, and taking 30 seconds to tell your legislator what you think, can make all the difference.
Contact members of the Texas House Federalism and Fiscal Responsibility NOW and tell them, politely but firmly, you will accept nothing less than a YES on HB 149. (Out-of-staters are encouraged to call as well.)
Rep. Brandon Creighton:
(512) 463-0726
Rep. Cindy Burkett:
(512) 463-0464
Rep. Eddie Lucio III
(512) 463-0606
Rep. Scott Turner
(512) 463-0484
Rep. Armando Walle
(512) 463-0924
If you are in Texas, join PANDA, the Tenth Amendment Center, the Libertarian Party and other groups at the Committee Hearing!
12:00 PM CDT
Hearing Room E2036
Capitol Building
Austin, TX 78701
Let’s show the Federal government “you don’t mess with Texas.”
P.S. What kind of responses are you getting? We want to know. Post the reply you get in the comments section of this post so other people know what to expect.
Boris Berezovsky is dead! Syrian ‘rebels’ falling apart. Gilad Atzmon in Japan [video]
Ryan Dawson
March 25, 2013
PANDA Endorses H.R. 198
P.A.N.D.A. People Against The NDAA
March 23, 2013
On September 14, 2001, in the wake of one of America’s greatest national tragedies, Congress gave the President unilateral power to use “all necessary and appropriate force” against those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks of 9-11.
On October 14th, 2011, a 16-year old American citizen from Colorado, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, was blown to pieces by a hellfire missile. He had no connection to the terrorist attacks of 9-11.
The assassination of a 16-year old is just one of numerous examples of the overbroad interpretation of the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force. In response, a bipartisan group of U.S. Representatives led by Barbara Lee (D-CA) have introduced H.R. 198 to repeal the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force.
H.R. 198 reads as follows:
“Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the “Repeal of the Authorization for Use
of Military Force”.
SEC. 2. CONGRESSIONAL FINDING.
Congress finds that the Authorization for Use of Military Force
(Public Law 107-40; 50 U.S.C. 1541 note), signed into law on September
18, 2001, has been used to justify a broad and open-ended authorization
for the use of military force and such an interpretation is
inconsistent with the authority of Congress to declare war and make all
laws for executing powers vested by the Constitution in the Government
of the United States.
SEC. 3. REPEAL OF PUBLIC LAW 107-40.
Effective 180 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the
Authorization for Use of Military Force (Public Law 107-40; 50 U.S.C.
1541 note) is hereby repealed.”
Legislation like this is sorely needed to reign in the “war on terror” powers our Congress gave the President. The Authorization for Use of Military Force has given rise to the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), extrajudicial execution of U.S. citizens, and the expansion of Presidential war powers to a level never authorized in the Constitution.
PANDA wholeheartedly endorses H.R. 198 as introduced. We must restore Constitutional governance in the United States, and this bill will be a giant step in the right direction.
CONFIRMED: US Shipping Weapons to Syria – Al Nusra’s “Mystery” Sponsors Revealed
by Tony Cartalucci
Land Destroyer
March 25, 2013 (LD) – While US President Barack Obama and the Western media lied in concert to the world regarding America’s role in supporting terrorists operating in Syria, it is now revealed that the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has been shipping weapons to Syria via NATO-member Turkey and Jordan since at least early 2012. The New York Times in their article titled, “Arms Airlift to Syria Rebels Expands, With C.I.A. Aid,” admits that:
With help from the C.I.A., Arab governments and Turkey have sharply increased their military aid to Syria’s opposition fighters in recent months, expanding a secret airlift of arms and equipment for the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, according to air traffic data, interviews with officials in several countries and the accounts of rebel commanders.
The airlift, which began on a small scale in early 2012 and continued intermittently through last fall, expanded into a steady and much heavier flow late last year, the data shows. It has grown to include more than 160 military cargo flights by Jordanian, Saudi and Qatari military-style cargo planes landing at Esenboga Airport near Ankara, and, to a lesser degree, at other Turkish and Jordanian airports.
The New York Times piece attempts to spin America’s role in arming militants in Syria. The Times continues by stating:
The American government became involved, the former American official said, in part because there was a sense that other states would arm the rebels anyhow. The C.I.A. role in facilitating the shipments, he said, gave the United States a degree of influence over the process, including trying to steer weapons away from Islamist groups and persuading donors to withhold portable antiaircraft missiles that might be used in future terrorist attacks on civilian aircraft.
