Tuesday, April 21, 2009

A PRESIDENTIAL POLICY (Updates)

Well, there's a rumble growing.

Since last Friday the Rubiconworks website has received more than 45,000 visitors and close to 8,000 clicks through multiple pages. We have received well over twenty bona fide requests for review copies. A few examples are The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones, the BBC, two members of congress and one large-city mayor's office. We're all still waiting to hear from the great folks at Bluemark Films as to when we'll see a trailer for CoLLapse but it should be soon. I have not seen a single clip yet but I was there for all of the filming... Trust me on that. The Director, Chris Smith, is a genius, as his two prior wins at Sundance testify. I don't want to spoil the movie for you guys but the filming was one of the most intense things I've ever experienced. It turns out now that I was in this dark, dank, cold basement for four days instead of three. We just shot a few last scenes last week. I do know this -- CoLLapse is a serious, serious motion picture. So I'm eagerly waiting to see something just like the rest of you...

What's before us now is the challenge of proving to the world on May 1 that there are a lot of people around the world who understand what we're facing. Breaking the NY Times list means that cartelized mainstream media will have to finally acknowledge all of us. That will mean that so many who have never had the chance to hear the message of Peak Oil/Sustainability will finally hear it. Who knows how many lives that might save. That's what I would like the blog that bears my name to focus on now. The more people read the book, the more will step out of the Old Paradigm, giving all of us a better shot. We can save lives by figuring out the best-possible viral marketing campaign for the book. Think global and local.

The Bear Market-sucker's-manipulated-pumpanddump rally ends shortly -- right on time. The only thing I missed in recent predictions was $2,000 gold, but I think I know why. I've noticed two huge gold sales recently. One for 140 metric tons and another for (I think) 30 metric tons. There can only be so many tranches of that size. That's around six million ounces. No wonder the price has taken a hit as fools sold their gold and threw money back in the markets. I smell the end of the gold cabal. They've had to dip into their reserves... the real thing.

I have seriously missed communing with the loyalists, giants and friends who frequent here. But I'm back now until the real action starts. Then I suspect I'm going to be busy again. After I saw the responses to the book release earlier today I've been like way out of tune; cranky, ill-at-ease. I needed to write to you. I told you that I had to check out a while to finish a couple of jobs... I guess you'll forgive me. But it's great to be back. Let's start feeding each other on how we get as many copies sold in the shortest period possible.

Do we really want to change the world -- or just play with it a little?

MCR

*********************************************************************************

From Jenna Orkin:

A few days ago, Businessman sent in the following comment:


Great article, Jenna! Since you brought up the subject of 9/11 and scientific panels, here's a 10-minute video from Denmark featuring an interview with scientist Niels Harrit, stating they've now determined through scientific testing of the WTC dust, that there were more than 10 tons of thermite explosives in the World Trade Center: Click Here for the Video ********************************************************************************
JO's response:

Businessman, if you were not the wonderful loyal helpful guy you are, I would have just rejected your comment. But you're Businessman, so I clicked on the video and was impressed to see that the nanothermite boondoggle has been awarded over ten minutes on a Danish news channel.

Not a prominent channel, it seems, for its hits on google are unimpressive, as are the other outlets that lend time, space and credence to the highly speculative nanothermite venture. But at least the interview was slickly produced.

So a highly engaging ten minutes ensued, reminiscent of those puzzles in which you have to spot what's wrong with the picture.

Without devoting too much time to the shortcomings of this bit of junk science, ask yourselves these questions (if you entertain the matter at all, which we are not recommending:)

How does the scientist concerned, Niels Harrit (Is he a Ph.D? There's little sign of it) know that there was ten to a hundred tons of nanothermite in the World Trade Center debris? Who found it? Where is it now? The debris was removed to Fresh Kills in Staten Island as well as to Third World countries ASAP. Is Harrit just assuming there was ten to a hundred tons (give or take an order of magnitude) because that's what he thinks it would take to demolish the buildings?

He says the nanothermite was discovered "by chance" a short while ago. What kind of chance is it when scientists beg for dust samples for years so they can test it for said nanothermite? Every couple of months I used to get their emails. I never complied because the science would not have been valid; the chain of custody was broken. And mind you, the requests were for a few measly samples, not ten to a hundred tons. All of this, by the way, ignores the myriad scientists (Millette, Lioy, Yiin....) who, whether well-intentioned or not, were studying the dust for pollutants.

So Harrit didn't know any of this? Does he know the other scientists working on this wild goose chase? But the best part was the dead silence when the politely incredulous journalist didn't know what to say next because the only reasonable response was, "Huh?"

While only cursory, this response is intended to quash speculation about issues which at this point can never be proved. It is not intended to open up the floodgates to further questions. Harrit is either a loony patsy or pure disinfo. But it's enlightening to see what's getting into the European media so thank you for the link.

