700 year old Austrian Mickey Mouse?

A medieval fresco featuring a rodent with an uncanny resemblance to Mickey Mouse has been uncovered in an Austrian church.

As word of the 700-year-old image spread, the minds of local tourism officials began working overtime.

“This fresco proves that Mickey Mouse is a true Austrian and was not born in Hollywood,” said Siggi Neuschitzer, the manager of the tourism office in the village of Malta, in the south of the country, where the painting was found.

He said he was planning to refer the painting to lawyers.
 
“The similarity to Mickey Mouse is so astounding that Disney could lose its world-wide copyright.”

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Sydney trade protesters regroup to test police cordon. 

Senior ministers from the world’s most powerful trading nations will come under siege today following protests that yesterday brought the centre of Sydney to a standstill and saw 13 demonstrators arrested.

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Be scared, be very scared

You Are a Suspect.
Op-ed by conservative columnist William Safire, via Privacy Digest

If the Homeland Security Act is not amended before passage, here is what will happen to you:

Every purchase you make with a credit card, every magazine subscription you buy and medical prescription you fill, every Web site you visit and e-mail you send or receive, every academic grade you receive, every bank deposit you make, every trip you book and every event you attend — all these transactions and communications will go into what the Defense Department describes as “a virtual, centralized grand database.”

To this computerized dossier on your private life from commercial sources, add every piece of information that government has about you — passport application, driver’s license and bridge toll records, judicial and divorce records, complaints from nosy neighbors to the F.B.I., your lifetime paper trail plus the latest hidden camera surveillance — and you have the supersnoop’s dream: a “Total Information Awareness” about every U.S. citizen.

This is not some far-out Orwellian scenario. It is what will happen to your personal freedom in the next few weeks if John Poindexter gets the unprecedented power he seeks.

Remember Poindexter? Brilliant man, first in his class at the Naval Academy, later earned a doctorate in physics, rose to national security adviser under President Ronald Reagan. He had this brilliant idea of secretly selling missiles to Iran to pay ransom for hostages, and with the illicit proceeds to illegally support contras in Nicaragua.

This ring-knocking master of deceit is back again with a plan even more scandalous than Iran-contra. He heads the “Information Awareness Office” in the otherwise excellent Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency(DARPA), which spawned the Internet and stealth aircraft technology. Poindexter is now realizing his 20-year dream: getting the “data-mining” power to snoop on every public and private act of every American.

Even the hastily passed U.S.A. Patriot Act, which widened the scope of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and weakened 15 privacy laws, raised requirements for the government to report secret eavesdropping to Congress and the courts. But Poindexter’s assault on individual privacy rides roughshod over such oversight.

Background from Privacy Digest archives:

• August 08,2002 - US Military (DARPA) - Total Information Awareness(TIA) Systems.
  
• August 08,2002 - Conflict News from Wired News - Feds Open ‘Total’ Tech Spy System.
  
• August 11,2002 - Slashdot | Your Rights Online - Feds Open ‘Total’ Tech Spy System.
  
• November 09,2002 - New York Times Pentagon Plans a Computer System That Would Peek at Personal Data of Americans.

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International Answer & NION

I went to an organizing meeting for LA Answer last night, Answer being the organizers of the recent large and successful Oct 26 antiwar protests in DC and SF.

They are well-organized and hard-working, with the leaders being older and maybe a bit more seasoned than in Not In Our Name (NION), the other major antiwar umbrella group. NION, who I also volunteer for and respect, is just getting established in LA while Answer has been here three years.

During the meeting we pasted stamps on 4,000 letters going out to LA supporters (and possible supporters), part of a much larger nationwide mailing. They are a nonprofit so we used the ultra-inexpensive non-profit organization stamps.

Ah you say, but isn’t Answer, like NION, linked to a Communist Party? Some are, however the national board has representatives from many groups and this local group, like NION, appears to genuinely accept and encourage anyone who wants to join and help. The roots of some members is a non-issue, in my opinion.

These two groups are tireless and are doing good work. Answer plans a major peace rally in LA on Jan 11, place to be determined, this being the week before the expected-to-be-huge rally in DC on Jan 18-19. Plus their new site, www.VoteNoWar.org intends to get one million signers on the petition for the DC rally.

NION plans to get one million globe posters (their symbol) and car flags out in the near future, and are actively organizing at high schools and colleges, with more national events being planned. 

After being at meetings for both groups, I find concerns about their roots to be irrelevant. Both groups have lots of dedicated people organizing hard to stop the war. Those inclined should have no hesitation about joining in.

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Iraq war ‘could kill 500,000′

A war against Iraq could kill half a million people, warns a new report by medical experts - and most would be civilians. Collateral Damage is being published on Tuesday in 14 countries and has been compiled by Medact, an organisation of British health professionals

The report claims as many as 260,000 could die in the conflict and its three-month aftermath, with a further 200,000 at risk in the longer term from famine and disease. A civil war in Iraq could add another 20,000 deaths.

