China to Raise Oil Imports by 14%, Sinopec Group Says
April 18th, 2007Sure, and I’ll flap my wings and fly around like a bird. Could happen, right?
Via: Bloomberg:
China, the world’s largest energy user after the U.S., may increase crude oil imports by as much as 14 percent this year to meet surging domestic demand, said an official with the nation’s largest oil refiner.
The nation may import between 160 million metric tons and 165 million tons this year, Sun Yongsheng, deputy chief engineer of Economic and Technology Research Institute of China Petrochemical Corp., known as Sinopec Group, said in the northern city of Dalian.
China is increasing oil-processing capacity by 25 percent by 2010 to satisfy growing consumption of gasoline, diesel and chemical raw materials. The country’s reliance on oil imports will rise to 60 percent by 2020 from 47 percent currently, when the imports almost doubles, Hao Hongyi, head of strategy research at China National Petroleum Corp., the nation’s largest oil company, said yesterday.
Virginia Tech Shooting: I’ve Already Seen Enough
April 18th, 2007I thought that I should designate a single post to all of the Virginia Tech related analysis, to parse out some of the key signals from the noise. Within 30 minutes of actually sitting down to read about the incident, I had already seen enough.
At first, I was looking for—and found—indications of trauma induced mind control.
According to ABC News:
Lucinda Roy, a co-director of the creative writing program at Virginia Tech, taught Cho in a poetry class in fall of 2005 and later worked with him one-on-one after she became concerned about his behavior and themes in his writings.
Roy spoke outside her home Tuesday afternoon, saying that there was nothing explicit in Cho’s writings, but that threats were there under the surface.
Roy told ABC News that Cho seemed “extraordinarily lonely–the loneliest person I have ever met in my life.” She said he wore sunglasses indoors, with a cap pulled low over his eyes. He whispered, took 20 seconds to answer questions, and took cellphone pictures of her in class. Roy said she was concerned for her safety when she met with him.
She said she notified authorities about Cho, but said she was told that there would be too many legal hurdles to intervene. She said she asked him to go to counseling, but he never did.
One play attributed to him, called “Richard McBeef,” describes a 13-year-old boy who accuses his stepfather of pedophilia, and ends with the boy’s death.
In another, called “Mr. Brownstone,” three high-school students face an abusive teacher.
“I wanna kill him,” says one character.
“I wanna watch him bleed like the way he made us kids bleed,” says another.
The two plays were posted on AOL after a staffer named Ian MacFarlane, a December 2006 graduate of Virginia Tech, brought them to his editors’ attention.
MacFarlane said he was in a class with Cho in which students were required to post their plays online for peer review and comment.
In a different ABC News article, Brad Garrett, a former FBI agent / ABC News consultant, provided some interesting commentary:
The date of the first gun purchase will likely serve as the time of “some triggering mechanism that was very important” to Cho said Garrett, an expert on profiling murderers.
That made me want to read through the first ABC News article again, and I noticed something that I had skipped the first time.
Let’s look at Sun-Kyung, Cho’s sister:
Cho’s parents live in a townhouse development in Centreville, a suburb of Washington. They own a dry-cleaning shop nearby.
His older sister, Sun-Kyung, graduated from Princeton University in 2004. A source, who asked to be identified as a senior Administration official, said she works for McNeil Technologies, a firm contracted by the State Department to manage reconstruction efforts in Iraq.
Woh. Ok. Stop right there.
What does McNeil Technologies do?
Oh, the usual black bag intelligence agency cut out kind of stuff… Actually, there’s more here than you can shake a stick at.
The McNeil Technologies Services page lists the following categories: Language Services, Information Management Services, Program Support Services, Security Services, Intelligence Services.
I clicked on Intelligence Services first.
Intelligence Services -> Overview
McNeil”s Intelligence and Language Center (ILC) provides unmatched expertise in the areas of Intelligence and Language Services. The combination of Intelligence and Language guarantees our clients mission success.
Our services and capabilities include:
* Intelligence Architecture Operations in support of the US Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).
* Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) which supports the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and other government agencies, and
* HUMINT (Human Intel) operations in support of DIA, or with federal counter Intel outsourcing effort. Our
* Linguist operations, with linguists deployed in various theaters of operations,
* Translation operations which include document and website translation,
* Testing, Training and Research of language and cultural awareness.
Under Intelligence Services -> Key Solutions, we see:
HUMINT Operations:
Classified CONUS and OCONUS support by seasoned Intel professionals.
That means support for intelligence operations inside and outside of the continental United States.
Then we have:
Security Services -> Overview
The Security Center at McNeil Technologies is a dynamic and growing Center providing full spectrum security services.
