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Area 51 Hackers Map Buried Surveillance Network
advair writes "There's a story on SecurityFocus about a pair of Area 51 'hackers' who discovered a buried network of wireless motion sensors on the public land surrounding the "operating location near Groom Lake, Nevada." Using a frequency counter and a GPS receiver, they tracked down and logged 30 - 40 of the sensors, before the FBI and Air Force raided one of them, and questioned the other. Now one of the guys has been charged with a federal crime for allegedly removing one of the devices that was protecting a base that doesn't officially exist."
My bet is area 51 is just a deco, think about you set up a "base" you plant a few "good" stories for the conspiracy theorist to love, you play the whole thing up. you have a real base some where else. Every one will flock to area 51, then you do your real work at area 52 (or what ever they might call it) I also doubt there are any extra terrestrial research going on in the government, think about it you need the best of the best to even think of starting it, and the government well its the government what other insult do I need to lob at it.
Area 51 is probably just a few buildings there to keep the amount of people to perpetuate the image that area 51 is real.
This people probably have fallen for it, and the government might have just planted the motion sensors to keep them busy, they the person steal one I don't know, but either way the government sorta unofficial clams it, and the conspiracy theorists will go wild.
Hasn't that base been officially declared as real, and that it has been unused for some time?
a pair ... discovered a buried network of wireless motion sensors on the public land surrounding the "operating location near Groom Lake, Nevada."
:)
Upon their arrival, hundreds of vents opened up and millions of alien-virus infected bees immediately started swarming around them...
Oops, wait, sorry... wrong movie.
Area 51 is a hoax by the goverment
Hast thou learned nothing from the x-files?...
"All great things are simple & expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope." --Churchill
If there ever was anything at Groom Lake, it won't be there now. The SECOND anyone knew that UFO nuts had got wind of it, anything interesting would have been moved somewhere else.
At a tangent - whatever happened to Bob Lazar?
Has anyone been keeping track of the sensors the aliens have to track us? I think that's the real story.
Raided motion detectors? How'd they do it with just one though? Did they go with a motion detector mirror or were they looking for more of n-1 most motion detection for their buck type setup with a motion detector 5?
Huh? Made up story about the usaf raiding civilian homes? Oh. Never mind.
The base exists. Clinton signed it into existance when the workers sued for being exposed to pollutants which the goverment didnt want to disclose. As of 2002 all of the John Doe's are now dead and the foverment still didnt explain what materials they were exposed too.
* Large playing area
:)
* GPS coordinates are mapped
* Public land (hey, the taxpayers _pay_ for it)
* Who knows what goodies are at each site to be traded
Sounds like a good place for some geocaching to me!
The DOD forgot to have mommy write their name on the things. If they are on public land, is there anything besides fear of reprisal (like a law) to stop somebody from taking the things?
signatures are for fools with hands
This is the real story:
the invisibile man so upset when they walked across his vegetable garden that he reported them to the FBI
the real creator of linux out there, microsoft labels were found on the motion sensors...
"No ma'am. This is Area 51A."
Nowhere does it mention that one of these things was seized from the guy. What happened to assumed to be innocent until proven guilty? For all they know the thing could have broken, batteries run flat, someone drove over it, etc. Or for the conspiracy nuts - they removed it themselves just to accuse the guy.
Now they know that we know that they exist!!! on a serious note poking around in stuff like this is asking for troble be it legal or not. The gov needs to keep some things secret because some people don't need to know or are not ready to know some stuff,stuff like that causes problems.
Oh wait, it was just /. ed ...
Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
Yes, there IS another base located somewhere else. There are several bases from which the Aurora is flown, for example.
But it's not smart to play with these people. You could disappear and no one would ever see you again, alive or dead. Trust me, I know what I am speaking of.
Do NOT fuck with these people, if you care about your future.
last i heard the base had been evacuated. about 4-5 years ago i think. art bell had a blurb about it being deserted.
"...if you don't like your job, you don't strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed..." -Homer
When the number of visitors reaches a high enough level, a new theme park will be deemed viable. It happens everywhere.
They got him on conspiracy, but they never said who with.
During the Clinton era it was acknowledged that Area 51 (Dreamland, Groom Lake, etc) existed. This was about the same time that Area 51 buffs reported a dramatic decrease in activity at and around the base. It was acknowledged in a very generic manner, but was acknowledged none the less.
Supposedly, the reason for the abandoning of the base was because the radiation from atomic tests wasn't going the "China Syndrome" way, back into the earth, but coming back up (area 51 was the 51st grid on a map used for nuke testing).
I haven't followed it for a while, but last I heard, the experts were pointing at Arizona and New Mexico as the new locations for many, mini, Area 51s.
END OF LINE.
"If you or I accidentally kick one of these hidden transmitters, should the feds be able to seize our Macintosh and photos of Aunt Betty?"
They took his Macintosh?!? Those bastards!
I'm in the hole of the broadband donut.
http://www.dreamlandresort.com/area51/new_sensor_5 .jpg
Duracell - The Official Battery of Groom Lake Black Operations
that sure could make me a lot of tinfoil hats..
Lot's of military bases have perimeter security and sensors. Try getting into Camp Peary in Virginia. Or any one of a number of other places.
oooo....But it's Area51! Obviously they are hiding something behind those sensors.
Ha. If there ever was anything alien there (highly doubtful), it's long since been moved. Hangar 18, maybe?
no text [n/t]
There was a television special recently about this. What I found even more interesting was a different security compromise.
A private investigator was hired to watch the airport in Las Vegas and he observed which cars came and went on a frequent basis. He was eventually able to deduce which cars' owner were spending the day at Area 51.
At that point, it became a simple matter of just following the cars to a plush neighborhood. When he went to knock on the door and asked about Area 51, they said "no comment" and shut the door in his face. One would think that just mentioning Area 51 would be enough to inspire curosity from the non-involved.
An once-insider agreed to secretly meet with them doing the whole inside-a-hotel with blured-face and altered-voice routine. He examined maps and photos and said they were accurate. He also said that there were no UFOs at Area 51, and that the big secret was the abusive politics and unsafe worker conditions.
Guess Area 51 scooby gang missed the television special on S4, where the anti-gravity from borrowed UFOs go on.
Several years ago the Sec. of Defense admitted its existence in a press conference. Hell, I can tell you what goes on there: nothing exciting. They test secret missile systems and secret aircraft.
Derek Greene
The Register has the same story.
The government is not capable of organizing anything... the very least of which is a alien cover up. This is just another case of their incompetence being viewed from an odd angle looking like something that it is not.
Dumb asses, I bet they were surprised when they were caught?
Now, granted he did rebury the devices, and granted, they were in the public park, not Area 51 itself, but it's not hard for the average person to see why this is a bad idea. There's a lot of stuff in "public" areas you're not allowed to monkey with. If a public park provided restrooms with those annoying motion-sensor faucets, does anyone think they would be within their rights to repeatedly take them apart?
Sure, there is a worry in this case about the government monitoring private citizens in a public place, but "approach" sensors invade privacy a lot less than swarms of armed guards peering through binoculars from the fenceline 24x7.
In short, this guy crossed the line. I understand being intrigued, and even outraged by these devices, but making a map is one thing, and once he figured out what the devices were he never should have touched them.
(Just had a scary thought on preview: what if the odd buried device he found had turned out to be a errant landmine? Of course it's massively criminal for it to be there, but there is a reason you don't got poking unknown military hardware...)
Well if we weren't all on a list before this story, we are now. Thanks /.
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Area 51 is probably just another detention camp where alien terrorists are being tortured^Wquestioned. Govt. denies the existence of this camp to protect the red cross inspectors from the awful sight of ugly aliens nursing their greenish wounds. Ever seen an alien with sleep deprivation? Uh oh...
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
Now one of the guys has been charged with a federal crime...
If you absolutely, positively must be raided today - illegally enter a restricted area.
I mean, come on, you know they're motion sensors - what did you think would happen?
-Adam
The enola gay (the plane that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima during WW2) was stationed out of Area 51. True story.
There is no such thing as "The Government"
In this country, you and I are the government.
If the government owns something, you and I own it.
Too many ppl have fallen for the ignorant notion that there is a discrete entity named "the government" that can help or hinder them.
Couldn't agree with you more. These guys were messing with government property, regardless if it was on puplic land or not.
But if these sensors were in a private area (ie: home, office) then hack away...
...but by somebody else.
Sorry, it was too easy a fsck, I couldn't resist.
The Federation of American Scientists has a nice description of what is on Area 51, as well as many links to provide more info.
There is no denying that there is much about the place kept under wraps, but the crazy UFO stories need to come to an end.
Sunny Dubey
n/t
Here is the link from the article to the photos of the sensors. Sensor Photos
"If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts." -Albert Einstein
Karma? There's a serial modder out there.
Apparently the motion detectors were working properly, otherwise they wouldn't have been detected and caught, and then they would have tried to sell broken motion detectors on the black market.
--Residential Interior Design
I'm so cool I had to reply to myself.
Cool pictures and stuff here.
END OF LINE.
So, at a time of heightened awareness/paranoia of potential terrorist threats, some fellows get pinched as they good-naturedly map out a government security system. And they are surprised at the official reaction? Is joke, yes?
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
President Bush gave the area an exemption from EPA regulations on waste disposal in 2002:0 020918-9.html
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/09/2
Read any good sonnets lately?
Maybe they got too close to Stargate Command??
Goverment decides that keeping track of who's not on the list is easier than keeping track of who's on it. Goverment sells old list to telemarketers and spammers and uses RNC contributers list for new list on the theory that terrorists don't contribute to the RNC.
Oddly enough, when I clicked on those satellite image links, my WiFi connection went out. I had to remove the WiFi card from the laptop and reinsert it to get my connection back.