List of Bank Failures
Bank Profits Appear Out of Thin Air
Profits Mask Bank Problems: Analysts
Bank of America Credit Losses Spiral
Recession Sing-a-long
Gorbachev, the Model for the Obama Doctrine
Blackwater Out of Iraq? No, Not Yet
GM "Likely" to Build in China as US Factories Close
Record Number of State Businesses Close in First Quarter
Tons of Released Drugs Taint US Water
Home Invasions Increase as Thugs Seek Mexico Drug Cash

The World's Most Unhappy People (Moldova)

China, Russia, Make Breakthrough in Energy Cooperation
Petrobras' Gabrieli Says China Loans Won't Be Backed By Oil
China Mulls Law on Military Mobilization (from Rice Farmer)
Global Crisis Wipes Out 1.5T Yuan of China Investor Wealth
Taleban Boasts of Its Own AfPak Alliance
Ghana: Plummeting Profits Drive Tomato Farmers to Suicide (from Rice Farmer)
New Zealand: The Upcoming Corporate Debt Default

28 comments:

businessman said...

Jenna...I do my best to submit information to the Blog that I think comes from credible sources. I may not always get it right, but I do my best.

For those who may be interested, in addition to the video I submitted I'm providing a link here to the 25-page scientific paper titled, "Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe". This paper was written by Niels Harrit and eight additional authors.

The paper discusses how the dust samples from the World Trade Center disaster were obtained, who they were obtained from, and there's a map showing the locations where each sample was taken from.

Enlarged photos of the samples under a microscope are also shown, and the chemical analyses of the samples are given, too.

Click Here for the Scientific PaperSince that link is getting a ton of traffic from around the world and the Web page may not load for you immediately because of it, you can also download the scientific paper here:

Click Here for the Alternate Download Site

OregonSurvivor said...

I am eagerly looking forward to the release of both the MCR book and the coLLapse movie. A bit confused though - the links don't seem to lead anywhere. Bluemark films does not list the movie as one of their projects - is it a secret? The book announcement contains links that don't work as pointed out here. From a marketing perspective this is, so far, less than compelling... Hopefully this is premature, and no offense is intended - I wish to see these works widely distributed!

Unknown said...

Jenna,
Here's an interesting link you may wish to publish. Just a tidbit on localization through a system of village committees being used to rehabilitate farm land and forests in Niger. It's sponsored by the NGO IFAD for whatever that may be worth.
http://www.ifad.org/newsletter/update/2/5.htm

My Kindest Wishes,
BL

Rice Farmer said...

Businessman -- I too appreciate your posts. But on the WTC destruction I have to agree with Jenna.

Don't get me wrong -- I personally have little doubt that explosives were involved. But the physical-evidence case for that would easily be demolished in court.

Same goes for photographic evidence. Jenna mentions the "chain of custody" problem, which equally affects all the photographs out there on the web. A Japanese acquaintance of mine, who was for many years a photographer for a wire service, wrote a book about how unreliable photographs can be. And you'd be surprised to see how a simple operation such as cropping can totally change the information gleaned from a photo. So although the photos are interesting to look at, they actually give us very little reliable information, and could in fact be highly deceptive. We have no idea who did what to them.

Therein lies the value of "Rubicon." It avoids all those pitfalls and builds its case on a foundation of verifiable facts.

I've said it a million times: The 9/11 truth movement has done itself irreparable harm by trying to build its case on photos, videos, and the physical evidence. It's a shame, but I think that's one reason why justice will never be done.

Jenna Orkin said...

businessman, where would we be without you? but here's another nail in the coffin of the nanothermite argument from a reader who goes by the monicker "m":

from M:

the journal that this alleged scientific report (tons of nanothermite) was published in is a newsletter based in UAE. There might be some politics interfering with objectivity here. A bag of dust from a 9/11 truther that supposedly was in her NYC apartment provided years after the event is not "chain of custody."

Nanothermite seems about as real as the "hologram" claim that used to infest the suburbs of the "truth" movement some years ago.

All three towers - even WTC 7 - were observed leaning and bulging before they fell down. And no demolition theories seem particularly interested in the structural impact of large planes flying full speed into the towers or the parts of the towers that fell on WTC 7 (first time that has ever happened).

I'm waiting for the "no buildings" theories.

Jenna Orkin said...
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Jenna Orkin said...
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Anonymous said...

