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Without commenting on the behaviour of the US Army Core of Engineers, infecting people with germs through use of blankets was indeed known at the time.

E.g. http://www.nativeweb.org/pages... is giving approval to do exactly that, in 1763.

So your entire basis for dispelling the alleged myth is flawed and false, sorry.

Okay, let's be honest here. While it's clear that the colonizing powers had a reckless disregard for the wellbeing of the native population, your smallpox blanket claim makes you sound like a lunatic.

It doe indeed sound like lunacy.

but......

http://www.nativeweb.org/pages...

http://www.straightdope.com/co...

The interesting thing is, This Lord Amherst? An Englishman , so if people want to blame da 'murricans, it was not. evil ol' us.

It was one of the superior Europeans, who do seem to have a particular desire to practice genocide, as proven throughout history.

Your link only shows that one authour was full of shit. The way I heard it, it was before there was a USA and this article references enough letters to show it was probably true and if not then it was planned. http://www.nativeweb.org/pages... shows Lord Jeffrey Amherst as full of hate and genocidal against the native Indians with multiple discussions (actually postscripts) about giving the Indians smallpox blankets and handkerchiefs.

He may well have been a Native-American-hating bastard, but he was living in a time when the germ theory of disease was not widely known outside the scientific community (and not widely accepted even among those who knew of it.)

If it was true that he had managed to deliberately weaponize smallpox by giving away contaminated blankets, he was not only a racist bastard, but he was the greatest evil-genius scientific mastermind of his day.

Your link only shows that one authour was full of shit. The way I heard it, it was before there was a USA and this article references enough letters to show it was probably true and if not then it was planned. http://www.nativeweb.org/pages... shows Lord Jeffrey Amherst as full of hate and genocidal against the native Indians with multiple discussions (actually postscripts) about giving the Indians smallpox blankets and handkerchiefs.

Not that i want to give anybody the wrong idea...
http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/amherst/lord_jeff.html

you'll need to back up your claim about police treating aboriginal deaths the same as animal deaths. i've lived here my whole life and never heard such a claim.

I have read many times that, under Australian law, it was legal for white men to hunt Aborigines up until the 1950s. e.g. this:

"the classic "nigger hunting" license that station (ranch) owners obtained from the local police was to permit them to eliminate Aborigines by hunting the local fauna, Aborigines were fauna by constitutional definition, kill them and feel not the retribution of law for murder. I have interviewed men who say this genocide continued into the 1950s when they had to get more subtle about the disposal of the remains, so they'd slit open a steer and slide the corpse inside. Mutual decomposition took care of the rest."

and this:

"In fact, as recently as the 1950s, a white man could apply for a hunting permit to hunt and kill Aborigines! Can you imagine? They were hunted and killed as if they were a game animal."

These are not great references - I would welcome a better reference to settle this urban myth one way or the other.

Well never having heard of Ward Churchill I looked him up and it seems that he was active pretty recently. First essay being published in '86. Considering I was taught about the smallpox blankets in school in '72 or so when Ward Churchill was still in University I doubt very much he started the story.
Not much evidence has survived from the 18th century regarding whether smallpox was willingly introduced but some has. Here http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/amherst/34_40_305_fn.jpeg and http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/amherst/34_41_114_fn.jpeg are a couple of letters by Lord Amherst discussing giving the infected blankets to the Indians. Shortly after the Indians did have a major outbreak of smallpox.
Note also that George Washington was very worried about the English pulling the same stunt and was very careful about where blankets and other supplies came from.
Another method of biological warfare used on the natives was just not inoculating them. During one outbreak in BC white men were inoculated but not the natives leading to most of the native population from Washington to Alaska being wiped out.
On the other hand it seems that in the 1830's attempts were made to inoculate the natives along with every one else.
Note that smallpox has been known to be contagious since the 1720's. At that for close to 150 years it was considered to be the only disease that was contagious.

