Civil and Criminal Penalties for Healthcare Non Compliance

http://republicans.waysandmeans.house.gov/UploadedFiles/JCTletter110509.pdf

Letter From Fort Hood

— By Kevin Drum | Fri November 6, 2009 8:19 AM PST
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—Photo by flickr user brokenthoughts used under a Creative Commons license.
A former reader emails today to pass along a firsthand account of the shooting at Fort Hood on Thursday. It’s unedited except for paragraph breaks:

I was walking into the medical SRP building when he started firing (he never made it to the main SRP building….the media accounts are understandably pretty off right now). He was calmly and methodically shooting everyone. Like every non-deployed military post, no one was armed. For the first time in my life I really wish I had a weapon. I don’t know how to explain what it feels like to have someone shoot at you while you’re unarmed. He missed me but didn’t miss a lot of others. Just pure random luck. It’s a very compressed area, thus the numbers.

I saw a lot of heroism. So many more would have died if this wasn’t an Army post. We’re almost all CLS trained and it made a huge difference. Cause the EMTs didn’t get there for almost an hour (they thought there was a second shooter). I just can’t believe one of our own shot us. When I saw his ID card I couldn’t believe it. After he shot the female police officer he was fumbling his reload and I saw the other police officer around the corner and yelled at him to come shoot the shooter. He did. Then I used my belt as a tourniquet on the female officer.

I hate to tell you this but in the course of the day it became clear that it was another Akbar incident.1 (Once they convinced them the blood drenching my clothes wasn’t mine I spent the day being interviewed by the alphabet.) Akbar again. God help us. He was very planned. I counted three full mags around him (I secured his weapon for a while). Found out later that his car was filled with more ammo.

This was premeditated. This wasn’t VBC again. That guy snapped, not this one. He was so damn calm when he was shooting. Methodical. And he was moving tactically. The Army really is diverse and we really do love all our own. We signed up to be shot at but not at home. Not unarmed. No one should ever see what the inside of that medical SRP building looked like. I suppose that’s what VA Tech looked like. Except they didn’t have soldiers coming from everywhere to tourniquet and compress and talk to the wounded while rounds are still coming out.<Blog_Fort_Hood_EMT.jpg>

No one touched him…the shooter that is…other than to treat him. Though I told the medic (and I’m not proud of this) that was giving him plasma that there better not be anyone else who needed it because he should be the last one to be treated. But I had just finished holding a soldier who was critical (I counted three entry wounds) and talking to him about his children…. If the shooter had a grievance he should have taken it out on those responsible; he wasn’t shooting people he knew (media reports to the contrary). He was just shooting anybody who happened to be present for SRP medical processing, mainly lower enlisted.

But please, no one use this politically! The Army is not “broken”, PTSD doesn’t turn people into killers, most Muslims aren’t evil, and whether we should stay or go in Afghanistan has nothing to do with this. I’m babbling…sorry.

1Hasan Akbar was an Army sergeant who killed two soldiers and wounded 14 others in a grenade attack in Kuwait in 2003. He’s currently under a sentence of death.

There have been several media reports that the Fort Hood shooter yelled “Allahu Akbar!” during his rampage, but my correspondent says, “He was silent in my presence.”

LA Times Opinion-The GOP should dump the neocons

Limited-government conservatives have been undermined by big-government neoconservatives.

The founders envisioned a federal government constitutionally limited to defending our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. For that to happen, we must have at least one political party that strongly advocates limiting the power of government. For much of the 19th century, that party was the Democrats. For the early part of the 20th century and from the early 1960s through 1988, that party was the Republicans.

Today, it is difficult to find noninterventionists in either party.

The Democrats demonstrate a disdain for capitalism, free trade and the validity of contracts. They cheer the restriction of certain types of speech on campus and in federal law, and think nation-building is our moral obligation, even when there is no discernible U.S. interest involved. Lately, the Democrats have been popularly associated with principled opposition to waging war in far-flung corners of the globe. But evidence on the ground today tells a somewhat different tale.

