WMD

I was misinformed.....

Here's a collection of popular myths about Bogie and his films:

Bogie's birthdate

According to The Complete Films of Humphrey Bogart, Bogie was actually born on January 23, 1899. Warner publicity later "changed" his birthdate to December 25, "possibly to foster the view that a man born on Christmas Day couldn't really be as villainous as he appeared to be on screen."

As Laurie McLaughlin points out, however, Lauren Bacall wrote in her autobiography that she and Bogie celebrated his birthday on Christmas and that he felt he was cheated out of a birthday by being born on that day. The book Bogart & Bacall describes Maude Bogart giving birth on Christmas Day, 1899. And Robert Young writes, "I actually have a copy of Bogie and Bacall's marriage license application. It has Bogie's date of birth and also has Natalie Bacall's consent signature. I got it right out of the Richland County, Ohio, Probate Court records office when Kristin and I were there last year. December 25, 1899 is what the document states as Mr. Bogarts date of birth. New York City, New York." Finally, according to Bogart, by Sperber & Lax, "The Ontario County Times, which kept tabs on the region's notables, announced in its January 10, 1900, issue: 'Born: at New York, Dec. 25, 1899, to Dr. and Mrs. Belmont DeForest Bogart, a son.'"

How Bogie got his lisp

According to press releases, Bogie got his distinctive lisp because a splinter from a ship's rail destroyed in a submarine attack hit him in the face while serving as a boatswain's mate onboard the U.S.S. Leviathan, a troop transport during WWI. According to Bogart and Bacall, though, Bogie's father hit him in the mouth when he was about 10 years old. And Brian Thornton recalls reading in another biography that Bogie himself always maintained that he was working a brig detail, and was hit in the face with handcuffs by an inmate trying to make an escape.

As J.D. Clark points out, in David Niven's book, Bring on the Empty Horses, Niven wrote: "His famous lisp was caused by a badly performed operation on his lower lip in which a splinter of wood had become embedded. 'Goddamn doctor--instead of stitching it up, he screwed it up.' I asked him how the piece of wood had got into his lip in the first place. 'Accident as a kid,' he shrugged. The Warner Brothers publicity department improved upon this and announced that it was a 'shrapnel wound suffered during combat in World War I.'"

On the other hand, as Marey Mac noted, according to Louise Brooks in her book Lulu in Hollywood, when she knew Bogart in the late 1920s/early 1930s there was nothing wrong with the way he talked. In fact, he practised different ways of speaking to make himself seem "more original."

Ronald Reagan was originally cast as Rick in Casablanca

According to Round Up the Usual Suspects, Reagan was never seriously considered for the role. A press release announcing that Reagan and Ann Sheridan would star as Rick and Ilsa was simply a publicity stunt, "little different from the false publicity about a star taking a lovely bath by candlelight during the first blackout of the war." In fact, "no one except Bogart was seriously considered by [producer Hal] Wallis for the part."

Bogie was the Gerber baby

It was rumored that Bogie is the baby whose picture is featured on Gerber baby food products. But it's not true. Bogie was used as a model by his mother, an advertising artist, and he appeared on products by a company named Mellin, but Gerber didn't even exist until he was around 28 years old.

Bogie and Ed Sullivan were brothers

Apparently a lot of people have heard it. It's simply not true. According to all the biographies, Bogie had two sisters and no brothers. End of story.

Andy Williams dubbed Lauren Bacall's singing

According to legend, Andy Williams sang for Bacall in To Have and Have Not. Not true. According to Bogart, by Sperber & Lax, "Some later accounts alleged that the actual singing was done by a very young Andy Williams, dubbed in for Bacall. But studio memos and production reports make it clear that the voice in the film is her own."

And, of course, there are the famous non-quotes:

• Play it again, Sam!
• If you need me, just whistle.
• Tennis, anyone? - Allegedly Bogart's first line on stage in a Broadway play, but there's no evidence he EVER said it, let alone as his first line, and what his first line really was is unknown.

Does the Koran really promise Islamic martyrs 72 virgins?

First, nonfundamentalist Muslims don't take the cosmological parts of the Koran any more literally than nonfundamentalist Christians take the biblical story of Genesis. They understand the bits about virgins and so on as metaphors for the ineffable joys of the afterlife. Second, while dreams of celestial babes may motivate the impoverished Palestinian kids who blow themselves up on Israeli street corners, a number of the 9-11 terrorists were older and had known something of earthly delights. That these middle-class types nonetheless were suicidal fanatics is yet another indication that we've entered a scary new phase.

The difficulty in determining what the Koran has to say about virgins and such is establishing what the Koran says, period. Translators vary widely in their rendering of the spare and often opaque text.