For added excitement:
*Armed patrols
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
In this post on the Area 51 site linked to from the article, Joerg Arnu (one of the "hackers" in the article) claims that Poulsen lured him into the interview under false pretenses, then refused his requests not to use the interview, hung up on him, and didn't return any further messages. I haven't read much of Poulsen's stuff, but is this typical of him?
Juiced? Or Not?
They want you to think exactly that. Neat, unh? :-)
/.ERS: This is a joke. Or isn't it?
ATTENTION HUMOUR-IMPAIRED
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
If he was stupid enough to steal one, he deserved to get busted.
Raiding his trailer and taking his computer is a whole 'nother story. That's just intimidation, especially since the sensors were on public land and touching them cannot be a crime.
Thanks. I had known about using video streams to infer a higher-quality image, and was even thinking about implementing it.
But it had never crossed my mind to unblur those news broadcasts with it... Werd.
Area 51 is real and is used everyday. There are planes that take off everyday from McCarran Airport in Las Vegas bringing employees to Groom Lake.
"Another area of interest is the EG&G terminal on the Northwest corner of McCarran International Airport. Every weekday morning, about 500 people arrive at the guarded terminal with one destination, Groom Lake. When I was in Las Vegas observing the activity of the EG&G terminal, I counted six EG&G owned 737-200s. The aircraft are easily identifiable; they are white with a red strip running the total length of the plane. They fly out to Groom Lake about every half hour in the morning but things slow down in the afternoon with about two to three aircraft always sitting outside. Starting in the late afternoon (I noticed one coming in at 2:30 PM), the 737s start coming back to Las Vegas. At about 6:00, all of the aircraft (6 of which I counted, there could be more) were back to the EG&G facility for the night. Below are the photos that I took when I was out to Groom Lake and observing the EG&G terminal." From sr-71.org, and a picture here.
Also for the "new" Area 51, Popular Mechanics had an article a long time ago that is located here.
I bet they are hiding it in plain sight. Like under New York City or something.
Evolution or ID?
Ever heard of this concept? The simplest explanation is probably the best one. Let's start out with Area 51 being a "secret military base" that "doesn't officially exist". Area 51 exists, is acknowledged to exist, and is generally known as an Air Force base. So what could their motivation here be?
Probably that they're tired of a bunch of crazy conspiracy theorists trying to get a photo of the "aliens" on the base. The idea that Area 51 is a government hoax is ridiculous. Anyone who works or has worked for the US Federal Gov't knows the insane levels of bureacracy that you have to deal with on a daily basis, and you don't get thinking anywhere near that creative from the federal government.
Let's stop making such a hugely asinine deal about this. Get out of your basement and stop wearing your x-files t-shirts around.
-- K
The system they are using is most likely the IRembass [sec.army.mil] system which is used in detecting movement.
http://www.dreamlandresort.com/area51/new_sensors. html
You'd think that slashdot editors would get tired, or even a little embarassed, of posting things a full day behind the single guy (I think) that maintains fark.com.
I'd wager at least 2/3rds of the really interesting stuff that I come across on slashdot has been on fark for half a day or more... sad.
Anyone remember when slashdot would link to nifty project sites, nifty home-brew stuff and the like? Is it that such things aren't undertaken as much anymore, they're harder to find due to all the other garbage, or slashdot just doesn't go after the fun stuff? What am I missing here?
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
Sensors deployed by aliens to track people?
hmm... Microsoft Windows, then?
there is NO area 51, and if there was i would never admit to such secrets about extra terrestrial space craft and/or intelligence, as our beloved U.S. Armed forces need those secret research labs and bases to be on top of the cutting edge of technology in order to remain the #1 superpower
Site slow, freecache doesn't work on files less than 5mb (and I am not letting my webserver feel the wrath of slashdot), so here's article text:
Area 51 hackers dig up trouble
By Kevin Poulsen, SecurityFocus May 25 2004 1:03PM
To the Area 51 buffs who travel to the Nevada desert in the hopes of catching a glimpse of unexplained lights in the sky or to bask in the mythic allure of the region, 58-year-old Chuck Clark is almost as much a part of the local color as the Black Mailbox.
A resident of tiny Rachel, Nevada -- 100 miles north of Las Vegas along the Extraterrestrial Highway -- the amateur astronomer and author has spent years keeping an eye on the spot the government calls the "operating location near Groom Lake, Nevada." He's said to be a frequent presence at the Little A'Le'Inn, where you can purchase post cards and tee shirts, enjoy an "Alien Burger," and walk out with a copy of Clark's "Area 51 & S-4 Handbook" to guide you on your journey into the desert.
But this self-appointed military watchdog is harder to find these days: messages left for him at the Inn go unreturned, and his media appearances have dried up like Groom Lake itself. "I think he's really not as motivated to talk to the media anymore as he used to be," says friend and fellow base-watcher Joerg Arnu. The reason: it turns out the truth really was out there, and the government didn't appreciate Clark digging it up.
Clark didn't find the Roswell craft or an alien autopsy room -- in fact, while officially shrouded in secrecy, the 50-year-old base is generally believed to be dedicated to the terrestrial mission of testing classified aircraft. "The U2 spy plane, the SR-71, the F-117A stealth fighter, all were flight-tested out of the Groom Lake facility," says Steven Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists' Project on Government Secrecy. The myth of Area 51 memorialized in films, T.V. shows and novels is a function of the secrecy that surrounds it. "It is a concrete manifestation of official secrecy at its most intense, and that invites a mixture of paranoia and speculative fantasy that has become ingrained in popular culture," says Aftergood.
Even without aliens, the facility has its secrets, and last year while roaming the desert outside the Groom Lake base Clark stumbled upon one of them: an electronic device packed in a rugged case and buried in the dirt. Marked "U.S. Government Property," the device turned out to be a wireless transmitter, connected by an underground cable to a sensor buried nearby next to one of the unpaved roads that vein the public land surrounding the base. Together, the units act as a surveillance system, warning someone -- somewhere -- whenever a vehicle drives down that stretch of road.
Similar devices had been spotted in the area in the early 90s, but they were crude and bulky, stashed in the bushes and easily spotted. They were later withdrawn. The new road sensors are more clandestine, given away only by a slender antenna poking up through the dirt. "They're very, very hard to find, because there's just this little wire, like a blade of grass," says Arnu.
Sniffing Out Surveillance
Arnu, a Las Vegas software engineer, has shared Clark's preoccupation with the Groom Lake base since 1999, when he made a trip to the area to see what all the fuss was about. "I thought, okay, I'll give it a try, see what's out there... A couple of days turned into a couple of weeks and before I knew it I started developing a website about Area 51," says Arnu.
So when Clark found the new generation of road sensor, Arnu drove out to help investigate further. The pair found that, at close range, they could use a handheld frequency counter to pick up the wireless signals given off by the devices as a car passes. Over the following month and half, Clark and Arnu engaged in a kind of geocaching game with the Men in Black, systematically sniffing out the road sensors with the frequency counter, exhuming them, and opening them up. They discov
Founder of Mirror Moon - Tsukihime Game Trans
Actually, while in an ideal world he probably shouldn't be prosecuted for investigating sensors in a public area, I do find it encouraging that, when he bothered Area 51, he got prosecuted, rather than just disappearing in the middle of the night.
Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
Clinton signed area 51 into existence. The base officially exists and is officially claimed government property so there's nothign strange about bringing charges of stealing federal property against these kids.
but we know where you and he live.
I seem to remember a Discovery channel program on Area 51 and that they had moved its operations elsewhere something like 5 years ago. I'd post a link to something, but I have to go to work now...so I'll let somebody else do it.
An article in Aviation Week back in (I think) the late 80's had and interesting article. Apparently the seismologists in California had tracked a "shock wave" comming in off the coast heading out to the desert at 4000mph. Due to it's shape and speed, they concluded it was not a geologic event and probably a really fast aircraft heading out to 51. Don't underestimate those guys just because they work for the government. Remember, the SR-71 was designed in the 1960's. Of course, I think most cool things we have today were invented before I was born. Now it's all an effort to patent things so there's no need to innovate...
I saw this series of docu's on two roque FBI agents . You should watch it it's called X files or something.
-- I don't buy it, I grow it.
I've always had some problems with the whole area 51 thing. First its in the middle of Nevada, if your trying to do top secret research why not do it in the middle of nowhere, like Antartica.
Also wouldn't we see the Hawkings, Einsteins, and Sagans of the world dissappearing for weeks on end, I mean they would want the best right?
As for the idea of it being a decoy that might make sense, have a decoy base in Nevada to hide the real base on some island in the middle of nowhere.
Is Duracell going to get comp dollars for this? Or should Radio Shack beging lobbying for a piece of the action; they certainly could use the money.
Their accountancy skills.
they dont want people fucking with this shit.
it's quite understandable. it's like you putting up security around your property only for some asshole to come up, and study the system and publish it up somewhere, leaving all stats up and how to bypass it.
With terrorists and all, they're prolly starting to really crack down on trespassers. they're testing experimental aircraft we wont know about for many years, things that we dont think is possible to be created yet. hell, they showed what most people thought were flying saucers once, some old aircraft that never came to be called the flapjack, because it was saucer, or pancake shaped
and then there's the valkerie, which was seen as one of the "ufos" over the area in the 50's taht sems to shoot across the sky (and the sr-71 in the 60s)
Thing is, did we know about area 51? yeah, did we know about these aircraft at the time? no. that's all they want you to know, the existance of the base isnt a problem, they just dont want people seeing what's inside it.
Trains make no sense in the wide-open Midwest, but here in the Northeast, Amtrak is actually an efficient and relatively pleasant way to get between major cities.
