OUTRIGHT INSANITY: Bio-weapons research endangers the planet.

[ Editor's Note: Plead with them to stop this madness. Lock up all samples of potentially catastrophic flu. Prosecute those who have been illegally engaging in biological weapons production. These bugs can kill BILLIONS of human beings.]


The history of the synthetic H1N1 flu virus and a not-so-rosy future
By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer


May 21, 2009, 00:20

(WMR) -- The history of the extraction of the genetic material from the corpses of victims of the 1918 Spanish influenza virus who were buried in Arctic permafrost is part �X-Files� and part �Jurassic Park.�

After an unsuccessful 1951 mission, that involved U.S. biological warfare specialists, to extract 1918 Spanish flu genetic material in 1951 from a cemetery in the Inupiat Eskimo village of Brevig Mission, Alaska, scientists made another attempt, a successful one it turns out, in 1997.

Dr. Johan Hultin, from the State University of Iowa, successfully extracted genetic material from the corpse of an obese 30-something female who died from the Spanish flu in 1918, along with 85 percent of Brevig Mission�s (called Teller Mission in 1918) villagers in a single week. The pandemic killed at least 50 million people around the world.

Once the Spanish flu genetic material was obtained from the lungs, spleen, liver, and heart of the Eskimo woman�s corpse, scientists, in a scene reminiscent of the fictional movie �Jurassic Park,� in which genetic material from extinct dinosaurs is used to bring the creatures back to life, recreated the long-since dead 1918 Spanish flu in a U.S. government-funded laboratory. The woman�s organs were cut into one-inch cubes and shipped to the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Rockville, Maryland, where the virus�s genetic RNA material was identified and the 1918 Spanish flu was successfully brought back to life.

The search for the frozen bodies of 1918 flu victims was not limited to Alaska. Another team of scientists, acting like Dr. Frankenstein�s �Igor,� set out to dig up the graves of miners who died from the flu in the remote Norwegian mining village of Longyearbyen in Spitsbergen, which lies north of the Arctic Circle.

WMR has learned from a research scientist who has been working on the recreation of the 1918 flu that the genetic material has been re-engineered to synthetically create what is now known as the A/H1N1 virus, or as the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) calls it, the �novel flu.�

The A/H1N1 influenza, which contains genetic material from two strains of swine flu, two strains of human flu, and a single strain of avian flu, has, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), infected, as of May 13, a total of 4,880 people in North America: 2,059 in Mexico; 2,535 in the United States, and 286 in Canada. There have been 56 reported deaths from the flu in Mexico, three in the United States, and one in Canada.

WMR has learned from an A/H1N1 researcher that the current �novel� flu strain is mutating rapidly in humans but no animals have contracted the virus. The enzyme in A/H1N1, as with all influenza A viruses, is called a polymerase. Scientists have calculated the molecular clock of A/H1N1 form the virus�s polymerase rate. Because of the rapid mutation of the virus and the fact that, unlike 1918, rapid global transportation is now the norm, scientists are predicting that the molecular clock of the A/H1N1 virus, coupled with modern transportation, means that almost all the countries of the world will experience an A/H1N1 outbreak within the next few months.

What is different about A/H1N1 is that, unlike other new strains of viruses that rapidly mutate upon emerging and then slow down mutation and then stop entirely, the �novel� or incorrectly-named �swine flu� is showing no signs yet of slowing down its mutation rate and that, according to scientists who worry about A/H1N1 being synthetically-generated, does not happen in nature.

In 2006, at a summit meeting in Cancun, Mexico, President George W. Bush, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and Mexican President Vicente Fox agreed for their nations to coordinate their response to avian flu, which was spreading in Asia. National Public Radio, on April 2, 2006, ran a segment on how bird flu wreaked havoc in 1918 in Brevig Mission. NPR�s Weekend Edition ran a report from Brevig Mission by Lori Townsend of Alaska Public Radio: �The grave has been opened twice by the same pathologist. In 1951, Johann Hultin convinced village elders to allow him to take tissue samples from bodies buried in permafrost. His lab attempts to map the virus were unsuccessful, but he returned in 1997, and when he did, he was once again given permission to re-open the grave.�

WMR has learned from a journalist from Anchorage who covered the 1997 grave exhumation that there was CIA personnel with the team of scientists. Inuit elders of Brevig Mission argued that digging up the graves of the flu victims would release evil spirits. However, money allegedly changed hands between the U.S. government research team and some of the elders, so permission to dig up the graves was granted.

NPR and Alaska Public Radio was reporting what was extracted from the 1918 flu victim�s corpse was the H5N1 avian flu virus, but that was erroneous. Or was it? If what was extracted from the dead woman�s body in Brevig Mission was used to synthetically create the current A/H1N1 virus, there is a strain of avian flu in the virus. But the current A/H1N1 virus also contains swine and human flu strains.

What has been relayed by the researcher is that the original 1918 virus was the H1N1 virus. In Bio-safety level 3 (BSL-s) laboratory work that was largely classified, the virus was artificially combined with common H3N2 and a minor gene splice from the H5N1 Eurasian avian flu strain.

The avian flu or H5N1 virus that struck Asia in 2006 contained some genetic mutations of the 1918 virus. And scientists researching pandemic flu strains have, since the recreation of the 1918 flu, been playing fast and loose with flu samples. On April 17, 2005, The Washington Post reported that Meridian Bioscience, which was under contract to the College of American Pathologists, accidentally distributed the pandemic H2N2/Japan flu strain, as part of a flu testing kit, to influenza laboratories around the world. WHO ordered the labs to immediately destroy the flu sample because it was worried about an accidental release of the pandemic virus, resulting in a global health crisis. In 1957, H2N2 killed a million people around the world.