As for the GOP, it has outwardly abandoned the limited-government principles of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan. Little other evidence is needed than the Medicare prescription drug benefit — with its $13-trillion unfunded liability — passed with a strong-arm campaign by the Bush White House and a Republican congressional majority.

What happened to the Republicans? Well, the two Bush presidencies didn’t help. Neither did the supply-side movement, focused on tax cuts and economic growth. Supporters of those ideas didn’t talk about spending cuts, much less the proper role of government. They had the effect of replacing “liberty” as the motivating force behind the GOP with “growth,” a somewhat less-inspiring ideal.

But perhaps most pernicious has been the role played by the neoconservatives. The late William F. Buckley used his conservative flagship publication, National Review, to make anti-communism the litmus test for joining the conservative movement. Dealing with the Soviets during the Cold War was clearly an important task, but it should not have opened the door of the limited-government movement to the neoconservatives, who are now — and always have been — advocates of big government. With the neocon foot in the policymaking door after the Cold War ended, the drumbeat for war in Iraq began in earnest a decade before 9/11.

It is important to realize that neocons are not just nation-building, America-first advocates. They like big government across the board. No Child Left Behind, the thinly disguised effort to nationalize education in America, was principally a neocon initiative. Consider this comment from the late Irving Kristol, self-described “godfather” of the neoconservative movement: “Neocons do not feel that kind of alarm or anxiety about the growth of the state in the past century, seeing it as natural, indeed inevitable.”

Read More;

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-crane4-2009nov04,0,277258.story

Bellvue and Thorazine to Free You from Your First Amendment Addiction

BLACK SHEEP AWARD

Veteran libertarian civil rights activist Julian Heicklen calls it “an out-and-out kidnapping” when Homeland Security Police forcibly transported him to a hospital where he was injected with Thorazine against his will.

It began shortly after Heicklen arrived at the US District Courthouse in New York City for the third Monday in a row to pass out pamphlets to prospective jurors.

The pamphlet, produced by the Fully Informed Jury Association (FIJA) entitled “A Primer for Prospective Jurors” informs jurors of their right to judge the law and its application as well as the facts in a case, regardless of the judge’s instructions to the contrary.

As in the past, (Jury activist arrested for exercising First Amendment rights) Homeland Security police told him he couldn’t do that on federal property and ordered him to leave. As in the past, Heicklen explained that the First Amendment recognized his right to do what he was doing.

Then, as Heicklen tells it in his email report to supporters, “One of them said that I was under arrest, get his hands behind his back and handcuff him.”

As Heicklen always does when faced with arrest, he dropped to the ground and went limp and silent.

In the past, he was arrested, handcuffed, placed on a gurney and transported to a hospital where he was examined and eventually released in time to be home later the same day.

(Full accounts of this and his first two trips to Manhattan can be read on the New Jersey Libertarian Party website.)

But this time something different happened. “I remained in that position for over an hour,” Heicklen says, “before I was lifted onto a gurney and strapped securely. I was never handcuffed nor received a citation or summons. It was an out-and-out kidnapping.”

At Bellevue Psychiaytric Hospital he remained nonresponsive to questions.

Around 3:00 PM, radio reporter Chris Goldstein called to say that he would start the publicity rolling.

After 4:00 PM or so, Heicklen continues, “I made a fuss to see someone in charge, so that I could either be released or brought in front of a magistrate. My requests were ignored, and became more persistent. Against my wishes four attendants grabbed me and gave me a shot of Thorazine to calm me down. It worked, I got an excellent night’s sleep.”

Read More;

http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-26370-Libertarian-News-Examiner~y2009m11d4-Libertarian-freedom-activist-forcibly-hospitalized-and-drugged

Rally for Senior Meals at the OK Capitol

About 400 Oklahomans crowded around the second-floor rotunda of the state Capitol today to ask state leaders to restore funding to senior nutrition programs.

