When The S*** Hits the Fan

What Hillary #Clinton Has in Common With #Communist #China

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(ANTIMEDIA) What do Hillary Clinton and the communist government of China have in common? Aside from their shared support for subverting freedom, lack of respect for human rights, and support of invasive surveillance, they both possess armies of trolls who manipulate online narratives.

According to a new report from researchers at Harvard’s Department of Government, the Chinese government employs millions of people to make posts praising government on their behalf. The internet mercenaries are deemed, collectively, “The 50 Cent Party,” because of rumors they are paid per post (the report concluded they do not appeared to be paid and most are government employees to begin with). They are believed to make 488 million posts per year.

After a blogger leaked hacked official email archives, the long-suspected program was confirmed to be real. Those leaks “reported activities of Internet commentators, including numerous 50c posts from workers claiming credit for completing their assignments, and many other communications.” The posts were often “cheerleading” for government, sometimes to “distract the public, although this activity can be also be used to distract from other events, general negativity, specific grievances, etc.” Posts that reflected positively on government made up the majority of so-called 50 centers’ activity, and the researchers theorized it “is a strategy designed to actively distract and redirect public attention from ongoing criticism, other grievances, or collective action.”

Perhaps such behavior is to be expected of an overarching communist regime, but Hillary Clinton’s internet army made headlines before China’s. As Anti-Media reported last month, the Clinton campaign has invested $1 million to fund an army of internet crusaders to challenge negative conversations about her online. That army, called “Barrier Breakers” and is a division of her organization, Correct the Record, which describes itself as “a strategic research and rapid response team designed to defend Hillary Clinton from baseless attacks.”

According to Correct the Record’s website, Barrier Breakers is intended to “serve as a resource for supporters looking for positive content and push-back to share with their online progressive communities, as well as thanking prominent supporters and committed superdelegates on social media.” (By “committed superdelegates,” perhaps they mean “paid lobbyists.”)

The project is extensive, “including the more than tripling of its digital operation to engage in online messaging both for Secretary Clinton and to push back against attackers on social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, and Instagram.”

It appears 50 centers and Barrier Breakers are performing the same function: creating potentially artificial perceptions that the Chinese government and Hillary Clinton, respectively, enjoy enthusiastic support (it’s likely some members of both the Chinese and Clinton social media teams do genuinely believe the things they post). But there are differences.

For one, the Chinese government has attempted to keep its operations secret. In contrast, the Clinton campaign has made its intentions public, seizing the opportunity to couch their attempts to control the conversation in proactive language that conflates itself with combating online harassment. “The task force currently combats online political harassment, having already addressed more than 5,000 individuals who have personally attacked Secretary Clinton on Twitter,” they boast. They do not disclose whether task force members’ individual identities are public or private.

Correct the Record claims Hillary supporters are “oftentimes are discouraged from engaging online and are ‘often afraid to voice their thoughts’ because of the fear of online harassment,” using this, evidently, as justification for paying people to post positive sentiments about the candidate, who currently suffers a likeability problem as severe as reviled presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump.

The biggest difference between Clinton and the Chinese government in their efforts to sway conversations online concerns the degree of defensive engagement they display: according to the researchers, the Chinese government’s posters “do not step up to defend the government, its leaders, and their policies from criticism, no matter how vitriolic; indeed, they seem to avoid controversial issues entirely,” preferring, rather, to use cheerleading efforts to distract and redirect. “Letting an argument die, or changing the subject, usually works much better than picking an argument and getting someone’s back up,” the researchers explained.

In contrast, Clinton’s Barrier Breakers project openly admits its active engagement in countering anti-Hillary narratives. Referencing “Bernie Bros,” Barrier Breakers vows to use what they’ve learned to “quickly and forcefully [respond] to negative attacks and false narratives.” This reaches beyond the Chinese government’s designs to distract with cheerleading; it’s an unabashed effort to change minds — even as Barrier Breakers fails to elaborate on the “false narratives” they plan to challenge.

Their goal conveniently ignores Clinton’s own proclivity for dishonesty and manipulating narratives. Indeed, her collective of paid public supporters extends to cable news, where many pundits praise her but fail to disclose they are on her payroll.

Hillary Clinton and the Chinese government are not the only entities who attempt to mold narratives and public perception to their benefit. Donald Trump was caught hiring real-life actors to drum up enthusiasm for his campaign. In the social media sphere, the Israeli government has a student program, called “Hasbara,” meant to counter online speech critical of Israel. British spy agency, GCHQ, which wokrks closely with the NSA, has a program to manipulate online political narratives and destroy the reputations of activist movements. And of course, the American government, namely — that we know of — the military, uses sock puppet accounts to spread pro-American propaganda.

