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Every day, Americans play the role of Elmer Fudd to the oligarchy’s Bugs Bunny–if you look at it from the oligarchy’s point of view, at least.

Exhibit A: Multigazllionaire scumbag Angelo Mozilo v. American Suckers.

“Teaching employees that dissent on issues of public concern is something to be feared, rather than encouraged, is a dangerously counterproductive use of scarce security resources, making us less safe as a democracy,” Northern California ACLU staff attorney Ann Brick and ACLU Washington national security policy counsel Michael German wrote in the letter to Gail McGinn, acting undersecretary of Defense for personnel and readiness.

“DOD employees cannot accomplish their mission of protecting our nation and its values unless they understand that those values encompass the right to criticize our government through protest activities,” they wrote. “It is imperative that they are taught the difference between political, religious or social activism and terrorism.”

Among the multiple-choice questions included in its Level 1 Antiterrorism Awareness training course — an annual training requirement for all DOD personnel that is fulfilled through Web-based instruction — the department asks the following: “Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorist activity?” To answer correctly, the examinee must select “protests.” The ACLU wants that changed immediately, and it wants corrective information sent to all Department of Defense employees who received the training.

The ACLU letter notes that this is particularly disturbing in light of the long-term pattern of government treating lawful dissent as terrorism. In the Bay Area, my colleagues and I reported exactly this in 2003, as the California Anti-Terrorism Information Center fed local police agencies information on protests, with catastrophic results. Two years after that, it was the California National Guard.

Prechter, known for predicting the 1987 stock market crash, joins a growing coterie of market heavyweights in forecasting the United States will lose its top credit rating as the government issues trillions of dollars in debt to fund efforts to bail out the economy.

Fears about the long-term vulnerability of the prized U.S. credit rating came to the fore after Standard & Poor’s in May lowered its outlook on Britain, threatening the UK’s top AAA rating. That move raised fears that the United States could face a similar risk, with the hefty amounts of government debt issued in both countries to pay for financial rescues causing budget deficits to swell.

Prechter, speaking at the Reuters Investment Outlook Summit in New York, said he sees investors’ confidence in an economic rebound fading, a trend that will drag the S&P 500 stock index .SPX well below the March 6 intraday low of 666.79 by the end of this year or early next.

“There will be a leg down in stock prices, and it will affect all other areas,” including corporate bonds and commodities, said Prechter, who is executive officer at research company Elliott Wave International, based in Gainesville, Georgia.

Prechter, who is known for his bearish views, has repeatedly forecast a steep decline in stocks this year, even as the stock market has rebounded from 12-year lows set in March as optimism about an economic recovery has risen.

Despite the government and Federal Reserve’s massive rescues for financial companies and securities markets, Prechter expects credit markets to clam up again as they did in the first phase of the global financial crisis and for the U.S. economy to sink into a depression.

Although U.S. banks’ recently passed government “stress tests” that assessed the adequacy of their capital levels to absorb losses and have been able to raise some capital in debt and equity markets, “the banking sector is in severe trouble,” as more loans turn bad, he said.

The economy “is obviously heading toward a depression,” despite the government’s efforts to dodge one, said Prechter.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has not averted a re-run of the 1930s Great Depression, even though investors are becoming firmly convinced that the Fed has avoided disaster and that the economy has hit bottom.

The amount of oil stored at sea climbed to the highest in at least two decades because traders could buy the commodity, sit on it and take advantage of higher prices in the future, according to Frontline Ltd., the biggest supertanker operator. Hamilton, Bermuda-based Frontline on May 28 estimated as many as 60 supertankers were storing oil.

The storage trade boosted demand for vessels as oil supply and demand contracted. BP Plc, Citigroup Inc.’s Phibro LLC, Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Koch Industries Ltd. were among the companies that sought tankers to store cargoes. Most of the crude oil is being stored in the Gulf of Mexico and in Europe, according to E.A. Gibson Shipbrokers Ltd.

The premium for Brent crude for delivery in a month’s time compared with immediate supply has shrunk to 72 cents a barrel from as much as $1.16 a barrel a month ago. The spread is profitable so long as it exceeds storage and finance costs.

Oil Products

Traders are now seeking to store oil products. JPMorgan Chase & Co. booked the newly built supertanker Front Queen to store 2 million barrels of heating oil off the coast of Malta, and several other traders are seeking similar deals, Athens- based Optima Shipbrokers said June 2.
A supertanker is capable of storing about 2 million barrels of crude, more than France consumes every day. Crude oil has advanced 55 percent in New York trading this year, rebounding from last year’s 54 percent slump.

Oil-shipping costs have climbed in recent days, further reducing potential profit from storage. The industry-benchmark route, based on Saudi Arabian shipments to Japan, has gained 28 percent since May 28.

The route rose 2.5 percent to 36.58 Worldscale points today, according to the Baltic Exchange in London. Worldscale points are a percentage of a nominal rate, or flat rate, for more than 320,000 specific routes.

Unconfirmed reports said one protester was killed and several more were hurt when security forces opened fire.

The crowd had been addressed by beaten candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who believes the vote was fixed in favour of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Mr Ahmadinejad has dismissed the claims and says the vote was fair.

The BBC’s Jon Leyne, in Tehran, says Monday’s rally was the biggest demonstration in the Islamic republic’s 30-year history and described it as a “political earthquake”.