Gov. Brad Henry, whose office is on the same floor, did not attend. But he spent Tuesday night and early this morning talking to advocates about a possible solution to the financial crisis.

Charles Campbell, a coordinator of today’s rally, said Henry called him Tuesday evening and told him that the state Department of Human Services, which cut $7.4 million from the senior nutrition program because of state revenue shortfalls, is willing to use money earmarked for other programs but not due to be spent until later this fiscal year

Read more: http://newsok.com/hundreds-of-oklahomans-rally-at-state-capitol-for-senior-meals/article/3414588?custom_click=headlines_widget#ixzz0VvoCljS9

Thank you Homeland Security!

If you buy the devil’s bargain that we must trade our liberty/privacy in order to gain security-do I have a deal for you!

With our privacy and freedom at nearly zippo, we will be Oh so safe. You just wait and see. Big Momma’s gonna take care of all of us for sure!

*)*)*)*)*)*))*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*)*))*)*)*)*)*))*)*))*)*)*)*))*))*)*)*)*)*)*)*))*)*

 

 

 

Science & Technology Directorate Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division

Mission

We will advance national security by developing and applying the social, behavioral, and physical sciences to improve identification and analysis of threats, to enhance societal resilience, and to integrate human capabilities into the development of technology. Learn more about Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Projects.

Objectives

• Enhance the analytical capability of the Department to understand terrorist motivation, intent, and behavior  
  
• Improve screening by providing a science-based capability to identify unknown threats indicated by deceptive and suspicious behavior.
  
• Improve screening by providing a science-based capability to identify known threats through accurate, timely, and easy-to-use biometric identification and credentialing tools.
  
• Enhance safety, effectiveness, and usability of technology by systematically incorporating user and public input.
  
• Enhance preparedness and mitigate impacts of catastrophic events by delivering capabilities that incorporate social, psychological and economic aspects of societal resilience.
  

Leadership

Dr. Sharla Rausch is the Director for the Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) within the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate.

Organization

The division strives to identify and generate the best technologies for assisting our operational customers in the areas of Personal Identification Systems, Human Technology Integration, and Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis. The primary federal customers for the division include Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE), Transportation Security Administration (TSA), U.S. Coast Guard (USCG), U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Office of Intelligence and Analysis (OIA) and U.S. Secret Service (USSS). End users also include federal, state, and local emergency management officials, first reponders, and private sector infrastructure owners and operators.

The Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division is comprised of three Thrust areas:

• Personal Identification Systems
  
• Human Technology Integration
  
• Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis (SBTA) Thrust Area
  

   

Personal Identification Systems Thrust Area

This thrust area focuses on biometrics-based Research and Development to develop an accurate, contactless, near real-time capability to identify known threats at U.S. checkpoints while speeding the unconstrained movement of legitimate travelers. The Biometrics program develops biometrics-based technologies to identify known terrorists and criminals and prevent their movement into and out of the U.S. through effective, interoperable multi-biometrics capabilities in diverse areas, such as border crossings, ports-of-entry, and visa application sites. The Credentialing program develops and demonstrates tamper-proof credentialing systems incorporating multi-modal biometric information that can be used across the entire Department customer base.

Human Technology Integration Thrust Area

This thrust area integrates human factors into the development and use of homeland security technologies with the goal of achieving high levels of system effectiveness, safety, and acceptance. HFD conducts fundamental research designed to maximize human performance and feed the development of technologies for enhanced human performance. HFD also works with other divisions in S&T to ensure that human factors are appropriately integrated into the development and use of technologies. The Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division directly manages programs or, in some cases, the relevant portions of programs that are funded by other divisions by providing guidance and tools related to human systems integration.

Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis (SBTA) Thrust Area

This thrust area applies the social and behavioral sciences to improve the detection, analysis, and understanding of threats posed by individuals, groups, and radical movements. It also addresses the psychological, social, and economic impacts of catastrophic events to enhance risk analyses, risk communications, preparedness, response, resiliency, and recovery efforts. Programs within SBTA include motivation and intent; suspicious behavior detection; and community preparedness and resilience.

http://www.dhs.gov/xabout/structure/gc_1224537081868.shtm

 

Human Factors Behavioral Sciences Projects

 

Commercial Data Sources Project

Project Manager: Patty Wolfhope

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors Behavior Sciences Division (HFD) Commercial Data Sources Project will quantitatively assess the utility of commercial data sources to augment governmentally available information about people, foreign and domestic, being screened, investigated, or vetted by the Department. The use of commercial data sources may provide a valuable source of corroborating information to ensure that an individual’s identity and eligibility for a particular license, privilege, or status is correctly evaluated during screening. This project is part of the Personal Identification Systems Thrust Area and Credentialing Program within HFD.

 

 

Community Perceptions of Technology Panel Project

Project Manager: Ji Sun Lee

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/ Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) Community Perceptions of Technology Panel (CPT) Project brings together representatives of industry, public interest, and community-oriented organizations to better understand and integrate community perspectives and concerns in the development, deployment, and public acceptance of technology. This will yield feedback to aid ongoing technology and process development and strategies to accurately inform the public of new approaches to securing the homeland. This is designed to better ensure acceptance of the technology within affected communities. This project is part of the Human Technology Integration Thrust Area and Technology Acceptance and Integration Program within HFD.

 

Homeland Innovation Prototypical Solutions – Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST) Project

Project Manager: Bob Burns

Project Overview: The Homeland Security Advanced Research Project Agency (HSARPA) and Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST) Project is an initiative to develop innovative, non-invasive technologies to screen people at security checkpoints. FAST is grounded in research on human behavior and psychophysiology, focusing on new advances in behavioral/human-centered screening techniques. The aim is a prototypical mobile suite (FAST M2) that would be used to increase the accuracy and validity of identifying persons with malintent (the intent or desire to cause harm). Identified individuals would then be directed to secondary screening, which would be conducted by authorized personnel. This project is part of the Innovations Portfolio/Homeland Security Advanced Research Project Agency (HSARPA) Program within the S&T Directorate.

 

Hostile Intent Detection – Automated Prototype Project

Project Manager: Larry Willis

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) Hostile Intent Detection – Automated Prototype Project demonstrates real-time automated intent detection using non-invasive and culturally neutral behavioral indicators. S&T plans to transition the automated hostile intent prototype to the Transportation Security Administration, Customs and Border Protection, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. This project is a part of the Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis Thrust Area and Suspicious Behavior Detection Program within HFD.

Insider Threat Detection Program

Project Manager: Jennifer O’Connor, Ph.D.

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) Insider Threat Detection Project will detect insider behavior that is likely to present or lead to a threat to critical infrastructure using behavioral indicators. Department of Homeland Security will collaborate with other U.S. agencies and international partners to move beyond the current focus on responses to accomplished hostile insider acts, and begin developing a greater capacity to deter and detect insider threats before substantial harm has been done. The immediate operational goal is to produce new and better tools to identify behavior patterns and characteristics identifiable before, during, and after employment that are associated with insider threats. This project is part of the Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis Thrust Area and Suspicious Behavior Detection Program withinHFD.

Mobile Biometrics System Project

Project Manager: Patty Wolfhope

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavior Sciences Division (HFD) Mobile Biometrics Project develops prototype technologies for mobile biometrics screening at remote sites along U.S. borders, during disasters and terrorist incidents, at sea, and in other places where communications access is limited. The goal is to demonstrate mobile biometrics screening capabilities and technologies that meet the future needs of Department operational users, but currently are not available with conventional biometrics systems. This project is part of the Personal Identification Systems Thrust Area and Biometrics Program within HFD.