* It is one of only three competitively-selected providers, and the only Washington-based provider of airport passenger/baggage screening services under Transportation Security Administration’s Screener Partnership Program. McNeil provides service at Greater Rochester International Airport.
* Physical Security which includes Access control, escorts, and Guard services, Electronic systems monitoring, as well as classified mailroom and package inspection.
* Personnel and Logistics Support is provided by MILPO operations
* Program Security consists of arms control and nonproliferation support, treaty vulnerability assessments, and support of Balanced Survivability Assessments
* McNeil Security Inc. – For more information about the McNeil Security subsidiary go to the website at www.mcneilsecurity.com.
Cui bono? Who benefits? At some point in the future, would a company that provides physical security for large organizations benefit from what just happened at Virginia Tech? It’s obviously just a coincidence that the sister of the shooter works for a large provider of these services. Right? A company with more publicly stated connections to U.S. Intelligence than you can shake a stick at… A company that is providing ongoing support to current U.S. Intelligence operations…
Feel free to keep clicking around on that site, if you dare. Intelligence operations. Physical security operations at airports and top secret government facilities. Government document declassification. Handling of information related to weapons of mass destruction… It goes on and on.
I’m not trying to sell you a set of steak knives: But wait, there’s more.
Who/what owns McNeil Technologies?
According to the McNeil Technologies About page:
In July 2004 Veritas Capital acquired McNeil Technologies and its subsidiaries.
Veritas Capital is a private equity investment firm headquartered in New York. Founded in 1992, Veritas’ primary objective is to partner with experienced and entrepreneurial management teams to develop leading companies in their respective markets. As a long-term investor in the defense, aerospace, and government services sectors, Veritas has established a Defense & Aerospace Advisory Council consisting primarily of former high-ranking government and military officials. The Council provides Veritas with insight into industry trends from both a business and policy perspective. Veritas’ principals bring over six decades of collective investing experience through a variety of economic conditions.
With over a $ 1 billion in investments, Veritas is able to offer unprecedented resources to its portfolio companies to help them satisfy their clients’ requirements.
Moving on to Veritas Capital, again, take your pick of what to look at there, but with two board members being associated with the Council on Foreign Relations…
Like I said, I’ve already seen enough.
UPDATE 1: 4/19/07: Is the South Korean Film Oldboy Somehow Related?
I know I said that I’ve already seen enough, but it’s actually difficult to keep up with the rest of the news without bumping into this story.
The New York Times posted a brief story about how Cho appears to be imitating a scene from Oldboy, a 2003 South Korean film. I gathered the appropriate images from Cho’s “multi media manifesto” and Oldboy.
Cho and Oldboy?
If you don’t know what Oldboy is about, you might think pfft!, so what, two Korean dudes with hammers, God damned conspiracy theorists… I’ve never heard of the film before today. What’s it about? See for yourself. The parts about forced drugging, psychological torture and split personalities caught my attention. But to the growing number of people who insist that this has nothing to do with mind control (really! you conspiracy theorist whackos should just get a life!), this is just another coincidence. * yawn * Of course, your results may vary.
UPDATE 2: 4/20/07: Comment Moderation
This post is attracting the WRONG kind of traffic, and lots of it. The troll population has literally exploded.
So, some rules about comments:
1) Make sure your comment is on topic. For this post, it would help if you’ve read at least some of the literature on U.S. Government mind control programs.
2) If you have a personal issue with me or Cryptogon, comments on posts aren’t the place for that. Feel free to send me an email if you want. I may or may not respond. (Why not start your own I-Hate-Cryptogon blog, with round the clock coverage of why you hate Cryptogon? That may be a more productive use of your time.)
3) Be polite to other users.
4) Read rule #1 again.
UPDATE 3: 4/23/07: Cho Attended Same High School as Another “Lone Nut” Shooter
And the shootings occurred within one year of each other.
To quote the story, “It’s just a horrible coincidence… It’s hard to believe.”
But is it really that hard to believe?
Is it?
In general, when lies are told to Americans, everyone knows that there’s no point is telling small lies. Tell them whoppers. Tell them nonsense that wouldn’t even fly in a nut house full of raving lunatics. The more absurd the lies, the more Americans have to believe in multiple, ridiculous ‘coincidences’, the more readily they will internalize the programming. For people who managed to believe the Mohammad Atta magic passport story, and so many other absurdities, this will just be another walk in the park.
Via: Chicago Tribune:
Fairfax County, Va., police investigators said today that Virginia Tech gunman Cho Seung-Hui was a 2003 graduate of the same high school attended by an 18-year-old who went on a shooting rampage last year at a Virginia police station, killing two officers.
Michael Kennedy, armed with an AK-47, fired more than 70 rounds in the parking lot of the Sully District police station on May 8, killing Det. Vicky Armel and Master Police Officer Michael Garbarino. Kennedy was shot to death by police.