Jenna:

I'm confused by your response to businessman. How can you poo-poo businessman's documentary when you could post that article about the Shroud of Turin? Where is your science on that one? Do you really believe that just by coincidence 25 Saudis just happened to hijack planes right in the middle of a terrorism exercise exactly while our former VP was at the controls to stop the fighter jets from scrambling? The director for security at the WTC right up to the tragedy was none other than Marvin Bush, something that the press has done a great job of concealing. Also, there was a power-down of the whole complex right before it happened, which would have provided ample opportunity for rigging this up. This could have been in the planning phase for years. How is it there has been no prosecution or war efforts against Saudi Arabia, if the hijackers were from there? The CIA can surveille anyone's most private records, yet the bank records for those puts and calls on the major airlines in the weeks before 911 were too sacred to divulge. None of this makes any sense. A scientist with good methods can extrapolate data to provide estimates in the cases of dusts and vapors covering large areas. This article was subtitled from Danish, so the language may have been simplified. I've come to the point to where I believe just about anything could be possible in today's world. The media just keeps things hazy and scrambled to assure we don't all come to the same conclusion and revolt. My mother was an newsreel editor during WWII. She always said a far as the news goes, the truth is always left on the cutting room floor.

businessman said...

Thanks both Rice Farmer and Jenna...:)

LOL...Jenna is such an expert on 9/11...and has been through so much around it...that she recognizes so quickly that which may be true from that which may be B.S.--no matter how good the B.S. may look to some of us who have also studied 9/11.

It reminds me of what some people used to say about Henry Aaron, the great home run hitter in baseball here in the United States:

"Trying to sneak a fastball past Henry Aaron was like trying to sneak a sunrise past a rooster."

Jenna Orkin said...

cj

legitimate arguments about put options and war games are not equivalent to questionable science about a substance of dubious origin.

MCR said...

BUSINESSMAN -- You've been so valuable but what you're doing now is a major distraction that cannot contibute to what's most important for all of us.

The building demolition crap will not be injected into my list -- ever. From a legal standpoint nothing of what your posts are about is legally admissible evidence and proves nothing. Even if thermite were used, this so-called evidence (which wouldn't be considered by any court) does nothing to prove who put it there does it?

This is a distraction I won't permit. Your intelligence and loyatly and friendship are valued here. But the timing of this is highly suspect to me. If Jenna doesn't stop posting this thread I will.

I learned a long time ago that if COINTELPRO isn't nipped in the bud early it gets real "expensive" later on.

Go back and read FTW and what I wrote about physical evidence for the last eight years. Did you read Rubicon?

That's the last 9/11 physical evidence post I'll alow here. There are many other places more suitable for that. This is a blog that does things.

MCR

AussieGal said...

Many of you will have come across Indian ecologist and activist Vandana Shiva. This 40 minute presentation (http://vodpod.com/watch/1474602-vandana-shiva-the-future-of-food-and-seed) by her at the end of February this year is as always an impassioned defence of the sanctity of seed as one of the principal sources of life. It's also an equally impassioned condemnation of the manifold injustices that flow from the conversion of seed from the common heritage of humanity into private property monopolies in the hands of the five giant seed and chemical conglomerates that now dominate the global seed industry. This presentation highlights why it's so important that individual communities worldwide take steps to protect our common cultural and biological heritage through the establishment of seed saver networks.

businessman said...

cj...I don't think Jenna is saying she agrees with the mainstream media story about what happened on 9/11. I think she's just saying there are other arguments outside of the paper these scientists and others have submitted that are more convincing about what really happened, and much less likely or close to impossible to have been manipulated.

Although I'd like to believe that the scientists and the people involved in writing this paper wouldn't have manipulated the experiment for their own personal gain, Rice Farmer and Jenna have made me recognize that even scientists could covet fame and celebrity so much that they'd do whatever it takes to achieve it.

With this in mind, while their paper could be accurate, we'll never know if the samples of the dust they utilized were tainted in advance to produce the results they wanted to see in the experiment...or not.

So in effect, we can't really verify that their experiment and conclusions are solidly based on sound science.

brell said...

is it an ebook? or cd?

why so many points? nothing to do but wait. at least it's only a week or two. :)

Hugh Barr said...
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winstonsmith said...
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tim said...
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businessman said...

Got it, Mike.

It was a learning experience for me.

Let's get back on track again.

businessman said...

Mike...Will there be a premiere of your movie in L.A. or in any other areas that people will be able to attend?

Jenna Orkin said...

ben
your message was fwded thx

F.Kamilov said...

Read this. It is excellent:

Why the West is Boyle'd

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/KD21Ad01.html

Jenna Orkin said...

harvkilljoy wrote in part:

Thanks again Jenna, Mike, for all of this- much of it's way over my head, but I'm learnin' to swim with your guidance.

Regards,

Alan aka "HARV"

Unknown said...

Hey, Kamilov!

Again this "Ha-ha, the West is doomed." I wish you lived in Taiwan, so we could have long discussions. I find myself constantly in the defensive position on America, which I find awkward but can't help doing.