Multi-modal Biometrics Project

Project Manager: Arun Vemury

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavior Sciences Division (HFD) Multi-modal Biometrics Project develops biometric technologies that accurately and rapidly identify individuals. The operational goal is to provide the capability to non-intrusively collect two or more biometrics (fingerprint, face image, and iris recognition) in less than ten seconds at a ninety-five percent acquisition rate without impeding the movement of individuals. The multi-modal technology will allow the Department to compare and match biometric samples from different sources, collected with different sensor technologies, under varying environmental conditions — a capability that eludes existing technology. This project is part of the Personal Identification Systems Thrust Area and Biometrics Program within HFD.

Social Network Analysis for Community Resilence Project

Project Manager: Michael Dunaway

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) Social Network Analysis for Community Resilience Project develops a modeling capability for identifying formal and informal social networks that may be useful in enhancing preparedness and community resilience to natural disasters and terrorist events. This effort will leverage social network analysis research for understanding terrorist networks, social and financial transactions, and the spread of infectious diseases, and apply that knowledge to the construction of networks dedicated to strengthening local response capabilities and preparedness. It will also leverage past and on-going work from the Department of Defense (DOD) and other agencies. This project is part of the Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis Thrust Area and Community Preparedness and Resilience Program within HFD.

 

Violent Intent Modeling and Simulation Project

Project Manager: Ji Sun Lee

Project Overview: The Science and Technology (S&T) Directorate Human Factors/Behavioral Sciences Division (HFD) Violent Intent Modeling and Simulation Project develops intelligence analysis frameworks, including extraction of terrorist intention signatures, systematic estimation of future terrorist behavior based on social and behavioral sciences, and modeling and simulations of future terrorist behavior influences. It identifies leading edge social science modeling and simulation technologies and advances social science modeling and data fusion capabilities in such areas as hybrids of neural nets, structural equations, genetic algorithms, social networks, etc. This project is part of the Social and Behavioral Threat Analysis Thrust Area and Motivation and Intent Program within HFD.

http://www.dhs.gov/files/programs/gc_1218480185439.shtm#9

MIAC changes proposed after controversial report

The recommendations are no more than what ought to have been done from the outset.

I believe that the MIAC hearings were more to allow  the public a venting session than anything else, the good intentions of many of the board members notwithstanding.

The state of MO or any state should settle for no less than defunding and disabling  these centers.  They are redundant and are in the dangerous position of having to justify their existence to stay afloat which means the population at large will be increasingly targeted and harassed by the system in its efforts to flush out deviants before they ripen.  The whole “New Paradigm” of policing is premised upon  predicting and preempting terrorism making it impossible to avoid infringing upon our rights.  Presumption of innocence, due process, free speech and more cannot be upheld in a climate of pervasive surveillance and suspicion.

Expect more and more intrusion and further constriction of liberty for  as long as we allow our government to continue to use the specter of terrorism to cow us into handing over the remaining control we have over our lives.

What has become of the people of America and their devotion to independence?  We are becoming thoroughly scrutinized, graded, assessed, hand fed and domesticated people.

Watched as we are, naturally I recommend nothing more forceful than a chorus of bleating towards the ears of our keepers by way of protest.
I advise not to make any sudden moves lest you be regarded as “possible threat to public safety”

AxXiom

A panel of state lawmakers is recommending the General Assembly provide greater oversight of the type of intelligence-gathering activities a controversial state agency can perform.

Since March, the Missouri Information Analysis Center has been under scrutiny for an intelligence report it sent law enforcement agencies across the state about the “modern militia movement.”

The report suggested people who oppose abortion, resist paying federal income taxes and support third-party political candidates may be linked to violent militias. The report sparked outrage among social conservatives who believed it instructed police officers to target those exercising right-wing political speech as potential militia members.

On Thursday, an interim House committee chaired by Rep. Bob Dixon ended a summerlong study of MIAC by recommending possible changes in law to the rest of the legislature.

Meeting via conference call, the committee recommended:

- Enact legislation defining MIAC’s mission and scope in statute. In response to the federal government creating the Department of Homeland Security, MIAC was established in 2005 as a central repository for police agencies to share crime trends. Until the militia report controversy, very few state lawmakers even knew the 30-person agency existed.

- Define and limit the types of intelligence information gathering or sharing in which MIAC can engage.

- Establish a legislative committee to provide oversight of MIAC to review its activities.

- Require MIAC to present an annual report to the legislature on its activities.

- Strengthen personal privacy, civil rights and liberties laws to ensure they can’t be compromised by MIAC’s intelligence-gathering and sharing operations.

- Establish a formal, independent oversight board to provide policy direction and overall leadership to MIAC. Currently, there is an informal committee of advisers.

MIAC is based in Jefferson City and is a division of the Missouri State Highway Patrol, which falls under the state Department of Public Safety. In response to the political backlash from the militia report, MIAC has ceased distribution of additional intelligence reports.

Read More;

http://www.news-leader.com/article/20091016/NEWS01/910160334/MIAC-changes-proposed-after-controversial-report

Are pregnant women receiving vaccine endangering their baby?

 

November 3, 10:58 AMFort Worth Kids’ Nutrition & Exercise ExaminerSusie Stone

It has always been a principle of medicine that one should not vaccinate pregnant women, except in extreme cases, because the risk to the baby is just too high. Recently, we have seen two examples of violation of this policy. When the HPV vaccine Gardasil was first released the CDC and the manufacturer (Merck Pharmaceutical Company) recommended that it be given to pregnant women.

Shortly after beginning this dangerous practice it was ordered halted because a number of women were losing their babies and babies were being born with major malformations.

It is known that stimulating a woman’s immune system during midterm and later term pregnancy significantly increases the risk that her baby will develop autism during childhood and schizophrenia sometime during the teenage years and afterward. (1)

Compelling scientific evidence also shows an increased risk of seizures in the baby and later as an adult. (2)   In fact, a number of neurodevelopmental and behavioral problems can occur in babies born to women immunologically stimulated during pregnancy. (3-6)

It is true that serious flu infections or E. coli infections during pregnancy are a major risk for all these complications, but a woman’s risk of becoming infected, is a very small fraction of 1 %, yet the CDC, medical doctors, and the media are announcing that all pregnant women should be vaccinated for the swine flu.

The media repeats the manufacturers’ mantra that this vaccine is produced exactly like the seasonal flu, when in fact it is not. Yes, they use chicken eggs, but the rest has been fast tracked and many shortcuts on safety procedures have been allowed. Many physicians are calling for all pregnant women to be vaccinated with at least three vaccines, two of which contain mercury. There is also evidence to show that a large number of these women will gain no protection from the vaccine.

Dr. Michael Bronze, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, writing for emedicine medscape.com (WebMD), states that the risk of a pregnant women being hospitalized with the H1N1 infection is 0.32 per 100,000 pregnant women (which is 1 in 300,000 pregnant women). One can safely say, based on the Australian/New Zealand experience (at the peak of their flu season) and the American data somewhere in the middle of their flu season, that pregnant women have about a 99.97% chance they will not become so sick as to require hospital care at any level.The death rate of pregnant women who were admitted to the ICU was 7.7%, a fairly low figure for infectious ICU patients. Remember, most patients admitted to the hospital are admitted for hydration and are not that ill in terms of the infection itself.

Read More;

http://www.examiner.com/x-26390-Fort-Worth-Kids-Nutrition–Exercise-Examiner~y2009m11d3-Is-there-proof-that-pregnant-women-given-vaccine-have-babies-with-more-health-problems

Just Lie and Claim There’s a Shortage

Who’s the Crazy One’s?

