Spontaneous order is not “chaos“.  Instead, it is anarchy.  Spontaneous order is what you get when there is no “control” over a situation beyond things (or people) acting according to their nature.  It is what makes a snowflake always form with six sides, and what makes the Universe display other beautiful patterns and function as it does.  It is also what would provide for peaceful and mutually beneficial interactions among free people if there were not the insane control-freaks always trying to impose their “better way” from afar.

As spontaneous order in nature gets studied more, and hopefully understood better, perhaps educated people will begin to understand what wise people have known all along: that left alone, things will generally work themselves out in a beneficial way.  And if they don’t, imposing control wouldn’t have made the situation any better anyway.

Tom Cruise is one of those people that you either love or you hate.  I personally think the guy is a great actor, provided the role fits him, and can see that he is smart enough to avoid roles that don’t fit.  Tom Cruise as the English Patient?  Nope, not gonna work.  Tom Cruise as Colonel Stauffenberg in Valkyrie?  Near-perfect fit.

For those unfamiliar with the story, Unternehmen Walküre, was a contingency plan drafted by the German War Ministry to deal with domestic invasion, insurrection, and so forth.  Similar to our own martial law and National Guard mobilizations, the plan used all reserve troops being kept throughout the Reich to provide security in a state of emergency.  What the film doesn’t portray is that by 1944, most of those reserve troops were children from Hitler’s Youth and partially disabled soldiers retired from the front.

Regardless, the movie itself is an excellent portrayal of the dramatic events that happened in 1944 when Colonel Stauffenberg and his co-conspirators attempted to assassinated Hitler and use Operation Valkyrie to take control of the German government and end the war before it ended Germany.  This was the last of 14 attempts to kill Hitler during World War II, most of those attempts being made by Germans who saw through the Third Reich’s national socialism.

While historical inaccuracies are present within the film, this isn’t a concern for a non-documentary.  I would recommend Operation Valkyrie: The Stauffenberg Plot to Kill Hitler if that is what you’re after.  It’s an excellent video documentary of the true events behind the plot.  It is based on the book of the same name, I believe, published in the 1960s.

No, the real problem with Valkyrie is not the actors, the plot, or the way the movie was filmed.  Instead, the problems are with either the editing or the script.  It’s hard to tell which.  Probably editing.  All motivation for Stauffenberg’s actions are compressed into a few short minutes at the beginning of the film and it falls flat.  The Colonel is, for all appearances, a dedicated soldier in the German Army.  Then he complains that he’s being sent to the wrong area and that it will kill his men, he plots with a General to change the orders, and then everything gets shot up by Alllied planes.  It’s just empty.

Other than that glitch, though, the movie is outstanding and well worth the watch.  There is some violence, but it’s wartime violence that shouldn’t be disturbing and the movie was careful to keep it’s PG-13 rating.  It’s a good movie, and I recommend it, but it’s not a must see by any means.

What started as a routine traffic stop ended with a Colorado teen doing hard time. The offense? Not returning a “House of Flying Daggers” DVD to his local library. Come on, Colorado. You’re better than that.

Apparently young Aaron Henson, an impressionable lad all of 19 years old, fell in with the wrong DVD-borrowing crowd sometime last year. Henson packed up the flick for a move, forgot that he had it, and ended up with a warrant for his arrest:

The city said it sent an overdue notice and bill, neither of which were returned.

The city then sent a summons, which was returned.

Then, the city sent a new court date order, it was not returned. And when Aaron failed to appear for the second court date, the city issued a warrant.

Why all the fuss? Because apparently the municipality of Littleton, CO values the DVD of a 2004 release at $31.45, and any “theft” over $30 gets prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Also of note: Littleton, CO has apparently never heard of Amazon.

Anyhow, the whole mess get straightened out after Henson’s family forked over a $200 fine for the DVD, $200 to remove the car from the impound lot, and $60 in court fees. And while Littleton has acknowledged its mistake and the mayor swears it won’t happen again, the arrest is still on Aaron’s record.

Just so long as no one got hurt, I suppose, except for the integrity of our judicial system. [The Denver Channel via Consumerist]

UN chief Ban Ki Moon has announced what the media is calling a “mistakes review” but is actually a review of IPCC procedures prior to the Fifth Assessment Report.

The review is going to be performed by an umbrella body for national science academies, which frankly doesn’t inspire much confidence and it will be interesting to see just how independent the panel turns out to be. A sixth independent-but-entirely-free-of-sceptics review might cause eyebrows to be raised, I would say.

The terms of reference look rather vague to me. There are sections on looking at making the IPCC better at managing itself and spinning a line to the media, but the substance is here:

1. Review IPCC procedures for preparing reports including:
• Data quality assurance and data quality control;
• Guidelines for the types of literature appropriate for inclusion in IPCC
assessments, with special attention to the use of non peer-reviewed literature;
• Procedures for expert and governmental review of IPCC material;
• Handling of the full range of scientific views; and
• Procedures for correcting errors identified after approval, adoption and
acceptance of a report.

The first bullet point is interesting and might cover relevant issues, like transparency of data. Then again, it might not. It would be reasonable, however, for the IPCC to demand data and code for a paper be public before permitting it to be cited in the report. I’m not holding my breath on that one though.

On Wednesday, Obama said he “would try to block the court-ordered release of photos showing U.S. troops abusing prisoners.” The release, which was to be the result of a Freedom of Information Act request made by the ACLU, had been reasonable in the final weeks of April, but today, Obama chose to come out against the release.

According to the Associated Press, “out of concern [that] the pictures would “further inflame anti-American opinion” and endanger U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan” Obama planned to block them.

Obama intends to block the release of the photos because they may negatively impact American empire and American military adventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. Gen. Ray Odierno, a prime architect of “the surge” in Iraq, and Gen. David Petraeus influenced Obama’s decision after informing the administration that they were afraid the photos will “cost American lives.”

Obama suggested that the “photos had already served their purpose in investigations of “a small number of individuals” and “the individuals who were involved have been identified, and appropriate actions have been taken.”

Also, Obama made the argument that “these photos that were requested in this case are not particularly sensational, especially when compared to the painful images that we remember from Abu Ghraib.”
When choosing to make a “mockery” out of his “promise of transparency and accountability” (as one member of the ACLU put it), Obama is fine with contending that if information requested does not show something worse than said previous atrocity or does not show that something more inhumane happened the information should not be released.
Even if the information would give further credence to the argument that the Bush Administration tortured (which many in the corporate news media are still reluctant to outright accept as they continue to cling to the “enhanced interrogation technique” euphemism when discussing “torture”), the fact that it does not top the brutality of a batch of previous photos means that the ACLU’s FOIA request should not be fulfilled.
The ACLU released a response to Obama’s decision, which was written by Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the ACLU.

Two old friends, civil rights activist David Mixner and former U.S. Senator (and my oft co-author) Don Riegle (D-MI), believe that in the economic recovery, not enough attention is being given to ‘who’s really poor’ now. David and Don have for years advised me — and others — on the issue of poverty in America, and they are worried that too many people, and especially too many people in the administration and Congress, are missing this imperative.

To help make their point, they referred me to poverty activist Marsha Timpson, who describes today’s poor as “America’s dirty little secret, hidden in the backyards of America’s shining homes, the hollows, the reservations, the border towns and the dark ghettos of the city where they are the lie of the American dream.”

I agree with my friends, and with Ms. Timpson’s view, and everyone else should as well, for right now in America:

• At least 50 million people are ill-fed — up from 37 million just a year ago — including 17 million children. Hunger in America is now at an all-time high, and there are currently entire national geographic regions — the very large 15-state ‘South’ being one of them — where more than half of all public school students are poor and ill-fed.

Although I myself grew up in a fairly hardscrabble environment, as the father of a daughter who was in fact able to create a successful life from the opportunities

her mother and I could give her, it is hard for me to imagine what it must be like to have your child needy and hungry. Yet all of us need to ‘imagine’ this, because each night in America millions of children do in fact go to bed hungry and under-nourished, while also lacking proper housing, needed clothing, and the basic education required to develop and ultimately find gainful employment. And while I wholeheartedly support the First Lady’s new “Let’s Move” effort to improve the nutrition of America’s children, we must first react to basic hunger rather than to food quality.

• 30% of the nation’s 50 million homeowners own a home whose value is below its mortgage balance, and this number could rise to an almost unbelievable 50% by year-end 2011. It would cost about $745 billion, more than the size of the original 2008 bank bailout, to restore these borrowers to the point where they were breaking even, which there is no obvious political will to find right now.

• Despite the truly dismal ‘real unemployment’ figures with which most everyone now agrees — a staggering 30 million workers and 19% of the labor force — very little attention is being paid to the particularly adverse effects the recession is having on people of color, recent immigrants, and out-of school youth. And almost no one is acknowledging the sad reality that even the nation’s 130 million full-time workers have had an average economic loss of 15% just since December 2007 — an average effective work week of 34 hours rather than 40 — which means that the number of unemployed workers, measured economically, is actually as high as 50 million.

The overwhelming problem today for most workers isn’t this recession, as horrible as it is — it’s the fact that for every earned income level except the top 10%, average household income hasn’t changed a bit for 10 years, and that for the bottom 60% of wage earners it hasn’t changed for more than 20 years. Through economic expansions and recessions — and bull and bear markets — alike, 90% of workers in America have been standing still earnings-wise.

• And 100 million people, fully one-third of the entire U.S. population, are at or below “200% of the federal poverty line of $21,834 for a family of four”, which is a needs-measure made lame by the fact that no family of four can actually comfortably live on such a low annual income.

**********

The best response to this scourge would be for our government to embrace in today’s troubled time the same “economic bill of rights” that FDR, in his last State of the Union Speech in January 1944, demanded for his.

Read the rest at this link.

To the Members of TrueMajority,

The Department of Homeland Security has received a copy of the following missive from your organization and subsequent inquiries have authenticated this email as coming from your headquarters cave in Pakistan via the Al Qaeda network in Afghanistan, New York City, etc.

Pursuant to the directives given DHS in our Congressional mandate, we hereby declare your organization to be a terrorist group engaged in treasonous and anti-American behavior. See also the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), and the Missouri IAC report (MIAC), all of which define what is a terrorist and insurrectionist in today’s modern United States of America.

Your missive, which is quoted below, clearly shows your anti-government leanings and that you are engage in terroristic propaganda.

Yesterday we sent health insurance industry a message they will not forget.

Thousands of protesters marched through downtown Washington, D.C., to arrest the CEOs of Big Insurance, and demand that Congress finish reform right.1 In addition, we faxed over 3,000 wanted posters made by TrueMajority members like you to the insurance CEOs’ offices — tying up phone lines and creating chaos for their lobbyists.

It was big news, and Congress is taking notice. This morning leaders of the House of Representatives committed to making progress on a final bill NEXT WEEK,2 and President Obama is touring the country to build support too.3

But getting the debate restarted and putting the insurance companies on notice is only the first step. Yesterday thousands of people marched in D.C. To win, we need Congress to follow through. And that’s going to take more pressure from more of us.

This type of un-American behavior must be squelched in its infancy. Thus, this letter will be delivered via a joint task force of Department of the Treasury, Secret Service, and Federal Bureau of Investigation SWAT agents.

Yours in Love of Country,

Janet Napolitano
Chief Director, Department of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C.

U.S.-Canadian state and provincial integration is being achieved in areas of transportation, the economy, energy and the environment. With some national, trilateral and global initiatives being discredited, stalled or ineffective, it appears as if the strategy has further shifted to a regional and local level in an effort to lay the groundwork for new agreements.

In 2008, the Pacific Coast Collaborative was established between Alaska, British Columbia, California, Oregon and Washington as, “a formal basis for cooperative action, a forum for leadership and information sharing, and a common voice on issues facing Pacific North America.” Some of its key priorities include action on clean energy, regional transportation, emergency management, sustainable regional economy, ocean conservation and climate change, as well as other issues. The inaugural Leaders’ Forum of the Pacific Coast Collaborative was held in Vancouver, British Colombia on February 12, 2010. It was hosted by Premier Gordon Campbell and chaired by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. The meeting was also attended by Washington Governor Christine Gregoire and Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown. Although Alaska is also a member of the group, they were not able to send a representative to the meeting. It was announced that Oregon will be hosting the next forum to be held later this year.

The Pacific Coast Leaders signed two action plans. The first being- Innovation, the Environment and the Economy which, “sets out a series of co-operative initiatives to promote renewable and low-carbon energy and energy conservation, including developing Interstate 5/Highway 99 as a green transportation corridor. It also promotes development of high-speed rail from San Diego to Vancouver and the move to ‘Green Ports’ through co-operation to reduce local air pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions.” The second action plan on Ocean Conservation and Coastal Climate Change Adaptation, “focuses on co-operation on invasive species, reductions in toxins and other pollutants, promoting sustainable fisheries management and research into impacts from climate change and adaptation options.” The leaders also released a document entitled Vision 2030: Positioning Pacific North America for Sustainable Prosperity which sets out a strategic outlook for regional collaboration.

One of the Pacific Coast Collaborative top priorities includes a high speed rail system. On its website it states, “For the Pacific Coastal region to remain competitive, we need transportation systems that will facilitate the movement of people and goods north to south while reducing the number of vehicles on our highways. Rail, particularly high speed rail, can deliver significant benefits to the region including advancing climate change goals, energy conservation, congestion reduction, and job creation for the citizens of the region.” Cassandra Anderson’s article Agenda 21 Alert: Obama Railroads Us With the Bullet Train details how in many ways a high speed rail system in the U.S. would be impractical and costly, with the majority of the trains running off of diesel fuel. President Obama has promised that such an undertaking would create many jobs, but it has been reported that much of the needed equipment and supplies would have to be outsourced. The article also lays out how future transportation systems could restrict auto and personal mobility in an effort to further control the population.

At the recent meeting, Pacific Coast Leaders urged further local action in combating environmental issues. Governor Schwarzenegger acknowledged that, “We’re united, there’s no two ways about it. Politically, ecologically, we speak with one voice.” He also added that, “We saw at Copenhagen that national governments and the national community has not yet been able to come to an agreement to reducing green house gas emissions. The UN and the national governments have realized that the sub-national governments are really the ones in the end who can put the pressure on and engage the kind of action that is needed.” In her article Agenda 21 Alert: Schwarzenegger’s ‘True Lies’ in Copenhagen Cassandra Anderson stated that, “The globalists’ battle for complete control over all populations is from ‘global to local.’ This is why Arnold was brought to speak at the Copenhagen Summit. He truthfully revealed the power that state and local governments have in accomplishing carbon reduction goals.” Anderson went on to say that, “States can enact their own carbon emission reduction laws and Cap and Trade schemes- it is not necessary for international treaties and federal regulations to be passed.”

The Western Climate Initiative (WCI) was launched in 2007 and includes some U.S. states and Canadian provinces as member partners and observers. Their website states that, “The WCI is a collaboration of independent jurisdictions working together to identify, evaluate, and implement policies to tackle climate change at a regional level.” In September of 2008 the WCI unveiled the centerpiece of their strategy, aregional cap-and-trade program to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. “The first phase of the cap-and-trade program begins on January 1, 2012, covering emissions from electricity, including imported electricity, industrial combustion at large sources, and industrial process emissions for which adequate measurement methods exist. The second phase begins in 2015, when the program expands to include transportation fuels and residential, commercial and industrial fuels not otherwise covered.” With an eye on the future, the WCI also admitted that their, “cap-and-trade program is designed in such a way that it can provide a model for, be integrated into, or work in conjunction with any future U.S. or Canadian emissions-reduction programs.”

President Obama has been forced to delay his push for a national cap-and-trade plan as legislation has been stalled in the U.S. Senate. Many critics of the program argue that it could lead to millions of jobs being lost and the push for a green economy might further hamper economic recovery. A North American climate change strategy is moving forward which includes more emphasis being placed at a regional and local level. The threat of man made global warming has been discredited in the eyes of many, yet the environmental agenda continues. Protecting our planet has turned increasingly more political and profitable. Under the guise of safeguarding the environment, many solutions being offered are in the form of more taxes and more control over our lives.

The state of Virginia turned to a baldfaced fleecing of motorists this past weekend as a part of a solution to chip away at the state’s $2.2-billion budget deficit.

The Truthaboutcars.com, via the newspaper.com, reported the shameful results of Virginia’s weekend revenue-pumping ticket blitz that flew under cover of a safety campaign: the state’s “Operation Air, Land & Speed, dealt out an astonishing 7,016 traffic tickets this past Saturday and Sunday.

Overtime for the state troopers engaged in the 48-hour turkey shoot was paid via a federal grant, meaning tax dollars helped fund Virginia’s budget-balancing con.

If the 3,536 speeding citations aren’t enough proof of the bizarre charade speed limits have become all over the nation, Virginia took the swindle a step further: troopers issued 717 citations for reckless driving, a “judgment call” ticket that can be handed out for speeding as little as 10 or 15 miles per hour over the speed limit – and one that can come with a fine of as much as $2,500.

Apparently unable to fathom the irony of what issuing 3,536 speeding tickets in two days must say about speed limits, Colonel W. Steven Flaherty, Virginia State Police superintendent, said in a statement, “It is discouraging to see so many motorists on our interstates putting themselves and others at risk by failing to comply with speed limits, to buckle up, and to drive sober.”

The state police superintendent makes no attempt to connect the alleged chaos caused by speeding to the nation’s near-perpetual downward spiral in road fatalities – or Virginia’s own 20-percent drop in fatalities just this year.

Nobody seems to want to calculate just how much Operation Air, Land & Speed helped Virginia in its quest to balance its budget, yet even with the massive number of tickets issued, the figure isn’t going to be much help in filling a $2.2-billion shortfall. But motorists whose own federal tax dollars helped finance Virginia’s latest ticket-writing ripoff – the state boasts of the 120,000 tickets 23 such operations have yielded since 2006 -  will be paying the cost of Virginia’s punitive enforcement many times over.

Nor are any figures available on how many of the drivers ticketed this weekend have signed on to be fans of the Virginia State Police on the department’s new Facebook page, launched March 1. - Bill Visnic, Senior Editor

Photo by Virginia State Police

Every official study of why it is so difficult for the U.S. Postal Service to remain solvent notes the obvious: the decline in use of the system because of the advent of e-mail. While this challenge cannot be denied, my unofficial observations as one who has been a sender and recipient of a high volume of postal mail for decades cause me to conclude that poor service, a lack of accountability, tenured and untouchable workers and an archaic model are prominent explanations for a system that continually comes to the public for more money.

If I had kept a record of every instance in which I have endured home and work misdelivery, delayed delivery, general incompetence and rudeness, I could share encyclopedic volumes. Complaints to the Postal Service are of limited value, as problems recur, and it is obvious that no employee is required to answer for his or her actions.

The credo “The mail must go through” is not accurate in reference to the U.S. Postal Service. It would be accurate for the United Parcel Service and FedEx, both of which always find a means to deliver their packages. Unlike postal workers, workers engaged by private firms know their jobs depend upon accurate and timely delivery and that the carrier must be courteous when encountering customers.

Might the U.S. Postal Service ever be privatized? It is unlikely. This is America, where the poor soul who funds the system is not a valued customer, but a sap.

OREN M. SPIEGLER

Upper Saint Clair, Pa.