The government had outlawed any protest following two days of unrest, with the interior ministry warning that “any disrupter of public security would be dealt with according to the law”.

Despite this, correspondents said riot police had been watching the rally during the afternoon and had seemed to be taking no action.

But reports at 2045 local time (1615 GMT) said shots were being fired.

“There has been sporadic shooting out there… I can see people running here,” Reuters quoted a reporter of Iran’s Press TV as saying from Tehran’s Azadi Square.

“A number of people who are armed, I don’t know exactly who they are, but they have started to fire on people causing havoc in Azadi Square.”

A photographer at the scene told news agencies that security forces had killed one protester and seriously wounded several others.

He said the shooting began when the crowd attacked a compound used by a religious militia linked to the country’s powerful Revolutionary Guard.

Until recently, Raytheon’s eye-in-the-sky technology was used in Afghanistan and Iraq to guard American military bases, working as airborne guards against any oncoming desert threat. Using infrared sensors and a map overlay not unlike Google Earth, the technology scans a large area, setting important landmarks (say, the perimeter of a military base), and constantly relays video clips back to a command center. If a gun fires or a bomb is detonated, the airships can detect the noise and focus the camera—all from a mighty-high 500 feet.

After the success of the Indy 500 trial, the company is targeting police departments and sporting facilities that want to keep an eye on crowds that might easily morph into an unruly mob. “Large municipalities could find many uses for this [technology] once we figure out how to get it in their hands,” says Nathan Kennedy, the blimp’s project manager.

The resemblance between their outfits and those of Benito Mussolini’s Blackshirts has triggered a judicial inquiry.

The Italian National Guard says that it has 2,500 recruits. It claims that a third are drawn from former members of the police and Armed Forces.

The Guard revealed its oufits and kit in Milan at the weekend: khaki shirts with armbands bearing the Nazi symbol of the Black Sun, black belts and shoulder straps, black ties, heavy black boots and military style caps decorated with the eagle, symbol of the Roman Empire. They are also equipped with black helmets, black gloves and torches.

Milan prosecutors yesterday opened an inquiry into the Guard, which has been dubbed “the Black Patrols” because of its Fascist-style insignia and uniforms. Fascist and Nazi symbols and slogans are forbidden in Italy under laws passed after the Second World War and the fall of the Fascist dictatorship of Mussolini. Maurizio Monti, deputy head of the Guard, said that the organisation was properly registered. “We do not believe we have committed any crime.”

A law allowing for local patrols to help police to combat street crime is in its final stages in parliament. Patrols have, however, already begun to operate in Italian cities, some organised by the anti-immigrant Northern League, a key ally in the ruling centre-right coalition of Silvio Berlusconi.

Archaeologists, who have only just begun excavating the site, say they do not yet know who the bones might belong to.

“We think that these dismembered bodies are likely to be native Iron Age Britons. The question is — how did they die and who killed them,” said dig head, David Score, of Oxford Archaeology.

“Were they fighting amongst themselves? Were they executed by the Romans? Did they die in a battle with the Romans?

“The exciting scenario for us possibly is that there were skirmishes with the invading Romans and that’s how they ended up chopped up in a pit,” he told Reuters.

When the main Roman invasion force landed in Britain in AD 43, Claudius’ legions moved swiftly through western England to subdue fierce Celtic tribes.

The skulls and other bones were unearthed at a place called Ridgeway Hill, on the construction site of a new major relief road to Weymouth, on the Dorset coast in southwest England.

The seaside town — in the heart of Thomas Hardy country — is to host sailing events for the London Olympics.

The grave site is close to Maiden Castle — Europe’s largest Iron Age hill fort where local tribes are said to have staged a last stand against the Roman legions after the invasion.

Some historians believe the Romans sacked the site, butchering its population including women and children, before burning it to the ground.

Score said they had counted 45 skulls so far in the 6-meter wide pit, together with a tangle of torsos, arms and legs, More could be found in the coming weeks.

“It’s a time bomb,” said Jim Peterson, a professor of wheat breeding and genetics at Oregon State University in Corvallis. “It moves in the air, it can move in clothing on an airplane. We know it’s going to be here. It’s a matter of how long it’s going to take.”

Though most Americans have never heard of it, Ug99 — a type of fungus called stem rust because it produces reddish-brown flakes on plant stalks — is the No. 1 threat to the world’s most widely grown crop.

The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center in Mexico estimates that 19% of the world’s wheat, which provides food for 1 billion people in Asia and Africa, is in imminent danger. American plant breeders say $10 billion worth of wheat would be destroyed if the fungus suddenly made its way to U.S. fields.

Fear that the fungus will cause widespread damage has caused short-term price spikes on world wheat markets. Famine has been averted thus far, but experts say it’s only a matter of time.

“A significant humanitarian crisis is inevitable,” said Rick Ward, the coordinator of the Durable Rust Resistance in Wheat project at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.

The solution is to develop new wheat varieties that are immune to Ug99. That’s much easier said than done.

After several years of feverish work, scientists have identified a mere half-dozen genes that are immediately useful for protecting wheat from Ug99. Incorporating them into crops using conventional breeding techniques is a nine- to 12-year process that has only just begun. And that process will have to be repeated for each of the thousands of wheat varieties that is specially adapted to a particular region and climate.