The Post�s article, by Wendy Orent, states that scientists were working to create an artificial strain of the 1918 virus: �[Scientists] can combine some 1918 genes either with laboratory strains that have been adapted to grow in mice, which don�t normally catch human flu, or with ordinary human flu strains to yield new artificial strains. Then the researcher infects mice with his new strain. Strains using three of the 1918 genes are already known to kill mice.�

The same Post article quotes Peter B. Jahrling, the chief scientist at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, about the danger of the virus recreation research. Jahrling stated the research was like �looking for a gas leak with a lighted match.� The article continues: �What concerns Jahrling and Brown, among others, is that experiments involving 1918 genes are not being carried out under the highest biosafety level, BSL-4. While most of the scientists use what is known as BSL-3 plus, or enhanced, conditions, they do not use space suits, chemical showers or gas-tight cabinets in their work.�

Lastly, the article has a stark warning regarding the 1918 flu reconstruction at the military laboratory in Rockville, research led by Dr. Jeffery Taubenberger. The article states: �Even more disturbing is what may happen when Taubenberger publishes the remaining three gene sequences. Then the entire 1918 flu could be built from scratch by anyone, anywhere, who has sufficient resources and skill. It is quite conceivable that resurrected 1918 flu could someday be used as a bioterrorist agent.�

In a January 29, 2006, New York Times article by Jamie Shreeve, titled �Why Revive a Deadly Flu Virus?,� it is reported that the 1918 flu had been successfully revived. The article states: �In October, a team of scientists, [CDC�s Terrence] Tumpey among them, announced that they had recreated the extinct organism from its genetic code -- essentially the scenario played out in the movie ��Jurassic Park,�� albeit on a microbial scale. In the movie, the scientists� self-serving revivification of dinosaurs leads to mayhem and death . . . How dangerous is the 1918 virus to today�s population? Its genetic code is now in public databases, where other researchers can download it to conduct experiments. Scientists from the University of Wisconsin and the National Microbiology Laboratory in Canada have already collaborated to reconstruct the virus from the publicly available sequence. How easy would it be for a bioterrorist to exploit the same information for malevolent ends?�

The article details how the 1918 genetic material was extracted and who worked on the project: �The resurrection of the 1918 influenza virus was a team effort engaging the resources of the C.D.C. in Atlanta, an obscure military pathology lab outside Washington, D.C., an esteemed group of influenza experts at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York and one elderly Swede. Though the story has been told before, it is impossible not to begin with the Swede. In 1950, Johan Hultin, then a 25-year-old graduate student at the University of Iowa, was searching for a Ph.D. topic when he heard a visiting virologist say that the only way to solve the mystery of the 1918 pandemic would be to recover the virus from a victim who had been buried in permafrost.�

There has been yet another secretive U.S. government group involved in researching bio-warfare agents like influenza. Known simply as JASON, the group consists of civilian scientists, the top experts in their fields and a number of Nobel laureates, who meet periodically and issue reports, many of which are classified. JASON has been in existence for 40 years and is thought to be a follow-on to the Manhattan Project, the top secret scientific group that created the atomic bomb during World War II. In fact, some of JASON�s earliest members helped to design both the atomic and hydrogen bombs. Its first three members were scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory, the home of the Manhattan Project.

Operating under the aegis of the MITRE Corporation, a federally-funded contracting entity, JASON scientists primarily met in the highly-secured Building 29 at 3550 General Atomics Court in San Diego. The location is the address of the Torrey Pines Institute. Funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), JASON also has links, according to distribution lists on JASON reports, to the CIA. The CIA maintains an element called the IC [Intelligence Community] JASON Program under the Chief Technical Officer. Traditionally, JASON self-selects its members from a number of academic disciplines. However, JASON almost lost its funding a few years ago, when, after issuing a report critical of the Bush administration�s ballistic missile defense program, DARPA attempted to force three new members, obviously political overseers, on to the JASON membership rolls. DARPA�s chief, Tony Tether, pulled funding for JASON, forcing the group for the first time since its inception in 1959 to look for another Pentagon sponsor. The ballistic missile defense program, also called Star Wars II, was a personal pet project of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

JASON survived when DARPA�s parent orgzniation, the Pentagon�s Directorate for Defense Research and Engineering (DDR&E), provided JASON with direct funding, an indication of the power enjoyed by the secretive JASON organization. JASON also has other federal government sponsors, including the Department of Energy.

JASON is also very much involved in issues of biological warfare. JASON produced a report on Civilian Biodefense in January 2000, which was highly redacted when released. Even the names of the report�s authors and the information on four bio-warfare scenarios is completely blacked out, except for a discussion of a 1947 smallpox incident in Scenario Two. The report also states that the CIA�s Clandestine Measurement and Signatures Intelligence (MASINT) Operations Center and Counter-Proliferation Center were interested in biological weapons intelligence collection and signatures. A section of the report on �Managing Civilian Response� to a bio-war attack is also completely redacted, as is a section on domestic intelligence. A page on the anthrax threat references �psychological BW [biological weapons] warfare.� The JASON report was completed almost two years before anthrax attacks all but suspended the work of Congress after 9/11 and saw the quick passage of the USAPATRIOT Act.

The JASON report also discusses the mining of medical data, including patient billing records, to find out if a disease outbreak has occurred and how far and what direction it is spreading by examining �spatiotemporal patterns,� including �averaging statistics for humans traveling globally.�

In fact, the JASON Civilian Biodefense report mirrors, in many respects, the analysis being currently conducted by medical intelligence (MEDINT) agencies around the world on the outbreak and spread of A/H1N1. And that begs the question: is A/H1N1, artificially-developed by U.S. government scientists, the real thing or a test run for something much worse?

SIDEBAR:

The JASON report on bio-war discusses �managing civilian response.� That also appears be a major concern of the CDC on A/H1N1 at the present time judging from the following internal CDC memo obtained by WMR (note that �swine flu� is being referred to as the �novel H1N1 flu�):

From: CDC Announcements
Sent: Monday, May 11, 2009 10:31 AM
To: CDC All - [REDACTED]

Subject: Public Inquires Regarding Novel H1N1 Flu � CDC-INFO

Public Inquires Regarding Novel H1N1 Flu � CDC-INFO

The CDC National Contact Center, CDC-INFO, is available to assist CDC programs in responding to calls and emails related to the novel H1N1 flu. CDC-INFO maintains current content for phone and email responses; maintains records of calls/emails; collects and analyzes quality assurance and customer satisfaction data; and provides on-demand reports for program partners.

If the general public is contacting you with questions related to the novel H1N1 outbreak, we encourage you to direct those inquires you receive to CDC-INFO. CDC-INFO representatives are available to respond to inquiries 24 hours, 7 days a week via email and phone, in English and Spanish. Emails should be forwarded to cdcinfo@cdc.gov. Telephone inquiries may be routed to 1-800-CDC-INFO (1-800-232-4636).

If you have any questions regarding this email, or for assistance in routing public inquiries, please contact eocjiccdcinfo@cdc.gov.