While Barrier Breakers is, perhaps, more permissible than the Chinese government’s program, in that it is not officially sponsored by government, Clinton has given the populace no reason to believe her manipulative practices will cease should she make it to the White House.

This article (What Hillary Clinton Has in Common With Communist China) by Elizabeth Montag is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Carey Wedler and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

 

From theantimedia.org Team

Researchers Just Found Some VERY Surprising Ingredients in Your #Hamburgers

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(ANTIMEDIA) From the presence of bile and human hair in pork to the FDA’s guidelines that some rat feces, insect larvae, and mold in food is permissible, many Americans are increasingly wary of the products they put in their body. According to a new report, hamburgers, in particular, may be worthy of extra scrutiny.

“The Hamburger Report” was conducted by an accredited independent research firm, Clear Labs, and screened for “for authenticity, major, medium, and minor substitution [when ingredients are observed in testing but not listed on the label], contamination, gluten, toxigenic fungi and toxic plants, other allergens, and missing ingredients.” In addition, the firm analyzed hamburgers for “nutrition content accuracy, such as calories, carbs, fat, and protein.”

The analysis, intended to provide a broad view of the burger industry to help suppliers improve their products, tested 258 samples from 79 brands and 22 retailers. Those samples included “ground meat, frozen patties, fast food burger products, and veggie burger products.” They were tested with next-generation genomic sequencing (NGS), and major issues were found to be discrepancant between product labels and actual ingredients, the presence of rat and human DNA, the presence of contaminants, and widespread mislabeling of nutritional information.

Though the report largely praised the beef industry for improving the quality of its products, it noted a number of issues with the current quality of hamburgers in the U.S. Of particular concern was Clear Labs’ analysis of vegetarian burgers. “23.6% of vegetarian products showed some form of discrepancy between product and label, compared to the 13.6% of all samples. We found pervasive issues in food quality and end-product consistency in these non-meat samples,” the report says.

Sixteen, or 6.6 percent of samples had issues with substitution, “when ingredients are observed in our molecular analysis but do not show up on the label.” Fourteen were missing ingredients that were supposed to be present, pursuant to the product’s ingredient label; this deficiency was found exclusively in vegetarian products. In one case, a black bean burger contained no black beans. In another, beef DNA was found in vegetarian patties, an ingredient undoubtedly absent from the label. Over 15 percent of vegetarian products were missing at least one ingredient.

When it came to meat burgers, researchers found multiple cases where meat not listed on the label was found in products. “We found chicken DNA in 1 sample of ground fresh pork, 1 sample of a turkey burger, and 2 samples of beef burger products. We found turkey substitution in 2 samples of ground beef and 1 sample of ground chicken,” they noted.

The report gave a positive review to the beef industry on low levels of hygienic issues in burgers, which occur when “undesirable but generally non-harmful contaminant is introduced into a burger product.” Even so, they found three instances of rat DNA in products — one fast food burger, one vegetarian burger, and one ground meat sample — and one instance of human DNA. The human DNA was found in a frozen vegetarian patty (Clear Labs also found human DNA in hot dogs last year, though the findings were arguably sensationalized).

While their tests could not determine the exact source of the human DNA, they explained it was likely a result of “hair, skin, or fingernail that was accidentally mixed in during the manufacturing process.” They note the FDA says “certain low levels of contamination are acceptable” but the presence of DNA is still a “potential indicator of low quality and speaks to issues of inconsistent adherence to handling protocols.” Last year, whistleblowers from the USDA revealed contaminants, like hair, fingernails, and bile were present in pork products, and though they may not be ‘dangerous,’ it’s doubtful Americans would be comfortable if they knew they could be eating the genetic content of rats and humans.

Though these revolting ingredients may not be particularly harmful, the report more disturbingly found that 11 products, 4.3 percent, contained pathogenic DNA from “microorganisms that can cause human illness.” Four were found in vegetarian products, a finding of heightened concern to the researchers, who point out plant-based foods are generally believed to be safer and cleaner than meat products. Yersinia pseudotuberculosis, which can cause tuberculosis-like symptoms, was the most common pathogen.

The report explains their testing methods could not determine whether the pathogens were alive or dead, and that in meat products, cooking them can often kill the live germs. Nevertheless, the findings are consistent with ongoing trends in the American food supply, including a widespread listeria outbreak currently sweeping the country. As the report notes, “The United States’ economy hemorrhages about $7 billion every year due to food outbreaks. One in six Americans get food poisoning each year, and 3,000 of those cases are fatal.”

A final ingredient found in many of the samples tested, though perhaps not as nauseating as bacteria and DNA, may be one of the greatest causes for concern: calories. According to the report, nearly half of all samples tested had more calories than reported on the label. In 49 percent of samples, there were more carbohydrates than listed. Worse, nearly 81 percent (38 of 47) of the fast food burgers tested contained more calories than reported in the product’s nutritional information.