Well never having heard of Ward Churchill I looked him up and it seems that he was active pretty recently. First essay being published in '86. Considering I was taught about the smallpox blankets in school in '72 or so when Ward Churchill was still in University I doubt very much he started the story.
Not much evidence has survived from the 18th century regarding whether smallpox was willingly introduced but some has. Here http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/amherst/34_40_305_fn.jpeg and http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/amherst/34_41_114_fn.jpeg are a couple of letters by Lord Amherst discussing giving the infected blankets to the Indians. Shortly after the Indians did have a major outbreak of smallpox.
Note also that George Washington was very worried about the English pulling the same stunt and was very careful about where blankets and other supplies came from.
Another method of biological warfare used on the natives was just not inoculating them. During one outbreak in BC white men were inoculated but not the natives leading to most of the native population from Washington to Alaska being wiped out.
On the other hand it seems that in the 1830's attempts were made to inoculate the natives along with every one else.
Note that smallpox has been known to be contagious since the 1720's. At that for close to 150 years it was considered to be the only disease that was contagious.

First, WMDs were one of the reasons as well as Iraq defying UN resolutions and Not to mention one or two isolated instances were we know about Al Qeada and Iraq mingling.

First what resolutions did Iraq defy? And how does it compare to the number of UN resolutions Israel continues to defy? Also if you want to talk about UN resolutions then let's talk about treaties too. The US has broken many treaties, treaties made with American Indian tribes, signed, and approved by congress. Even now, Bush wants to violate treaties, his push to site nuclear waste storage at Yucca in a violation of a treaty with the Western Shoshone. Yucca is part of a reservation promissed to the Shoshone by the Ruby Valley Treaty. As for any connections between al Quada and Saddam, those claims of meetings have been shown to be false aligations. Saddam also knew bin Laden and al Quada wanted him dead so there's no way he would support them. bin Laden even called upon Iraqis to rise up against Saddam and to repele invaders.

You doubtfully had any more or less respect for Powel after he went to the UN with the case for war.

So, you can read my mind? What am I thinking now?

Chavez, in the early 90's was charging a 1% tax in income derived from thier oil fields and the split was the oil company devloping the fields would kep 84% of the revenue and venezuela would keep 16%.

Chavez wasn't even president of Venezuela in th eearly '90s. He wasn't elected president until 1998. He did lead a coup in 1992 but it failed.

Ever since he has been attempting to keep his popularity by claiming the US is out to get him and justifying it with crazy speaches.

So no one in the US wanted to get him? Then why did Bush support the coup? Isn't that out to get him? Also didn't Pat Robertson, or another rightwing Christian leader call for his assassination?

Whats your point other then republican leaders suck? Kenedy has done some pretty bad things too. Isn't he the one who got us into vietnam?

First, I am not Democrat, politically I am Libertarian. Now as for Kennedy, while he escalated troop deployment to Viet Nam, he did not get the US into the country. The Republican president who warned of the military industrial complex, Eisenhower first sent troops there. By 1955/6 in an accord both North and South Vietnam agreed to have a vote on whether they should reunite or remain two nations. Eisenhower was against this vote so he sent Edward Lansdale, an Air Force Col at the tyme to South Vietnam. There he sought out Veit Namese who opposed the reunitication, armed, and trained them.

Thre are neccesary evils that need to happen for various reasons.

Like two wrongs make a right?

Mostly these reasons are for the security and safety of the country. This is no different then a parrent shooting an intruder who tryed to attack him after discovering the intruder malesting his children.

There is a hugh difference, there really is no comparison, between a parent shooting an intruder and supporting an invasion of a sovereign nation which leaves 200,000 dead.

It definatly wasn't a perfect model but it also defniatly wasn't Reagan or bush going "here is some money and weapons, kill some of your own citizens" like your tone tries to make it.

While they may not of supported Saddam's massacres they still could have stopped supporting him once it became known what he was doing. But did they? NO!!!

Use some reason and thought in it and skip the political bias a little.

I suggest you do the same.

There are many places in the crust of the earth that are in the middle of tectonic plates and are extremely stable for many millions of years and will likely be so for a long time to come. Yucca was chosen for that reason.

Dispite what you may think Yucca Mt is a seismically active region and has has earthquakes in the area. A government building there was damages in the '70s because of an earhquake. There was another Quake reported near Yucca Mountain in 2002. Besides this all overlooks the fact that Yucca Mountain is situated on the Shoshone's ancestral lands that was promised them by the Ruby Valley Treaty.

What is a likely scenerio where there is damage to enough casks to significantly raise the levels of radiation in the surrouding area?