CDC-INFO�s Novel H1N1 Flu Response

Since April 22, 2009, CDC-INFO has answered more than 29,000 phone and email inquiries from the general public and health care professionals in support of CDC�s novel H1N1 flu response. As of Friday, May 8, 2009, the average hold time for phone calls related to novel H1N1 flu was less than 5 seconds. To date, the states with the highest number of phone inquiries are: California, Texas, New York, Florida, and Georgia.

On Thursday, April 30, 2009, CDC-INFO answered the highest number of inquiries on a single topic in its 4-year history, with 3,127 calls and emails answered related to the novel H1N1 outbreak.

As of May 5, 2009, 75 percent of survey respondents gave CDC-INFO their highest satisfaction rating for the novel H1N1 flu-related services they received.

Supporting CDC�s Mission

The CDC-INFO National Contact Center (1800-CDC-INFO or cdcinfo@cdc.gov) supports CDC�s mission by providing a single trusted source of accurate, timely, consistent, and science-based information for the general public, healthcare providers and public health partners. Information is available on more than 400 CDC health and safety topics, disease prevention, and health promotion information through phone, TTY, and email. CDC-INFO provides critical health information to vulnerable populations, including those without access to CDC�s internet resources or those with low health literacy.

Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report.

...a ‘war on terrorism’ red herring

‘What Pelosi knew’ is a ‘war on terrorism’ red herring

By Larry Chin
Online Journal Associate Editor


May 20, 2009, 00:19


A red herring is a fallacy in which an irrelevant topic is used to divert attention from the original issue. The furor over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s knowledge of the Bush/Cheney administration’s use of torture is the latest Washington noise that conveniently diverts attention from the illegitimate “war on terrorism” that continues to serve as the justification for torture, murder and war.

Nancy’s clumsy tap dance

In a series of bumbling statements, Pelosi has denied her knowledge of the extent of the Bush/Cheney administration’s use of torture and other “enhanced interrogation techniques.”

Pelosi admits that she was aware, as early as September 2002, that “enhanced interrogation” techniques were being explored by the Bush/Cheney’s Office of Legal Counsel as legal options, but that she was not told that they were being used. A timeline from the CIA and statements from well-placed (but unnamed) Democratic Party sources refute Pelosi’s claim.

In response, Pelosi accused the CIA of lying about the degree of her knowledge, and covering up the fact that torture was already being used without congressional input. She admitted that, as House speaker, she learned in February 2003 that “certain techniques,” including waterboarding, were being used, and that Congresswoman Jane Harman, Pelosi’s replacement as senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee sent, a letter to the CIA’s general counsel with her support.

Essentially, Pelosi passed the buck to Harman, who was the “appropriate person to register a protest,” but did nothing else.

The Harman letter

But Harman’s letter to CIA General Counsel Scott Muller contains no language calling on Bush/Cheney/CIA to cease and desist using torture. It is not a protest, but more of a fawning caress that underscores the full support she and fellow Democrats have continuously lavished upon Bush/Cheney and the CIA.

Jane Harman-letter to CIA General Counsel Scott Muller (February 10, 2003)

In the letter, Harman states that she “realizes” that “we are at a time when the balance between security and liberty must be constantly evaluated and recalibrated in order to protect our nation and its people from catastrophic terrorist attack.” Obviously here, Harman is an enthusiastic proponent of the fabricated pretext of 9/11, and the bogus “war on terrorism.”

Then Harman oozes that she “appreciates the obvious effort” that the CIA made to “address tough questions,” stating that Bush/Cheney lawyers had already assured those who attended the classified briefing (including Pelosi) that the torture methods were within the law, approved by the attorney general, and extensively reviewed by the appropriate lawyers at the CIA, the Justice Department and the National Security Council.

Harman merely asks the CIA general counsel if the senior levels of Bush/Cheney had determined that “the practices” are “consistent with the principles and policies of the United States,” and politely asks what “policy reviews” had taken place.

In fact, Harman’s letter suggests that she was more immediately concerned with how to stage-manage the CIA’s plan to destroy tapes of the capture of alleged terrorist Abu-Zubaydah than with torture. Harman urges the CIA to reconsider the destruction of the Abu-Zubaydah tapes, in order to prevent a political scandal: “The fact of destruction would reflect badly on the Agency.”

In other words, the Harman/Pelosi position, the overriding bipartisan consensus position shared by the majority of Washington’s functionaries, is that there was no problem with torture, as long as sufficient cover had been created for it, and the appropriate parties have concocted the appropriate legal opinions to justify it. As long as everyone’s rear ends were covered, torture gets the green light.

Pelosi’s own words at her recent news conference further bear this out: “We were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used. What they did tell us is that they had some . . . Office of Legal Counsel opinions, that they could be used, but not that they would.”

This fallback position itself is damning enough. Torture is the definition of barbarity, an atrocity that goes against moral and ethical laws stretching back to the beginning of human history. It is impossible for Nancy Pelosi, or any coherent human being on the planet, not to know this.

Yet, upon first learning that Bush/Cheney/CIA were “exploring” torture, Pelosi did nothing. She expressed no outrage, expended none of her extensive political power to oppose or stop any of it. Then, one full year later, she again did nothing, except pass the buck to Jane Harman, whose letter, in fact, adds to the evidence of their complicity.

And now, after years of silence, Pelosi supports a “truth commission,” and only because she is under fire.

Republicans and Bush/Cheney apologists, who are themselves directly responsible for all of the worst atrocities and war crimes, have accused Pelosi and other Democrats of only expressing outrage about torture when it became politically expedient to do so, while aggressively pushing “anti-terrorism” when mass fear makes it popular to do so. This accusation is politically on target, if transparently hypocritical.

It is also another crop of red herrings.

The ironclad bipartisan consensus

What must be realized, however, is that the political theater surrounding Pelosi distracts from the larger crime: the Washington “war on terrorism” consensus that continues to provide the pretext for the US government to commit torture, and other atrocities, within US borders and around the world.

The “war on terrorism” is a product of an elite bipartisan consensus deception, supported and nurtured equally by Republicans and Democrats. The “war on terrorism,” itself, is a massive fabrication and cover-up built entirely upon the false-flag operation of 9/11, resting squarely on the perpetual threat of an outside enemy.

The endless criminal abominations begun by Bush/Cheney -- from the USAPATRIOT Act to the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and throughout the world, illegal surveillance, militarization, and torture -- continue under the management of the equally deceptive, equally criminal Obama administration, and Nancy Pelosi.