As the report points out, “these discrepancies are potentially worrisome for customers who make decisions about what to order based on calorie counts and other available nutritional information.” Considering fast food establishments already face ardent criticism about their ingredients, these findings further indict the fast food industry’s standards.

The report stresses that “no outside partners, companies, customers, or other entities had any influence on or contribution to the research and testing, and all sample information will remain anonymous,” though it openly seeks to help industry players improve their product. The findings undoubtedly need further scientific study, but the preliminary results Clear Labs has published are cause for concern.

Perhaps most telling is Clear Labs’ subtle, if not unintentional, commentary on the failures of the FDA to keep food safe for consumers; they stress their goal is to improve the safety and quality in hamburgers — “regardless of whether or not they are acceptable according to FDA guidelines.”

This article (Researchers Just Found Some VERY Surprising Ingredients in Your Hamburgers) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Elizabeth Montag and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

 

From theantimedia.org Team

Whistleblowers Confirm #Facebook #Censors Certain Types of News Stories

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(ANTIMEDIA) Former Facebook employees who managed the “Trending News” section of the site are accusing the behemoth social media platform of censoring news stories and “injecting” others to artificially inflate their popularity. Unsurprisingly, in light of these accusations, the developing story appears to have been censored from the site’s list of popular stories, underscoring deeply-rooted problems in the way information is presented online.

The fresh allegations follow a story published last week by Gizmodo, which detailed how some of the journalists tasked with populating the trending news list were overworked and mistreated. The reporters, “a small group of young journalists, primarily educated at Ivy League or private East Coast universities,” select stories for the feed, and also write the headlines and three-line descriptions that show up on the right-hand side of the Facebook home screen.

Gizmodo points out the influence of this seemingly small operation, noting the list of trending stories, “constitutes some of the most powerful real estate on the internet and helps dictate what news Facebook’s users—167 million in the US alone—are reading at any given moment.”

Since the publication of last week’s initial story, other former Facebook employees have come forward to describe the types of stories that were intentionally included in — and excluded from — the feed, which purports to be determined by the stories’ popularity among users.

Rather than reflecting users’ organic interests, however, one of the most glaring components of the Facebook trending stories tool — according to the effective whistleblowers — is the company’s policy of excluding stories about Facebook. According to Gizmodo, “When stories about Facebook itself would trend organically on the network, news curators used less discretion—they were told not to include these stories at all.”

As one former news curator said, “When it was a story about the company, we were told not to touch it. It had to be cleared through several channels, even if it was being shared quite a bit. We were told that we should not be putting it on the trending tool.”

This former employee’s experience was substantiated by at least one other. “We were always cautious about covering Facebook,” another former curator said. “We would always wait to get second level approval before trending something to Facebook. Usually we had the authority to trend anything on our own [but] if it was something involving Facebook, the copy editor would call their manager, and that manager might even call their manager before approving a topic involving Facebook.”

But limiting the exposure of Facebook-centered articles is only one tactic in the social media platform’s manipulation of news stories. As Gizmodo explained:

“When users weren’t reading stories that management viewed as important, several former workers said, curators were told to put them in the trending news feed anyway. Several former curators described using something called an ‘injection tool’ to push topics into the trending module that weren’t organically being shared or discussed enough to warrant inclusion—putting the headlines in front of thousands of readers rather than allowing stories to surface on their own.”

Often, some former employees said, the injected topics would eventually become the most popular trending stories. While on the surface, this practice may seem like a proactive effort to provide more news for users, the injected stories were firmly rooted in establishment pillars of information.

“We were told that if we saw something, a news story that was on the front page of these ten sites, like CNN, the New York Times, and BBC, then we could inject the topic,” said one former curator. Indeed, all three of these outlets epitomize “mainstream” journalism, and, unsurprisingly — or even synonymously — all three outlets have been thoroughly accused of censorship, deception, and bias.

Facebook’s policy to artificially inject stories, as long as they were validated by coverage from outlets like these, reflects the platform’s clear, albeit perhaps unwitting, connection to perpetuating establishment narratives. As the former curator said, “If it looked like it had enough news sites covering the story, we could inject it—even if it wasn’t naturally trending.”

Though boosting placement of relevant news stories seems like a noble cause, the practice clearly violates Facebook’s efforts to make the trending news feed appear as strictly “topics that have recently become popular” on the site.

Whereas censoring stories on Facebook and injecting others were a matter of policy, the subjective biases of the journalists curating stories also reportedly affected the neutrality of the stories presented to users. Though no former curator interviewed by Gizmodo said this was an official protocol, many said stories from conservative outlets were routinely excluded from the trending news list.