I believe the Northeast Corridor line is actually profitable.
I was down there in mid-April, while on vacation in Las Vegas. The white trucks and the soldiers they rode in, were in fact there. They wathed us through their bonics, and as we left, drove out to the place we had been. No doubt, looking for DNA samples to id us. Dipshits, they could have just looked at the license plates on our rented vehicle. :D
The obvious answer here is to plant a remote controlled 'thumper' device (or several) and set up a program to activate them in random order.
What if it is just turtles all the way down?
Here at DSD we use the little grey alien bastards to copy down all the HF traffic 'cause, basically, static sucks.
While I know that often plea deals are important in order to garner testimony about organized crime or other criminal activities this sort of case illustrates (or at least might illustrate since I don't actually know who is telling the truth) the potential dangers. Bizarelly I find myself in agreement with Ashcroft, plea bargains should be *only* be offered in return for becoming an informant, it should be banned (legally and not just by the AGs rules) otherwise.
For instance in this case the government has *every* encouragment to file suit against this guy even if they have no evidence. The threat of prison time is scary enough that any normal person will take a plea agreement accomplishing what the government really wants, stopping them from investigating area 51 (it would not surprise me at all if part of his probhation is not to even passively map the sensors, or even go close to area 51). The plea bargain allows the government to exercise considerable power by the threat of legal action without any real chance of court review.
Moreover, as far as I'm concerned giving someone a deal for pleading guilty should be a violation of the 5th ammendment. After all a plea bargain is a reduced sentence in return for not insisting on your innocence. Or put another way in the presence of a plea offer there is a penalty for insisting on your innocence. Sure it isn't technically punishing someone for refusing to incriminate themselves but this is certainly within the spirit of the ammendment, if the implicit privacy argument is considered a valid constitutional principle than this sort of broad interpratation of the 5th is perfectly reasonable as well. I really can't see any pragmatic difference between a law which penalizes someone for not testifying to their guilt (which presumably could only apply if the individual was convicted) and a general practice of giving significantly reduced sentences in return for the admisson of guilt.
Some people will protest that my position would rob the judicial system of discretion. Not at all, judges would still have plenty of discretion to give a light sentence. The change would just stop penalizing individuals for insisting on innocence. I also think it is only because upper class white kids always recieve plea bargains in drug cases (while poor black ones often don't) that the public is willing to stand for things like mandatory minimums and extreme drug sentences. I doubt most of the prosecutors are overtly racist but many people's gut reaction to seeing a well dressed white kid busted for drugs is a good kid who screwed up while a black kid in baggy pants and so forth is far more likely to be thought of as a bad person. Sure, the problem will still exist in sentencing but at least the system will be a little better and more open (it is easier to see that a judge is racially biased in his deciscions because everything is public record while often the surrounding facts to a plea bargain aren't so publicly accesible).
If you liked this thought maybe you would find my blog nice too:
Using the latitude and longitude garnered from wikipedia, and terraserver, we can clearly see that this place is an airport. Area 51
he will eventually flame and eat you.
it were subsidized to the same extent as the US interstate highway system.
Hm, seems you are eager to give up some essential liberties.
So am I actually allowed to -walk- over public space? Or do I need a goverment permit or something?
Can private employed cleaners, clean waste from public streets? It doesnt -belong- to them.
Can someone leave a TV in the middle of the street, watch it get picked up, and complain about theft?
In The Netherlands, you MUST take reasonable steps to identify and protect your property. Heck, if a garden doesnt have a visible sign, or clue it belongs to a private citizin, you can easily get away with tresspassing. The land MUST be marked as private property, otherwise the tresspasser is not even breaking a law.
Whats more, if you leave your bike unlocked, you can get a fine.. Thats right, your "Inviting people to break the law".
Obviously the Dutch governement is also quickly taking away these terrorist-friendly liberties from all of us.
Just today, the Dutch police started to "preventive frisk" traffic on a major -highway-. Imahine this: every car stopped, searched, for NO reason, but you are there. This is the next salami slice our terrorist hunting governement eats, after passing a law making it legal to search people (for no reason, except you being there) in High Crime areas. (Such as Downtown Amsterdam, thou compared to Uptown Washington, Amsterdam really is the garden of eden.)
Boy, you will love our new terrorist-unfriendly overlords. Me, I might move to France.
"/Dread"
All those people being flown in an out are CmdrTaco's chefs.
As for President Bush signing an excemption for waste disposal.......well, I'll leave that to your imagination.
And if you thought that was boring you obviously havn't read my Journal ;-)
I, for one, welcome our new insectiod overlords.
What prompts people to screw with Top Secret government facilities. They are top secret for a reason; the sensitive nature of work done there.
You don't want your enemies to figure out how to build a nuclear bomb, but a next generation super fighter, or UFO if you're one of those, is OK?
If something did fall out of the sky and did land in our backyard, you should only be so lucky.
Lance Armstrong is probably the best spokesperson for the USPS on the planet. If anyone can personify getting things to where they should be on time, through hardship, it's him.
"is a base in "northeast florida" one of the places still?"
Not to my knowledge.
The U-2, A-12 (predecessor to the RS, err SR-71), M-21/D-21, Haveblue (F-117 prototype), F-117, and Shamau were all flight tested there. Among other programs that Lockheed may not have been involved in.
There are other programs that were tested there, but I don't remember them off the top of my head (most are stuff that only aviation buffs would care about).
One of the reply posters are correct they all the Lockheed Aircraft were developed by their Skunkworks department in Plamdale, CA, and radar tested else where.
Kelly Johnson is the designer most famously associated with Skunkworks, but it was Ben Rich, the man in charge of Skunkworks when the F-117 was developed, who wrote one of the best auto-biographies from Skunkworks.
Now one of the guys has been charged with a federal crime for allegedly removing one of the devices that was protecting a base that doesn't officially exist. dumbass!!
if the SR-71 was developed at area51, my nextdoor neighbors dad would have been there.
he designed most of the cockpit and was the original test pilot and was also the first person to fly the plane..
too bad he passed away a few years back
it would have been nice to ask him about it and get a great response such as "That's Classified"
the reason the government was forced to disclose that there was a base at area 51 because of a lawsuit from employees that worked there. they had become sick with some sort of chemical poisoning but the government would not tell them what them had been exposed to. the doctors couldn't figure out what it was either and these people had started dying. skin was peeling off their bodies. the government denied the existance of these people. they were refered to as john doe 1 through 7. their lawyer argued that these people must exist because they were sitting in the courtroom and in the hospital. the judge agreed. then the goverment said these people may exist but the location where they claimed to work doesn't exist. their lawyer argued back that it does exist because he drive him out to the desert and point at the damn base. the judge agreed. the government then said yes there is a base but nothing is going on there that would cause these people to get sick. this is wrong too. area 51 is exempt from all EPA hazardous materials disposal laws. there are numerous reports of large football field sized holes being dug and filled with barrels of unknown chemicals then being covered in jet fuel and set on fire. that doesn't sound safe. they never did tell those people what they were exposed to.
Area 51 might well exist, but after the slashdotting, securityfocus.com no longer seems to. :)
I would have been pissed if some yahoo started messing with them, too. After all, they are there to ensure that no one vandalizes the equipment or gets fried by the 21,500 volts that exist across the base insulator of the antenna. We were most afraid of some BASE jumper getting killed while trying to climb the tower. In LORAN the whole tower is "hot" instead of a small radiator at the top.
And if they broke one, I'd have to fix it.
It is easy to argue that the govnt employs common people, who cannot handle some info. The truth is, that the secret stuff gives the feds an advantage over spooks in other countries. If you can keep the fact that you have a fleet of F-117s on hand, you get the advantage of Saddam Hussein not buying the latest anti-stealth shoulder launched rockets from Serbia at $zillion a pop for a few more years. Simple. Military advantage. I can handle knowing that the USAF has rocket powered toilets just as well as the next guy, but may be in USAF's advantage not to let ANYONE know about it.
It's logical that if they publish this in the USA, then Osama is going to read all bout it the same day. It's not that regular people like us can't know about it, it's that us not knowing about it is the only way to guarantee that Osama won't know either.
They have full right to do this in the name of security, and it is also their duty to judge what information may be released. Remember, if they release something which allows Osama to level New York tomorrow (i.e. "suitcase thermonuclear bomb for $100 HOWTO"), it's THEIR ass on the line.
And just to drive the argument home: Foreign spies would be out of work if stuff like that was public. What's the harm? Why do you think other countries spend so much money on intelligence, if this info isn't crucial to security?
TR3-A, B... ;)
The Slashdot Paradox: "100% Overrated"
See how inept the USPS is? Within one day of the DHL man? Some shop steward obviously dropped the ball. There are checks and balances in place to prevent this sort of thing. How are all the shareholders in DHL going to feel now? All those customs officials that rake in bazzillions charging duty on items deemed time-sensitive? Clearly something is wrong.
"I've been all over the Internet looking for information on the Aurora. The consensus at this point is that it doesn't exist. Or if it *did* exist, it was canceled and doesn't exist any more."
Believe what you like, but it's a BIG world out there, and there are lots of places for things to hide.
I've seen the plane. I've seen it fly. Oh, and I could be wrong but I heard that the Internet might not always be the ultimate source for accurate information. By the way, the plane in question is handy because re-tasking satellites takes time and fuel, and those in charge prefer to only re-task if all other options are exhausted / unavailable. ( this is more than ever true because of the problems with the shuttle, which was used to service spy birds ).
"Men in black helicopters and all of that? A "smoking man" maybe? Come on. The military is staffed by human beings. They might have some difficulty in deciding what to do with you, but they hardly make people "disappear". I'd be willing to bet that many of the super-curious have ended up being drafted as CIA or military intelligence agents."