True, the dominant forces in the West have set mediocrity as a cultural norm, and punished deviation from that norm both with legal repression and with scorn and rejection by the self-satisfied mass.

Yet this competition with The West vs. The Rest is not a healthy notion. Because you see only what the media release, quite a lot of the value of America is invisible to you. The author of your article likes discipline and achievement, but there are other important values to feed the world.

As an American who lived Jimi Hendrix, the Haight Ashbury, surfing and (real) rock 'n' roll, I can tell you that there is more in The West than mediocrity. It's just that mediocrity has been so efficiently encouraged, and its opposite so persecuted, that it takes as much "discipline and dedication" just to be a real person in America as it does to be a concert pianist in China. Long hours of discipline will develop virtuosity, but they cannot teach Life, which is what is going on outside the practice room.

China will not produce a Jimi Hendrix. True, they have state- and parental-discipline, they work long hours and get selected from a billion and a third candidates. But this kind of rigor produces only technicians, not artists. In Chinese tradition, the Taoists withdrew from this tedious current of Chinese culture, creating arguably the most interesting cultural trends to come out of East Asia. Taoist philosophy does not play much of a role in modern, go-gettum China.

Actually, dividing The West from The Rest does no one any good. True, racism and aggressive capitalism have separated the two in the past, but as China embraces capitalism and America studies Taoism, lines blur. Those whose ancestors were oppressed by Western aggression may desire to take it out on the descendents of the oppressor, but this strategy has not been very successful in the past. It's legacy in Zimbabwe for instance, is quite poignant. China itself lost a great deal by thrashing the remnants of the oppressive upper class in the Cultural Revolution. Black culture in America has had tremendous influence on the mainstream through patient integration, and I think this provides a better model for co-creation of a descent future.

Cooperation between the peoples of the world is the only way we're gonna make it through this difficult time, and come out with a world worth visiting.

ecosutra said...

Mike, I love the discipline. I just cant believe its not me getting in trouble.

I love the fighting between the Kamilov and Eyeballs, lol. There is some serious chemistry in this house.

For all in LA! I have found an important network of heavy hitting green builders that are saying the land near the LA river in downtown is being handed over to people like us. We just need to get the grants going and start food foresting the LA river. Developing...

ecosutra said...

I fear greatly the analysis paralysis gripping this great country from a wall street toxic capitalist game. It seems nothing left in wall street is non toxic.
The people need to see the green technology capitulation that is taking place in wall street. They really should not be paying attention to anything else.
Is Obama lying? I don't know. Every cabinet member is a wall street crook. It does'nt look good. What does the Fed fear in releasing green energy technology? Power

I am in a place where, if you don't eco nest soon, and start coming together with a budget of something like $20 grand a family on 2000 acres somewhere at $2000 an acre. And each family of 300 families gets 5 acres, a green house and some solar pumps, and the access to share $800 grand of equipment, then there is no hope. Every city council I have researched has failed creating a power park model. They can not install " small". Like the above plan of $6 million is small. Small is beautiful in green energy. Everyone of them is more efficient in small scale than commercial. Thats just the way the ball is bouncing in green energy technology.

That is the cheapest I can get you going with a real good model for the future. Living in a food food forest in 5 years, building bio char sustainable soils.

Someone might do another one. BUt I have done my homework. I need pioneers.

Pandabonium said...

Thanks to Rice Farmer's suggestion, I now have potatoes coming up - a small area in my yard as well as some in a large container.

A neighbor brought by some small daikon radishes the other day which we've enjoyed raw in salads as well as cooked along side sweet potatoes.

We share our extra mikan (tangerines) and cumquats.

Doing what we can for ourselves while being a good neighbor.

Works for us.

Jenna Orkin said...

agape wins wrote in part:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/193491

It is clear to me what Mike Tyson says, what Allison thinks, and what
Newsweek wants to convey, this article is clearer to me than any I
have read in some time, work it over with some friends, pick it apart,
it will improve how you think!

MCR was vary clear in Rubicon, but there were other voices,
I expect "A Presidential Energy Policy" to be clearer, AND even
more convincing, because he is more in control of the entire process!
Amae.

F.Kamilov said...

Dear Eyeballs:

With due respect, this article was written by an "ultra-American" conservative and Wall Street CEO who represents the bedrock of your country's social values and those who established them. His name is David P. Goodman, and till recently he used the pseudonym "Spengler". This man is a vehement "East baiter" and detests Muslims and all things alien to the Judaeo-Christian stereotype, so therefore he should be right up your American street - except that perhaps he doesn't share your enthusiasm for the likes of Jimi Hendrix. In most of those things I agree with "Spengler", except that I manage to enjoy listening to Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, The Eagles, Bon Jovi and Bruce Springsteen, etc. - minus the drugs and the LSD of course.