One former curator who, as a political conservative was a minority on the curating team, said, “Depending on who was on shift, things would be blacklisted or trending.” He added, “I’d come on shift and I’d discover that CPAC or Mitt Romney or Glenn Beck or popular conservative topics wouldn’t be trending because either the curator didn’t recognize the news topic or it was like they had a bias against Ted Cruz.”

For example, stories about Lois Lerner, the head of the IRS implicated in unfairly targeting conservative groups, were not included in trending stories. Stories from conservative aggregator, Drudge Report, were also censored, along with stories about conservatarian politician, Rand Paul. “It was absolutely bias[ed]. We were doing it subjectively. It just depends on who the curator is and what time of day it is,” a former curator said, revealing the lack of consistency in Facebook’s reporting practices.

Further highlighting Facebook’s establishment philosophies, Gizmodo noted “stories covered by conservative outlets (like Breitbart, Washington Examiner, and Newsmax) that were trending enough to be picked up by Facebook’s algorithm were excluded unless mainstream sites like the New York Times, the BBC, and CNN covered the same stories.”

While to some left-leaning Facebook users the omission of conservative stories seems like a fair — or even necessary — practice, these fundamentally exclusionary practices should be cause for concern to anyone obtaining news from the trending stories list.

Facebook declined to comment on these allegations, but the site is no stranger to accusations of censorship and manipulating information. The platform was recently caught censoring at least one story unfavorable to Hillary Clinton while multiple groups supporting presidential candidate Bernie Sanders have been suspended. On a different note, Facebook also works closely with the United States government to enable surveillance of the internet, a role that better illustrates the company’s establishment culture than the left-wing biases of individual employees.

Between the individual biases of employees and the broader, more controlling policies of injection and censoring stories about the site, Facebook has proven its incompetence in accurately informing users. Gizmodo reports some former curators said as algorithms were increasingly employed, biases became less pronounced, also noting that the employees worked for Facebook between 2014 and 2015, so if changes have been made, the whistleblowers would not be aware of them.

At the very least, however, the confessions of former curators should raise fundamental questions about journalistic integrity among users who trust the friendly social networking site to deliver information in a responsible, education-oriented manner. As Gizmodo noted, “the revelations undermine any presumption of Facebook as a neutral pipeline for news, or the trending news module as an algorithmically-driven list of what people are actually talking about.”

Perhaps most telling is the trending news section’s reaction to Gizmodo’s breaking story on Facebook news practices: it’s nowhere to be found.

This article (Whistleblowers Confirm Facebook Censors Certain Types of News Stories) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Elizabeth Montag and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

 

From theantimedia.org Team

Scientists’ New Breakthrough May Have Just Solved the #Drought Problem-#water

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(ANTIMEDIA) Kalpakkam, India — Indian nuclear scientists have developed a new method to remove salt from seawater, spurring hope for regions around the world ravaged by drought. In India, 13 of 29 states are currently suffering from a lack of clean, fresh water — with conditions expected to worsen — but the scientists have devised a method to make otherwise heavily salinated water safe to drink. They have also developed tools to purify contaminated groundwater to make it safe to drink.

New Delhi Television (NDTV), a popular news organization in India, recently visited Kalpakkam, a small town in Tamil Nadu that houses a pilot plant built by nuclear scientists from the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), a division of the Indian government’s Department of Atomic Energy, located in Mumbai. The plant in Kalpakkam is one of the country’s main nuclear facilities.

As their video report shows, the scientists “have quietly been working on finding solutions to desalinate sea water and to purify water laced with chemicals.” Using waste steam from one of the nuclear reactors, the scientists say they are able to successfully remove salt from the water. As the reporter for NDTV noted, “this reporter tasted the purified water – it tasted like fresh water, not saline at all.” The freshwater is currently being used at the Kudankulam power plant. Though the India Times reports the water is safe to drink, it has not yet been distributed to communities.

Though they do not offer extensive details on how the process works, BARC’s website notes they have “developed and demonstrated several types of thermal and membrane-based desalination and water purification technologies.” Further, they say BARC boasts expertise in building both small and large-scale desalination plants.

Indeed, according to Dr. Shri Kamlesh Nilkanth Vyas, Director of BARC, the desalination process at Kalpakkam has the capacity to remove salt from 6.3 million liters (over 1.6 million gallons) of seawater every day single day. They have since launched similar plants in both Punjab and West Bengal, Rajasthan.

These developments are particularly important as millions of people in India struggle to obtain clean water. They are also far-reaching; historic droughts are sweeping the globe, from California to Brazil, and South Africa to North Korea.

These dire conditions have inspired efforts to make salt water safe to drink. In 2015, for example, MIT scientists won an award for developing a low-cost, efficient process to remove salt from water using solar power. While solar power may be ultimately preferable to nuclear power, this method is currently small-scale, expensive, and requires intricate technologies to implement — in contrast to the BARC scientists 6.3 million liters per day.