Cho and Kennedy lived in Centreville and graduated from Westfield High School, said Officer Courtney Thibault of the Fairfax County Police Department. She said Cho graduated four years ahead of Kennedy.
Once Cho’s identify was released by police in Blacksburg, Va., home of Virginia Tech, Thibault said Fairfax County police launched an investigation to determine if there was any connection between the two shooters. She said they found nothing tying the two young men together.
“It’s just a horrible coincidence,” she said. “It’s hard to believe.”
UPDATE 4: 4/27/07: System Planning Corporation Involved with Investigation
System Planning Corporation is such a profoundly spooky outfit that it creeps me out just thinking about it. But I’m sure that it’s just another coincidence that one of DARPA’s largest contractors—a private company involved with some of the U.S. Government’s blackest projects—is involved with the investigation into the Virginia Tech shooting.
Via: Washington Post:
An Arlington County consulting firm that evaluated the emergency response to the 1999 Columbine High School shootings and other public safety crises has been hired by state officials to assist the panel that will investigate the Virginia Tech massacre.
TriData Corp. will provide staff and research support to the eight-member panel named last week by Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D). Kaine, in Northern Virginia yesterday for a community meeting with the South Korean ambassador, met privately with Philip S. Schaenman, TriData’s president. Schaenman said the contract terms are being worked out.
A division of defense contractor System Planning Corp., TriData is best known for studying fire safety issues. But it also conducted a study for the Federal Emergency Management Agency on police and emergency medical response to the shootings at Columbine, in which two students killed 15, including themselves, at the Colorado school. The report pointed out problems with communications and management of the disaster scene.
The firm was retained by Virginia officials to review the chaotic response to a false positive anthrax test at the Pentagon’s remote mail facility and a similar alarm at Defense Department sites in Fairfax County in March 2005.
Again the firm concluded that poor communication and unclear chains of command hampered coordination between federal officials and local jurisdictions. Schaenman told a congressional committee that the response was “the homeland security version of the fog of war.”
More: Cho Seung-hui and the Not So Secret School
New Zealand: Where Is the Outrage?
April 18th, 2007I’ve been scooping the U.S. media for half a decade, but I didn’t expect to do the same thing in New Zealand. The thing about doing it in the U.S. is that few people notice, well, except perhaps a few of you, dear readers and supporters. There’s lots of noise, and very little signal, on U.S. related topics.
New Zealand is a lot smaller, so when I sink my fangs into something here, weird things happen. I started to wonder when I saw so many Kiwi news organizations typing carry trade new zealand dollar into Google. Well, lookie there.
The fact that Cryptogon comes up for that search before any political or activist pages in New Zealand is shocking. (And no, being ranked above the New Zealand Herald is not an ego booster for me.) There are a lot of similarities between New Zealand and the U.S. and if Kiwis have any plans to limit the impact of those similarities and reverse the damage that has already been done, they need to understand how money works.
Where are New Zealand politicians on this!? Where is the ourtage?
Hint to New Zealand Media: Get real and talk about the criminal carry trade. Got it? Good.
Via: Stuff / Dominion Post:
Sheep farmers say they are heading back to the dark days of the 1980s, “crucified” by the Kiwi dollar at a two-year high.
The dollar is close to a 23-year high, going above US74 cents yesterday before ending the day at US73.9, up half a US cent from Friday, and 6 per cent up on a month ago.
Economists expect the dollar to stay high for the rest of the year, in part because the Reserve Bank raised interest rates last month and is likely to do so again late this month or in June. That would push floating mortgage rates above 10 per cent, and fixed rates above 9 per cent.
The high dollar is expected to reduce spending in rural towns, and may lead to forced bank sales of unprofitable, heavily indebted farms and speed up the trend for companies to move production overseas.
…
Federated Farmers said many sheep farms – especially those of young farmers with high debts – were becoming unprofitable.
“It is pretty grim and not looking any better, when the banks (last year) predicted a US58c exchange rate,” sheep farmers spokesman Keith Kelly said. Mr Kelly, chairman of the New Zealand Meat and Fibre producers council, added: “Sheep farmers in particular are being crucified by the high value of the dollar.”
The low returns from wool, about $2.50 a kilogram, and lamb, about $45 a head, meant many farmers were not spending in rural towns. “It is a huge drop and it is depressing.”
Kucinich to Press for Dick Cheney Impeachment
April 18th, 2007Hmm. These lone nuts have remarkable timing!
Via: Cleveland.com:
Cleveland congressman Dennis Kucinich sent his Democratic colleagues a two-sentence email this morning announcing imminent plans to introduce “Articles of Impeachment with respect to the conduct of Vice President Cheney.”
