U.S. Home-Buying Applications Sink to 13-Year Low
July 15th, 2010Via: Reuters:
Demand for loans to purchase U.S. homes sunk to a 13-year low last week, and refinancing demand also slid despite near record-low mortgage rates, the Mortgage Bankers Association said on Wednesday.
Requests for loans to buy homes dropped 3.1 percent in the week ended July 9, after adjusting for the Independence Day holiday, to the lowest level since December 1996, the industry group said.
Refinancing applications fell 2.9 percent, and the mortgage market index that reflects total loan demand also fell 2.9 percent.
Average 30-year mortgage rates edged up 0.01 percentage point to 4.69 percent, but were near the record low of 4.61 percent set in March 2009, based on MBA records dating back to 1990.
Questions, Questions: Terawatt Research
July 15th, 2010How many “free energy” companies have a former Director of the CIA and FBI on their payrolls? By my math, there’s just one: Terawatt Research, LLC.
Here is William Webster’s bio on the Terawatt Research website:
Judge William H. Webster
(Milbank Tweed Hadley & Mc Cloy)
Strategic AdvisorWilliam H. Webster was sworn in as director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) on May 26, 1987. In this position he headed the United States intelligence community and directed the CIA until September, 1991. Following his departure from the CIA, he joined the law firm of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy, LLP in Washington, DC.
Webster served as United States attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri from 1960 to 1961. In 1970, he was appointed a judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and in 1973 was elevated to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. During his service on the bench, Webster was chairman of the Judiciary Conference Advisory Committee on the Criminal Rules and was a member of the Ad Hoc Committee on Habeas Corpus and the Committee of Court Administration. He resigned on February 23, 1978 to become director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where he served for nearly a decade before moving on to lead all foreign intelligence agencies of the United States as CIA director.
On July 1, 1991 Judge Webster was presented the Distinguished Intelligence Medal and on July 25, 1991 he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the National Security Medal.
Webster earned bachelor’s degrees in history and political science, as well as an honorary Doctor of Laws degree, from Amherst College in Massachusetts. He received his law degree from Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri, in 1949. He served as a lieutenant in the United States Navy in World War II and again in the Korean War.
Judge William H. Webster is current Chairman of the Homeland Security advisory Council (HSAC)
The other publicly acknowledged Terawatt Research personnel with obvious black world connections are James G. Magee (Internal Security, Strategic Advisor, Finance) and Gary W. Caille, Ph.D., P.E. (Scientific Advisor).
James G. Magee
(Internal Security, Strategic Advisor, Finance)Mr. Magee is the CEO of Level 4 Group LLC, a multi-million dollar strategic consultancy and capital funding provider to companies in the defense and security sector markets. Mr. Magee is a recognized expert on ballistic protection systems, special operations and national security issues, and has been the president of three industry leading body armor manufacturers, Point Blank Body Armor, Inc.; ArmorShield USA, Inc.; and Select Armor, Inc. during the past decade. At Point Blank, he designed the US Army’s Interceptor™ vest, still the benchmark body armor worn by US Armed Forces personnel today. Defying conventional industry history, he led Point Blank to a position of industry leader from Chapter 7 Bankruptcy in less than 12 months. After leaving Point Blank, Mr. Magee managed the Modular Body Armor (Interceptor™) program for the US Army’s Prime Contractor for MBA, Arthur D. Little, Inc. Magee served as the president of Exothermal Technology Corporation, Inc. (ETC), a torso cooling protective vest system company, and after a year’s service as president, was appointed to ETC’s Board of Directors for another two years. Mr. Magee served as the President of HIPERTEX, Inc., a manufacturer of high output lightweight diesel engines for DARPA, and a pioneer in alternative energy solutions. Mr. Magee led GartnerGroup’s Performance Management Practice for five years. His team was responsible for the Eastern half of the USA and for Federal government clients. At Gartner, Mr. Magee was the global leader in providing efficiency, effectiveness, cost and performance consulting for Fortune 500 commercial clients, as well as for major Federal and state government agencies. In his first sortie into industry after retirement from the US Marine Corps, Mr. Magee served as a senior operations analyst with Kapos Associates, Inc. (KAI, now part of L3Comm). His clients included The White House, the National Security Council (NSC), and The Atlanta Olympics, the federal departments of Defense, Army, Navy, and Treasury. While at KAI, Mr. Magee led KAI teams that assessed the interoperability for the NSC including the Defense Department’s command, control, computers and intelligence systems (C4I3) at combatant commands around the globe.