Did I say anything about helicopters or the smoking man ? No.
The disappearances I speak of involve individuals being arrested in circumstances which tend to "avoid" any witnesses. The next stop for the person who is arrested might be any number of Federal prisons in a "no contact" ( aka solitary ) cell. The prisoner tends to get moved around a LOT, in order to avoid any guards or other prisoners becoming familiar with them. I know of several people who have disappeared this way, and have been held for well over 10 ( ten ) years without trial OR charges. It's scary, isn't it ? You're damned right it's scary. Stuff doesn't have to conform to paranoid fantasies or some silly TV show to be real, and only the naive believe the U.S. government wouldn't do such things. There is more, and worse, but I am out of time right now. Adios...
If the Feds want to bury motion sensors on public land, well then we oughtta be well within the law when we bury randomly active motion *creators* nearby!
Too bad the Feds can't seem to apply this level of creativity and resources to the problem of keeping over 5 MILLION illegal aliens (of the terrestrial sort) from sneaking across our southern border every year!
This story really has me pissed off.
"A microprocessor... is a terrible thing to waste." --
GeneralEmergency
The problem with the USPS is that they use their government-granted monopoly on US domestic mail to subsidize their international shipping division. It makes it hard for companies like DHL, FedEx and UPS to compete internationally.
But they still make sure that they run the whole thing at a loss, that way they can go to congress to get more funding whenever they want. They can also increase domestic postage whenever they want. The whole thing is a big scam.
-molo
Using your sig line to advertise for friends is lame.
but I would have traded off the absence of Internet with absence of nuclear weapons in a snap
Gee, Einstein, I must have missed the referendum where we had the choice to give up the creation of the internet in exchange for nuclear weapons not being invented.
War and war-related activities stimulate scientific advances.
Hey, how 'bout if you propose we give up the concentration of fine resataurants and cultural activities in exchange for not having awful, congested, polluted cities?
Woot!
No. They were not geocaching. RTFWS (Read the Fine Web Site.)
Irene KHAAAAAAN!
Please refrain from using the internet for more than seventy(70) minutes in a ten(10) day period. This probationary period will last as long as the rest of your Slashdot absence.
At the end of this period, you will be required to write a five(5) paragraph essay on why you had to leave the Slashdot community and submit this as an article.
Halo, it's time to go.
Geez, doofus, get your own facts straight. He never claimed to invent it, just that he and some other people supported the legislation that funded its development.
Yes, I know you're a troll, but anyway... Snopes - Al Gore
...or are you just ignorant?
I've seen the plane. I've seen it fly. Oh, and I could be wrong but I heard that the Internet might not always be the ultimate source for accurate information. By the way, the plane in question is handy because re-tasking satellites takes time and fuel, and those in charge prefer to only re-task if all other options are exhausted / unavailable.
Alright, I'll bite. What makes it fly then? Pulse Jet Engines? Those wouldn't make it out of the stratosphere. Anti-gravity engines? Nope, they don't actually work. As I responded to another poster, they are really just ion engines that use air as fuel. So what makes it fly? Nuclear Thermal Engines? Compressed LHOx?
The disappearances I speak of involve individuals being arrested in circumstances which tend to "avoid" any witnesses. The next stop for the person who is arrested might be any number of Federal prisons in a "no contact" ( aka solitary ) cell. The prisoner tends to get moved around a LOT, in order to avoid any guards or other prisoners becoming familiar with them.
[sarcasm]Welcome to national security.[/sarcasm] Well, you definitely aren't Black Ops, or this stuff wouldn't freak you out so much. And the government is very selective about who disappears and when. More often than not they'll attempt other tactics before resorting to a decade of imprisonment.
At least you're not trying to claim that "Men in Black" put a bullet in their heads.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Lob all you want, but dont forget that that same inept government developed the internet or at least what became the internet, and without it, you would still be posting comments like yours on dial up BBS's...
;)
man, always these false claims. this for the net. ant btw, the phone was invented by p. reis.
false claims can be very unpleasant
beer as in "free beer"
Easiest solution is to keep a fence around the base at a significant distance to protect security. Then post a sign on it that reads 'If you cross this fence, you will be shot and killed.' People will cross the fence and the average iq of the US will go up a fraction of an iq point.
In God we trust, all others require data.
Seriously? If its area 51...then where are the other 50 areas? Excuse me, theres some helicopters outside I need to check out. they look cool, all black and
Before he came down with Alzheimers (God bless him), I asked him once if he had ever been to Area 51 given his work on these previously top secret aircraft. I told him that I would understand if he could not reveal any details. He sat back, smiled in his gentle way, and with a twinkle in his eyes said, "No, but I have been to Area 42."
Apparently, Area 42 is some sort of rocket test range out in the middle of nowhere in California or Nevada. I just performed a Google search and came up with nothing except for a whole bunch of bad fanfics. He said that he saw various tests out there of aircraft, but no UFOs. Then again, he was a 32nd or 33rd degree Master Mason, so who knows. Illuminati and all, you know. FNORD.
--Chag
Without NASA, we'd all be less tangy.
It has been known for some time that Area 51 was simply an aeronautical research base. All those funny lights and weird noises coming from the base were experimental aircraft that the military can't admit to.
For example, the F-115 (the angular black bomber) was actually designed and built in the 60's. However, we first heard about it in the 90's in Desert Storm. You may think that it is using cutting-edge technology, but the tech for the bomber is actually built on research in radar done in the 50's.
It makes you wonder: If they could build the F-115 in the 60's, what kind of craft are they building today? Pulse jets, hovering craft, craft that accelerate at greater than several G, craft that can fly into low orbit and back again, maybe craft that can project images on radar or visual or both.
The military pours billions of dollars into its research each year, and employs the brightest minds in America and abroad. They've been doing this since World War II. Their capabilities are left to the imagination.
About why they won't admit to any of this new tech: Basically, World War II was caused by new advances in battleship and tank technology. Germany thought that they had an invincible battleship, and that their tanks and cannons were vastly superior to anything else in the world. Thus, they believed that they could roll over Europe. Advances in technology tend to give the developers a euphoria of power, expecially when the owner of said tech is a crazed dictator or socialist czar.
The US military is careful to release just enough information to the public to convince everyone else that they don't stand a chance against us.
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
I'm sorry, but I'm more comfortable with a lack of transparency when it comes to our aerospace defense technology. It's not like we're talking about Gitmo here... ;) We have much more secure unclassified bases up to some kind of mysterious shennanigans (Diego Garcia island!). I hope we have next generation fighters and bombers being readied, but I have to doubt the existence of Aurora fighter command when the V22 and YF-22 are years from combat readiness and may never see action before they're scrapped.
Before the Area 51 Research Center died off, the guy there reported often about the activities of the base, and how it was "more active than ever before."
Mostly, it looked like it was being used for chemical processing of some sort. I imagine they still use the base because it would be a big waste otherwise (for crying out loud, they have the longest runway in North America), but nothing super-secret is going to happen there anymore. So they let people think they've stumbled onto a big secret.
This guy spends all his free time snooping around area 51 and nabs morion sensors. This guy needs a girlfriend!
Religion is the main cause of atheism.
He didn't steal a sensor, because Area 51 doesn't *have* sensors.
... there *is* no Anonymous Coward. ...... you never read this.
In fact, there *is* no Area 51.
The problem with area 51 is that it's become notoriously cliche to suspect something 'spooky' is going on. Mention aliens in full seriousness to anyone, and chances are they'll laugh in your face. It's a myth, and a mighty good one, and perfect to mislead every ol' shmuck. Guys with trucks and such are probably employed only for the purpose of keeping myth alive just to give the people something to care about. Kinda like an amusement park with AK-47's. Besides, if everyone's eyes are focused on this red herring, then the real stuff is still flying under the radar.
They were messing with stuff that doesn't belong to them. It eve said right on it that it was government property. Just because you find something on public land, doesn't mean it's yours to mess with. I work on public land (state university) and thousands of cars are parked here every day. Doesn't give you the right to go in any of them and mess with them, you'll be arrested and/or beaten up if you do. They are still the property of the person that holds the title, despite being parked on public land.
Actually, that's an urban legend; ARPA funding of the ARPAnet had nothing to do with protection against a nuclear attack. They just wanted a more efficient way of linking the various academic and commercial computing centers they were funding.
What is true is that before that, Paul Baran of the RAND Corporation did conceive of many of the ideas of the Internet, and he was trying to think of a more failure-proof system in case of nuclear attack. However, his ideas were largely ignored at the time. They were rediscovered after ARPA had already begun ARPAnet development for entirely different reasons.
For more on the history of ARPA's involvement with the Internet, see here (search for "nuclear"), as well as here.
Nice attempt to whore some karma but 50+ people beat you to it. Better luck next time! ;-)
My wife's been driving me crazy because she ordered a powerbook and had it shipped "2 day" FedEx. It's spent more than two days in Memphis. You can not believe how annoying that is.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
You've got it wrong. It's actually Area 51-A.
You make a good point. There's one more thing that I would like to add.
Many people seem to think that the terms 'government' and 'military' are interchangeable when it comes to conspiracy theories and the like. This is where a flaw in many theories lies.
Just because some government officials can't seem to keep their mouths shut (and let's face it, not all "leaks" are intentional) doesn't mean that classified military information can't be kept confidential. The military uses a different system. When you rely on strict need-to-know principles you reduce the number of PoFs (point of failure) to a minimum. Yes, there's always a few people who really do have a need-to-know but those can be hand-picked and are easier to monitor and control. Also, you can get away with implementing and enforcing a lot more stringent and intrusive security measures on military grounds than you can in a civilian workplace.