For example, we find the following passage in a Web-based version of Islam's holy book:

"Verily, for the Muttaqun [righteous], there will be a success (paradise); gardens and grapeyards; and young full-breasted (mature) maidens of equal age; and a full cup (of wine)" (An-Naba 78:31-34).

Whoa, one thinks--the Kingdom of Heaven meets the Playboy Advisor! However, most other English translations, both on-line and in print, replace "full-breasted maidens" with some tame construction such as "companions." Inquiring further, we find that the Arabic word at issue is WakawaAAiba, which appears nowhere else in the Koran. The French, less prudish in these matters, usually render it as something like des belles aux seins arrondis, "beautiful women with round breasts," so I think it's pretty clear what the Prophet, or at least his stenographers, had in mind.

Nothing in the Koran specifically states that the faithful are allotted 72 virgins apiece. For this elaboration we turn to the hadith, traditional sayings traced with varying degrees of credibility to Muhammad. Hadith number 2,562 in the collection known as the Sunan al-Tirmidhi says, "The least [reward] for the people of Heaven is 80,000 servants and 72 wives, over which stands a dome of pearls, aquamarine and ruby."

A little hype from the marketing department, you may say.

Fine. Let's return to the Koran, Islam's font of religious authority. Even if we leave out the racy detail and make allowances for metaphor, we're obliged to admit that Islamic heaven is a pretty rockin' place, with an emphasis on sensual pleasures. The provision of virgins in indeterminate quantities is alluded to at numerous points, and you know they're not just there to fluff the pillows. (In fairness to the Prophet, the physical quality usually attributed to the houris, as they're called, is "wide lovely eyes.")

The food, service, ambience., etc, are great. You're allowed to enjoy things the Koran explicitly denies you on earth, such as alcohol, and you won't even get sick. ("Wine . . . delicious to those who drink it . . . will neither dull their senses nor they will become drunk.") Granted, the whole thing is skewed toward the male idea of a good time, a defect by no means confined to Islam. Were Muhammad to found a religion today, I'm confident that each female arrival in heaven would be assigned a comely stud who would provide fabulous sex and in addition hang the curtain rods the first time he was asked. Granted, also, the emphasis on virgins is a little weird. (Think back on the first nights you've been party to. Was this your idea of great sex?) Still, you have to admit, heaven as Party Central sure beats the Christian idea of angels with harps.

Does this make Islamic cosmology "unsophisticated and juvenile"? Maybe. (Oh, let's not be lame about this. Of course it does.) But don't be too quick to judge. Christianity, after all, invented the idea of paradise in the first place. Looking at things from the point of view of a cynical materialist, which is the more outrageous proposition--luring the proles with the promise of eternal life, or throwing 72 virgins into the bargain?

Theories of the Ufo phenomenon

the ancient astronaut theory
This theory suggests that at the beginning of human history an alien race visited Earth for some reason, and interacted with the species on the planet. There are several sub theories involved here such as aliens genetically engineered mankind, etc .

the inter dimensional theory
This theory suggests UFO's are piloted by a race capable of travelling through dimensional gaps to visit our world, in fact they may even have come from Earth themselves in a different dimension.

the time travel theory
This theory suggests that in the future man has developed the means of time travel, which is actually possible according to Einstein. They have come back to study us as archaeologists sift through the soil today, looking for our past. Or they could be coming back to try and prevent an event that will happen in our future (their past) that drastically effected them and will us too.

the extra-terrestrial hypothesis
This is the famous theory which everybody thinks of when the topic of UFO's comes up.

the human theory
Technology is at present advancing at a dramatic rate, the computer you are reading this off now will, no doubt be obsolete in 2 years time at the most, probably 1!

This theory suggests that mankind has already developed the means for anti gravity flight and free energy and the like, but the governments are keeping it top secret to prevent economic collapse. There is quite a bit of evidence that during WWII Hitler has actually developed Saucer shaped craft that could seriously out-manoeuvre Allied craft at the time!!! It is said that if Hitler had delayed the end of the war anymore then the Nazi's would have had a totally different means of air combat which would have probably reversed the outcome of the war totally!

the earth theory
What if there was another species on Earth that equalled man's intelligence, or even excelled it (not hard, some may say!).

What if this race lived underground, or deep in the oceans away from mans influence. Why not??? Man doesn't know everything, well not yet, or for a long time yet!!! There are many a cases of UFO's rising or diving into/ out of the deep oceans, and there are plenty of places to hide!

War on Terrorism

If the world treated WW2 the same way we treat the "War on Terrorism" and the "Conflict in the Middle East" this is what it would have been like...

March 15/16, 1939: Nazis take Czechoslovakia. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge Czechoslovakia to be restrained in their response.)

