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--- Begin Message ---Please send as far and wide as possible. Thanks, Robert Sterling Editor, The Konformist http://www.konformist.comDemocrats attack new bill over Net neutrality By Anne Broache News.com CNet WASHINGTON--Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday assailed a new telecommunications bill for allegedly failing to preserve Net neutrality principles. The Republican-backed proposal unveiled this week would give the Federal Communications Commission the authority to go after individual violations of end-to-end connectivity principles, but it does not include a weighty set of regulations that all broadband providers must follow. But that's not nearly sufficiently regulatory, the Democrats charged, pointing to the section of the measure that prohibits the FCC from making any new rules related to Net neutrality. Many technology firms, including Microsoft and Google, have also backed more regulations. Net neutrality, also known as network neutrality, is the idea that the companies that own the broadband pipes should not be able to configure their networks in a way that plays favorites--allowing them, for example, to transmit their own services at faster speeds, or to charge Net content and application companies a fee for equally fast delivery. "The bill before us effectively condones online discrimination and ties the hands of the FCC," Rep. Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, said at a lengthy hearing that included testimony from the telecommunications, cable, broadcast and Internet sectors. Telecommunications and cable executives say they deserve the right to create a tiered Internet system. A two-tiered system could, for instance, guarantee that all Web sites would be accessible, but prioritize streaming video provided by the pipe's owner or business partner. Michigan Democrat John Dingell saw the fees in a different light, saying they amounted to "private taxation of the Internet" an idea that he said troubled him. "The ones that get hurt are the young innovators, the garage innovators, the small-business innovators, the ones that have not achieved the great success of the Googles of the world," added Rep. Jay Inslee, a Washington Democrat. Rep. Rick Boucher, a Virginia Democrat, suggested that the bill would benefit from "a provision that says that if a fast lane is necessary, perhaps for video or for gaming, then all applications of a similar kind...should be entitled to fast-lane access without having to pay a charge." But one of the new bill's chief sponsors, Texas Republican Joe Barton, said he still didn't think it necessary to impose more specific Net neutrality regulations until the feuding parties can agree on a definition of the concept. (In a conference call with reporters on Wednesday, Barton dismissed concerns about Net neutrality as overblown.) Barton polled each of eight speakers appearing on the first panel at Thursday's hearing for a "concise verbal definition" and, after receiving an array of responses, implored them to "let your lawyers work on it and send it to us in writing." ***** US to test 700-tonne explosive Mar 30, 2006 AFP The US military plans to detonate a 700 tonne explosive charge in a test called "Divine Strake" that will send a mushroom cloud over Las Vegas, a senior defense official said. "I don't want to sound glib here but it is the first time in Nevada that you'll see a mushroom cloud over Las Vegas since we stopped testing nuclear weapons," said James Tegnelia, head of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency. Tegnelia said the test was part of a US effort to develop weapons capable of destroying deeply buried bunkers housing nuclear, chemical or biological weapons. "We have several very large penetrators we're developing," he told defense reporters. "We also have -- are you ready for this - a 700-tonne explosively formed charge that we're going to be putting in a tunnel in Nevada," he said. "And that represents to us the largest single explosive that we could imagine doing conventionally to solve that problem," he said. The aim is to measure the effect of the blast on hard granite structures, he said. "If you want to model these weapons, you want to know from a modeling point of view what is the ideal best condition you could ever set up in a conventional weapon -- what's the best you can do. "And this gets at the best point you could get on a curve. So it allows us to predict how effective these kinds of weapons ... would be," he said. He said the Russians have been notified of the test, which is scheduled for the first week of June at the Nevada test range. "We're also making sure that Las Vegas understands," Tegnelia said. *** Published on Friday, March 31, 2006 by the Associated Press Plans for Massive Blast in Nevada Draw Fire by Kathleen Hennessey LAS VEGAS - Plans for a Pentagon-led experiment that involves detonating 700 tons of explosives in the desert