This quote seems fitting about now:
"The United States is a nation of laws: badly written and randomly enforced." - Frank Zappa
"I'm not ashamed I can't function in society like I'm supposed to." - Paul Westerberg
i used to work there. i'm in my fifties now, but i still remember.
...mom, what's it your doing with the cable? this is for homework, i'm not surfing. mom, don't...
it's deep under the earth, and at least two alien spacecrafts are hidden there, one still able to fly. five alien pilots are also hidden there, two are alive and held prisoners, cause only they know how to fly these spacecraft with only one finger.
these aliens come from a planet called ursa minor, and one is called wowbagger, all he can do is talking in insults.
[CARRIER LOST]
beer as in "free beer"
They already HAD a case against him, messing with the sensors he found. That's not legal you know. Just because something is on public land, doesn't mean you can mess with it. They KNOW he did this since he was dumb enough to DOCUMENT the whole thing. So they would have no trouble getting a guilty conviction for tampering. However, they decided not to they said "Look, just quit messing with the sensors and pay us for the missing one, wether you took it or not, and we'll let the whole thing slide."
I see no justice problems at all in this case. He broke the law, documented himself doing it, and got charged. They (not unreasonably) figured he might be the one that took one of them (I'm not convinced he didn't). However, rather than prosecute him, since he didn't really cause any harm, they just made him promise to stop.
All off-subject now. Old sensors -> missing desert rats -> government ineptitude. The agents provocateur are well trained and doing their jobs well.
The only thing new in this world is the history that you don't know.[Harry Truman]
I live about 100 miles north of Groom Lake. They test all kinds of things like microwave weapons to knock out communications. Once or twice a month my cell phone squelches worse than any CB you've ever heard. This lasts for a few hours. I've also seen unmanned vehicles flying in the area, some going almost faster than the eye can track them.
If you want to see an SR-71 up close, the Boeing Museum of Flight has one. They even have a Tagboard drone. They also have the technical documents for the aircraft, and you can read them if you make an appointment.
Sadly, the Skunk Works is no more. The hangars in Burbank are abandoned, as a result of the Lockheed/Martin merger.
Recon aircraft today are less dramatic. We don't need to build something to overfly Russia or Hanoi. What we need is something that can overfly Afghanistan and find bin Laden. That's more of a sensor problem than an airframe problem.
Still, the Air Force has a huge "black budget". It's not at all clear what they're hiding from whom.
But instead the money paid in tolls and fuel taxes is siphoned off into the state's General Account spending fund and spent on things entirely unrelated to road maintenance and repair (at least in California).
9/11 Eyewitnesses to Explosive WTC Demolition 1 of 2
All the "interesting" items were moved to another "non-existent" base in North Dakota.
The new base is known as (EL) or Echo-Lima. It is so remote there is no chance of anyone getting to the area without being seen.
With the growth of NV the test range became too high profile.
..And This ladies and gentlemen is why you don't go "Haha, yea we got aliens in there", when someone asks you about work :)
--- [Insert intresting Sig here]
"Now, for all we know, Area 51 still could be an advanced aircraft development center. If they retired the SR-71 (also a Skunk Works Project) and allowed the F-117 to become public before it was absolutely neccessary, then what do they have that they aren't talking about?"
:)
Oh, that's easy. Whatever it is is REALLY EXPENSIVE and a huge waste of tax dollars. The public outcry would be uncomprehensible.
Hey, lets go sneak around a military base with motive to find out its secrets.
Gasp! The Men In Military Outfits Are Coming After Us! They MUST be hiding something...
No shit they're coming after you, you're snooping at a MILITARY BASE... Wether its Groom Lake, or even the bloody smallest frigging military outpost, walking around with gear to snoop is -GOING- go get you shit.
Even if its abandoned totally, not like you can just wander in and videotape the structures...
They just won't die. President Clinton did not slash military funds constantly as the Right claimed he actually increased funding.e .bill/
http://www.cnn.com/2000/US/08/09/defens
His proposed $288 Billion dollar budget was the biggest since 1984 during Reagan's massive buildup. And that was during the Cold war. Clinton's budget was at a time of relative peace so explain to me how he decreased funds? If you mean he increased their pay and medical benefits then yes you'd be right.
The funny thing B*sh et al spread lies and propaganda about "entire divisions not be ready" but when then claim was tested it was found out that he made it up. B*ush lying? Huh. B*sh and compay lied so that if the military fell flat they would have someone to blame. Remember right wing mantra? Blame Clinton. Anyway the funny/sad thing is that B*sh went to Afghanistan and Iraq with Clinton's military and did a great job. Of course they probably should have planned beyond Step 1, Take over Iraq. Who of course does B*sh give credit to? Not the ex Pres.
Of course the hardliners will continue the "Clinton gutted our military" line until the day they or no more. They'll just be wrong, just like you.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
IIRC, Bob Lazar came up with the whole story based on a Scientific American paper from 1969 about superheavy element synthesis (the 114 element).. it was an effort to stir up hype for a movie for his TriDot Productions.
US foreign aid is about 10 billion and less than 1% of the GDP Source and the debt is being kept low by the Chinese and Japanese buying up Uncle Sam's bonds.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If the mail is so slow why not either have the mortgage company draft your account or if you are not comfortable with that, they can probably do a "check by phone". Even if they charge a small fee it might be worth it to not have to stress out each month.
Good luck!!!
Ohana means family. Family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten.
Sure you didn't forget a zero there?
$500 billion is nearly as much money as NASA has received in it's ENTIRE history.
You are quite correct that there was technically no violation of due process.
The whole area of these special plea bargains is however suspect in that they all leave us open for violations of the spirit of due process. All a prosecutor needs to do is trump up charges MUCH more serious than what they actually believe to be appropriate, and make sure the defendant is sufficiantly fearful that they will be convicted (possibly in spite of their innocence).
Then, offer a deal that amounts to a reasonable sentence for the crime they are ACTUALLY suspected of. This is called a plea bargain. A 'nice' side effect for the DA is that it keeps inconvieniant evidence out of the public record.
It's not at all clear what did happen there since there is no court record presenting the evidence. He may or may not have been guilty of anything. The fact that we can't check up on the process of justice is exactly the problem.
The most blatant form of this is the case of traffic violations. Some counties have it rigged so that it costs more to successfully fight the ticket than to pay it in all cases. As a result, technically, due process is there, but in practice the only 'process' is cash or credit card.
This is closely related to other misdemeanor offenses where people unable to make bail end up in jail awaiting trial for longer than the maximum sentence. Ironically, those people would be better off without their so-called due process. As far as I know, that situation (in Atlanta) didn't get anyone fined, fired, or jailed, nor were the victems compensated.
Are these guys stupid? Of course the USAF should be able to protect vital interests and the FBI raid your home if you'e doing something like sniffing out their security perimeter and digging up their equipment and making that information public. What kind of idiot are you for thinking your "rights" have been trampled on after doing that? I'm all for the hacker ethic of figuring things out, I do that myself. But you also need to balance that with "do I *need* to know how this works, and what are the ramifications of my actions *beyond* *myself*?"
Before Area 51 was the big name, it was Hangar 18.
Hangar 18 was on Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
Area 51 / Groom Lake is just a flight strip for testing stealth equipment, etc.
Hangar 18 was storage at one of the most secure bases in the country. This base is where the Air Force Research Lab is, their aerospace projects started there, etc.
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base
My mom says I'm cool.
Somebody go hunt up Syvia Sydney (Grandma Norris) and see if she still has her old record of Jeannette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy singing "Indian Love Call"
If that doesn't work we can get another copy at:
Indian Love Call
Erehwon
I'm armed and I haven't changed my patch, so don't start with me -- you *know* how I get!
I wonder if those little transmitters are FCC approved?
that nerd planted the darn thing so he could sell more alien burgers.
Now the special sauce in those burgers, that's the real mystery.
Perhaps you missed the news: the AFB and the S4 area (known as Area 51) has been "official" since the mid 1990's. It should also be noted that it is widely believe that the S4 facility at Groom Lake has been moved to another facility somewhere in Utah.
Anthony Papillion
Advanced Data Concepts, Inc.
"Quality Custom Software and IT Services"
> If you absolutely, positively must be raided today - illegally enter a restricted area.
:)
Or just share some movies and mp3 and wait in the confort of your home for the feds
Maybe you are right we should keep to ourselfs we should stop giving out the trillons that we do to other countrys.
We give out $15 billion in various types of foreign aid with the bulk of it being "foreign military aid" to countries that serve our strategic interests(Israel, Pakistan, Uzbekistan) rather than humanitarian ones.
But don't feel bad. Many Americans think we devote almost a quarter(24%) of our budget to foreign assistance when it's really about 1%.
Given the types of governments in the countries we send "aid" to, I think their citizens might prefer it if we turned off the spigots and stopped propping up bloodthirsty dictatorships.
They have clearly marked signs that say "We will fucking shoot your ass"
Do you think they're kidding? Would you stick your penis in an alligator's mouth?
they tracked down and logged 30 - 40 of the sensors, before the FBI and Air Force raided one of them
Guess the feds haven't quite got the hang of that alien sensor technology yet.
Please donate your spare CPU cycles to help fight cancer and other diseases
In Denmark they collect 8% raw off your income, then , after you are allowed to deduct an amount for transportation, union fees and some minor part of your real estate mortgage interest, they snatch another betwix 40 and 47 off the rest..... Nice place to live!! (then of course we have free medical treatment and hospitals, free education, free social security and a small old age allowance...)
Speak for yourself. If I can gain knowledge, I will do so, and I will not peacefully allow others to prevent me from it. The only danger there is in attaining knowledge is that of some bully shooting me for trying to grow beyond their control. There is nothing noble or responsible in deliberately choosing to follow a path of ignorance.
Only a willing piece of food would accept life within such parameters.