May 22, 1939: Nazis sign 'Pact of Steel' with Italy. (Other nations declare that Italy and Germany signing pact to help each other take over the world "not helpful to the peace process.")

Aug 23, 1939: Nazis and Soviets sign Pact. (The world heralds signing of treaty as a sign of Hitler's good intentions. He wouldn't be signing a peace treaty if he wanted war would he?)

Sept 1, 1939: Nazis invade Poland. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

Sept 3, 1939: Britain, France, Australia and New Zealand declare war on Germany. (World condemns these nations for declaring war. This may cause unrest in Europe!)

Oct, 1939: Nazis begin euthanasia on sick and disabled in Germany. (World mildly condemns this but declares that we must understand the actions of Germany in the context of the horribly unfair treaty of Versailles.)

April 9, 1940: Nazis invade Denmark and Norway. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

May 10, 1940: Nazis invade France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

June 14, 1940: Germans enter Paris. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

July 10, 1940: Battle of Britain begins. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge Britain to be restrained lest they further the "cycle of violence.")

Aug 23/24: First German air raids on Central London. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge Britain to be restrained lest they further the "cycle of violence.")

Aug 25/26: First British air raid on Berlin. (World outraged at British attacks! Civilians may have been killed by irresponsible British attacks! World votes 453-4 to condemn Britain!)

Sept 13, 1940: Italians invade Egypt (Other nations give mild condemnation of Italian attack but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

Nov 20, 1940: Hungary joins the Axis Powers. (World excited! Hopes Hungary may now have the influence to help move the peace process forward. World publicly says they applaud the peace effort they are sure Hungary will soon begin!)

Nov 23, 1940: Romania joins the Axis Powers. (World excited! Hopes Romania may now have the influence to help move the peace process forward. World publicly says they applaud the peace effort they are sure Romania will soon begin!)

Dec 9/10: British begin a western desert offensive in North Africa against the Italians. (World outraged at British attacks! How will we ever have peace if Britain keeps attacking the other side?)

March 11, 1941: President Roosevelt signs the Lend-Lease Act. (World criticizes Americans for selling weaponry to combatants! Announces they should only give food, blankets, and tents if they're going to get involved at all.)

May 10/11, 1941: Heavy German bombing of London; British bomb Hamburg. (World is outraged by British attack on Hamburg! Civilians may of been injured! World condemns Britain in strongest terms and demands they stop bombing anywhere civilians might be!)

June 14, 1941: United States freezes German and Italian assets in America. (Americans accused of "hating all Germans and Italians". 32 lawsuits filed.)

June 22, 1941: Germany attacks Soviet Union as Operation Barbarossa begins. (World upset that treaty broken. They urge president Roosevelt to personally sit down with Stalin and Hitler to negotiate new treaty.)

Sept 29, 1941: Nazis murder 33,771 Jews at Kiev (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi murders but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

Dec 7, 1941: Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor (Other nations give mild condemnation of Japanese attack but urge United States to be restrained in their response.)

Dec 8, 1941: United States and Britain declare war on Japan. (Other nations outraged! Accuse United States of furthering "cycle of violence". World says that Roosevelt calling Dec 7, 1941 "a date which will live in infamy" is "simplistic" and "not helpful.")

Jan 20, 1942: SS Leader Heydrich holds the Wannsee Conference to coordinate the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question." (World declares plan to kill all Jews is "not helpful". Urges Hitler to declare that exterminating all Jews is wrong in German.)

Aug 17, 1942: First all-American air attack in Europe. (World outraged at American aggression! Suggests putting Roosevelt up for war crimes trial!)

Oct 18, 1942: Hitler orders the execution of all captured British commandos. (World takes occasion to remind "Allies" that German prisoners should get extra Bratwurst and beer for "Oktoberfest".)

Jan 14-24, 1943: Casablanca conference between Churchill and Roosevelt. During the conference, Roosevelt announces the war can end only with an unconditional German surrender (World outraged! Says that Churchill and Roosevelt must be willing to negotiate with Hitler now while they're being attacked!)

May 13, 1943: German and Italian troops surrender in North Africa. (World demands that relief groups monitor the conditions for German and Italian troops to make sure they're not being "tortured.")

July 25/26, 1943: Mussolini arrested and the Italian Fascist government falls; Marshal Pietro Badoglio takes over and negotiates with Allies (World fears change in Italian leadership will cause "more instability in Europe.")

July 27/28, 1943: Allied air raid causes a firestorm in Hamburg. (World condemns "Allies" raid on Hamburg. Votes 454-2 to order all allied forces to withdraw to their own countries and begin negotiating for peace.)