The Obama administration and the Democratic Party leadership continues to block torture investigations, while deepening and expanding the “war on terrorism” across Central Asia, continuing a host of other Bush/Cheney atrocities, such as military tribunals, illegal surveillance, and covert operations.

The “war on terrorism” continues unabated. Therefore, so will torture and the false confessions needed to keep it all going.

It is no surprise, then, that the same Nancy Pelosi who has almost singlehandedly prevented investigations and prosecutions of the Bush/Cheney administration (taking it “off the table” years ago), also goes along with the idea of “legal” torture.
Of course, Pelosi knows.

Copyright © 1998-2007 Online Journal

PRESIDENT OF PAKISTAN: Osama bin Laden was US operator

ALSO: Bin Laden dead for "seven years."

"I've asked my counterparts in the American intelligence agencies and they have not heard of him [Osama bin Laden] since seven years."

Osama bin Laden was US operator: President Asif Ali Zardari

By Arun Kumar

May 11, 2009 "New Karala" -- Washington, May 11 : Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has alleged that elusive Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was a US operator who had tried to destabilise his late wife Benazir Bhutto's government back in 1989.

In fact, as premier Bhutto had "warned America about Osama bin Laden in 1989 with a call to then US president George H. Bush", Zardari said on NBC's Meet the Press programme Sunday.

"She rang senior Bush and asked of him: 'Are you destabilizing my government?' because he (apparently referring to bin Laden) paid the then opposition $10 million to overthrow the first woman elected (prime minister) in an Islamic country," Zardari added.

"So, we knew that he was your operator," said Zardari responding to a question about bin Laden's whereabouts.

"You'll have been there (in Afghanistan) for eight years. (So) you tell me. You lost him in Tora Bora, I didn't, I was in prison," he countered when asked where bin Laden was before hurling the allegation at Washington.

Asked if Pakistan was actively looking for bin Laden, Zardari replied: "The world is looking for him and we are part of the world look-out brigade."

Zardari also reiterated his belief that bin Laden is dead. "I have a strong feeling and I have reason to believe that because I've asked my counterparts in the American intelligence agencies and they have not heard of him since seven years."

--- IANS

Argument: Propaganda Rising to a War Cirme

Well this seems to be in part a response to me...

"By Shenonymous, May 6 at 4:41 pm #

When an erosion of freedom of speech begins with any ban, unless it is sedition to overthrow a government, banning anyone for political sentiments will eventually erode your own freedoms, make no mistake about it."

So Thomas Jefferson should have been punished for saying that revolution is a good thing every twenty years or so?

"It is the slipperiest slope imaginable. It is pernicious. That is the nature of fascism. Fascism can occur on the right as well as the fanatical left."

Okay. I don't see how any of that is relevant to what I said.

What I was referring to, context, was incitement to violence: mass murder. This has been acknowledged as constituting war crimes, such as when the result is genocide.

"Savage was not in any way suppressing any one else’s freedom."

Wasn't he? That's a (mindless) blanket defense of a long and stained career. [And irrelevant to what I said, of course. Can you at least try and keep it on point?]

"You who call for limiting Savage’s speech, and travel rights, regardless of how despicable his opinions are, would not censure the Islamists who are calling for the UN via a resolution to outlaw criticism of violent practices in the name of their religion, would you?!"

First of all, I haven't "called" for whatever it is you are saying. That a distracting misrepresentation of what I said.

I said he should be INVESTIGATED FOR WAR CRIMES. War crimes, as we well know, are not actually prosecutable if the person committing them is American, or Israeli apparently. An American Zionist like Savage is in the most priviledged and protected category on earth at the present time.

My position is that people like Yoo, Cheney, Bush, Rummy, Gonzales, et al ad nauseum -- and Savage -- shouldn't be worried about travelling anywhere at all. Their travel arrangements should long ago have been made for them, and they should be sitting in a dock being read extensive lists of war crimes charges.

It's obvious that war crimes prosecutions are only meant for the losers in any given conflict. The victors are spared nuisances like following international law.

"One wonders just how many listen to Savage’s vitriolic broadcasts, and what kind of people they are anyway? Who exactly did Savage incite to violence against Muslims?"

That would be a matter for the court to present. The US has been at war with Muslims for eight years now. The bodies are piling up quite high. Did that elude you?

"This is a claim without any substance."

Propagandists call for people to join the military and go kill the selected enemy. People listening are influenced to do so. They go over and murder the enemy as instructed. There's a case to be examined.

"Free speech" does not protect gangsters who order hits on their rivals. Free speech has numerous limitations regarding "terroristic threats," "coercion," "blackmail" etc. Telling people to commit a crime could land you in prison for "conspiracy." These are standard, rock solid legal principles.

If the same standards were applied to monsters like Goebbels and Savage, there is a case to be made that inciting war is criminal. War is criminal. The Iraq War was clearly a crime (admitted by the head of the United Nations).

You may not agree with the rationale, but this is certainly not a "claim without any substance."

"In 1946, Julius Streicher, the Editor of Der Sturmer, an anti-Semitic paper, was sentenced to hang by the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal for Nazi War Crimes. In sentencing him, the tribunal gave as cause the evidence that “with knowledge of the extermination of the Jews in the Occupied Eastern Territory, this defendant continued to write and publish his propaganda of death.” Streicher was convicted of conspiracy to commit crimes against peace and crimes against humanity. His partner in media crimes, Joseph Goebbels, managed to avoid a similar sentence by committing suicide after first killing his wife and children. "-LINK

"According to prosecutors of the United Nations war crimes tribunal for Rwanda, the answer to both questions is a forceful yes. The three men in the dock, all former Rwandan news media executives, stand accused of genocide and incitement to genocide through their use of radio broadcasts and newspapers. " -LINK

Just because you've never thought about these matters before does not mean that others have not. That's a "permicious" variety of myopia.

http://crimesofthestate.blogspot.com/

FBI TRANSLATOR SIBEL EDMONDS: OPEN CRIMINALITY, STILL...

[SEE ALSO: Previously from Sibel Edmonds]

In Congress We Trust...Not

The former FBI translator and whistleblower suggests blackmail may be at the heart of Congressional refusal to bring accountability and oversight to its own members - such as both Hastert and Harman - in matters of espionage and national security

Guest Editorial by Sibel Edmonds
Exclusive to The BRAD BLOG...