drew criticism from state leaders and a disarmament activist. The explosion scheduled for June 2 at the Nevada Test Site is part of an effort to design a weapon that can penetrate solid rock formations in which a country might store nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction. "I am concerned that tests of this magnitude have been planned without providing Nevadans with any information about the possible impact on their health or safety," said Demcratic Sen. Minority Leader Harry Reid in a statement Thursday. Nevada Test Site spokesman Darwin Morgan said the test will be conducted about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, near the center of the former nuclear testing site. The test, named "Divine Strake," will involve nearly 40 times the amount of commercial ammonium nitrate and fuel oil explosive set off in the largest open-air, non-nuclear blast at the site to date. In 2002, 18 tons of explosives were set off at the Nevada Test Site. "This is nothing that's out of the bounds for us. That's what our expertise is in," he said. Morgan said the site obtained the required state approvals and air quality permits in January. Officials from the National Nuclear Security Administration, which operates the site, alerted the state's congressional delegation and state government in December. The Nevada Department of Administration responded with a letter stating: "Your proposal is not in conflict with state plans, goals or objectives." No elected officials responded to the notice until Thursday, Morgan said. The test site is not required to seek public comment, he said. "Given the level of contamination in areas where nuclear tests were conducted, I have real concerns about the dust and other pollutants that will be released into the air as a result of this explosion," said U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley. Disarmament activist Pete Litster said tests at the site violate international law. Litster, executive director of the Shundahai Network, said the site belongs to the Western Shoshone Indian tribe. ***** Whitney: She's Broke, and On the Run Thursday, March 30, 2006 By Roger Friedman FoxNews.com Troubled pop superstar Whitney Houston once a bigger seller than Madonna is running out of cash. Insiders tell me she is literally broke, with no current income and huge expenses. Not only that: Whitney's life is such a dismal mess that, according to sources, her daughter, Bobbi Kristina, is living with Whitney's brother Gary and sister-in-law, Pat, close to Houston's home in Atlanta. And it just keeps getting worse: A local Atlanta lawyer told me yesterday that he recently had housemates Whitney and `80s pop star Cherelle (real name Cheryl Week Norton) evicted from the luxury townhouse he'd rented to the latter last fall. Houston's name was not on the lease, but the landlord says she was living there and has witnesses to back him up. Now the landlord says he's about to sue both women for about $17,000 in back rent and about $8,000 in damages for the mess they left behind. That includes carpets and furniture ruined by burn marks and broken windows. The papers will be filed shortly, he tells me. When the landlord went to speak to Houston about the noise and filth emanating from the townhouse, he told me the singer appeared "disheveled" and her voice was gravelly. On the plus side: "She was very pleasant." Houston still owns a beautiful home in suburban Atlanta, but moved in with Cherelle at least temporarily last fall. Houston and Norton, according to my sources, abandoned the befouled townhouse and moved to the Atlanta neighborhood of Buckhead. She has since returned to her Alpharetta home, where husband Bobby Brown has also alighted after having been last seen partying in Los Angeles. There, Brown told friends alternately that Houston was pregnant and that they were divorcing. Sometimes -- let's face it -- we have fun tweaking the stars. But that's not the case with Whitney Houston. I've known her well since 1989. She was once a beautiful girl with the greatest voice in the world and an unlimited future. What's happened to her in the last few years is the worst kind of show business tragedy. Friends of hers tell me they fear for her life. This is a monumental disaster for which no one wants to take responsibility. It doesn't help that this week, Whitney was sold out by her sister- in-law, Tina Brown (not to be confused with the journalist Tina Brown). Tina's brother is Houston's often-arrested and imprisoned former pop star husband Bobby. Tina sold the most salacious stories she could muster to "The National Enquirer" and the "UK Sun" tabloid, along with pictures that suggest a horrifying saga of Whitney's drug abuse. Her take could be as high as $200,000. There has been some suggestion that Brown, needing cash, put her up to it. Ironies abound: First, Whitney entered rehab one year ago. Obviously, it didn't work. And second, sources say that Whitney took care of Tina