Jan 6, 1944: Soviet troops advance into Poland. (World condemns Soviet aggression! Demands Soviets stop their "brutal oppression.")

March 18, 1944: British drop 3000 tons of bombs during an air raid on Hamburg, Germany. (World outraged! Citizens of Hamburg "under siege"! World suggests putting troops inbetween combatants in effort to insure a cease fire.)

June 6, 1944: D-Day landings. (World goes nuts! This outrageous aggression by the Allies must not stand!)

June 13, 1944: First German V-1 rocket attack on Britain. (Other nations give mild condemnation of Nazi attack but urge rest of the world to be restrained in their response.)

Sept 1-4, 1944: Verdun, Dieppe, Artois, Rouen, Abbeville, Antwerp and Brussels liberated by Allies. (World urges Allies to negotiate with Axis for peace! World has moment of silence for the German people who may of been harmed in attacks!)

Dec 17, 1944: Waffen SS murder 81 U.S. POWs at Malmedy. (World chides Allies that they had better not treat their prisoners like that!)

Dec 26, 1944: Patton relieves Bastogne. (World outraged! Patton is a "hawk". The fact that the Americans put a man like that in charge of their military shows "they're not serious about peace.")

Feb 13/14, 1945: Dresden is destroyed by a firestorm after Allied bombing raids. (World calls for all allied leaders to be put up for war crimes trial. World expresses "shock and dismay" at Allies "complete disregard" for civilians!)

March 6, 1945: Last German offensive of the war begins to defend oil fields in Hungary. (World comments "Who could blame them after all those allied attacks? Wouldn't you do the same thing in their place?"

April 1, 1945: U.S. troops encircle Germans in the Ruhr. (World demands US allow German troops a way out rather than attack.)

April 16, 1945: Soviet troops begin their final attack on Berlin; Americans enter Nuremberg. (World demands that Hitler not be overthrown! He is the elected leader of the German people!)

April 30, 1945: Adolf Hitler commits suicide. (World now very upset! Fears someone "worse than Hitler" may now take his place!)

May 7, 1945: Unconditional surrender of all German forces to Allies. (World upset and concerned about fate of German people. Sends relief groups in to make sure Germans not mistreated!)

June 5, 1945: Allies divide up Germany and Berlin and take over the government. (World outraged! Demands that the "occupation of Germany" end immediately)

Aug 6, 1945: First atomic bomb dropped, on Hiroshima, Japan. (World demands Truman be tried for war crimes. Protestors and peaceniks from across the world flock to Japan to act as human shields)

Aug 9, 1945: Second atomic bomb dropped, on Nagasaki, Japan. (World tells US that dropping atomic bombs will only "create more martyrs" and will encourage more Japanese than ever to turn against the Allies!)

Aug 14, 1945: Japanese agree to unconditional surrender. (World sincerely hopes the citizens on the Axis nations can forgive the Allies for their uncalled for aggression, imperialism, and oppression in this war.)

Fast Food

Big Apes and Bad Biology

By Seth Shostak

OK, imagine winding back the clock three-score and ten. Picture a return to that singular time in human history when knowledge of the continents and oceans was sophisticated and extensive, but not yet complete. By going back only a generation, before aircraft and spacecraft pixelated the Earth, you arrive at an era when nature still held a few surprise cards; when major discoveries could still be made.

Now imagine that you and a few dozen low-lifes are passengers on a tottery rustbucket, slicing through dark waters towards a patch of land forgotten by time and cartographers – rinsed by the South Pacific and hunkered down in fog as thick as Mississippi biscuit gravy. Here, on malevolently monikered Skull Island, you discover the climax species of the Jurassic—dinosaurs—alive and well. These hulking, snaggletoothed sauropods are sharing real estate and food supplies with a clutch of modern primates. The latter consist of a few hundred perpetually scared, menacing and malformed natives, and one XXL-size simian, King Kong.

Skull Island’s a happening place. Sauropods stampede to a booming death, insect carnivores the size of phone booths writhe out of the swamps, and Kong – stricken by the sight of blonde hair – develops an inappropriate interest in the one woman who’s aboard ship. Eventually, the entrepreneurs who have initiated this less-than-idyllic odyssey capture Kong and take him back to Manhattan as an E-coupon sideshow attraction.

Let me give that a bit of emphasis: these guys find an island filled with living, prehistoric dinosaurs. And they bring back the mammal.

Now some will see this classic cinema tale as a touching love story between two primates who share their affections but only 98% of their genes. A recent opinion piece in the New York Times suggested that this film was motivated by Soviet experiments in the 1920s designed to produce a human-chimpanzee hybrid (in an attempt to discredit religion, while simultaneously offending chimp family values). Then there’s the now-forgotten prewar habit of bringing back wild beasts and natives from distant lands to exhibit as living exotica. As recently as 1931, you could observe caged humans (Africans and Inuit were favorites) on display in Europe.