In addition to using steam to desalinate water, the Indian scientists have also developed strategies to purify groundwater.

“Besides, BARC has developed several membranes, by which, at a very small cost, groundwater contaminated by uranium or arsenic can be purified and make fit for drinking,” Dr. Vyas told NDTV.

Indeed, as the outlet reported, India’s prime minister recently visited the plant. “Prime Minister Narendra Modi had pedalled a bicycle that had a water purifier installed on it. It turns dirty contaminated water into potable water. Turning the pedals produces the energy the purifier needs.”

This is particularly vital for India, considering, for example, a 2011 report by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) found as much as 70 percent of water in Delhi, India’s densely populated capital territory, was contaminated.

As BARC’s website points out, they have been able to drastically reduce the levels of harmful toxins in water. “Uranium content in groundwater of some of the wells in Punjab was reported above permissible limit of 60 ppb,” they note. “The uranium content in product water was brought down to 6 ppb using BARC developed UF-RO technology giving clean water as per IS 10500/ WHO limit.” These filtration techniques may ultimately also be useful in cleansing desalinated sea water, though it is reportedly already safe to drink; water from the ocean is, unfortunately, filled with many manmade chemicals considered unsafe for humans to consume.

The scientists have also produced household water purifiers, which are currently being marketed to residents of drought-stricken Marathwada, one of five regions in the state of Maharashtra.

Though many may rightfully balk at nuclear power — BARC is better known for producing nuclear weapons — in this situation, the scientists might have found a redeeming quality with their ability to generate clean drinking water. To its credit, BARC stresses its “commitment to the focus on cutting edge research for the unique diverse requirements of our country including the rural adaptability of the technology.”

“The demand for water in the country is increasing rapidly,” they observe. “The existing water resources are diminishing,” and, consequently, “technological intervention has become a necessity for a reliable and sustainable availability of clean water.”

This article (Scientists’ New Breakthrough May Have Just Solved the Drought Problem) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Elizabeth Montag and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. Image credit: Peripitus. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

 

From theantimedia.org Team

#Government Chemist Was Making #Crack in the Lab, Stealing Meth and Cocaine

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(ANTIMEDIA) As if the futility, destruction, and absurdity of the decades-long war on drugs were not already painfully apparent, a Massachusetts state chemist involved in testing evidence for drug prosecutions was high on a variety of illicit substances, including crack, cocaine, meth, and acid, for most of the nine years she worked for the government, including one year working directly for a police lab.

The chemist was not only high on drugs she stole throughout her tenure — she cooked and consumed crack cocaine at work. Additionally, throughout the years she testified in scores of drug cases, whose verdicts — along with the Drug War itself — have now been called into question.

Sonja Farak worked as a chemist for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) from 2003 to 2012, switching labs twice throughout the years. She spent most of her time with DPH at a lab in Amherst, but also worked as a chemist for the Massachusetts State Police from 2012 to 2013.

As a Massachusetts Attorney General (AG) investigation released this week summarized, her responsibilities included “testing, for authenticity, various controlled substances submitted by law enforcement agencies throughout the Commonwealth. Additionally, she was required to testify in court as to her test results, which served as evidence in criminal cases.”

The implications of her behavior are nothing short of disturbing. “Anything that went through that lab while she was there is in question,” said Anthony Benedetti, chief counsel of the Committee for Public Counsel Services. “It’s too soon to know how many, but it clearly is in the thousands.”

In at least one case, she appeared to have consumed drugs submitted by police and replaced them with counterfeit substances. Farak was reportedly also overly inquisitive about large arrivals of new drugs at the lab, which tipped off others who worked there when considered along with the absence of other drugs.

According to the AG report:

“Farak began to consume the Amherst Lab’s standards [drugs purchased from drug companies to be used as controls in testing] on a fairly regular basis beginning in late 2004 or early 2005. The first standard she admitted to using was the methamphetamine standard, which was the largest or most voluminous standard at the Amherst Lab. The methamphetamine standard was a base sample, meaning its form was oil base and it was not cut or diluted with any other substance, essentially making the standard the purest form of a controlled substance.”

By 2009, her addiction was so consuming she had “nearly exhausted” the lab’s methamphetamine standard supply. As the report notes, “by 2009, she also began using other standards at the Amherst Lab including ketamine, MDMA, MDEA, and LSD (including police-submitted evidence samples),” as well as cocaine. She eventually took it a step further, ultimately manufacturing crack for her own consumption. By Farak’s own admission:

“During mid to late 2012, she would enter the Lab after hours or when she was working overtime, remove powdered cocaine from samples, and cook it to produce crack. Specifically, Farak would dissolve the powdered cocaine in water, add baking soda, and heat up the mixture so that the moisture would dissipate and form crack,” the AG report says.