Knowledge protects. Ignorance endangers.
-FL
Funny thing is...as I understand it. FedEx was originally going to put their hub in Little Rock, Ar. Unfortunately, politics of some kind got in the way...and pissed them off, and they went to 2nd choice, Memphis.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
It is reasonable to assume that military science is extremely advanced in many more areas than simply aerospace. Indeed, with even the slightest use of reasonable thought, it is perfectly logical to assume that almost all of the technology which Slashdotters and the public at large consider 'New' and get all excited over, is really stone-age by comparison to what could be available if only it were allowed. --That in fact, the reality we all live in is a total farce -which for some reason- nearly everybody seems happy enough to play along with.
.
.
"Oooh. Digital paper." "Oooh. Bigger hard drives." "Oooh. Internal combustion."
This stuff is only impressive in the way that withheld candies are impressive to children. To pretend that we are actually pushing the boundaries of human knowledge and capability with any of this crap is nothing short of willfully stupid.
"Yeah? So what?" --Some might ask. "We know this is how it is, but there's national security to consider."
Er. . . Well, no, that's a very thin excuse. This goes far beyond secret planes which fly faster. Technological advance has happened in areas and directions which go amazingly far beyond a simple question of keeping the better airplanes out of the hands of the commies. (Which in itself is an incredibly stupid concept which again, everybody on the planet plays along with.)
The war in Iraq is an excellent example.
Saddam and his forces could have been removed with very few soldiers with much greater efficiency and cleanliness than was done. The kind of technology available and in use today makes it possible to shut down a city or a stronghold, walk in and murder or abduct the people you want to murder or abduct with ease and simplicity. The only reason to commit giant forces with archaic weapons and broken, (and some would say, nonexistent) tactics to a giant overseas ground war is this. .
To create a huge, infernal endless war designed to kill millions of people and absorb billions of dollars in goods. --There is a LOT of money and power to be had from big messy wars. Understanding how this is true and where the power comes from and goes to, who it benefits and why, is the first step to grasping how the real world works.
Consider this. .
One of the other directions military research has gone in has been toward that of mind control and mood altering. In fact, this could easily be considered the holy grail of military science; when you can control a population, then the need for guns and tanks is instantly nullified. --And anybody who has any level of competency in research, and who has the courage to look at frightening possibilities rather than seek comfort in ridiculing others while avoiding the pain of being ridiculed themselves, (and geeks have strong sore spots regarding this given their experiences through life; and isn't it curious that those most able to see through the veil are also those targeted with some of the most deliberate and cruel social programming?) --Anybody who knows how to question and has the balls to do so, knows that the holy grail of mind control was discovered long ago, and is widely implemented today across all strata of society in many different forms.
Secret planes that go fast?
The military industrial complex, (to use an old but accurate term), has more than secret planes in its bat belt!
The 'other' effects of cell phones upon the human brain and cognitive function were not only well understood, but were deliberately designed and were the primary reason for the proliferation of the wireless technology. --And population control through EM is only one way; combined with chemicals in our food, the direct psychological programming in advertising, music, television and movies -through all strata of media- combine to provide a means of near total control of humanity.
Many of you laugh. Would it be mind control if you feel that knee-jerk desire?
maybe they put the sensors there so if one of ...
the aliens should decide to run from "home" they can
go pick it up in the deasert.
i hope these motion detectors aren't made from alien
technology, cause that would really s#ck: imagine
landing on an alien planet and saying: "hello
aliens, we come in peace" only to have the alien
snatch your sidearm and pointing it at you.
i'm sure the military doesn't respect human
rights, since they're not humans, right? maybe
rename it to "intelligent being rights"? so maybe
dolphins and whales also get some rights
UPS has shipped nextday to nowhere Alaska by hiring a private airplane to get from the UPS hub in Alaska to some guys house which doesn't even have any roads going to it. The shipment originated in the continental US too. I forgot how much this actually cost, probably thousands.
What's this, an area 51 discussion and not even one mention of area 6413?
You can always bop down to the Thieves Market and buy your bike back.
Amsterdam is great, if you like stepping in dog shit.
Aaaaaaaaaah!
And hearing "Cocaine, Heroin, Speed?" mumbled by every other pedestrian.
Though the "Coffee Houses" and "Window Shopping" do tend to make up for it...
"Your honor, the defendant is charged from removing this device from the premises of Area 51."
"But your honor, the accusing party has always denied the very existence of Area 51. That means the crime he is accused is of removing a non-existant device, from a place that doesn't exist. Wouldn't that make it copyright infringement of a work of fiction your honor, and not trespass?"
"I agree with the defendant, the defendant is not guilty of trespass. The accusing party is hereby advised to keep works of fiction away from courts of the real world when it comes to trespassing on federal property." Said the judge with an Ironic grin.
They can control what you can and cannot do with it - often at someone's whim. I learned this secondhand watching someone struggle with a planning & zoning department. They have set standards, but often you need a variance- if they like you, and your plans don't conflict with any internal agendas, you get approved. If not, they can come up with countless ways to deny, stall, can cost you serious money, all the while effectively denying you the use of your own property. If you do a little research on the net, you will find horror stories about how public entities have abused their position when it comes to land use, permits, and easements.
Montauk Air Force Base, now THIS is a secret base! So secret in fact nobody is there and the buildings all LOOK deserted. The security comes in the form of kooky looking "locals" who warn you you're on private property. Rumor is the entire facility is underground ever since the Philadelphia Experiment went awry.
Personally, I've had better experience with USPS than UPS or FedEx.
:)
When I was ordering my BTTF replacement DVDs, they put letters in my house number. For example, if my house was 8519, then it would have been AD519. USPS delivered this just like a normal letter, despite the screwed up format.
On the other hand, FedEx sometimes can't even get it to the right house when the address is exactly correct!
USPS gets mad props from me
"The American government hasn't been able to keep a single secret longer than about 15 minutes."
wtf are you talking about,,,,, there are millions of secrets that they've managed to keep secret for WELL over 15 minutes,,, a few examples: the manhattan proyect, the development of the stealth bombers.....
Poulsen used to run with Kevin Mitnick. You may have seen him on Unsolved Mysteries or on a post office wall... (he's the one who won a Porsche from a radio station by taking over their phonelines)
Now he's "reformed" and reporting for Security Focus (however his reporting tactics are tantamount to social engineering).
without the usps we wouldn't have netflix. I get my movies NEXT BUSINESS DAY every time. without fail. fedex is late according to their estimated arrival times using tracking codes every time, and I live 5 minutes from Washington DC, so it's not like I am in a remote location. And the last fedex overnight package I got arrived 3 days late and looked like it was used in an nhl game. USPS kicks butt.
Whether or not Popular Mechanics is right or not remains to be seen. Either way, the Groom Dry Lake Bed testing ground currently known as Area 51 has attracted too many visitors, and as such is likely to be or have been phased out of existance in the short term.
When it comes to matters affecting national security or federal government interests.
A few examples:
Counterfeitting U.S. currency is a '20-years in prison' offence.
Restricted airspace over government buildings such as the Pentagon and the White House.
Federal employees are considered Government property: It is a felony offense to threaten the President's life. It is an automatic 25-year sentence in prison to assault/kill a U.S. Postal Service mail carrier.
These two guys brought trouble on their own heads as the Feds likely used the 'eminent domain' card to make their little mapping project backfire.
Again people,
When it comes to matters affecting national security or federal government interests...
DO NOT FOOL WITH THE FEDS!...
(Definitely not now after the the events of 2001-09-11 in New York City, Washington D.C., and Stonycreek Township, Pennsylvannia.)
Although I have no belief nor disbelief as to it's existence, It does make you wonder about the idea of Misdirection. The thing magicians use to perform their tricks. Get all the conspiracy theorists looking in a false direction instead of directly at them...
1. Terrorists are more inclined to attack US troops in Iraq than civilians on American soil. It's cheaper, quicker and easier for the terrorists than trying to strike on American soil.
How is that a fact? More people died in 9/11 than all the soldiers killed in the Iraq war to date. And what about non-Americans such as the people on the train in Madrid? There is no real evidence the "terrorists"/"insurgents" in Iraq are al Queda. Most of them are al Sadr's militia. In fact, it was announced today that our own government believes the terrorists are going to strike big again this summer. The attacks in Iraq are more frequent, mind you, but those are "insurgents" who may believe they're liberating their country instead of terrorists hell-bent on removing the United States and its people from existence.
2. The war in Iraq may bring stability to the country and a regime that is more US friendly.
The fact, as you stated is that it "may" bring stability. Logically, then, it is also a fact that it may NOT bring stability to Iraq. In fact, the sense I get is that Iraq is less stable now than it was under its former dictator. And, apparently, you still have about the same chance of getting tortured in prison!
3. The war in Iraq will show the middle eastern countries that the US will follow through on military actions despite casualties.
That remains to be seen. Will we follow through? We have so far. It may also show that we will attack a country that doesn't have WMDs and they they did, while leaving alone those thonry countries we KNOW have WMD, such as North Korea. In that case, all the more reason to obtain WMDs to defend yourself.
4. ...
See response to number 3.
5. With a friendly Iraq, perhaps gas prices will come down in the US (not likely though).
This is not really a "fact", is it? You even admit its not likely. So what was the point of this? In fact, the instability in Iraq has likely contributed to higher oil prices.
And the number 6 point, which I'll add, is thatthis is only giving more evidence to for the terrorists to twist as propoganda. American's sexually uhmiliating and toruturing innocent Iraqis. Americans firing on wedding parties. American tanks shooting at graveyards.
[END DEVIL'S ADVOCACY]
Hi, we're from the government, and we're here to help.