Brown's children, said to be six in total, while she was in rehab herself. Even at her worst, Houston, friends say, has tried to keep her husband's relatives happy. "There are 30 members of the Brown family," says an insider, "and they've all sponged off of Whitney." That's the problem. Generous to a fault, Houston has now managed to spend most of her earnings taking care of her own family and Brown's. She has two main assets: a five-acre estate in posh Mendham, N.J., assessed in 2005, according to public records, at $5.6 million. In 2003, she also purchased a large home in Alpharetta for $1.8 million, almost all of which was borrowed. "There's no money," says an insider. "She's really broke." The Mendham property has become to Houston what Neverland is to Michael Jackson: a bank account against which she can draw loans. Unlike Jackson, however, Houston does not have investments like the Beatles catalog to fall back on now that she's in trouble. Public records show Whitney has borrowed millions of dollars and taken out many staggering mortgages in her time enough to give Michael Jackson a run for his money. The original Mendham home, records show, was bought in 1987 for $2.2 million; Houston borrowed $1.4 million to pay for it. In 1998, as part of a refinancing plan, she took a $6.45 million mortgage that involved buying a second home in Mendham around the corner from the first. It also appears that she bought a condominium in North Bergen, N.J., simultaneously with a $3.4 million mortgage. In May 2003, Houston obtained a $2 million, 15-year mortgage against the Mendham house. At the same time, records show she also took out a second equity loan against the same property for $500,000. Three months later, there's a new $700,000 mortgage for a different property. Houston's financial problems are simple, and they were easy to predict. She is a singer, not a songwriter. Unlike Celine Dion, Mariah Carey and Madonna, Houston does not write her own material. Or, to be more exact, she never attached her name to her hits and took a cut of the publishing. She has only five song credits on ASCAP's Web site. This is rare among modern singers: Almost all of them including Barbra Streisand, were smart enough to write some hits of their own. And if they didn't, like Bette Midler and Cher, they made their stage show a central source of income. One reason Mariah Carey has not had to tour extensively is that she has her name on dozens of hits. It's kind of surprising that Houston fell into this trap. She's watched both her mother, Cissy Houston, and cousin, Dionne Warwick, neither of whom wrote their own hits, tour endlessly every year and work to keep up with their expenses. You'd think she would have learned something from their experiences. What's evident is that through the years, Houston has had inadequate advice and counsel. Depending on just record sales to get her through bad times was a mistake. While Houston had many bestsellers, they are well in the past. Simply singing a hit record is not enough if you're not going to save your money. The real profit in the music business comes from touring and publishing. Houston has toured very little in her career. And with no songs on her resume, she has no perennial moneymakers on which to rely, like Carey's "Vision of Love" and Madonna's "Like A Virgin." So Whitney, with dozens of dependents and no income, is indeed broke. News reports claimed she got a $100 million recording contract from Arista Records in 2001. In reality, she received a $20 million advance. Take half off from taxes, it's $10 million. Another $2 million might come off in fees. Then deduct the costs of her 2002 flop album, "Just Whitney" which sold just 540,000 copies and her 2004 Christmas album, now ranked on Amazon.com at 68,000. Suddenly, it's not so much. And that doesn't take into account her notorious lifestyle. And I'm not talking about the first-class airfare, the nice cars, clothes or jewelry. Houston has frittered away millions of dollars living on the edge and being irresponsible. Had she not entered into a spiraling down world of drug addiction, and kept recording and touring, she would be at age 42 a very wealthy woman with a reputation as the best singer of her generation. That none of that has come to pass is shameful. Houston's next big problem is going to be with Child Protective Services in Alpharetta. Even though Bobbi Kristina lives away from home, there will no doubt be a new investigation based on the "Enquirer" story. If 50 percent of the report is deemed true, Houston and Brown could easily lose their daughter for good. One wonders if that will be enough of a wake-up call for the singer who once represented the best of America's youth. ***** Actor & Director Ed Asner Shares 9/11 Concerns Highlights story of hijackers still alive and well Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones/Prison Planet.com | March 31 2006 Award winning director, producer and actor Ed Asner is the