May 05, 2009 "Brad Blog" -- -I have been known to quote long-dead men in my past writings. Whether eloquently expressed thoughts by our founding fathers, or those artfully expressed by ancient Greek thinkers, these quotes have always done a better job starting or ending my thoughts - that tend to be expressed in long winding sentences. For this piece I am going to break with tradition and start with an appropriate quote from a living current senator, John Kerry: "It's a sad day when you have members of Congress who are literally criminals go undisciplined by their colleagues. No wonder people look at Washington and know this city is broken."

The people do indeed look at Washington and know that this city is 'badly' broken, Senator Kerry. The public confidence in our Congress has been declining drastically. Recent poll results highlight how the American people's trust in their Congress has hit rock bottom. A survey of progressive blogs easily confirms the rage rightfully directed at our Congress for abdicating its role of oversight and accountability. Activists scream about promised hearings that never took place - without explanation. They express outrage when investigations are dropped without any justification. And they genuinely wonder out loud why, especially after they helped secure a major victory for the Democrats. The same Democrats who had for years pointed fingers at their big bad Republican majority colleagues as the main impediment preventing them from fulfilling what was expected of them.

The recent stunning but not unexpected revelations regarding Jane Harman (D-CA) by the Congressional Quarterly provide us with a little glimpse into one of the main reasons behind the steady decline in the integrity of Congress. But the story is almost dead - ready to bite the dust, thanks to our mainstream media's insistence on burying 'real' issues or stories that delve deep into the causes of our nation's continuous downward slide. In this particular case, the 'thank you' should also be extended to certain blogosphere propagandists who, blinded by their partisanship, myopic in their assessments, and ignorant in their knowledge of the inner workings of our late Congress and intelligence agencies, helped in the post-burial cremation of this case.

Ironically but understandably, the Harman case has become one of rare unequivocal bipartisanship, when no one from either side of the partisan aisle utters a word. How many House or Senate Republicans have you heard screaming, or even better, calling for an investigation? The right wing remains silent. Some may have their hand, directly or indirectly, in the same AIPAC cookie jar. Others may still feel the heavy baggage of their own party's tainted colleagues; after all, they have had their share of Abramoffs, Hasterts and the like, silently lurking in the background, albeit dimmer every day. Some on the left, after an initial silence that easily could have been mistaken for shock, are jumping from one foot to the other, like a cat on a hot tin roof, making one excuse after another; playing the 'victims of Executive Branch eavesdropping' card, the same very 'evil doing' they happened to support vehemently. Some have been dialing their trusted guardian angels within the mainstream media and certain fairly visible alternative outlets. They need no longer worry, since these guardian angels seem to have blacked out the story, and have done so without the apparent need for much arm twisting...

Hastert Redux

I am going to rewind and take you back to September 2005, when Vanity Fair published an article, which, in addition to my case and the plight of National Security Whistleblowers, exposed the dark side of the then Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert (R-IL), and the corroborated allegations of his illegal activities involving foreign agents and interests.

Vanity Fair printed the story only after they made certain they were on sure footing in the face of any possible libel by lining up more than five credible sources, and after triple pit-bull style fact-checking. They were vindicated; Hastert did not dare go after them, nor did he ever issue any true denial. Moreover, further vindication occurred only a month ago. On April 10, 2009, The Hill reported that the Former Speaker of the House was contracted to lobby for Turkey. The Justice Department record on this deal indicates that Hastert will now be "principally involved" on a $35,000-a-month contract providing representation for Turkish interests. That seems to be the current arrangement for those serving foreign interests while on the job in Congress --- to be paid at a later date, collecting on their IOU's when they secure their positions with 'the foreign lobby.'

In a recent article for American Conservative Magazine, Philip Giraldi, former CIA officer stationed in Turkey, made the following point: "Edmonds's claims have never been pursued, presumably because there are so many skeletons in both parties' closets. She has been served with a state-secrets gag order to make sure that what she knows is never revealed, a restriction that the new regime in Washington has not lifted."

And then, he hits the nail on its head: "In Hastert's case, it certainly should be a matter of public concern that a senior elected representative who may have received money from a foreign country is now officially lobbying on its behalf. How many other congressmen might have similar relationships with foreign countries and lobbying groups, providing them with golden parachutes for their retirement?"

Congress went mum on my case after the Vanity Fair story, with, of course, the mainstream media making it very easy for them. They turned bipartisan in not pursuing the case, with the same zeal as they have, so far, not pursued the Harman case. Similarly, the mainstream media is happily letting it all disappear.

I was not aware that during the publication of the Hastert story in Vanity Fair, Jane Harman's AIPAC case was already brewing in the background. Moreover, one of the very few people in Congress who was notified about Harman was none other than Hastert --- the man himself. The same Hastert, who in addition to being one of several high-ranking officials targeted by FBI counterintelligence and counterespionage investigations, was also known to be directly involved in several other high profile scandals: from his intimate involvement in the Abramoff scandal, to the Rep. William Jefferson scandal; from his 'Land Deal' scandal - where he cashed in millions off his position while "serving", to the 2006 House Page scandal.

All for One, One for All?

How does it work? How do these people escape the consequences of accountability? Are we talking about the possible use of blackmail by the Executive Branch against Congressional representatives, as if the days of J. Edgar Hoover were never over? Cases such as NSA illegal eavesdropping come to mind, when Congressional members were briefed long before it became public, yet none took any action or even uttered a word; members of both parties. Or is it more likely to be a case of secondhand blackmail, where members of Congress watch out for each other? Or, is it a combination of the above? Regardless, we see this 'all for one, one for all' kind of solidarity in Congress when it comes to criminal conduct and scandals such as those of Hastert and Harman.

Although at an initial glance, based on the wiretapping angle, the Harman case may appear to involve blackmailing --- or a milder version, exploitation of Congress by the Executive Branch --- deeper analysis would suggest even further implications, where Congressional members themselves use the incriminating information against each other to prevent pursuit or investigation of cases that they may be directly or indirectly involved in. Let me give you an example based on the Hastert case mentioned earlier:

In 2004 and 2005 I had several meetings with Rep. Henry Waxman's (D-CA) investigative and legal staff. Two of these meetings took place inside a high-security SCIF, where details and classified information pertaining to my case and those involved could be discussed.

I was told, and at the time I believed it to be the case, that the Republican majority was preventing further action - such as holding a public hearing on my whistleblower revelations. Once the Democrats took over in 2006, that barrier was removed, or so I thought.