“Please have your staff contact my office,” the missive continued,”if you would like to receive a confidential copy of the document prior to its introduction in the House.”
Kucinich press secretary Natalie Laber refused to comment on Kucinich’s email or to provide any more information about his efforts to push for Cheney’s impeachment. The Plain Dealer obtained the email from a different Democratic congressional office.
Cheney’s deputy press secretary, Megan McGinn, said she couldn’t comment on Kucinich’s email because she hadn’t seen it.
Asked whether Cheney had done anything he could be impeached for, McGinn replied: “The vice president has had nearly 40 years of government service and has done so in an honorable fashion.”
While Democratic activists have called for impeachment of Cheney, President Bush and other administration officials, Democratic leaders in the House and Senate have not expressed interest in doing so.
Weird Terror Drill in Los Angeles
April 17th, 2007You’ll love the script on this one. No really, be sitting down.
Via: Los Angeles:
Notice to Westsiders: Disregard the thwack-thwack-thwack of Black Hawk helicopter blades you might be hearing. The West Los Angeles Veterans Affairs campus is not, repeat not, under attack.
The California National Guard is slated to launch a three-day training exercise today titled Operation Vector. Plans call for a Hollywood-style convergence of a simulated natural disaster and faux bio-terror attack designed to test how well Guard teams work with local emergency responders. Much of the action will take place on the VA campus.
On Wednesday, the exercise is scheduled to continue in the Hollywood Hills with a fake chemical attack and at the Port of Los Angeles with the “siege” of a passenger-laden cruise ship (portrayed by a Coast Guard cutter). Thursday’s simulated disaster will be the collision of two airliners at Universal Studios.
…
The scenario will continue on the VA campus. The “tremor” will cause an “explosion” at a laboratory operated by an Al Qaeda cell. Plumes of smoke will rise from vacant Building 158, which will be sitting in for the terrorist lab. According to the script, the explosion will release ricin, a deadly toxin, and several “casualties” in need of decontamination will be rushed to UCLA Medical Center.
Research Credit: EP
Rate of U.S. Losses in Iraq Is Highest Yet
April 17th, 2007Mission accomplished.
Via: Miami Herald:
Over the past six months, American troops have died in Iraq at the highest rate since the war began, an indication that the conflict is becoming increasingly dangerous for U.S. forces even after more than four years of fighting.
From October 2006 through last month, 532 American soldiers were killed, the most during any six-month period of the war. March also marked the first time that the U.S. military suffered four straight months of 80 or more fatalities. April, with 58 service members killed through Monday, is on pace to be one of the deadliest months of the conflict for American forces.
1 in 2 Americans Now Receives Income from Government Programs
April 17th, 2007Via: Christian Science Monitor:
As Americans finish their annual tax-filing flurry to meet a Tuesday deadline, it is true that tax rates are lower than they were a few years ago. But according to a different yardstick, the federal government’s reach is expanding.
Slightly over half of all Americans – 52.6 percent – now receive significant income from government programs, according to an analysis by Gary Shilling, an economist in Springfield, N.J. That’s up from 49.4 percent in 2000 and far above the 28.3 percent of Americans in 1950.
Sterling Through $2
April 17th, 2007Via: Forbes:
The British pound broke through the $2 barrier for the first time in 15 years on Tuesday, as currency traders bet that rising inflation would spur the Bank of England to raise interest rates.
The pound was quoted at $2.005 early in the London afternoon.
Senate Committee Postpones Gonzales Hearing
April 17th, 2007Via: Houston Chronicle:
The Senate Judiciary Committee postponed Tuesday’s questioning of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on the firings of eight federal prosecutors, saying the proceedings would be inappropriate in light of the Virginia Tech shootings.
Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy made the decision today to postpone the long-awaited hearing that has been considered Gonzales’ last chance to quiet a controversy that has prompted calls in both parties for his resignation.
Leahy said the hearing had been rescheduled for Thursday. He said he made the decision after conferring with Gonzales and the committee’s senior Republican, Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. “All three of us agree,” he said.
“I’m sure that he will want to be dealing with the matters of the shooting,” Leahy said of Gonzales.
Justice spokeswoman Tasia Scolinos said Gonzales was anxious to testify but would defer to Leahy to reschedule the hearing “out of respect for the family members impacted by this horrific tragedy.”
The Bush administration has pushed for Gonzales to testify as soon as possible to try to quell intensifying demands for his resignation. The Democratic-led Judiciary panel said Gonzales delayed the testimony last month.
Silly Me
April 16th, 2007I thought the collapse of the U.S. Dollar was going to finally make it into the numbnut consciousness today. Silly me. Who knew that the worst mass shooting in U.S. history would happen on a day like this; when even the zombie media might have chosen to focus on the dire macroeconomic situation that is emerging?
Again, silly me.