Mr. Magee periodically consults for Georgia Tech and the U.S. Marine Corps on combat systems and armor optimization, and has been an on-screen consultant to NBC News and PBS’s The News Hour with Jim Lehrer on armor systems and military procurement issues. Mr. Magee has been published in Armed Forces Journal, the Marine Corps Gazette and the Washington Post on these and other national security issues.
He served a full career in the Marines, retiring as a highly decorated infantry Colonel in the 1990’s after service as the Marine’s special operations expert, and commander of the largest anti-terrorist organization in DOD, the Marine Corps Security Forces with 3400 Marines and Sailors at 82 sites in 16 countries. He enjoys the distinction of having stood up and commanded the Marines first Light Armor Battalion, as well as having been selected as the 2002 recipient of the National Defense Industrial Association’s (NDIA) Lifetime Achievement Award for his contributions to the Nation’s ability to wage special operations.
Mr. Magee lives in the suburbs of Atlanta, GA with his wife, Carole. They have three grown children.
Education:
MBA Studies: Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia
BS: Virginia Tech, Blacksburg,
MA Equivalent: NATO Defense College, Rome, Italy Virginia
Did you check out Level 4 Group? For all your counter intelligence and clean energy needs? Unique Experience : Battlefield to Boardroom??? (Nope, this isn’t The Onion.)
Next up: Gary W. Caille:
Gary W. Caille, Ph.D., P.E.
(Scientific Advisor)Current:
Director, Systems Solutions Group, CSU Ventures
Background:
PRE/Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech Research InstituteDr. Caille has extensive experience in the theoretical and practical development of armor and blast resistant systems. Recently he led systems development of the ULTRA Armored Personnel Concept Vehicle and the USMC Marine personnel Carrier, focusing on the survivability and mobility of armor vehicles and their personnel. For the ULTRA APV, he delivered a next generation armored patrol vehicle and developed a new armor for under 3 million dollars all in approximately 1 year. Dr. Caille has also used his expertise in thermal systems by forming systematic solutions to energy generation that use renewable sources such as geothermal, solar and wind combined with gasification and plasma systems using other waste streams to provide optimized solutions that have positive environmental and economic impacts to the community.
Dr. Caille was commissioned in the United Stated Navy after graduation from Cornell University with a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering (1977). He completed a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Central Florida (1985) and a Doctor of Philosophy in Mechanical Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech, 1988). He is a licensed Professional Engineer in Georgia, New Jersey (inactive) and Florida (inactive).
After completing nuclear power training and submarine training, Dr. Caille served on a fast attack nuclear submarine. He served as the Reactor Controls Division Officer, Sonar Division Officer and Weapons Department Head from 1978 to 1982. From 1982 to 1984, he served as an instructor and director of the Officer Chemistry, Materials and Radiological Fundamentals Division at the Navy’s Nuclear Power School.
In 1988, Dr. Caille reported to the Chief of Naval Operations Strategic Submarine Directorate where he served as the Deputy Program Manager and Technical Director for research and development programs with an annual budget of approximately $100M. He also directly supervised the planning, installation, execution, and data analysis of ten, multi-platform, highly complex at-sea experiments. Dr. Caille retired from the Navy Reserve as a Captain with 4 commands.
After returning to Georgia Tech in 1993, Dr. Caille served as a Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Electro-Optics, Environment and Materials Laboratory, a 250-person, $25 M highly diversified research organization. In 2008, Dr. Caille formed the Systems Solutions Group of CSU Ventures which is focused on developing applied technical research from Colorado State University and partnering with industrial corporations to develop systems level solutions.
I would be most interested in knowing where the money is coming from. If you have any information on who is actually behind this, let me know.
Related: Terawatt Research LLC Defies Free Energy Stereotypes
Retired NASA Flight Director: 9/11 Aircraft Speed Is The “Elephant In The Room”
July 14th, 2010Via: Pilots for 9/11 Truth:
A Responsibility to Explain an Aeronautical Improbability
Dwain Deets
NASA Dryden Flight Research Center (Senior Executive Service – retired)
AIAA Associate Fellow
The airplane was UA175, a Boeing 767-200, shortly before crashing into World Trade Center Tower 2. Based on analysis of radar data, the National Transportation and Safety Board reported the groundspeed just before impact as 510 knots. This is well beyond the maximum operating velocity of 360 knots, and maximum dive velocity of 410 knots. The possibilities as I see them are: (1) this wasn’t a standard 767-200; (2) the radar data was compromised in some manner; (3) the NTSB analysis was erroneous; or (4) the 767 flew well beyond its flight envelope, was controllable, and managed to hit a relatively small target. Which organization has the greater responsibility for acknowledging the elephant in the room? The NTSB, NASA, Boeing, or the AIAA? Have engineers authored papers, but the AIAA or NASA won’t publish them? Or, does the ethical responsibility lie not with organizations, but with individual aeronautical engineers? Have engineers just looked the other way?
Boeing Unveils Phantom Eye Hydrogen-Powered Spy Plane
July 14th, 2010Via: BBC:
Boeing has unveiled its unmanned hydrogen-powered spy plane which can fly non-stop for up to four days.
The high-altitude plane, called Phantom Eye, will remain aloft at 20,000m (65,000ft), according to the company.
The demonstrator will be shipped to Nasa’s Dryden Flight Research Center in California later this summer to prepare for its first flight in early 2011.
Boeing says the aircraft could eventually carry out “persistent intelligence and surveillance”.
It is a product of the company’s secretive Phantom Works research and development arm.
Boeing says the aircraft is capable of long endurance flights because of its “lighter” and “more powerful” hydrogen fuel system.
“We flew Condor [the company’s previous reconnaissance drone] for 60 hours in 1989 on regular jet fuel, and that was the maximum,” said Chris Haddox from Boeing Phantom Works. “Now we’re talking 96 hours.”
The company explained in a statement that Phantom Eye was “powered by two 2.3 litre, four-cylinder engines that provide 150 horsepower each”.
It is also very large, with a 46m (150ft) wingspan.
U.S. Company Set to Ship Billions of Gallons of Water from Alaska to India
July 14th, 2010Tell me this is a hoax.
Via: TreeHugger:
India is hurting for water. With rapidly growing populations of people and a rising middle class that is mimicking the wasteful water consumption habits well known here in the United States, coupled with poor water management practices, India is set to be one of the first parts of the world hit by a major water crisis. Still, does that mean shipping water from Alaska all the way to India is a smart solution? One Texas-based water supply management company, S2C Global Systems, thinks it is — at least, it’s smart for their bottom line, if not for the environment. They’re all lined up to ship billions of gallons of water annually from an Alaskan city to India, and other parts of Asia and the Middle East.
Circle of Blue brings our attention to a press release on the company’s website.
Sitka, Alaska will sell water from its Blue Lake Reservoir for a penny a gallon to Alaska Resource Management, a company formed by S2C and True Alaska Bottling, will export as much as 2.9 billion gallons each year, providing the city with as much as $26 million annually. It could earn as much as $90 million annually if it can sell off the rest of its maximum water right of 9 billion gallons.
According to Circle of Blue, “This will be the world’s first large-volume exports of water via tanker: companies have tried unsuccessfully for more than two decades to break open the bulk water export market. Past attempts have been thwarted by daunting logistics, concerns about natural resource sovereignty and commodification as well as the availability of cheaper local sources.”
Fresh water is set to be the next “big oil” of the world, with supplies in some areas growing exceedingly tight. Technologies from smart metering to irrigation management to purification all seem to be slower to reach areas like India than tankers of exported water. However, while businesses are dashing to find a profit in water exportation, water management will need to become far more popular globally if we’re to avoid a worldwide water shortage.
S2C is set to start shipping water within eight months, using tankers that have a “Ozonating” system onboard to keep the water clean.
SmithKline Hid Test Data on Dangerous Diabetes Drug
July 14th, 2010Via: New York Times:
In the fall of 1999, the drug giant SmithKline Beecham secretly began a study to find out if its diabetes medicine, Avandia, was safer for the heart than a competing pill, Actos, made by Takeda.
Avandia’s success was crucial to SmithKline, whose labs were otherwise all but barren of new products. But the study’s results, completed that same year, were disastrous. Not only was Avandia no better than Actos, but the study also provided clear signs that it was riskier to the heart.
But instead of publishing the results, the company spent the next 11 years trying to cover them up, according to documents recently obtained by The New York Times. The company did not post the results on its Web site or submit them to federal drug regulators, as is required in most cases by law.
“This was done for the U.S. business, way under the radar,” Dr. Martin I. Freed, a SmithKline executive, wrote in an e-mail message dated March 29, 2001, about the study results that was obtained by The Times. “Per Sr. Mgmt request, these data should not see the light of day to anyone outside of GSK,” the corporate successor to SmithKline.
The heart risks from Avandia first became public in May 2007, with a study from a cardiologist at the Cleveland Clinic who used data the company was forced by a lawsuit to post on its own Web site. In the ensuing months, GlaxoSmithKline officials conceded that they had known of the drug’s potential heart attack risks since at least 2005.
Former Member of Clinton Regime: Obama Needs “A 9/11 Event or an Oklahoma City Bombing” to Command Confidence
July 14th, 2010Via: Financial Times:
“The bottom line here is that Americans don’t believe in President Obama’s leadership,” says Rob Shapiro, another former Clinton official and a supporter of Mr Obama. “He has to find some way between now and November of demonstrating that he is a leader who can command confidence and, short of a 9/11 event or an Oklahoma City bombing, I can’t think of how he could do that.”
Research Credit: PL
Thousands of Laptops Stolen During Nine-Hour Heist from Government Contractor
July 14th, 2010Via: AP:
Thousands of laptops have been stolen from the Florida office of a private contractor for the U.S. military’s Special Operations Command.
Surveillance cameras caught up to seven people loading the computers into two trucks for nine hours.
U.S. Special Operations Command coordinates the activities of elite units from the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. A spokeswoman said Tuesday that none of the stolen laptops contained military information or software.
The Virginia-based company iGov was awarded a $450 million contract earlier this year to supply mobile technology services linking special operations troops worldwide. A company executive says iGov is cooperating with authorities and the March 6 break-in at its Tampa facility remains under investigation.
Arizona: Hundreds of Thousands of Speeding Tickets Ignored by Drivers; Not Enough Process Servers to Handle the Load; Dozens of Speed Cameras Coming Down
July 13th, 2010Technofascism Blog is going again after a short break.
Via: AZ Family:
Dozens of photo-enforcement cameras on freeways throughout the state are coming down this week.
A total of 76 cameras will cease operation on Thursday.
The photo-enforcement program, which was meant to catch speeders on Arizona’s freeways, has been controversial from the beginning. The cameras first went up nearly two years ago.
While the cameras have done a good job at snapping speeders, drivers have been ignoring the tickets.
According to the Department of Public Safety, the cameras led to more than 700,000 tickets in the first year of operation. Many of those people, however, never paid the fines.
Some say that’s because the tickets were mailed, making them easy to ignore.
Any driver who ignored a photo-enforcement ticket was supposed to have been served. One problem was that process servers were inundated and simply couldn’t get to everybody. If a person was not served, his or her ticket became invalid after three months.
The speeding tickets should have generated about $90 million in the first year of the program. About one-third of that was actually collected.
Gov. Jan Brewer, who has always been critical of the program, decided earlier this year not to renew Arizona’s contract with Redflex Traffic Systems, the company that runs the cameras.
South Korea Deploys Killer Robots Along Border with North
July 13th, 2010Via: Telegraph:
South Korea has deployed sentry robots capable of detecting and killing intruders along the heavily-fortified border with North Korea, officials said on Tuesday.
Two robots with surveillance, tracking, firing and voice recognition systems were integrated into a single unit, a defence ministry spokesman said.
The 400 million won (£220,000) unit was installed last month at a guard post in the central section of the Demilitarised Zone which bisects the peninsula, Yonhap news agency said.
It quoted an unidentified military official as saying the ministry would deploy sentry robots along the world’s last Cold War frontier if the test was successful.
The robot uses heat and motion detectors to sense possible threats, and alerts command centres, Yonhap said.
If the command centre operator cannot identify possible intruders through the robot’s audio or video communications system, the operator can order it to fire its gun or 40mm automatic grenade launcher.