In March 2007, I was contacted by one of Rep. Waxman's staff people who felt responsible and conscientious enough to at least let me know that there would never be a hearing into my case by their office, or for that matter, any Democratic office in the House. Based on his/her account, in February 2007 Waxman's office was preparing the necessary ingredients for their promised hearing, but in mid-March the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, called Waxman into a meeting on the case, and after Waxman came out of that twenty-minute meeting, he told his staff 'we are no longer involved in Edmonds' case.' And so they became 'uninvolved.'

What was discussed during that meeting? The facts regarding the FBI's pursuit of Hastert, and certain other representatives, were bound to come out in any Congressional hearing into my case. Now we know that Hastert and Pelosi were both informed of Harman's role in a related case involving counterespionage investigation of AIPAC. Is it possible that Pelosi asked Waxman to lay off my case in order to protect a few of their own in an equally scandalous case? Was there a deal made between the Democratic and Republican leaders in the House to keep this and other related scandals hushed? Will we ever know the answer to these questions? Most likely not, considering the current state of our mainstream media.

And the victims remain the same: The American people who have entrusted their Congress with the role of ensuring oversight and accountability.

This kind of infestation touches everyone in Congress; one need not have a skeleton of his own to get sucked into the swamp of those infested. Does Waxman have to be a sinner to take part in the sin committed by the Hasterts and Harmans of Congress? Certainly not. On the other hand, he and others like him will abide by the un-pledged oath of 'solidarity with your party members' and 'loyalty to your dear colleagues.'

Rotten at its Core

Back to the enablers: How can we explain the continued blackout by the mainstream media, and/or, the logic-free defenses of the Harmans and Hasterts alike by the apologist spinners --- some of whom pass as the 'alternative' media? Some are committing what they rightfully accused the previous administration and their pawns of doing: cherry picking the facts, then, spin, spin, and spin until the real issue becomes blurry and unrecognizable. The conspiracy angle aimed at the timing; Porter Goss' possible beef with Jane Harman; accusing the truth divulgers, CQ sources, of being 'conspirators' with ulterior motives; portraying Harman as an outspoken vigilante on torture. And if those sound too lame to swallow, they throw in a few evil names from the foggy past of Dusty the Foggo man! If the issue and its implications weren't so serious, these spins of reality would certainly make a Pulitzer-worthy satire.

Let's take the issue of timing. First of all, the story was reported, albeit not comprehensively, by TIME magazine years ago. It took a tenacious journalist, more importantly a journalist that could have been trusted by the Intel sources to give it real coverage. It is also possible that the sources who leaked in the Harman case got fed up and disillusioned by the absence of a real investigation and decided to 'really' talk. After all, the AIPAC espionage case was dropped by the Justice Department's prosecutors within two weeks of the Harman revelations.

Same could be said about the Hastert story. At the time, many asked why the story was not told during the earlier stages of my case. It took three years for me and other FBI and DOJ sources to exhaust all channels; Congressional inquiry, IG investigation, and the courts. Those who initially were not willing to come forward and corroborate the details opened up to the Vanity Fair journalist, David Rose, in 2005.

We all can picture one of the President's men in the White House pulling an opposing Congressional member aside and whispering 'if I were you, Congressman, I'd stop pushing. I understand, as we speak, my Justice Department is looking into certain activities you've been engaged in.'

Now let's look at the 'blackmail' and 'Goss Plot' angles. Of course the 'blackmail' scenario is possible; in fact, highly possible. We all can picture one of the President's men in the White House pulling an opposing Congressional member aside and whispering 'if I were you, Congressman, I'd stop pushing. I understand, as we speak, my Justice Department is looking into certain activities you've been engaged in.'

We all can imagine, easily, a high-ranking Justice Department official having a 'discreet' meeting with a member of Congress who's been pushing for a certain investigation of certain department officials for criminal deeds, and saying, 'dear Congresswoman, we are aware of your role in a certain scandal, and are still pondering whether we should turn this into a direct investigation of you and appoint a special prosecutor…'

But, let's not forget, the misuse of incriminating information, for the purpose of blackmail, does not turn the practitioner of the wrongful deed into a victim, nor does it make the wrongful criminal deed less wrong. Instead of spinning the story, taking away attention from the facts in hand, and making Harman a victim, we must focus on this case, on Harman, as an example of a very serious disease that has infected our Congress for far too long. Those who have been entrusted with the oversight and accountability of our government cannot do so if they are vulnerable to such blackmail from the very same people they are overseeing…Period.

Those who have been elected to represent the people and their interests cannot pursue their own greed and ambitions by engaging in criminal or unethical activities against the interests of the same people they've sworn to represent, and then be given a pass.

As for far-reaching ties such as Harman's stand on torture, or a specific beef with former CIA Director Porter Goss, or wild shots from the hip in bringing up mafia-like characters such as Dusty Foggo; please don't make us laugh! Are we talking about the same Hawkish Pro-Secrecy Jane Harman here?! Harman's staunch support of NSA Wiretapping of Americans, the FISA Amendment of 2008, the Patriot ACT, the War on Iraq, and many other activities on the Civil Liberties' No-No list, is widely recognized by almost everyone, apparently, but the authors of the recent apologist spin.

And, let's not forget to add her own long-term cozy relationship with AIPAC, and the large donations she's received from various other AIPAC-related pro-Israeli PACs. To these certain 'wannabe' journalists, driven by far from pure agenda(s), shame on you; as for honor-worthy vigilant activists out there: watch out for these impostors with their newly gained popularity among those tainted in Washington, and take a hard look at whose agendas they are serving as a mouthpiece for.

Despite a certain degree of exposure, cases such as Harman's and Hastert's, involving corruption of public officials, seem to meet the same dead-end. Criminal conduct, by powerful foreign entities, against our national interest, is given a pass, as was recently proven by the abandonment of the AIPAC spy case. The absence of real investigative journalism and the pattern of blackout by our mainstream media seem now to have been almost universally accepted as a fact of life.

Pursuit of cases such as mine, via cosmetically available channels, has been, and continues to be proven futile for whistleblowers.

Therefore, you may want to ask, why in the world am I writing this piece? Because more and more people --- although not nearly enough --- are coming to the realization that our system is rotten at it's core; that in many cases we have been trying to deal with the symptoms rather than the cause.

I, like many others, believed that changing the Congressional majority in 2006 was going to bring about some of the needed changes; the pursuit of accountability being one. We were proven wrong. In 2008, many genuinely bought in to the promise of change, and thus far, they've been let down.