latest high profile public figure to voice his support for Charlie Sheen's stance on 9/11 and share his own concerns about 9/11, the war in Iraq and the Neo-Cons. Speaking to The Alex Jones Show Asner, best known for his Emmy- winning role as Lou Grant on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, echoed Charlie Sheen's sentiments in stating, "I became suspicious of 9/11 on the day it happened." "I will always be that suspect of it and challenge it and challenge various points of it," said Asner. Asner agreed that the official story of 9/11 and the Kean Commission investigation was a fable and a fraud. "I do not buy it and I would challenge it, I know all of these points....the standing down," said Asner. Asner questioned why no authority figures had been fired for their inability to prevent 9/11. "Nobody in high office has ever paid the penalty for keeping us unprepared for 9/11, no one has paid the price and I cite the fact that Abu Ghraib was another typical example of the way this government works," said Asner. "It's very easy to think of 9/11 to think of being yet another cause of being able to generate war in this country, " said Asner as he compared 9/11 to past examples of manufactured provocations such as the Gulf of Tonkin incident, the attack on the Maine and Pearl Harbor. "Many of the purported hijackers are living persons elsewhere," said Asner highlighting a story reported by BBC and others that several of the so-called perpetrators of 9/11 visited their embassies in protest that they had been identified as terrorists. Asked who gained from 9/11 Asner answered, "Certainly the military has, Halliburton, Brown and Root, Mr. Cheney's old outfit....the oil companies of course now with record highs, and the White House is of course involved with oil and the military and always has been." Asner doubted that another terror attack needed to be staged in order to accomplish more of the same agenda. "They don't have to have another attack, if they indeed launched the first one they have screwed up our country so badly they could just let us sink in upon ourselves." Asner questioned why CNN chose to cancel his scheduled spot on Showbiz Tonight. After speaking to inside sources within CNN we were able to confirm that the order came down from a higher office to "kill" the story, despite the fact that the issue had generated the most interest Showbiz Tonight had ever encountered. Asner is a true humanitarian and is an activist in the fields of missing US PoW's, depleted uranium, which Asner suggested was a deliberate population reduction method, and the fight to get the FDA to eliminate deadly thimerosal mercury additives to vaccines. His public stance on 9/11 and his support of Charlie Sheen helps in the ongoing effort to encourage public figures with large media platforms to step forward and become prominent voices for the 9/11 truth movement. ***** THE NEW WORLD OIL ORDER: HUGO CHAVEZ TELLS BBC, WE HAVE MORE OIL THAN SAUDI ARABIA Greg Palast Reporting for BBC Newsnight TV Monday, April 3, 2006 In an exclusive interview with GREG PALAST, Hugo Chávez declares a new oil order. Venezuela officially demands OPEC recognize his nation's reserves as largest. Tonight, BBC Newsnight will kick off its Latin America Week Special with Palast's exclusive report from Venezuela. You can watch the BBC Newsnight Report live at 5.30 pm EST at Newsnight's website: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/default.stm (The report will remain viewable for 24 hours). Read below about BBC Newsnight revelations ... NO MORE CHEAP OIL SAYS CHAVEZ BBC Newsnight Monday April 3, 2006 If you thought high oil prices were just a blip think again. In an exclusive interview with Greg Palast for BBC Newsnight the Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has ruled out any return to the era of cheap oil. The colourful Venezuelan leader hosts the OPEC meeting on June 1 in Caracas and he will ask OPEC to set $50 a barrel - the average price last year - as the long term level. During the 1990s the price of oil had hovered around the $20 mark falling as low as $10 a barrel in early 1999. Chavez told Newsnight "we're trying to find an equilibrium. The price of oil could remain at the low level of $50. That's a fair price it's not a high price". Hugo Chavez will have added clout at this OPEC meeting. US Department of Energy analyses seen by Newsnight show that at $50 a barrel Venezuela - not Saudi Arabia - will have the biggest oil reserves in OPEC. Venezuela has vast deposits of extra heavy oil in the Orinoco. Traditionally these have not been counted because at $20 a barrel they were too expensive to exploit - but at $50 a barrel melting them into liquid petroleum becomes extremely profitable. The US DoE report shows that at today's prices Venezuela's oil reserves are bigger than those of the entire Middle East including Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Iran and Iraq. The US DoE also identifies