But whatever its ontology, "King Kong" falls under a specific narrative genre – science fiction meets morality play. Writer John Baxter has summed up one moral of such stories with the phrase "there are some things man was not meant to know." Too much curiosity can be injurious to your health. Well, fortunately, when it comes to cataloging life on our planet, we feel free—even exhilarated—by the thought that we were meant to know all things.

Indeed, looking for unknown life is a well-burnished activity. Charles Darwin chronicled the flora and fauna at each port of call as the Beagle bobbed its way around the globe. Captain Cook’s famous botanist, Joseph Banks, did the same, and Lewis and Clark assiduously described new species every day as they paddled and stomped their way across the American continent.

Perhaps to your surprise, this sort of exploration not only continues, but does so with vigor. In 2004, Japanese researchers succeeded in photographing a giant squid swimming a half-mile beneath the Pacific (a specimen of an even bigger sucker, a colossal squid, was hauled out of the waters off the coast of Antarctica in 2003). Last year, primatologists reported discovering two new species of lemur on Madagascar. Even more recently, scientists found a kinder, gentler analog of Kong’s home habitat in the Foja Mountains of New Guinea. In this isolated, tropical forest, they’ve already uncovered dozens of new plant and animal species.

Now it’s important to note that Skull Island’s commendably diverse population isn’t very realistic. In such isolated habitats, competition among species is limited. The consequence is that, with time, predator species tend to get smaller while prey species grow larger. The optimum size (at least for mammals) seems to be roughly that of a rabbit. Kong is bigger than many rabbits. Scaling up a gorilla to 50 feet high at the shoulder produces a seriously underpowered simian, barely capable of standing (let alone clambering his way up skyscrapers). That’s because when you crank up an animal’s size, weight increases far faster than strength. King Kong would be one meek megamammal. Then there’s the notable absence of any Queen Kong, which doesn’t speak well for the future of King’s lineage. His ancestors, like those of the Loch Ness monster, have ignored the necessity of a minimum breeding stock.

Frankly, Skull Island, for many reasons, is a considerably less credible fantasy now than it was a generation ago. It violates both geography and biology. You can bet that the still-to-be-discovered creatures of Earth won’t be either relic sauropods or supersized simians (which is too bad: our population of great apes is very likely careening to extinction). But whatever they are, these unknown species undoubtedly exist in great numbers. A recent article by the BBC notes that it will be thousands of years before we’ve compiled a complete catalog of life on Earth. Thousands of years.

And of course, that is merely life on this planet.

Life on Mars

Fake Terrorism - The Road to Dictatorship

By Michael Rivero
from the Free Republic

It's the oldest trick in the book, dating back to Roman times; creating the enemies you need.

In 70 BC, an ambitious minor politician and extremely wealthy man, Marcus Licineus Crassus, wanted to rule Rome. Just to give you an idea of what sort of man Crassus really was, he is credited with invention of the fire brigade. But in Crassus' version, his fire-fighting slaves would race to the scene of a burning building whereupon Crassus would offer to buy it on the spot for a tiny fraction of it's worth. If the owner sold, Crassus' slaves would put out the fire. If the owner refused to sell, Crassus allowed the building to burn to the ground. By means of this device, Crassus eventually came to be the largest single private landholder in Rome, and used some of his wealth to help back Julius Caesar against Cicero.

In 70 BC Rome was still a Republic, which placed very strict limits on what Rulers could do, and more importantly NOT do. But Crassus had no intentions of enduring such limits to his personal power, and contrived a plan.

Crassus seized upon the slave revolt led by Sparticus in order to strike terror into the hearts of Rome, whose garrison Sparticus had already defeated in battle. But Sparticus had no intention of marching on Rome itself, a move he knew to be suicidal. Sparticus and his band wanted nothing to do with the Roman empire and had planned from the start merely to loot enough money from their former owners in the Italian countryside to hire a mercenary fleet in which to sail to freedom.

Sailing away was the last thing Crassus wanted Sparticus to do. He needed a convenient enemy with which to terrorize Rome itself for his personal political gain. So Crassus bribed the mercenary fleet to sail without Sparticus, then positioned two Roman legions in such a way that Sparticus had no choice but to march on Rome.

Terrified of the impending arrival of the much-feared army of gladiators, Rome declared Crassus Praetor. Crassus then crushed Sparticus' army and even though Pompeii took the credit, Crassus was elected Consul of Rome the following year.