“The Whole Truth” Perception Manipulators Brings Soros to Mind

As the gullible of the world start to relax after being told that the swine flu may not become a pandemic, the rest of us marvel at the breadth of their naïveté.  One would think they’d recall the similar hysteria in 2002 over SARS. The same so-called clinical experts were intimating that it would be disaster like the 1918 flu epidemic that took 40 million lives. That fear campaign fizzled out eventually and there were no deaths in the U.S.

Nevertheless, the world continues to swallow the global warming, end of the world scenario, but never bothers to wonder who’s profiteering from all these scare reports.

It’s obvious that the mainstream media has abdicated all objectivity so it’s up to novelists to come up with possible explanations to this deliberate fear campaign.

A few years ago, I met the wonderful Michael Crichton at an award luncheon and he graciously signed my copy of his book “State of Fear.” This thriller about eco-terrorists could never be made into a film because too many Hollywood denizens would recognize their own stupidity and hypocrisy described in the novel. While I can’t recommend the book as an easy read, it is exhaustedly researched and the facts within are compelling and eye opening.

Crichton’s villains, however, are not as credible as the ones in David Baldacci’s “The Whole Truth.” It was reading this suspense novel that I first saw the phrase, “perception manipulators.” The novel centers around a megalomaniac billionaire who fancies himself able to control world events. He contracts a PM (perceptual manipulation) firm  to do his bidding by using the Internet and the media to create chaotic events which in turn him benefit him monetarily. These firms are highly paid to establish information and frequently misinformation all over the globe.

Throughout the novel I kept imagining George Soros as the man pulling the world strings because he is the man behind many of the leftwing Internet websites and community organizations. The public seems to forget that he has been dubbed “the man who broke the Bank of England.”  Soros has a knack for pulling out his funds just before a financial crisis. Recently he was quoted in the Daily Mail, U.K. as saying, “I am having a very good “crisis.”

Another similarity between George Soros and the villain in Baldacci’s thriller is that the billionaires are both are generous philanthropists. Soros has donated about four billion dollars through his foundations. Baldacci’s villain hides his nefarious deeds through the PM agency which cloaks all transactions through a web of intricate maneuvers ensuring that nothing will track back to the billionaire.

Soros has been a huge supporter of the Democratic Party. He funds sites like Moveon.org., which has been hostile to all things Republican and might even take credit for the 2006 takeover of Congress by the Democrats. It goes without saying that Soros supported Barack Obama. His one big failure, however, was in attempting to oust President Bush in 2004.

According to an article (Money Man) by Jane Mayer in the Oct.16-18, 2004 New Yorker magazine, George Soros met with other Democrats at a clandestine summit meeting at the Aspen Institute. The August 6^th meeting consisted of five billionaires and a half a dozen liberal leaders to discuss the future of progressive politics, Mayer writes that they “shared a common goal: to use their fortunes to engineer the defeat of President George W. Bush in the 2004 election.”

Read More;

http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/05/gullible_america.html

 

 

The Money Man

Can George Soros’s millions insure the defeat of President Bush?

by Jane Mayer October 18, 2004

On August 6th, a week after the Democratic Convention, a clandestine summit meeting took place at the Aspen Institute, in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains. The participants, all Democrats, were sworn to secrecy, and few of them will discuss the event. One thing that is certain, however, is that the guests formed a tableau that not many people would associate with the Democratic Party of the past. Five billionaires joined half a dozen liberal leaders in a lengthy conversation about the future of progressive politics in America. The billionaires were not especially close socially, nor were they in complete agreement about politics or strategy. Yet they shared a common goal: to use their fortunes to engineer the defeat of President George W. Bush in the 2004 election.

“No one was supposed to know about this,” an assistant to one participant told me, declining to be named. “We don’t want people thinking it’s a cabal, or some sort of Masonic plot!” His concern was understandable: the prospect of rich men concentrating their wealth in order to sway an American election was an inflammatory one, particularly given the Democratic Party’s populist rhetoric.

http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/10/18/041018fa_fact3