This is categorically false. Already, in 2007, US officials had divulged plans to destroy Syria by arming sectarian extremists, using Saudi Arabia and other regional actors as proxies to launder US and Israel support through – maintaining a degree of credibility amongst the terrorist receiving the aid, as well as a degree of plausible deniabiliy for Washington and Tel Aviv politically. In Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh’s 2007 New Yorker article, “The Redirection: Is the Administration’s new policy benefiting our enemies in the war on terrorism?” the strategy was described as follows:
To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda.
Perhaps more importantly, the report would also state:
Some of the core tactics of the redirection are not public, however. The clandestine operations have been kept secret, in some cases, by leaving the execution or the funding to the Saudis, or by finding other ways to work around the normal congressional appropriations process, current and former officials close to the Administration said.
[hat tip: End the Lie]
Citizens Fight Back: PANDA Nevada Floods County Commission [video]
P.A.N.D.A. People Against The NDAA
March 23, 2013
One after another, citizens demanded the Commission defend their god-given, unalienable rights. From the Conservative Lunch group leaders to members of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), from former security guards to doctors, women and men, young and old, the people of Washoe County came together to fight for our Constitution.
If you’ve seen what this country has become…if you’ve seen what kind of path America is heading down…this video will give you hope. When you listen to the speakers, one after another, come up to defend our rights, you will be inspired.
Let’s make this video go viral, America needs to see more victories like this.
Join the movement: http://www.pandaunite.org
The PANDA (People Against the NDAA Mission Statement:
Our Mission is to nonviolently nullify, strike down, repeal, stop, void and fight the indefinite detention provisions, Sections 1021 and 1022, of the National Defense Authorization Act for the Fiscal Year of 2012, to fight for American civil liberties, to combat laws restricting liberty in the interest of National Security, to support current government officials that are doing so and to engage a younger generation in the politics of the United States so this cannot happen again.
Thousands gather in Damascus for funeral of assassinated Syrian cleric
End the Lie – Independent News
March 23, 2013
The coffins of Sunni Muslim cleric Mohamed Saeed al-Bouti and his grandson Ahmed al-Bouti, who both died in a suicide bomb attack, are carried during their funeral ceremony on March 23, 2013 at the Omayyad mosque in Damascus, Syria. (AFP Photo)
Thousands of Syrians have gathered for the funeral of a pro-Assad cleric who was killed in a blast at a mosque earlier this week. Saturday has been declared a day of mourning in the Arab country.
Mohammed Saeed Ramadan Al-Bouti, his grandson, and 49 others were killed when a suicide bomber detonated a bomb inside a mosque where he was delivering a sermon on Thursday.
The cleric was Imam of the Omayyad Mosque, a Damascus landmark. He is the most senior religious figure to be killed in the Syrian conflict to date.
During the funeral, mourners carried 84-year-old Mohammad Said Ramadan al-Bouti’s coffin on their shoulders while shouting “God is Great.”
The cleric was buried on grounds beside the tomb of the Saladin, regarded as a heroic warrior in Islam. The move angered opposition activists, who turned to social media to express their fury. “Burying Buti next to Saladin is a deliberate insult,” activist Waleed al-Akrat wrote on Twitter.
Syrian President Bashar Assad was being represented at the funeral by one of his cabinet ministers, according to state TV. On Friday, the Syrian leader vowed to “cleanse” his country of “extremists,” whom he accused of being behind the attack.
“I swear to the Syrian people that your blood, and that of your grandson and all the martyrs of the homeland, will not be spilled in vain because we will be faithful to your ideas by destroying their extremism and ignorance until we have cleansed the country,” Assad said in an official statement.
The slain cleric had been a vocal supporter of the Syrian regime since the days of Assad’s father and predecessor. In a speech earlier this month, al-Bouti said it was “a religious duty to protect the values, the land and the nation” of Syria. He previously referred to Assad’s opponents as “scum.”
According to journalist Abdullah Mawazini, it was those statements that prompted the opposition to carry out the attack.