With this manoeuvre, the Romans surrendered their Republican form of government. Soon would follow the first Triumvirate, consisting of Crassus, Pompeii, and Julius Caesar, followed by the reign of the god-like Emperors of Rome.

The Romans were hoaxed into surrendering their Republic, and accepting the rule of Emperors.

Julius Caesar's political opponent, Cicero, for all his literary accomplishments, played the same games in his campaign against Julius Caesar, claiming that Rome was falling victim to an internal "vast right wing" conspiracy in which any expressed desire for legislative limits no government was treated as suspicious behaviour. Cicero, in order to demonstrate to the Romans just how unsafe Rome has become hired thugs to cause as much disturbance as possible, and campaigned on a promise to end the internal strife if elected and granted extraordinary powers.

What Cicero only dreamed of, Adolf Hitler succeeded in doing. Elected Chancellor of Germany, Hitler, like Crassus, had no intention of living with the strict limits to his power imposed by German law. Unlike Cicero, Hitler's thugs were easy to recognize; they all wore the same brown shirts. But their actions were no different than those of their Roman predecessors. They staged beatings, set fires, caused as much trouble as they could, while Hitler made speeches promising that he could end the crime wave of subversives and terrorism if he was granted extraordinary powers.

The Germans were hoaxed into surrendering their Republic, and accepting the rule of Der Führer.

The state-sponsored schools will never tell you this, but governments routinely rely on hoaxes to sell their agendas to an otherwise reluctant public. The Romans accepted the Emperors and the Germans accepted Hitler not because they wanted to, but because the carefully crafted illusions of threat appeared to leave no other choice.

Our government too uses hoaxes to create the illusion that We The People have no choice but the direction the government wishes us to go in.

In 1898, Joseph Pulitzer's New York World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal were arguing for American intervention in Cuba. Hearst is reported to have dispatched a photographer to Cuba to photograph the coming war with Spain. When the photographer asked just what war that might be, Hearst is reported to have replied, "You take the photographs, and I will provide the war". Hearst was true to his word, as his newspaper published stories of great atrocities being committed against the Cuban people, most of which turned out to be complete fabrications.

On the night of February 15, 1898, the USS Maine, lying in Havana harbour in a show of US resolve to protect her interests, exploded violently. Captain Sigsbee, the commander of the Maine, urged that no assumptions of enemy attack be made until there was a full investigation of the cause of the explosion. For this, Captain Sigsbee was excoriated in the press for "refusing to see the obvious". The Atlantic Monthly declared flat out that to suppose the explosion to be anything other than a deliberate act by Spain was "completely at defiance of the laws of probability".

Under the slogan "Remember the Maine", Americans went to war with Spain, wresting from that nation ownership of what is now much of the American southwest.

In 1975, an investigation led by Admiral Hyman Rickover examined the data recovered from a 1911 examination of the wreck and concluded that there had been no evidence of an external explosion. The most likely cause of the sinking was a coal dust explosion in a coal bunker imprudently located next to the ship's magazines. Captain Sigsbee's caution had been well founded.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt needed a war. He needed the fever of a major war to mask the symptoms of a still deathly ill economy struggling back from the Great Depression. Roosevelt wanted a war with Germany to stop Hitler, but despite several provocations in the Atlantic, the American people, still struggling with that troublesome economy, were opposed to any wars.

Roosevelt needed an enemy, and if America would not willingly attack that enemy, then one would have to be manoeuvred into attacking America, much as Marcus Licinius Crassus has maneuvered Sparticus into attacking Rome.

The way open to war was created when Japan signed the tripartite agreement with Italy and Germany, with all parties pledging mutual defence to each other. Whereas Hitler would never declare war on the United States no matter the provocation, the means to force Japan to do so were readily at hand.

The first step was to place oil and steel embargoes on Japan, using Japan's wars on the Asian mainland as a reason. This forced Japan to consider seizing the oil and mineral rich regions in Indonesia. With the European powers militarily exhausted by the war in Europe, the United States was the only power in the Pacific able to stop Japan from invading the Dutch East Indies, and by moving the Pacific fleet from San Diego to Pearl Harbour, Hawaii, Roosevelt made a pre-emptive strike on that fleet the mandatory first step in any Japanese plan to extend it's empire into the "southern resource area".

Roosevelt boxed in Japan just as completely as Crassus had boxed in Sparticus. Japan needed oil. They had to invade Indonesia to get it, and to do that they had to remove the threat of the American fleet at Pearl Harbour. There never really was any other course open to them.

To enrage the American people as much as possible, Roosevelt needed the first overt attack by Japan to be as bloody as possible, appearing as a sneak attack much as the Japanese had done to the Russians. From that moment up until the attack on Pearl Harbour itself, Roosevelt and his associates made sure that the commanders in Hawaii, General Short and Admiral Kimmel, were kept in the dark as much as possible about the location of the Japanese fleet and it's intentions, then later scapegoated for the attack. (Congress recently exonerated both Short and Kimmel, posthumously restoring them to their former ranks).