These experiences are disheartening, surely, but they are also eye-opening. I do see many vigilant activists who continue the fight. As long as that's the case, there is hope. More people realize that real change will require not replacing one or two or three, but many more. More people are coming to understand that the road to achieving government of the people passes through a Congress, but not the one currently occupied by the many crusty charlatans who represent only self-interest --- achieved by representing the interests of the few, rather than the majority of the people of this nation. And so I write.

Here I go again, rather than ending this in a long paragraph or two, I will let another long-gone man do it shortly and effectively: "If we have Senators and Congressmen there that can't protect themselves against the evil temptations of lobbyists, we don't need to change our lobbies, we need to change our representatives." - Will Rogers

==

Sibel Edmonds is a former FBI translator and noted whistleblower who has been under a years-long "gag order", prohibiting her from discussing many details of her allegations of corruption and espionage gleaned during her time at the FBI, due to the continuing "States Secrets privilege" assertions by the Executive Branch. Her own story has been partially documented over the last several years in several different media outlets, including a lead story on CBS' 60 Minutes, a detailed feature in Vanity Fair and, over the years, in a number of exclusive articles here at The BRAD BLOG. She is the Founder and President of the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition.

Israeli Spying OK'd: Obama's Injustice Department Exposed

[Editor's Note: Protecting the guilty is job one for Obama's "Justice" Department. Obama is a puppet of certain entrenched interests. Such as this one.

The AIPAC spying case is not the most egregious or most dangerous case of Israeli spying that has gone unpunished. Look out for more aggressive Israeli activity on US soil now that it is officially sanctioned by the white house.]

New York Times

U.S. to Drop Spy Case Against Pro-Israel Lobbyists

By NEIL A. LEWIS and DAVID JOHNSTON

Published: May 1, 2009

WASHINGTON — A case that began four years ago with the tantalizing and volatile premise that officials of a major pro-Israel lobbying organization were illegally trafficking in sensitive national security information collapsed on Friday as prosecutors asked that all charges be withdrawn.

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Kevin Wolf/Associated Press

Keith Weissman during his arraignment in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va., in August 2005.

Ken Wolf/Associated Press

Steven J. Rosen, left, with his attorney Abbe Lowell at U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va., in August 2005.

From the beginning, the case against the lobbyists for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee was highly unusual. The two, Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman, were charged under the World War I-era Espionage Act, accused of improperly providing to their colleagues, journalists and Israeli diplomats sensitive information they had acquired by speaking with American policy makers.

Some lawyers at the Justice Department had always had significant reservations about the case, some current and former officials said. They believed that Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman had acted imprudently, but doubted that either man should be criminally prosecuted. Nevertheless, F.B.I. agents poured substantial resources into the case, and the decision to seek a dismissal infuriated many within the law enforcement agency.

But several current and former officials said the decision to abandon the case was no surprise. With adverse judicial rulings making the prosecution increasingly risky, lawyers in the United States Attorney’s Office in Alexandria, Va., and at Justice Department headquarters met on several occasions in recent weeks, agonizing over whether to go forward with the trial, which was scheduled to begin June 2.

Last week, officials from the F.B.I.’s Washington office who investigated the case made their final pleas to keep the case alive, arguing that there was enough evidence to persuade a jury to find the two men guilty. But prosecutors — including some who had worked on the case for years — disagreed.

Joseph Persichini Jr., the top official at the F.B.I.’s Washington office, praised the work of the F.B.I. agents on the case, and said he was “disappointed” in the decision to drop the charges.

The case had raised delicate political issues about the role played by American Jewish supporters of Israel and their close, behind-the-scenes relationships with top government officials. Advocates of civil liberties and of open government asserted that the defendants were being singled out for activities that were part of the accepted and routine way that American policy on Israel and the Middle East had been formulated for years, with people exchanging information.

The decision to drop the case comes just days before Aipac is scheduled to begin its annual policy conference in Washington, which has often served as an advertisement of its influence. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel is scheduled to address the event via satellite.

Lawyers for Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman said in a statement that while they were pleased at the decision, the government had erred in bringing the case in the first place and had caused great damage to their clients. Aipac dismissed the men early in 2004 after prosecutors presented some of their evidence to an Aipac lawyer. The group later agreed to subsidize their legal costs.

The Justice Department said that the decision to drop the case had been made solely by career prosecutors in Alexandria, and that senior officials of the Obama administration had acted only to approve the recommendation.

Several other officials said, however, that while senior political appointees at the Justice Department did not direct subordinates to drop the case, they were heavily involved in the deliberations. These officials said David S. Kris, the newly appointed chief of the department’s national security division, and Dana J. Boente, the interim United States attorney in Alexandria, had conferred regularly with prosecutors and ultimately decided to accept the recommendation to abandon the case. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. was informed and raised no objections.

The case would have been the first prosecution under the espionage law in which no documents were involved and in which the defendants were not officials who provided the information, but the private citizens who received it from them in conversations.

While Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman trafficked in facts, ideas and rumor, they had done so with the full awareness of officials in the United States and Israel, who found they often helped lubricate the wheels of decision-making between two close, but sometimes quarrelsome, friends.

The move by the government to end the case came in a motion filed with the Federal Court in Alexandria.

In pretrial maneuvering, the prosecution suffered several setbacks in rulings from the trial judge, T. S. Ellis III, that were upheld by a federal appeals court in Richmond, Va. Judge Ellis rejected several government efforts to conceal classified information if the case went to trial. Moreover, he ruled that the government could prevail only if it met a high standard; he said prosecutors would have to demonstrate that Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman knew that their distribution of the information would harm United States national security.

The investigation of Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman also surfaced recently in news reports that Representative Jane Harman, a California Democrat long involved in intelligence matters, was overheard on a government wiretap discussing the case. As reported by Congressional Quarterly, which covers Capitol Hill, and The New York Times, Ms. Harman was overheard agreeing with an Israeli intelligence operative to try to intercede with Bush administration officials to obtain leniency for Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman in exchange for help in persuading Democratic leaders to make her chairwoman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Ms. Harman has denied interceding for Mr. Rosen and Mr. Weissman, and has expressed anger that she was wiretapped. She is to be among the featured speakers at the Aipac conference next week.

Over government objections, Judge Ellis had also ruled that the defense could call as witnesses several senior Bush administration foreign policy officials to demonstrate that what occurred was part of the continuing process of information trading and did not involve anything nefarious. The defense lawyers were planning to call as witnesses former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; Stephen J. Hadley, the former national security adviser; and several others. Government policy makers indicated they were clearly uncomfortable with senior officials’ testifying in open court over policy deliberations.

The government’s motion to dismiss said the government was obliged take a final review of the case to consider “the likelihood that classified information will be revealed at trial, any damage to the national security that might result from a disclosure of classified information and the likelihood the government would prevail at trial.”

More Articles in US » A version of this article appeared in print on May 2, 2009, on page A11 of the New York edition.

O

REUTERS CONFIRMS: "New flu strain is a genetic mix"

"The new flu virus contains DNA typical to avian, swine and human viruses, including elements from European and Asian swine viruses."

[Editor's Note: This makes it highly unlikely to occur in nature and highly likely (certain) to have originated in a laboratory as some kind of bio-weapon. Who will investigate and prosecute those responsible for this murderous bio-weapon, and its release into the populations of the world?

FACTBOX: New flu strain is a genetic mix

Fri Apr 24, 2009 1:31pm EDT

(Reuters) - A deadly swine flu never seen before has broken out in Mexico, killing at least 16 people and raising fears of a possible pandemic. World Health Organization officials said the flu has killed about 60 Mexicans.

Here are some facts about the virus and flu viruses in general:

* The World Health Organization has confirmed at least some of the cases are a never-before-seen strain of influenza A virus, carrying the designation H1N1.

* Although it's called swine flu, this new strain is not infecting pigs and has never been seen in pigs. The threat is person to person transmission.

* It is genetically different from the fully human H1N1 seasonal influenza virus that has been circulating globally for the past few years. The new flu virus contains DNA typical to avian, swine and human viruses, including elements from European and Asian swine viruses.

* The World Health Organization is concerned but says it is too soon to change the threat level warning for a pandemic-- a global epidemic of a new and dangerous flu.

* When a new strain of flu starts infecting people, and when it acquires the ability to pass from person to person, it can spark a pandemic. The last pandemic was in 1968 and killed about a million people.

* Seven people in the United States have been diagnosed with the new strain. All have recovered, but the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention expects more cases.

* Flu viruses mutate constantly, which is why the flu vaccine is changed every year, and they can swap DNA in a process called reassortment. Most animals can get flu, but viruses rarely pass from one species to another.

* From December 2005 through February 2009, 12 cases of human infection with swine influenza were confirmed. All but one person had contact with pigs. There was no evidence of human-to-human transmission in those cases.

* Symptoms of swine flu in people are similar to those of seasonal influenza -- sudden onset of fever, coughing, muscle aches and extreme tiredness. Swine flu appears to cause more diarrhea and vomiting than normal flu.

* Seasonal flu kills between 250,000 and 500,000 people globally in an average year.

* In 1976 a new strain of swine flu started infecting people and worried U.S. health officials started widespread vaccination. More than 40 million people were vaccinated. But several cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome, a severe and sometime fatal condition that can be linked to some vaccines, caused the U.S. government to stop the program. The incident led to widespread distrust of vaccines in general.

(Reporting by Maggie Fox)

New swine flu feared to be weaponized strain -Wayne Madsen

New swine flu feared to be weaponized strain
By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Apr 27, 2009

According to two mainstream media journalists, one in Mexico City and the other in Jakarta, who spoke to WMR on background, they are convinced that the current outbreak of a new strain of swine flu in Mexico and some parts of the United States is the result of the introduction of a human-engineered pathogen that could result in a widespread global pandemic, with potentially catastrophic consequences for domestic and international travel and commerce.

The journalists have been told by top officials of the United Nations and the World Health Organization (WHO) about the grave dangers posed by the new and deadly swine flu strain, known as A-H1N1. This flu, never before seen by scientists, has already killed up to 68 people in Mexico and has forced the cancellation of public events, including sports matches and concerts, and the closure of schools, libraries, and museums. Eight cases have been reported in Texas and California. Doctors are examining several students at a Queens high school in New York who displayed symptoms similar to those experienced by swine flu patients in Mexico.

Our Mexico City source said a top scientist for the United Nations, who has examined the outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Africa, as well as HIV/AIDS victims, concluded that H1N1 possesses certain transmission “vectors” that suggest that the new flu strain has been genetically-manufactured as a military biological warfare weapon. The UN expert believes that Ebola, HIV/AIDS, and the current A-H1N1 swine flu virus are biological warfare agents.

Past swine flu outbreaks have been spread from pigs to humans, who then passed the flu on to other humans. However, with A-H1N1, there have been no reported infections of pigs. In fact, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), A-H1N1 has gene segments from North American swine, bird and human flu strains and a segment from Eurasian swine flu. Costa Rica, Brazil, and Peru have issued alerts to check all incoming passengers from Mexico at border crossings, airports, and seaports for symptoms of the swine flu.

WHO is convening an emergency session of its top medical experts in Geneva and is set to declare H1N1 a “public health event of international concern.” It is reported that WHO will recommend travel restrictions to and from areas where the flu has been reported, including Mexico City and the states of Mexico, Hidalgo, San Luis Potosí and Oaxaca.

Our Jakarta source said WHO officials are afraid that the presence of gene segments from dreaded H5N1 bird flu in the A-H1N1 swine flu strain could mean that the new swine flu strain was engineered to “jump species.”

WMR has been informed that the CDC and U.S. Army dug up the body of an Inuit woman who died in 1918 in Brevig Mission, Alaska from an outbreak of Spanish flu. The influenza pandemic that year killed up to 100 million people worldwide in an 18-month period. Brevig Mission saw 72 of its 80 residents die within five days, the worst case recorded anywhere in the world. WMR has been told the genetic material recovered by the U.S. government from the corpse of the Inuit woman provided the basis for the development of the H5N1, or bird (avian), flu strain at the U.S. Army Medical Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) laboratory at Fort Detrick, Maryland, the point of origin for the Ames strain of anthrax used in the 2001 bio-war attacks against the U.S. Congress and the media.

The fear in Asia is that if the A-H1N1 pandemic spreads to the United States, travel to and from the country will be all but shut down.

The following are the symptoms associated with A-H1N1:

· cough

· fever

· sore throat

· shortness of breath

· muscle and joint pain

The drugs Tamiflu and Relenza are seen as the most effective against A-H1N1.

Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report.