Though she only did so three or four times, she said she made large batches to “make a quantity worth [her] time.”

“All told,” she said, according to the AG report, “she estimated that she was smoking crack ten to twelve times a day.” She says her colleagues never suspected anything. One later testified that in 2012, her appearance had begun to deteriorate, as had the quality and volume of her work.

Farak was only caught when it was discovered in 2013 that drug samples were missing from the lab. Farak was arrested and ultimately served 18 months after pleading guilty in 2014. She was convicted of “evidence tampering, theft, and possession charges relating to a handful of criminal cases.” Though she was sentenced to two-and-half years, the rest of her sentence was suspended for five years.

The state is currently reviewing cases from individuals convicted, in part, as a result of Farak’s lab work and testimonies against them. “We are deeply concerned whenever the integrity of the justice system is called into question or compromised,” said Cyndi Roy Gonzalez, a spokeswoman for Attorney General Maura Healey. “The information we gathered during the course of our investigation is disturbing and will no doubt have implications for many cases.”

Considering another former lab employee was found, also in 2013, to “have fabricated evidence in thousands of samples she tested at a second state lab in Jamaica Plain, possibly tainting as many as 40,000 cases,” the underlying moral of Farak’s story is perhaps best illustrated by Matthew Segal, the legal director for the ACLU’s Massachusetts branch.

“It’s easy to get caught up in these scandals, zooming in on the specific misconduct because it’s so salacious,” he said.

“But it’s also important to zoom out, and take a look at what the drug war in Massachusetts has wrought. It hasn’t cured us of an addiction problem. It has obliterated the integrity that is supposed to be the foundation of the criminal justice system.”

No doubt, his observations can apply to the United States as a whole, where corruption and drug addiction plague the very individuals and institutions tasked with the fantastical — and futile — obsession with eliminating drug use.

This article (Government Chemist Was Making Crack in the Lab, Stealing Meth and Cocaine) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Elizabeth Montag and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

 

From theantimedia.org Team

#Obama Jokes About the “End of the #Republic,” Giving Speeches to #GoldmanSachs

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Elizabeth Montag
May 2, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) If the corporate media wasn’t gushing over Justin Bieber’s new haircut or the nation’s lingering transphobia bathroom drama this weekend, it was lauding President Obama for his speech at the final White House Correspondents’ dinner of his presidency.

The black-tie dinner draws the nation’s top celebrities, journalists, and politicians and includes a stand-up comedy routine from the president. The assemblage of attendees often resembles the elite crowd that populates the lavish capital in the Hunger Games — and the president’s statements this weekend detail an oligarchical American society similar to that depicted in the dystopic novels.

This year, the president seemed unusually candid about the country’s state of affairs — even if he articulated them in a comedic, albeit smug, way.

“It is an honor to be here at my last — and perhaps the last White House Correspondents’ dinner,” he said as he opened his set, obviously referencing the increasingly doomed presidential race.

“You all look great. The end of the republic has never looked better,” he said to laughs and applause.

“If this material works well, I’m gonna use it at Goldman Sachs next year,” he said.

The joke could have been referencing his former Attorney General, Eric Holder’s new job at a law firm that lobbies for corporate banks — or, more likely, Hillary Clinton’s exorbitant fees for giving speeches to the loathed company. His comments are particularly jarring considering he accepted massive donations from Goldman Sachs and its employees during both of his presidential campaigns, and upon taking office, invited former Goldman Sachs employees to join his cabinet. He has famously failed to take any meaningful action against big banks.

In spite of his acknowledgment of Goldman Sachs as an influential player in American politics, he appeared to indirectly endorse Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, which has been marred by the influence of special interests, including Goldman Sachs.

“Next year someone else will be standing here in this very spot, and it’s anyone’s guess who she will be,” he said. The president dished out tame insults to all of the presidential candidates, ultimately turning his attention to the chairman of the Republican Party, whom Donald Trump has said “should be ashamed of himself” for the Republicans’ attempts to thwart his nomination.

“GOP chairman Reince Priebus is here as well. Glad to see you feel you earned the night off. Congratulations on all your success. The Republican Party, the nomination process … it’s all going great,” Obama sarcastically quipped.

The president also focused his attention on journalism and freedom of the press in the United States. Whether or not he intended to highlight the revolving door between government and corporate news, he did exactly that.

“Key staff are now starting to leave the White House. Even reporters have left me. Savannah Guthrie, she’s left the White House Press Corps to host the Today show. Norah O’Donnell left the briefing room to host CBS This Morning. Jake Tapper left journalism to join CNN,” he said.

He also joked about the power of journalists to hold politicians and government accountable, referencing a recent award-winning film about reporters:

“As you know, Spotlight is a film, a movie about investigative journalists with the resources and the autonomy to chase down the truth and hold the powerful accountable. Best fantasy film since Star Wars. Look — that was maybe a cheap shot.”