General Pete Gration, former Chief of the Australian Defence Forces and an opponent of a war on Iraq, adds: “This is no exaggerated tract by a bunch of zealots. It is a coldly factual report by health professionals who draw on the best evidence available.”

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al Quaeda long term goal: damage US economy

From the deeply sober and respected Jane’s

It is almost certain that there is a comprehensive Al-Qaeda strategy for a long-term campaign against the United States because in the final analysis it is the US that is the major obstacle to their eventual triumph. This long-term strategy probably revolves around forcing the US into an isolationist ‘Fortress America’ policy.

To achieve this type of long-game result it is likely that the Al-Qaeda planners have been thinking along the following lines: ‘The business of America is business. Therefore, the way to force the political change that Al-Qaeda requires is to have an impact upon American business.’

It is almost impossible to destroy the US. However, it is almost certainly possible to cause significant economic damage to the US across a number of sectors.

Look at Al-Qaeda as a cross between a merchant bank, providing venture capital for terrorist operations and a terrorist consultancy. Possibly 5,000 trained terrorists from Afghanistan are at large, and it is likely that they are infiltrating Muslim groups (many of these groups totally innocent) in a number of countries worldwide. These Al-Qaeda terrorists are almost certainly identifying the radical individuals who are likely candidates for future operations and adding terrorist expertise and operational value to these local groups.

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No independent investigation of 9/11?

The current Homeland Security Act “would not create an independent commission to investigate the circumstances leading up to Sept. 11. The Senate in September overwhelmingly endorsed adding a commission to a homeland security bill. A commission still could be created in another way.” <I’m not holding my breath>

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Michael Moore interviewed by The Guardian

The perpetrator behind Stupid White Men and Bowling for Columbine is in the UK now. An excerpt from the interview.

He asks if his new wheeze for the live show - involving Northern Ireland, holy water, a sceptre and a posterior is going too far. Not at all, I say. Relieved, he tells me of another scheme. “It’s Called The Third Way games, where it’s OK to be rich and to take advantage of the poor, and have fun doing it, instead of being mean like under Thatcher. We’re going to be playing different games with millionaires. I’ve got a homeless guy, and we’re going to play dunk the homeless, and we’re gonna play Pie the Poor where we have a woman who is living below poverty, and then we’re going to pin the tail on the asylum seeker. The millionaire will be blindfolded for that one.”

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“The Prince and the Porn”

Above headline from MSNBC. An inflammatory, misleading headline, as nothing they report links Prince Charles or Philip with porn. Having said that, the English monarchy is defintely in deeply troubled waters and the storm is getting bigger.

Check the titillating, sleazy approach MSNBC takes, emphasizing minor sexual stuff before the serious charges;

A flood of filth is engulfing Britain’s royal family. How much more can the House of Windsor take? <What flood of filth?>

Princess Diana sometimes left home to meet her lover naked under her fur coat. <Cool!> In her flakier moments, she also distributed £50 notes (about $79) to prostitutes on the street and bought soft-core porn for her eldest son. <And why is this news?>

Prince Philip, wrote the princess letters that described her as a “trollop” and a “harlot.” <Sheesh, what a grump> A “gay mafia” is said to dominate the royal households. <Gasp> Back in the ’80s, one of Prince Charles’s former footmen says he was raped by a senior royal aide while both worked for the prince. <Finally - some actual news> For good measure, Charles supplements his £7.5 million-a-year income (about $11.9 million) by selling off the heaps of unwanted gifts though a trusted servant who takes his own hefty rake-off. <Another serious charge>

As reported here on 11/08, the butler said the Queen told him his life could be in danger and, that “There are powers at work in this country about which we have no knowledge.” Indeed, it does appear that someone is attacking the monarchy, rather well too.

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Israel

Shin Bet Chief: “Terror Wave by Radical Jews” Underway

Top Israeli intelligence chief told the Israeli government “security cabinet” that a group of Jewish radicals “who don’t listen to rabbis” are planning terror attacks against Palestinian targets.

What have I Done! - A Hundred Soldiers Treated for ‘Intifada Syndrome’

“The soldiers burst out crying and accuse themselves of mistreating Palestinians and humiliating them. Now, after being discharged, the vision of what they had done is playing itself in their minds like a non-stop film. Suddenly the soldier, the tough fighter who had been nicknamed ‘Rambo’, goes to <military rehab in> India. There he experiences another reality, a quiet and peaceful situation. When he comes back he realizes what he had done. He tries to escape from reality, to escape into drugs, and his life becomes a ruin” says one of the doctors.

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India: Bill Gates walks into a ‘culture of denial’ and AIDS controversy

Via AidsChannel

Bill Gates donated the largest donation to date from his charity, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to India.  And although India’s healthcare system did need Gates $100 million donation, the government was ticked off by ‘outside interference’ of spreading panic by giving wide spread predications on AIDS in India that were alarming.  However, another report released suggests that Eurasia is soon likely to face the same kind of AIDS pandemic that is decimating sub-Saharan Africa.

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