We subsidize the trucking industry to the tune of millions of dollars a year with federal highway dollars. We prop up our inflated dependency on foreign oil with billions in military spending. And you're going to bitch about Amtrack? Have another toke, my friend.
...so keep sniffin that wicked cocaine, maintain that 'C' average and pray hard... Just maybe, if your family has the $$$$, maybe you too can be President.
Can we get a "-1, disagrees with slashdot's general opinion" to more accurately reflect what I'm being moderated down for?
I do security
I think they hide all the trolls there.
The parent poster speaks truth. Fed-ex flies to my local "airport" (= 2 short runways), but can't seem to get things here on time. Ground packages take ca. 5-7 days to go 250 miles. The positive side is that if someone (e.g., the GF) pays for Fed-Ex overnight, they are only guaranteed 2-day, but can't make it, ergo $25 is refunded (5/5 record!). Downside: I've gotten stale brownies 10 days later in an OVERNIGHT package. /offtopic
Call them (1-800-ASK-USPS) and complain.
No, I'm serious. The branch near my work was consistenly undermanning the front desk. Three windows, one open, line a mile long. So I finally called and complained. Next time I went in, lo and behold, all three windows open.
So remember, kids, squeaky wheel and all that.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
...all this time you waste with area 51...can't you see it's just a decoy to keep you away from areas 1 to 49
http://www.fas.org/irp/overhead/ikonos_040400_over view_03-f.htm
A story I once read on usenet:
In the city of Olomouc in Czech Republic they produce a kind of extremely smelly cheese, which is considered by to be a great delicacy. A czech emigree living in Canada once got a phone call from his post office that there they have a package for him they would like to deliver. They wanted to know if he was going to be at home. He was rather surprised, because it was Sunday morning, when the post office is normally closed. When the package arrived, he discovered that the package was full of this cheese, fully ripe. They said it was stinking up the whole building.
This was the Canadian post office, though, not the USPS.
AccountKiller
It's old news but it's relevant. George W Bush kept Area 51's environmental secrets classified for yet another year. This keeps them exempt from environmental laws.
It is highly possible that our government could be working with aliens at Area 51 and/or Wright Patterson AFB. Why? The answer is simple. It's what Chris Carter, creator of the X-Files calls,"The truth hidden in plain sight." The X-files is not quite as sci-fi as you might want to believe; there are unexplained events that the government calls "x-files". The psychological trickery and mind games used to hide secrets is typical for people arrested at Area 51.
If UFO's and aliens are made to look ridiculous in the eyes of science, then anyone who were to witness such things would be immediately discreditted. The truth is hidden in plain sight and the government has pulled the right psychological strings to prevent even eye witnesses from being believed.
Also, Michael Crichgaugh tells Agent Mulder about Roswell and how it served as a diversion from the cold war. Crichgaugh also explained to Mulder how war was the excuse our government used to keep going after WW II. That's how the government kept the economy going. It justified spending more money on war even though there was no war.
The reason the government would want the existence of extraterrestrial life to be kept secret is simple IMHO. The government is a parent and society is the child. Until the child has matured enough to handle the truth, it will not be allowed to know about it.
No, no, they moved it to somewhere in Ohio, somewhere noone ever visits.
I think it's called "Cleaveland"
You have a twisted outlook where the world must fully accomodate you and bend to your will because you seem to feel you are acting out of some higher noble pursuit. That is the exact kind of egotistical, self-centered stance religious nuts use to justify killing people, whether they be physicians that perform abortions, or simply people of a different religion.
I'm not on one side or the other in particular, but for the sake of devil's advocacy:
You seem to be pretty hardcore antiwar from your posts...
1. Terrorists are more inclined to attack US troops in Iraq than civilians on American soil. It's cheaper, quicker and easier for the terrorists than trying to strike on American soil.
How is that a fact? More people died in 9/11 than all the soldiers killed in the Iraq war to date. And what about non-Americans such as the people on the train in Madrid? There is no real evidence the "terrorists"/"insurgents" in Iraq are al Queda. Most of them are al Sadr's militia. In fact, it was announced today that our own government believes the terrorists are going to strike big again this summer. The attacks in Iraq are more frequent, mind you, but those are "insurgents" who may believe they're liberating their country instead of terrorists hell-bent on removing the United States and its people from existence.
I would bet there is a mix of people in Iraq now attacking the troops. It's been reported that the American troops have be attacked by Al Quadia and that the Syrian boarder is still pretty wide open
2. The war in Iraq may bring stability to the country and a regime that is more US friendly.
The fact, as you stated is that it "may" bring stability. Logically, then, it is also a fact that it may NOT bring stability to Iraq. In fact, the sense I get is that Iraq is less stable now than it was under its former dictator. And, apparently, you still have about the same chance of getting tortured in prison!
This statement is just false. A few terrorists (not just iraqis, terrorists) that were held were tortured. Mass graves have been found from the Saddam era. It's just not the same. The democrats might try to paint it that way because it's an election year, but if you sit back and think about it you know it isn't even close to the same thing.
3. The war in Iraq will show the middle eastern countries that the US will follow through on military actions despite casualties.
That remains to be seen. Will we follow through? We have so far. It may also show that we will attack a country that doesn't have WMDs and they they did, while leaving alone those thonry countries we KNOW have WMD, such as North Korea. In that case, all the more reason to obtain WMDs to defend yourself.
North Korea doesn't support international terrorism, Iraq did. In addition to paying suicide bombers, Saddam also tried to have George H Bush Assassinated while he was in office. That is an act of war that should not have been forgiven.
5. With a friendly Iraq, perhaps gas prices will come down in the US (not likely though).
This is not really a "fact", is it? You even admit its not likely. So what was the point of this? In fact, the instability in Iraq has likely contributed to higher oil prices.
Yep, but there really isn't a supply and demand problem. The insabitlity has driven the price of gas up, but it seems more like it's the American gas comanies raping the consumers.
And the number 6 point, which I'll add, is thatthis is only giving more evidence to for the terrorists to twist as propoganda.
Agreed
American's sexually uhmiliating and toruturing innocent Iraqis.
Again, this is only a few soldiers who weren't following orders. It's being played up in the media because it's a election year. Worse things go on in US prisons everyday but no one talks about that, because it's not a sexy issue, and it's not going to get anyone elected.
Americans firing on wedding parties.
Again, there are conflicting reports about if it was or wasn't a wedding party. Even if it was a wedding party, the planes were fired upon because the Iraqis didn't have the common sense not to fire their guns in the air during a time
On a sign at Area 51:
You are here. We Are Not.
the way things are ratcheting up in our industry sector ( transportation ) i would strongly suggest kids or techies not screw around with federal property or anyones property for that matter. does the term zero tolerance ring these guys bells yet? spend some time in the bureaucratic system after a stunt like this and then respond please... your whinning is not an effective legal defense...
More people died in 9/11 than all the soldiers killed in the Iraq war to date.
How in the hell is that relevant to a discussion of whether the war is justified?
those are "insurgents" who may believe they're liberating their country instead of terrorists
How interesting. The media has continually been repeating the word 'insurgent' when there have been plenty of individuals captured who are from Iran, Libya, etc., countries that don't want the US to win. These are not insurgents.
the sense I get is that Iraq is less stable now than it was under its former dictator
Your 'sense' is based on watching the mainstream media, which wants you to think that that is the case. There are very few problems in Iraq compared to the areas that are doing well. According to those I've spoken to who were ON THE GROUND in Iraq, the country is doing great, except for the small handful of areas where there are fighters.
And, apparently, you still have about the same chance of getting tortured in prison!
Being humiliated by a woman looking at your genitals and being forced to wear panties on your head is not even remotely the same as the torture, maiming, and killing that was going on in this prison before US occupation. Give me a break!
we will attack a country that doesn't have WMDs
Iraq had WMDs. There is no question of this ANYWHERE. Hussein USED THEM. We went in to locate them because the UN told Hussein to provide a list of what he had, and what had been done with what he was missing. In addition, WMDs are being found in Iraq. Google for "serin gas found iraq" for instance.
Hello little man. I will destroy you!
Privacy is an illusion designed, I think, to make learning at this level of reality less painful. Understanding this provides a good reason to make peace with yourself and others as we each work through our lessons.
-FL
Where is my 'eveidence'? I'm 'enitlted' to my own beliefs? I'm sorry, did you say that you earned a degree?
Anyway. . . I'll answer this directly, but first I'm going to respond with a quote from the post you are having such a strong knee-jerk reaction against. . . (I've never quoted myself before, but it strikes me as relevant this time around. Hold on.
Okay. .
I've spent the last five years collecting, reading, interviewing and comparing all kinds of information regarding this stuff, and based on all of that, I have formed my current knowledge structure.
Aside from some of the government contacts who have been kind and brave enough to answer my questions, nearly all of the information I have looked at is freely available to anybody who chooses to seek for themselves. --Some of it must be dug up at the cost of some personal effort and expense, but those looking must expect to work for their knowledge. Nothing is free; it all takes effort, curiosity, and above all, a willingness to see the truth rather than resist it.
Even the sorts of contacts I have made are possible for others to make if they work hard enough.
So you want proof and evidence? Go get it. It's all out there, and I don't owe it to you. Your ignorance or lack thereof has no real value to me and I am certainly not going to fight to overcome your personal barriers in order to make available the fruits of my labor, particularly if you are going to be so rude about asking.
This is, in fact, a common piece of behavioral programming; the belief that the world owes people 'proof' and 'extraordinary evidence'. --That somehow, ignorance is something which should be fortified, defended and valued. A very strange and illogical state, but one which has been successfully impressed upon the public subconscious. --I think, in part, by way of endless court-room dramas on television. Television is an amazing tool when it comes to controlling how the public thinks.