Canada as another future oil superpower. Venezuela's deposits alone could extend the oil age for another 100 years. The US DoE estimates that Chavez controls 1.3 trillion barrels of oil - more than the entire declared oil reserves of the rest of the planet. Hugo Chavez told Newsnight's Greg Palast that "Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. In the future Venezuela won't have any more oil - but that's in the 22nd century. Venezuela has oil for 200 years." Chavez will ask the OPEC meeting in June to formally accept that Venezuela's reserves are now bigger than Saudi Arabia's. Chavez's increased muscle will not go down well in Washington. In 2002 the Bush administration welcomed an attempted coup against Chavez. He told Newsnight that the Americans had organised it in an attempt to get hold of Venezuela's oil. Ironically by invading Iraq George Bush has boosted oil prices and effectively transferred billions of dollars from American consumers to Chavez. Up to $200 million a day - half of it from the US - is flooding into Caracas. Chavez is spending this on building infrastructure and increasing the minimum wage and improving health and education in the poor ranchos which surround the cities. As a result even his opponents accept that Chavez is extremely popular and will easily win the next Presidential election in December. Chavez is also spending billions in the rest of Latin America - exchanging contracts for oil tankers and infrastructure projects and buying up loans in Argentina and Brazil. He has made cheap oil deals with Ecuador and the Caribbean. He has also spent some of the dollars which have come in from the US supporting Fidel Castro in Cuba. In return Cuba has supplied the thousands of doctors and teachers who are transforming conditions in the barrios of Caracas. Washington accuses Chavez of buying influence in Latin America. The Newsnight team had to endure the long speeches and marathon six hour TV shows which Hugo Chavez delights in. Chavez posed for Newsnight posing with the sword of Simon Bolivar the 18th century liberator who drove out Spanish imperialists from South America. The symbolism was clear but behind the showman is a clever political brain. Chavez has not invaded any foreign countries. He does not have secret prisons at home or abroad. Chavez has repeatedly won democratic elections and the opposition operates freely although some members have been charged with accepting illegal foreign donations. Nonetheless George Bush's administration repeatedly targets Chavez on human rights and finances his opponents. Earlier this year US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld compared Chavez to Hitler - because he was elected democratically - and last year the influential American evangelist Pat Robertson called for his assassination. Robertson later apologized and said that he did not "necessarily" have to be killed so long as he was kidnapped by American special forces. Chavez told Newsnight that he was still concerned that George Bush had not learnt the lessons of Iraq and would order an invasion to try to secure Venezuela's oil. "I pray this will not happen because US soldiers will bite the dust and so will we, Venezuelans". He warned that any such attempt would lead to a prolonged guerilla war and an end to oil production. "The US people should know there will be no oil for anyone". Chavez does not accept Tony Blair's criticism of him for lining up with Fidel Castro. He told Newsnight "if someone is sleeping together it is Bush and Blair. They share the same bed." -- Also see The Guardian story about the report: http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1745467,00.html Read, "The Assassination of Hugo Chavez," in Greg Palast's new book, "ARMED MADHOUSE: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War" to be released by Penguin Dutton June 6 (US) and July 7 (UK). Pre-order it today or donate to Palast Investigative Fund for a personally signed copy at: http://www.gregpalast.com/armedmadhouse/preorder.html View Palast's investigative reports for Harper's Magazine and BBC Television's Newsnight at http://www.GregPalast.com Special thanks to Matt Pascarella, Leni von Eckardt, and Richard Rowley for their research and production assistance on this report. The Konformist must make a request for donations via Paypal, at Paypal.com. If you can and desire, please feel free to send money to help The Konformist through the following email address: [EMAIL PROTECTED] If you are interested in a free subscription to The Konformist Newswire, please visit: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/konformist Or, e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the subject: "I NEED 2 KONFORM!!!" (Okay, you can use something else, but it's a kool catch phrase.) Visit the Klub Konformist at Yahoo!: http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/klubkonformist Yahoo! Groups Links
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