Adding insult to injury, the president, who has worked tirelessly to silence journalists, told reporters in attendance that though they have not always seen eye to eye with him, he still appreciates their work:

“But we’ve always shared the same goal  — to root our public discourse in the truth; to open the doors of this democracy; to do whatever we can to make our country and our world more free and more just. And I’ve always appreciated the role that you have all played as equal partners in reaching these goals.”

Obama has presided over the country’s slip in press freedom rankings, the prosecution of whistleblowers, and the intimidation of journalists. The corporate media he addressed in his speech has, in that same time, shown its corruption and lack of concern for the truth. Amid the current election cycle, establishment news outlets have shown their role is not to educate, but to manipulate, yet Obama maintained “[their] power and [their] responsibility to dig and to question and to counter distortions and untruths is more important than ever.”

As the media celebrated his epic “mic drop” at the end of his stand-up routine, those reading between the lines of his performance witnessed the not-so-secretive mechanisms of chaos, power, and corruption in Washington — as joked about by a president who maintained them.

This article (Obama Jokes About the “End of the Republic,” Giving Speeches to Goldman Sachs) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Elizabeth Montag and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. Image credit: Edalisse Hirst. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

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Why #US Govt. And #SaudiArabia Don’t Want Americans Knowing the Truth About 9/11

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Anti-Media Staff
April 21, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) In a rare show of bipartisanship, President Obama and top Republicans in Congress have come together to shield Americans from knowing the truth about who was behind the 9/11 terror attacks, which took the lives of 2996 people in 2001. However strange it is for neoconservative members of Congress to agree with Obama on anything, there is no doubt the issue must be serious if it warrants this level of partnership.

The issue at hand is the classified, 28-page section of the 9/11 commission report, which many experts and politicians with knowledge of the documents have said point to Saudi Arabian government officials’ direct role in the terror attacks. This is why the Saudis put out a stern warning several days ago threatening to dump up to $750 billion in U.S. assets if Senate Bill 2040 becomes law; S.B. 2040 would make public the 28 pages and also allow for victims of 9/11 to sue foreign governments found responsible.

The Saudis’ warning seems to have worked, with Obama now in the nation to “mend ties” with the monarchy and top Republicans sounding the alarm about the 9/11 bill. In an interview with Charlie Rose, President Obama claimed:

“If we open up the possibility that individuals in the United States can routinely start suing other governments, then we are also opening up the United States to being continually sued by individuals in other countries,” apparently referencing the U.S.’ own attacks overseas that have taken the lives of countless civilians.

Currently, Saudi Arabia enjoys “sovereign immunity” with the U.S., meaning even if the 28 pages proved Saudi officials were indeed behind the 9/11 attacks, Americans would not be able to seek justice for their losses. The new 9/11 bill would change that, and the Saudi response to the legislation moving through Congress reinforces suspicions the kingdom is somehow behind the 9/11 attacks.

The video below further explains why both Saudi Arabia and members of the U.S. government don’t want the 9/11 bill to pass:

This article (Why US Govt. And Saudi Arabia Don’t Want Americans Knowing the Truth About 9/11) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. Image credit: Robert J. Fisch. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

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#Clooney Raised $15 Million for #Hillary & DNC, Denounced #Money in Politics a Day Later

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Elizabeth Montag
April 18, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) George Clooney held a $353,000-per-couple fundraiser for Hillary Clinton just one day before he called the amount of money in politics “obscene.” On Sunday, he discussed his two-day San Francisco event on MSNBC’s “Meet the Press,” where he defended the pricey dinner galas — even as he acknowledged the problem of out-of-control spending in elections.

Clooney went on to justify the fundraiser, estimated to have generated $15 million in two days, by arguing the money raised goes not only to Hillary Clinton, but the Democratic National Committee (DNC) — the institution currently under fire for subverting the electoral process to satisfy the party’s establishment machinery which, of course, includes the Clintons.

Asked point blank by host Chuck Todd if he felt the fundraiser pooled an “obscene” amount of money, as Bernie Sanders alleged, Clooney acknowledged it was over the top:

“Yes, I think it’s an obscene amount of money,” he said, adding that protesters showed up to the event to voice their disapproval.

“[W]e had some protesters last night when we pulled up in San Francisco. And they’re right to protest, they’re absolutely right — it is an obscene amount of money,” he added. The protesters were largely Bernie Sanders supporters, some of whom threw dollar bills at Clinton’s motorcade.

“The Sanders campaign when they talk about it is absolutely right, it’s ridiculous that we should have this kind of money in politics. I agree, completely,” he said.

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The A-list actor acknowledged he likes Bernie Sanders and thinks he is fostering important conversations within the Democratic Party. He also vowed to throw a similar fundraiser should Sanders receive the nomination. Nevertheless, he reaffirmed Hillary Clinton as his first choice. Further, he justified the fundraiser by arguing, essentially, it was a necessary evil to place Democrats back in power.

“The overwhelming amount of the money that we’re raising, is not going to Hillary to run for president. … It’s going to the congressmen and senators to try to take back Congress,” he said, prefacing his statement with the suggestion the Clinton campaign has not made this clear enough.

He continued, “…we need to take the Senate back because we need to confirm the Supreme Court justice, because that fifth vote on the Supreme Court can overturn Citizens United and get this obscene, ridiculous amount of money out so I never have to do a fundraiser again. And that’s why I’m doing it.”

Indeed, much of the money raised for the Hillary Victory Fund — the beneficiary of the weekend’s fundraisers — goes to the DNC to invest in candidates, though Clooney did not explicitly mention the committee in the interview. A much smaller portion goes to state Democratic parties, leaving millions for Clinton and the national party establishment. Unsurprisingly, Todd did not press Clooney on the merits of raising millions of dollars for an organization that has admitted to suppressing the voices of Democratic voters in its tirade against Bernie Sanders.

As Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the increasingly loathed chair of the DNC, said of the Democratic Party’s political process in February:

“Unpledged delegates exist really to make sure that party leaders and elected officials don’t have to be in a position where they are running against grassroots activists.” Her statements — and the shenanigans at polling centers — enraged Sanders’s followers. Clinton’s corporate funding has also raised serious suspicions about her credibility.

When Todd pressed him, Clooney denied the possibility that — as Sanders suggested — wealthy donors will expect access to a ‘President Clinton’ for their contributions at the fundraisers. Rather, he abruptly shifted his focus to the Koch Brothers:

“No, I actually don’t think that’s true. I think there is a difference between the Koch Brothers and us. The difference is, if I succeed — if we — succeed in electing an entire Congress…and a president, you know, the tax policies that they would enact would probably cost us a lot more money, quite honestly. The Koch Brothers would profit if they [got] their way, and…there’s no profit for us in this.”

Though Clooney may not personally be making a profit (and he admits the policies he envisions would further indebt the nation), he neglected to note that under a Clinton presidency, defense contractors, private prisons, and other corporatist industries who back Clinton will expect to receive a boon to business for the investments they’ve made in her — even if they didn’t attend this particular Hollywood fundraiser. Further, considering the establishment DNC spearheads Clooney’s stated goal of winning a Democrat-dominated Congress, it’s likely those selected to run for office with the “obscene” cash he raised would favor the same interests as the corrupt party rulership.

In spite of these concerns, Hollywood’s behind-the-scenes moguls, some with interests in Washington D.C., have thrown their support and money behind Clinton; Jeffrey Katzenberg, founder of Dreamworks Animation and former top bundler for the Obama campaign, co-hosted Clooney’s fundraiser and enjoyed alone time with Clinton beforehand. Katzenberg and his staff  have enjoyed access to the White House throughout the Obama years, and he has long-promoted internet censorship legislation for the sake of stopping online piracy, along with other policies beneficial to the film industry.

Others, like Haim Saban, a proudly pro-Israel Hollywood billionaire, have supported Clinton for years. Saban currently runs Univision, which recently acquired the Onion and boasts of his contributions to Hillary, which total $6.4 million. Perhaps reflecting his purchased influence, Clinton wrote a letter to Saban last July vowing to oppose the BDS movement (boycotts, divest, sanctions), which seeks to disempower Israel’s occupation of Palestine.

As Hollywood’s behind-the scenes power players favor Clinton, so do celebrities. Many, like Beyoncé, Kerry Washington, Ellen Degeneres, and Katy Perry, are considered “empowered women,” and thus, apparently support the female presidential candidate. A majority of entertainers openly supporting nominees opt for Clinton. Clooney — and many other actors and musicians — proudly supported Barack Obama and continue to do so, even as his reign failed to live up to expectations, extended privacy violations, sanctioned and committed war crimes, and sought to bolster America’s oligarchy.

The star-studded event over the weekend undoubtedly raised millions for Hillary, but it is unclear whether the Hollywood establishment is unaware of her myriad crimes — or simply overlooking them for the chance at influence over the next president.

As Bernie Sanders said of the extravagant weekend galas:

“So it’s not a criticism of Clooney. It’s a criticism of a corrupt campaign finance system, where big money interests — and it’s not Clooney, it’s the people coming to this event — have undue influence on the political process.”

This article (Clooney Raised $15 Million for Hillary & DNC, Denounced Money in Politics a Day Later) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Elizabeth Montag and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. Image credit: Michael Vlasaty. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article at edits@theantimedia.org.

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