I'm having trouble thinking of a likely scenerio where an earthquake or lava flow could do so. So what am I missing?

Easy, the casks used could be crushed in an earthquake. Then with the migration of water, it has been shown water can flow many miles from there, the water will carry radioactive particles with it. In the case of lava flow, the lava would melt the casks then carry off radioactivity as well. Something I just thought of though is that if lava did flow it may dilute the waste and, or neutralize it. I once read about how encasing radioactive material in a glass like substance is an effective method of rendering waste safe, er relatively safe.

I'm not against nuclear power per se, but I am concerned about dealing with long term disposal of the waste that's left over. And I don't believe using Yucca is an appropriate method. Neither is using the Western Shoshone's Skull Valley as a temperary storage area. And by the way Yucca Mountain is in the area given by the Treaty of Ruby Valley (1862) to the Western Shoshone. Like many other treaties the US had broken this treaty.

http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/amherst/lord_ jeff.html

Care to provide a citation for this?

Although particular to the North American Indians, you should check out this page here.

I believe Benjamin Franklin preffered to hunt his injuns with bull mastiff dogs. Wonderful people, those Founding Fathers.

A little research shows I was wrong on 2 points: First, the Mayans were already gone by the time the Spanish encountered the Incas. It was the Aztecs and Incas who were decimated by smallpox.

Second, historians agree that the Spanish spreading of smallpox to the Aztecs was accidental. I was confusing this with later events during the conquest of Native American tribes, for example as approved by General Amherst on July 16th, 1763.

Trent's entry for May 24, 1763, includes the following statement: ... we gave them two Blankets and an Handkerchief out of the Small Pox Hospital. I hope it will have the desired effect.

smallpox infected blankets
Little Boy
Agent Orange
"Depleted" Uranium

pot, meet kettle
kettle, meet pot

Careful what you wish for, maybe some day some other large faction will decide that the US needs "intervention".

I know it's more comforting to think that your leaders and by automagical transference your nation down to anyone "you" are always the good guys, but history has shown there are no "good" guys, just various regimes throughout history take turns back and forth being the more-wrong bad guys du juor.

an unbiased source if ever there was one... which after making a totally unconvincing case, at least has enough of a sense of shame to say "Some people have doubted these stories"...

I wonder how "Lord Jeff" trained the smallpox to attack natives and ignore europeans...

Pardon my insistance but your statement is inaccurate.

Cortez did introduce a wide variety of dieseases to the Americas. However, to assume that Cortez, a Spanish explorer, had even a rudimentry knowledge of how diseases were spread in the early 16th Century is a bit unreasonable.

Now the Brittish Army did give smallpox laiden blankets to Native Americans but this was much later. The deed in question was done by a Lord Jeffery Amherst c. 1763. This practice was continued by the US army well into the 19th century and was used by General Custer against some of the tribes he fought.

spread of European diseases to the Americas wasn't exactly intentional

Distributing smallpox-infected blankets was an atrocity, to be sure. But the "genocide" was caused by naturally occuring diseases, transmitted naturally. Evolution at work.

Sorry, but I have to disagree. It was a natural disease, but the transmission was not natural - it was intentional:

"You will do well to inoculate the Indians (with smallpox) by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method that can serve to extirpate this exorable race. I should be very glad your scheme for hunting them down by dogs could take effect."

-General Amherst to Colonel Henry Bouquet, July 1763

here's a link to a page that has links to microfiches of the original letters.

It was known at the time that disease could be spread through contact with contaminated objects.

Canada (as we know it now) was founded in 1867. It was a business decision made by britshit business interests, as they realized they were not competent enough to compete against yankee businessmen.

(The typical britshit way of doing business is to force people to buy their products; cas in point, horsepiss brewer molson, came to canada only to find french peasants drinking their own applejack cider (grapes would not grow satisfactorly, and in any case, the french mostly came from Normandy where everyone makes applejack cider anyways). So, rather than corner the cider market, molson displayed his true britshit incompetence by whining that people wouln't buy his piss to the governor who promply outlawed applejack cider making, thus forcing the peasants to buy his horsepiss, the only thing he knew how to make).

Over the years, canada slightly evolved, but nevertheless remains mired as a britshit colony. But the main canadian problems remain the same thoughout the ages:

• Keep the americans out.
• Keep the french in.

The french were the first to introduce european civilization to north-america. Well before the Mayflower, a small colony was thriving along the banks of the St-Lawrence, in good harmony with the indians who gave the french the technology to survive the long winters. As the french are not as constipated towards private property as the britshit are, they certainly did not mind sharing the country with the indians, which being a totally different civilization, had very few competing interests.

As there was plenty of interaction between the french and the indians, it is not surprising that it was french explorers who "discoved" (ha ha ha. Like if the indians didn't discover it first) most of the inside of the continent, as only them had the technology and knowledge to survive off the land, quite unlike most britshit (Baniel Boon was quite atypical in that respect) who never mingle with natives.

When the britshit colonized Egypt, for example, they built themselves clubs surrounded by high walls so the would not see the natives. When France was in Egypt, they built schools to educate the natives for free.

The french were also the only colonizers who did not exterminate the indians when they found out they could not enslave them. As they were not competing with the french for ressources (different civilizations), they were best left to themselves. Better yet, when the britshit expansion in New England pushed the Iroquois out, the french gladly accepted them in New-France and gave them territory, even though they used to be ennemies.

This changed with the coming of the britshit, who promptly rounded the indians into reserves, and going about with their ultra-constitpated notions of private property, much to the dismay of the indians chiefs.

The britshit also introduced biological warfare when lord amherst gave smallpox-infected blankets to indians. Truly the works of an unenligthened civilization whose only goal is rape, pillage and plunder!

At first, when a handful of britshit found themselves at the head of a colony peopled with 60,000 french peasants, they quickly realized that their usual governing tricks (especially when it came to repression of the scatholics - as the totality of the french were [officially] scatholics). So, in order not to be kicked back at sea by the french and their indians allies, they compromised and allowed scatholicism to keep running rampant.

This, of course, was the typical britshit incompetence at work, as this tolerance towards scatholics precipitated the american revolution... So, to keep a small worthless colony, the britshit risked and lost the prize jewel...

Over time, the britshit merchants discovered one fantastic thing about scatholicism: for a devout scatholic, making a profit (be it through commerce, hard work or mere stock manipulation) is a one-way ticket to hell. So, they reasoned, if the french population was kept scatholic (and therefore ignorant), they would not face any competition while they set shop...

So, those merchant princes, the Frobishers, McTavish, Redpath, Allan, etc. (the incompetent family compact) accumulated extraordinary wealth, by plundering natural ressources with the cheap labour provided by the ignorant (because scatholic) french.

In order to perpetuate that status, when the britshit north america act (the constitution of canada) was elaborated in 1867 by the incompetent family compact, they made sure to enshrine in the constitution that education would be solely controlled by the scatholic church, for the french (and by the protestants for the britshit, of course). This is the reason of the economic backwardness of the french in canada, backwardness that is only starting to subside, as the french threw out the scatholic church en masse starting some 8-10 years after television was introduced in 1952.

Canada went through the usual colonial troubles. In 1836-37, a rebellion tore apart the country, as mostly french people rebelled against the britshit (but the rebellion included a non negligeable amount of englishmen). The britshit army fought back with unparalleled savagery (until perhaps the nazis) and thousands of farms were burned to the ground. Resentment for this still survives to this day; and in fact, when the parliamant voted some 10 years later to indemnify the innocent victims of the destruction, a mob of brishit lowlifes (mostly businessmen and merchants) ransacked the parliament and burned it down to the ground, as that kind of people will not tolerate democracy.

In 1867, the canadian population was half french, half britshit (the britshit certainly didn't count the indians). However, in typical britshit fashion, only the landowners were granted the right of vote; and as the french were systematically poorer, they were therefore underepresented. But this not preclude the existence of prominent french politicians, such as Wilfrid Laurier, who was the first french prime minister. However, do not let the frenchness fool you; the britshit would not let anyone become prime minister unless he displayed the utmost allegiance to the britshit interests... This held true of other french prime ministers: Louis St-Laurent, Pierre-Elliott Trudeau (this one declared martial law in 1970 and put his political opponents in jail), Brian Mulroney (well, he's irish, but in Québec, the irish very much became french) and Jean Chrétin.