But as the Army board had concluded at the time, and subsequent de-classified documents confirmed, Washington DC knew the attack was coming, knew exactly where the fleet was, and knew where it was headed.

On November 29th, Secretary of State Hull showed United Press reporter Joe Leib a message with the time and place of the attack, and the New York Times in it's special 12/8/41 Pearl Harbour edition, on page 13, reported that the time and place of the attack had been known in advance!

The much repeated claim that the Japanese fleet maintained radio silence on it's way to Hawaii was a lie. Among other intercepts still held in the Archives of the NSA is the UNCODED message sent by the Japanese tanker Shirya stating, "proceeding to a position 30.00 N, 154.20 E. Expect to arrive at that point on 3 December." (near HI)

President Lyndon Johnson wanted a war in Vietnam. He wanted it to help his friends who owned defence companies to do a little business. He needed it to get the Pentagon and CIA to quit trying to invade Cuba. And most of all, he needed a provocation to convince the American people that there was really "no other choice".

On August 5, 1964, newspapers across America reported "renewed attacks" against American destroyers operating in Vietnamese waters, specifically the Gulf of Tonkin. The official story was that North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" on the USS Maddox while it was on "routine patrol".

The truth is that USS Maddox was involved in aggressive intelligence gathering in coordination with actual attacks by South Vietnam and the Laotian Air Force against targets in North Vietnam. The truth is also that there was no attack by torpedo boats against the USS Maddox. Captain John J. Herrick, the task force commander in the Gulf, cabled Washington DC that the report was the result of an "over-eager" sonar man who had picked up the sounds of his own ship's screws and panicked. But even with this knowledge that the report was false, Lyndon Johnson went on national TV that night to announce the commencement of air strikes against North Vietnam, "retaliation" for an attack that had never occurred.

President George Bush wanted a war in Iraq. Like Crassus, George Bush is motivated by money. Specifically oil money. But with the OPEC alliance failing to keep limits on oil production in the Mideast, the market was being glutted with oil pumped from underneath Iraq, which sat over roughly 1/3 of the oil reserves of the entire region.

George wanted a war to stop that flow of oil, to keep prices (and profits) from falling any further than they already had. But like Roosevelt, he needed the "other side" to make the first move.

Iraq had long been trying to acquire greater access to the Persian Gulf, and felt limited confined a narrow strip of land along Kuwait's northern border, which placed Iraqi interests in close proximity with hostile Iran. George Bush, who had been covertly arming Iraq during its war with Iran, sent word via Jean Kirkpatrick that the United States would not intervene if Saddam Hussein grabbed a larger part of Kuwait. Saddam fell for the bait and invaded.
Of course, Americans were not about to send their sons and daughters to risk their lives for petroleum products. So George Bush arranged a hoax, using public relations firm Hill & Knowlton, which has grown rich on taxpayer money by being most industrious and creative liars! Hill & Knowlton concocted a monumental fraud in which the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador to the United States, went on TV pretending to be a nurse, and related a horror story in which Iraqi troops looted the incubators from a Kuwaiti hospital, leaving the premature babies on the cold floor to die. The media, part of the swindle from the start, never bothered asking why the "nurse" didn't just pick the babies up and wrap them in blankets or something.

Enraged by the incubator story, Americans supported operation Desert Storm, which never removed Saddam Hussein from power but which did take Kuwait's oil off of the market for almost 2 years and limited Iraq's oil exports to this very day. That our sons and daughters came home with serious and lingering medical illnesses was apparently not too great a price to pay for increased oil profits.

Following the victory in Iraq, yet another war appeared to be in the offering in the mineral rich regions of Bosnia. Yet again, a hoax was used to create support for military action.A photo of Fikret Alic, a Muslim, staring through a barbed wire fence, was used to "prove" that the Bosnians were running modern day "Concentration Camps". As the headline of "Belsen 92" indicates, all possible associations with the Nazi horrors were made to sell the necessity of sending yet more American troops into someone else's nation.

But when German Journalists went to Trnopolje, the site of the supposed Bosnian Concentration Camp. to film a documentary, they discovered that the photo was a fake! The camp at Trnopolje was not a concentration camp but a refugee centre. Nor was it surrounded by barbed wire. Careful examination of the original photo revealed that the photographer had shot the photo through a broken section of fence surrounding a tool shed. It was the photographer who was on the inside, shooting out at the refugees.

Once again, Americans had been hoaxed into support of actions they might otherwise not have agreed with.

While several American Presidents have willingly started wars for personal purposes, perhaps no President has ever carried it to the extreme that Bill Clinton has.

Coincident with the expected public statement of Monica Lewinsky following her testimony, Bill Clinton ordered a cruise missile attack on Sudan and Afghanistan, claiming to have had irrefutable proof that bogeyman extraordinaire (and former Afghani ally) Osama Bin Laden was creating terrorist chemical weapons there.

Examination of the photos of the debris revealed none of the expected structures one would find in a laboratory that handled lethal weapons-grade materials. Assurances from the CIA that they had a positive soil test for biological weapons fell on their face when it was revealed that there had been no open soil anywhere near the pre-bombed facility. Sudan requested that international observers come test the remains of the factory for any signs of the nerve gas Clinton had insisted was there. None was found. The Sudanese plant was a harmless aspirin factory, and the owner has sued for damages.

Later examination of the site hit in Afghanistan revealed it to be a mosque.Meanwhile, back in Kosovo, stories about genocide and atrocities were flooding the media (in time to distract from the Sudanese embarrassments), just as lurid and sensational and as it turns out often just as fictional as most of William Randolph Hearst's stories of atrocities against the Cubans.

Again, the government and the media were hoaxing Americans. A photo was shown on all the American networks, claiming to be one of Slobodan Milosovic's Migs, shot down while attacking civilians. Closer examination shows it to be stencilled in English!

Like Germany under Chancellor Hitler, there have been events in our nation which strike fear into the hearts of the citizens, such as the New York World Trade Tower bombing, the OK City Federal Building, and the Olympic Park bomb (nicely timed to divert the media from witnesses to the TWA 800 shoot down). The media has been very quick to blame such events on "radicals", "subversives", "vast right wing conspiracies", and other "enemies in our midst", no different than the lies used by Cicero and Hitler.

But on closer examination, such "domestic terrorist" events do not appear to be what they are made out to be. The FBI had an informant inside the World Trade Tower bombers, Emad Salam, who offered to sabotage the bomb. The FBI told him "no". The so-called "hot bed" of white separatism at Elohim City, occasional home to Tim McVeigh in the weeks prior to the OK City bombing, was founded and is being run by an FBI informant!

And nobody has ever really explained what this second Ryder truck was doing in a secret camp half way from Elohim City to Oklahoma City two weeks before the bombing.

So, here we are today. Like the Romans of Crassus' and Cicero's time, or the Germans under a newly elected Hitler, we are being warned that a dangerous enemy threatens us, implacable, invisible, omnipresent, and invulnerable as long as our government is hamstrung by that silly old Bill of Rights. Already there have appeared articles debating whether or not "extraordinary measures" (i.e. torture) are not fully justified under certain circumstances such as those we are purported to face.

As was the case in Rome and Germany, the government continues to plead with the public for an expansion of its power and authority, to "deal with the crisis".

However, as Casio watch timers are paraded before the cameras, to the stentorian tones of the talking heads' constant dire warnings, it is legitimate to question just how real the crises is, and how much is the result of political machinations by our own leaders.

Are the terrorists really a threat, or just hired actors with bombs and Casio watches, paid for by Cicero and given brown shirts to wear by Hitler?

Is terrorism inside the United States really from outside, or is it a stage managed production, designed to cause Americans to believe they have no choice but to surrender the Republic and accept the totalitarian rule of a new emperor, or a new Führer?

Once lost, the Romans never got their Republic back. Once lost, the Germans never got their Republic back. In both cases, the nation had to totally collapse before freedom was restored to the people.

Remember that when Crassus tells you that Sparticus approaches.

Remember that when thugs in the streets act in a manner clearly designed to provoke the public fear.

Remember that when the Reichstag burns down.

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UFOs - the "V-7 Legend"

The dominant explanation for the origin of UFOs is the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis (ETH). Other hypotheses have been proposed as supplementary to ETH, among them the so-called "Nazi Hypothesis". Witness testimony, photographs, and purported plans exist to suggest that some Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) may have originated in pre-1946 Germany.

This evidence has been downplayed for a number of reasons. An obvious factor is that documents and witness testimony tend to be in a foreign language. The universal revulsion felt for the Nazi regime and its occult origins is another factor. Then, too, some of the data seem to have been filtered through neo-Nazi sources.

Most difficult for some, perhaps, is that the implicitly underlying physics for these craft must have been concealed from most of us for 60 years or more. However, the ETH involves a similar element of concealment, if only for a shorter duration.

The "German saucers" are often known also as the "V-7 Legend": this comes from a reportedly circular aircraft named "V-7" that is claimed to have flown in Prague on February 14, 1945.

How the V-7 Legend Arose