“We believe the opposition is responsible for this. We have Islamist extremist groups – jihadis – who are fighting against the government. Mr. al-Bouti, before he was killed, in his last speech on Friday, said we should fight with the Syrian army and not the opposition groups so this raised a lot of controversy…and discussion in Syrian society and led to this killing,” he told RT.
But the opposition has also condemned the attack, pointing the finger at the Assad regime. The current head of the National Syrian Coalition, Moaz Alkhatib, said on his Facebook page that only the Syrian government could be behind the attack, stressing the importance that places of worship and clerics not be targeted.
“The killing of Doctor al-Bouti is a crime in every sense of the word,” he wrote. “No matter the differences that clerics in Syria may have in their view of the situation, this does not allow for the merciless killing of Muslims or the defilement of mosques.”
People take part in the funeral ceremony of Sunni Muslim cleric Mohamed Saeed al-Bouti, who died in a suicide bomb attack, on March 23, 2013 at the Omayyad mosque in the Syrian capital Damascus. (AFP Photo)
A ‘biased and imbalanced’ UN
Also on Saturday, Assad’s regime said it rejected a UN Human Rights Council decision to continue an investigation of “alleged violations of international human rights law.” An unnamed official told SANA news agency that the group’s work is “biased and imbalanced.”
The comment comes a day after the UN Human Rights Council passed the resolution, which the official said doesn’t take into account “the unethical role played by states that sponsor terrorism in Syria, which fund, train, arm and send terrorists and mercenaries” into the country.
He added that the resolution reflects “a policy of double standards practiced by some countries that claim to defend human rights.”
The resolution was adopted with 41 votes in favor, one against, and five countries abstaining. It strongly condemned violence on both sides, but noted that those “committed by anti-government armed groups did not reach the intensity and scale of the violations committed by the government forces and its affiliated militia.”
Meanwhile, European Union Foreign Policy chief Catherine Ashton says there is a real sense of urgency to ensure political progress in Syria.
The comment came during a meeting of EU foreign ministers at Dublin Castle. The two-day talks failed to find a common position on the future of the EU’s Syrian arms embargo.
France and Britain believe that lifting the embargo would raise pressure on Assad to negotiate an end to the civil war, which has led to the deaths of an estimated 70,000 people.
Other EU countries disagree, saying that lifting the embargo would lead to weapons falling into the hands of Islamist militants, as well as fuel regional conflict and encourage Assad’s backers to step up arms supplies to the leader.
The EU has until June 1 to decide whether to renew or amend its sanctions on Syria. Changing the arms ban needs the backing of all 27 EU states.
The coffin of Sunni Muslim cleric Mohamed Saeed al-Bouti, who died in a suicide bomb attack, is carried outside the Omayyad mosque after his funeral ceremony on March 23, 2013 in the Syrian capital Damascus. (AFP Photo)
People pray in the Omayyad mosque courtyard during the funeral ceremony of Sunni Muslim cleric Mohamed Saeed al-Bouti, who died in a suicide bomb attack, on March 23, 2013 in the Syrian capital Damascus. (AFP Photo / Louai Beshara)
People pray in the Omayyad mosque courtyard during the funeral ceremony of Sunni Muslim cleric Mohamed Saeed al-Bouti, who died in a suicide bomb attack, on March 23, 2013 in the Syrian capital Damascus. (AFP Photo / Louai Beshara)
The Truthseeker: 3 War Tricks [video]
End the Lie – Independent News
March 22, 2013
Happy anniversary Iraq! Exactly 10 years after Operation Iraqi Freedom and two years of Arm Syria’s Nuts, a leak gives away who’s next; how Israel runs American minds; insiders mock people falling for false flags; and Hollywood goes too far. Seek truth from facts with endthelie.com editor Madison Ruppert, Questioning the War on Terror author Dr. Kevin Barrett, former marine Prof. James Fetzer, War is a Lie author David Swanson, translator Arash Norouzi, and Senator John McCain.
MORE EPISODES http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=…
RT LIVE http://rt.com/on-air
Subscribe to RT! http://www.youtube.com/subscription_c…
Like us on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/RTnews
Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/RT_com
Follow us on Google+ http://plus.google.com/+RT
RT (Russia Today) is a global news network broadcasting from Moscow and Washington studios. RT is the first news channel to break the 500 million YouTube views benchmark.
PN 