In any case, your state of awareness is YOUR problem; nobody else's, certainly not mine. If you ask, I'll help, but it seems fairly obvious that you don't really want to know anything beyond the preconceptions you currently hold. With the violent sort of response you just demonstrated, it sounds to me like you very much want to stay ignorant. --Though, to be fair, a single post on Slashdot is far from enough to properly gauge a person's intent and personality. (It's a start, though.)
Anyway, what sort of formal study did you do in regard to the Military Industrial Complex?
Also, when looking at something simple like, Crop Circles. . . How much do you actually know about them? People who ridicule so very loudly typically don't have a broad understanding of the subject. I am curious to know the depth of your information.
-FL
I cannot comment on the EPA regulations, but I know that at the least, Air Force Bases are not legally considered within the same legal bounds as the states they reside in. That's why Air Force Bases have their own laws on what consitutes a deadly weapon, age of consent (It's 16 on any Air Force Base, no matter the state is) and moral behavior (Most bases that I know of still have rules on the book forbidding oral or anal sex). I am not in the Air Force myself, but from the friends I have in it, I get the impression that bases are considered to be a state of their own, kind of like the situation with foreign embassies.
This sig has absolutely no significance and serves only to take up screen space and waste the time of the reader.
I'm perplexed by the cetrainty by which you dismissed my rebuttals. You so much as called me a Democrat as if I was being political about it. Yet, every stance you have taken is exactly what the Republican's stance is. Since I was playing devil's advocate, naturally my rebuttal would seem like that of a Democrat, but that's why I prefixed it that way.
The truth of the matter is that nobody now knows the truth, and might not ever. Maybe those soldiers abusing prisoners were given direct orders. Maybe they were rogue. Or, maybe theose guys were given indirect orders to permit plausible deniability by the superiors and hang the soldiers out to dry. We just don't know. If you have real evidence, run -- don't walk -- to the nearest media outlet so we can put it to rest one way or another.
What scares me is that you seem even too stubborn to even consider the remote possibilities of these alternatives. It is exactly these alternatives views that the terrorists are thriving under. You completely dismiss these alternatives as the ideas of madmen just as they completely dismiss your views as the thoughts of the devil westerners.
These opposing views will never come to terms. Only an attempt at understanding, and a real desire to ghet at the truth will be. I for one cannot believe that one side is totally right and the other totally wrong.
For example, we know prisoners in the Iraq prison were abused. We don't know if they were guilty or not because they never faced trial, so you can't say with cetrainty they are terrorists. Thus, it is true, if only a partial truth, to say that the people tortured there weren't terrorists. At the same time it is logical that some of those people were terrorists (or insurgents who view themselves as liberators) and thus we were only using interrogation tacticts to try and get ifnormation that would save lives.
Now, to address some specific points:
1. There are conflicting statements about whether or not the soliders were or were not ordered to abuse the prisoners. Will we ever know the truth?
2. Yes, there were conflicting reports about the wedding party. Will we ever know the truth? (I agree that it is stupid to fire loaded weapons in the air at any time, especially in a war zone -- unless you WANT to get shot)
3. The graveyard battle happened in Najaf with Muqtadr's militia. Part of the reason the rest of the Shia Clerics wanted a cease fire and help pressure Muqtadr into it was because their holy sites, including graveyards, were caught in the middle. And regardless of the inhabitants of those graves being dead, descratign a grave is a bad thing in Iraqi culture and ours -- or shall I poop on your grandmother's grave?
4. (out of order now). We also tried to have Saddam Hussein assasinated. Everyone pretends assasination is a nasty thing. But its a brilliant tactic. Did you know that Lincoln tried to have [whoever the Southern president was] assasinated during the civil war? And the Southerners tried to plant dynamite under the white house?
5. I bet there is a mix of people are involved in the attacks as well. That doesn't make them all terrorists. What do you think the Brothers of Liberty were when they dumped tea in the harbor? What do you think the lined-up British tropps thought the American's hiding behind trees and hills were during the revolutionary war? The labels all depend on your point of view, and labelling everyone too coarsely is a dangerous thing. We all know the baggage that comes with the term terrorist. I don't think that fits with someone shooting a gun at an American soldier holding a gun. Just because we took over his country doesn't mean that he has no country to defend -- even if its a misguided defense against an occupying force that really does want to liberate it if they'd just stop shooting at us!
"More people died in 9/11 than all the soldiers killed in the Iraq war to date."
How in the hell is that relevant to a discussion of whether the war is justified?
It's relavent becausethe grandparent post implied that there were more attacks in Iraq than at home -- I was trying to point that while the quantity of attacks in Iraq are greater, the actual number of casualties from terrorists at home is still greater.
These are not insurgents.
Well, they aren't necessarily terrorists either, now, are they? What do you call the freelance American bounty hunters who went ot Iraq for the price tag on his head? They non-Iraqis in Iraq -- and they brought guns. If insrugent can only be applied to someone who is native to Iraq, then what do you call someone who came to Iraq to fight American military forces (the most prevalent target -- the civilian contractor casualties have been far less numerous)? Is it because they use roadside bombs? Would switching from car bombs to land mines -- a more traditional military weapon -- then make them mercenaries or freedom fighters or... terrorists still? THe sense I Get is from hearing interviews of Iraqi's on the street. Yes, those interviews came through the media and might have been edited. The general sense in those interviews, however, is that they're glad that Saddam is gone, but are still worried about security, joblessness, etc. Unexployment is significantly up. And, even in BIG cities like Najaf, Basra and Baghdad there is danger. If I were living there, I'd have to worry about getting shot as a suspected terrorist, caught in the cross fire, or getting blown up by a roadside bomb - or perhaps tortured... I mean... interrogated.
Being humiliated by a woman looking at your genitals and being forced to wear panties on your head is not even remotely the same as the torture, maiming, and killing that was going on in this prison before US occupation.
I heard a reference on NPR this morning that there were some 37 deaths in the prisons. 9 are still under investigation. Others were ruled "justifiable homicide". Are theseless than under Saddam? Yes. But if I was an Iraqi, I'd still be worried. Hell, I'm worried my very own Mr. John Ashcroft might label be a terrorist, ship me off to Guantanomo Bay for a long vacation, and maybe even "interrogate me".
In addition, WMDs are being found in Iraq.
I don't need to google. I've already heard all about it. They did NOT find Sarin in the way you think. What they found were two chemicals in an OLD shell that when fired owuld've mixed. However, used as it was, they didn't mix into Sarin as intended. Perhaps al little bit did, but it certainly didn't kill all sorts of poeple with the toxic gas as its original wartime design was intended. I think they found one other shell too that had some old trace of something in it. But, I was told BEFORE the war that Iraq had WMD, they said they destroyed them, but now can't prove they destroyed them. I was told BEFORE the WAR that he had hard evidence of Itaq's attempt to buy uranium, of their mobile chemical faiclities, of their chemical storage bunkers... all of which have been proven FALSE. If one or two shells is all they can find, then YOU give ME a break. That is not proof of a WMD program. That's proof that one or two slipped through through the cracks, or that some rogue person stole them from Saddam BEFORE the rest were destroyed. If there was some huge, secret, hidden stockpile the insurgents/terrorists/whatever had access to, do you really think they'd be using them so sparingly?
Let me repeat. I am not a terrorist. I'm not a Republican. I'm ont a Democrat. I vote for candidates who share my views with the issues I deem most important at the time (when I feel the need to follow a single group, I choose a good baseball team and stick with them.) I just can't believe that every where I turn, everyone is so polarized on their beleifs abotu the so-called facts, and no one is willing to discuss them. All of your points are valid, but only partially so -- and the only way I know how to balance that is by presenting partial facts from the opposing point of view. Reality is probably somewhere inbetween.
It's NOT relevant at all, because the attack on the WTC was before the war in Iraq started. If the implication was that the war is attracting terrorists that would otherwise be attacking the US, then an attack that happened before the war is NOT relevant to the discussion.
they aren't necessarily terrorists either
Their methods in Iraq are not necessarily terrorism, although there seems to be plenty of that as well. Just because they are picking up weapons doesn't mean they wouldn't otherwise be conducting terrorist attacks in the US.
THe sense I Get is from hearing interviews of Iraqi's on the street. Yes, those interviews came through the media and might have been edited. The general sense in those interviews, however, is that they're glad that Saddam is gone, but are still worried about security, joblessness, etc. Unexployment is significantly up.
Which is exactly what one should expect in a warzone where the government is being replaced. Undoubtedly there were plenty of government jobs that ended when the government was overthrown. There things always happen--jobs are lost, jobs are created. Regardless, the people are far better off without Hussein in power.
there were some 37 deaths in the prisons. 9 are still under investigation. Others were ruled "justifiable homicide".
According to the actual data I can find:
There are far worse track records in individuals prisons all over the world, notably China and even the US. There is no way this could be construed as a pattern.
I was told BEFORE the WAR that he had hard evidence of Itaq's attempt to buy uranium
A simple google search will show you that there was no such statement made.
None of which have been proven false. These are things which were stated by defected Iraqi scientists or were found by UN inspectors. Keep in mind that it is well known that Iraq had a number of items, and that is why Hussein was ordered to account for the weapons that he had or had destroyed. If Hussein really did destroy them, he could have simply done this. He probably sold or gave them to another state or organization, otherwise, why would he refuse to provide this list?
Hello little man. I will destroy you!
If you aren't the kook you appear to be,
and You truly want to gain this knowledge, and you are of average intelligence as measured on Slashdot, Then apply for government work in an area that will place you in direct contact with the knowledge you wish to gain.
Just remember that just because its a secret doesn't make it interesting. for example, my credit cards and banking information are closely guarded secrets, but they aren't interesting to the average person walking down the street.
do you really think the government's secrets are that much more exciting than yours??
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed