Obama: “They Don’t Poll Ron Paul”

KNOXVILLE, IA — Obama loves his Republicans. He makes an open pitch for GOP voters in his stump speeches, even as he calls them out in his stump speeches, saying he can beat Mitt and Rudy and Huckabee. At a town hall in Knoxville today, he threw in Ron Paul. “They don’t poll Ron Paul, but I can beat him too.”But there’s one Republican whom he seems to have a little more affection for than most. Obama frequently makes fun of Romney on the stump, joking about illegal aliens working on his Romney’s yard. And today, he was given permission by a Republican deciding between Obama and Romney to draw some “contrasts.”

“Mitt Romney is a very handsome guy. He’s taller than me. I was listening to an interview this morning and somebody asked him if he’s ever cursed. He said of course, but not the real harsh ones. I have to tell you — I’ve used the harsh ones, the really juicy ones,” Obama told the crowd, laughing.

He went on to contrast himself with all the Republicans in the field, saying he believes in fiscal restraint “unlike the Republican orthodoxy.”

Obama was introduced by Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND), who told the crowd that Obama could win voters in states as red as his.

The event was largely similar to the packed town halls that Obama has had over the past few weeks, giving his re-tooled stump speech and taking around four questions.

Obama did throw in an extra line to the Bill Clinton quote he’s been using frequently on the trail, saying “There’s a right kind of experience and a wrong kind of experience…”

Telling the crowd who gave the quote, he answered, “A guy named Bill Clinton, who now talks about the roll of the dice. You know Bill Clinton was right then, and I’m right now.”

In an interview with Radio Iowa’s Kay Henderson after the event, Obama said that when he talks about “risks” and “gambles” and “stakes” in his stump speeches, he is referring to Clinton’s comments on Charlie Rose, in which the former president said that voting for Obama would be a risk akin to “rolling the dice.”

“I mean President Clinton argues that it would somehow be risky to elect me. This is a theme that ironically George H.W. Bush used against Bill Clinton back in 1992,” Obama said.

MSNBC | Aswini Anburajan | Sunday, December 30, 2007

Bhutto ‘blocked from hiring US bodyguards’

Benazir Bhutto was so fearful for her life that she tried to hire British and American security experts to protect her, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.But the plans collapsed because President Pervez Musharraf refused to allow the foreign contractors to operate in Pakistan, according to senior aides.

“She asked to bring in trained security personnel from abroad,” said Mark Siegel, her US representative. “In fact she and her husband repeatedly tried to get visas for such protection, but they were denied by the government of Pakistan.”
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Ms Bhutto’s entourage discussed deals with the American Blackwater operation, this newspaper has learnt. Sources within the British private security industry said that she also had negotiations with the London-based firm Armor Group, which guards UK diplomats in the Middle East - last night the company said that it had no knowledge of any talks.

A Blackwater spokesman confirmed the negotiations. “We were approached to provide prime minister Bhutto’s security, but an agreement was unfortunately never reached,” she said. She declined to go into the precise details.

Ms Bhutto contacted officials, diplomats and friends in America, Europe and the Gulf to urge Gen Musharraf to improve her security following the suicide bomb attacks that killed more than 140 during her homecoming parade on Oct 19.

Indeed, US diplomats took the highly unusual step of providing her directly with confidential US intelligence about militant threats to her life.

Pakistan’s interior ministry also passed on details of plots against her and aides said that letters containing death threats had been smuggled into her home.

Husain Haqqani, a US-based Bhutto adviser, confirmed that she wanted to use private international security contractors but said that the Musharraf regime would not approve the plan.

He added that America, which has arranged for private contractors to guard the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, and leaders in Iraq, was reluctant to press Gen Musharraf, its ally, to change his mind. This was despite Washington seeing Ms Bhutto as a lynchpin in its crucial diplomatic attempt to encourage Pakistan to return to democracy.

Mr Siegel’s comments will add to the long-running controversy over Ms Bhutto’s security arrangements, which were widely regarded as woefully inadequate given the seriousness of the threats against her from al-Qaeda, the Taliban and others.

She relied largely on using a “human shield” of loyal followers who would form a ring around her, but as Thursday’s attack proved, it was little real protection against a determined assailant.

Some security industry specialists have suggested, however, that there may have been other reasons why the help of foreign security firms was not enlisted.

Being surrounded by foreign bodyguards would have added to criticisms that Ms Bhutto was in the pocket of the West - an accusation levelled at President Karzai - and might not have been welcomed by her own Pakistani security staff. But the companies could have taken a back role as consultants and trained locals in bodyguard techniques to maintain a Pakistani face to her entourage.

“It’s odd and disturbing that the Pakistan government did not do a better job of protecting her and that the US apparently could not do more to persuade them,” said Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer and former National Security Council director for South Asia. “She made it very clear privately and publicly that she did not have enough security. That was abundantly clear after the attack on her return.

“I can’t explain why the Bush administration didn’t pressure Musharraf to do more. Her death leaves the US with a Pakistan policy that is completely bankrupt.”

Telegraph | Philip Sherwell | Monday, December 31, 2007

Island nations to join eurozone

Two Mediterranean island states, Cyprus and Malta, begin using the single European currency on 1 January.

Banks will be closed in both countries to mark the New Year, but most cash machines have been prepared to dispense euros in time for the switchover.

Cyprus and Malta will add just 1.2 million people to the number of Europeans using the currency.

But they will have equal voting rights with the other 13 eurozone members at the European Central Bank.

Careful preparations

Both island nations have prepared for the changeover extensively.
In Cyprus 300,000 currency converters were sent to households, while in Malta a euro telephone hotline has been running alongside 59 “euro centres”.

The switchover in Cyprus will highlight the decades-old division between the south and the Turkish-controlled north of the island.

The Turkish lira remains the primary currency in northern Cyprus, which is outside the European Union and is recognised only by Turkey.

Aware of the previous experiences of some other eurozone members, Cyprus and Malta are watching retailers to ensure they do not use the changeover to round up their prices, contributing to inflation.

The Cypriot government has urged companies to round their prices down, while Malta has signed 12 price stabilisation agreements with importers, which will last until March 2008.

Both the Maltese lira and the Cyprus pound will be legal tender until the end of January.

Commercial banks in Malta will exchange Maltese lira into euros free of charge until the end of March, and the central bank will allow exchange of lira notes until 2018.

In Cyprus, euros can be exchanged free of charge until the end of June and the central bank will allow exchange of pound notes until 2017.

Big benefits

Scrapping currency exchange costs and adopting a major currency raise hopes of a big boost to the islands’ industries.
Malta is already enjoying a tourism boom, with double-digit growth expected this year, largely due to the arrival of low-cost airlines.

But it is also planning to become a magnet for hi-tech investment.

Several pharmaceutical companies have established research centres in Malta to develop generic copies of patented drugs.

And the German airline Lufthansa signed an agreement in 2007 for Malta to maintain and overhaul its planes.

The Cypriot Finance Minister, Michalis Sarris, has said the euro will benefit consumers and businesses alike because of the eurozone’s low inflation, low interest rates and large market.

In the Turkish-controlled north many businesses have already begun accepting the euro and cross-border commerce is flourishing.

In 2003, the Turkish Cypriot authorities opened crossing points, prompting Turkish Cypriot shoppers to go south in search of greater choice and Greek Cypriots to head north for bargains and casinos.

The euro will also become legal tender on British military bases in Cyprus, the first part of sovereign British territory to adopt the currency.

Although the bases at Dhekelia, Episkopi and RAF Akrotiri are not officially part of the European Union, an estimated 10,000 Cypriots live or work there.

Residents use the shops, cafes and beaches on the bases, so the authorities in the sovereign base areas have decided to adopt the same rules as the Cypriot government.

BBC News | | December 31, 2007

Bloomberg Moves Closer to Running for President

Buoyed by the still unsettled field, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is growing increasingly enchanted with the idea of an independent presidential bid, and his aides are aggressively laying the groundwork for him to run.

On Sunday, the mayor will join Democratic and Republican elder statesmen at the University of Oklahoma in what the conveners are billing as an effort to pressure the major party candidates to renounce partisan gridlock.

Former Senator David L. Boren of Oklahoma, who organized the session with former Senator Sam Nunn, a Democrat of Georgia, suggested in an interview that if the prospective major party nominees failed within two months to formally embrace bipartisanship and address the fundamental challenges facing the nation, “I would be among those who would urge Mr. Bloomberg to very seriously consider running for president as an independent.”

Next week’s meeting, reported on Sunday in The Washington Post, comes as the mayor’s advisers have been quietly canvassing potential campaign consultants about their availability in the coming months.

And Mr. Bloomberg himself has become more candid in conversations with friends and associates about his interest in running, according to participants in those talks. Despite public denials, the mayor has privately suggested scenarios in which he might be a viable candidate: for instance, if the opposing major party candidates are poles apart, like Mike Huckabee, a Republican, versus Barack Obama or John Edwards as the Democratic nominee.

A final decision by Mr. Bloomberg about whether to run is unlikely before February. Still, he and his closest advisers are positioning themselves so that if the mayor declares his candidacy, a turnkey campaign infrastructure will virtually be in place.

Bloomberg aides have studied the process for starting independent campaigns, which formally begins March 5, when third-party candidates can begin circulating nominating petitions in Texas. If Democrats and Republicans have settled on their presumptive nominees at that point, Mr. Bloomberg will have to decide whether he believes those candidates are vulnerable to a challenge from a pragmatic, progressive centrist, which is how he would promote himself.

The filing deadline for the petitions, which must be signed by approximately 74,000 Texas voters who did not participate in the state’s Democratic or Republican primaries, is May 12.

Among the other participants invited to the session next Sunday and Monday is Senator Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, who has said he would consider being Mr. Bloomberg’s running mate on an independent ticket.

Mr. Boren declined to say which candidate would be strongest, but suggested “some kind of combination of those three: Bloomberg-Hagel, Bloomberg-Nunn.” He said Mr. Bloomberg would “not have to spend a lot of time raising money and he would not have to make deals with special interest groups to raise money.”

“Normally I don’t think an independent candidacy would have a chance” said Mr. Boren, who is the University of Oklahoma’s president. “I don’t think these are normal times.”

Mr. Bloomberg, who has tried to seize a national platform on gun control, the environment and other issues, has been regularly briefed in recent months on foreign policy by, among others, Henry A. Kissinger, his friend and the former secretary of state, and Nancy Soderberg, an ambassador to the United Nations in the Clinton administration.

Advisers have said Mr. Bloomberg, a billionaire many times over, might invest as much as $1 billion of his own fortune (he spent about $160 million on his two mayoral races) on a presidential campaign.

But they warned that while they were confident of getting on the ballot in every state, the process was complicated and fraught with legal challenges, and that Mr. Bloomberg would begin with an organizational disadvantage, competing against rivals who have been campaigning full time for years.

Still, the mayor said this month at a news conference, “Last I looked - and I’m not a candidate - but last time I checked reading about the Constitution, the Electoral College has nothing to do with parties, has absolutely nothing to do with parties. It’s most states are winners take all. The popular vote assigns electoral votes to the candidate, and I don’t think it says in there that you have to be a member of one party or another.”

The key players - virtually the only players - in Mr. Bloomberg’s embryonic campaign are three of his deputy mayors, Kevin Sheekey, Edward Skyler and Patricia E. Harris. Another aide, Patrick Brennan, who was the political director of Mr. Bloomberg’s 2005 re-election campaign, resigned as commissioner of the city’s Community Assistance Unit earlier this year to spend more time exploring the mayor’s possible national campaign.

One concern among Mr. Bloomberg’s inner circle is whether a loss would label him a spoiler - “a rich Ralph Nader” - who cost a more viable candidate the presidency in a watershed political year. One person close to the mayor, who spoke on condition of anonymity so as not to be seen discussing internal strategy, stressed that Mr. Bloomberg would run only if he believed he could win.

“He’s not going to do it to influence the debate,” the person said.

The mayor was asked last week at a news conference whether a Bloomberg campaign would cost the Democratic or Republican nominee more votes.

“You know,” he replied, “if it’s a three-way race, the public has more choice than if it’s a two-way race, and has more choice in a two-way race than a one-way race. Why shouldn’t you have lots of people running, and what’s magical about people who happen to be a member of a party?”

Sam Waterston, the actor whose former co-star on “Law and Order,” Fred D. Thompson, is a Republican presidential candidate, is a founder of Unity08. That group also hopes to advance a nonpartisan ticket, and Mr. Waterston says the mayor is often mentioned on the group’s Web site as a prospective nominee.

“If he formally embraced Unity08’s principal goals of a bipartisan, nonpartisan, postpartisan ticket - which he’s almost in a position to do all by himself, having been a Democrat, a Republican, and now an independent - and of an administration dedicated to ending partisanship within itself and in Washington, then it’s hard to think of anyone better placed to win Unity08’s support if he sought it,” Mr. Waterston said. “And, of course, there’s nothing that says Unity08 couldn’t draft him.”

Some associates said that after six years as mayor, Mr. Bloomberg was itching for a new challenge - much like he was in 2000 when, as chief executive of Bloomberg L.P., he was flirting with running for mayor.

But Mr. Bloomberg will also have to weigh several intangibles: Can he run for president and serve as mayor of a combustible metropolis simultaneously for eight months? (He believes he can, and would not resign as mayor to run.) Does he want to be president badly enough to sacrifice his zealously guarded personal privacy? (He’s not completely convinced.)

Meanwhile, he thoroughly enjoys the attention, and despite the public denials, suggests that he is poised to run if the political stars align themselves for a long-shot, but credible, independent campaign. During a private reception this month, Mr. Bloomberg playfully presided over a personal variation of bingo, in which guests could win by correctly guessing the significance of the numbers on a printed card.

“Two hundred seventy-one?” Mr. Bloomberg asked.

One guest guessed correctly: It was George W. Bush’s bare electoral-vote majority in 2000.

NYT | Sam Roberts | Monday, December 31, 2007

Bhutto Killing Points To Pakistani ISI

The barbaric assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto points directly to the work of the Pakistani ISI. As expected, the establishment media is already blaming Al-Qaeda for the assassination because ever since the attacks of 9/11 the media has blamed every government sponsored terrorist attack on this fictional organization. Al-Qaeda is nothing more than a front for government intelligence agencies that was originally formed in the 1970’s as a database of people who could be counted on to fight the Soviet Union’s occupation of Afghanistan. There have already been news reports mentioning how the Pakistani ISI has associations with Islamic extremists and members of Al-Qaeda. This is because many of these so called Al-Qaeda groups and Islamic extremists are actually working for intelligence agencies like the Pakistani ISI. Not only this, but it is clear that the intelligence services that work directly for the criminals in the military industrial complex stood the most to gain from this assassination. It has destabilized Pakistan which has given Pakistan’s current leader Pervez Musharraf the excuse to unleash the military on the general population. There’s also talk of delaying Pakistan’s elections which serves the interest of the unholy partnership the U.S. government has with Musharraf. It has also provided an excuse for the increase of U.S. Special Forces within Pakistan. In a report from the UK Daily Mail, Bhutto herself sent an e-mail weeks prior to her death identifying three people within the Pakistan government who she believed wanted her dead. In addition, the government refused to provide Bhutto adequate security even after numerous death threats and a previous assassination attempt that killed over a hundred of her supporters. Police even abandoned their security posts in the general area prior to her assassination. All of this evidence indicates that the Pakistani ISI had involvement in the killing because they had the most to gain and their associations to Al-Qaeda groups is a historical fact.Due to the overwhelming evidence pointing the responsibility of the Bhutto assassination to the Pakistani ISI, the Pakistan government has attempted to misdirect the discussion of who killed Bhutto by making claims that Bhutto died by hitting her head against the vehicle’s sunroof instead of gunfire. This is just a distraction to change the discussion of who killed Bhutto into a less important discussion of how she died. The Pakistan government continues to claim that an Al-Qaeda group is responsible for the attack which is a ridiculous assertion.

Bhutto herself was an individual with ties to various globalist organizations including the Council on Foreign Relations and the Council of Women World Leaders. The globalists may have been seeking to install Bhutto into a position of power within Pakistan but her assassination served to consolidate power behind Musharraf which opens up the possibility to delay Pakistan’s elections and continue the militarized police state. Bhutto had also been critical of foreign troops being deployed to Pakistan to deal with the nation’s internal issues. It is possible that she was turning on the globalists and was prepared to take a more nationalist stance on the nation’s affairs which would have been a major problem for the establishment. Regardless of what actually happened, the globalists gained from her death. The assassination also allows the corporate controlled media to continue hyping the need for this phony war on terror right before the start of the 2008 presidential elections. The media pundits are already encouraging voters to cast their vote for an establishment candidate that will be strong on the terror war. This serves the interest of the military industrial complex because the phony terror war has been very profitable for them.

The point is, that Bhutto’s assassination served the interests of the Pakistani dictatorship as well as the military industrial complex. The fact that the U.S. military will be moving more special forces into Pakistan is proof of this. This military action will be sold to the American people as an escalation in the hunt to destroy Al-Qaeda. The globalists have sought to achieve order out of chaos and the assassination of Bhutto will serve to further those aims. All evidence points towards the Pakistani ISI and western intelligence agencies for the assassination of Bhutto. They had the most to gain from this barbaric act and history has shown that major terror attacks like this one almost always point to the work of clandestine government operations.

Rogue Government | Lee Rogers | Sunday, December 30, 2007

Top economist says America could plunge into recession

Losses arising from America’s housing recession could triple over the next few years and they represent the greatest threat to growth in the United States, one of the world’s leading economists has told The Times.Robert Shiller, Professor of Economics at Yale University, predicted that there was a very real possibility that the US would be plunged into a Japan-style slump, with house prices declining for years.

Professor Shiller, co-founder of the respected S&P Case/Shiller house-price index, said: “American real estate values have already lost around $1 trillion [£503 billion]. That could easily increase threefold over the next few years. This is a much bigger issue than sub-prime. We are talking trillions of dollars’ worth of losses.”

He said that US futures markets had priced in further declines in house prices in the short term, with contracts on the S&P Shiller index pointing to decreases of up to 14 per cent.
“Over the next five years, the futures contracts are pointing to losses of around 35 per cent in some areas, such as Florida, California and Las Vegas. There is a good chance that this housing recession will go on for years,” he said.

Professor Shiller, author of Irrational Exuberance, a phrase later used by Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman, said: “This is a classic bubble scenario. A few years ago house prices got very high, pushed up because of investor expectations. Americans have fuelled the myth that prices would never fall, that values could only go up. People believed the story. Now there is a very real chance of a big recession.”

He pointed out that signs at the beginning of 2007 that had indicated that some states were beginning to experience a recovery in house prices had proved to be false: “States such as Massachusetts had seen some increases at the beginning of the year. Denver also looked like it had a different path. Now all states are falling.”

Until two years ago, each of America’s 50 states had experienced a prolonged housing boom, with properties in some - such as Florida, California, Arizona and Nevada - doubling in price, fuelled by cheap credit and lax lending practices to borrowers who ordinarily would not have been able to secure a mortgage. Two years ago, the northeastern states of America became the first to slide into a recession after 17 successive interest-rate rises between June 2004 and August 2006 hit the property market.

Last week, new numbers from the S&P/Case Shiller index showed that house prices had declined in October at their fastest rate for more than six years, with homes in Miami losing 12 per cent of their value.

Times Online | Suzy Jagger  | December 31, 2007

Lou Dobbs | Mexico To Use Biochips To Curb Immigration

Lou Dobbs | Mexico To Use Biochips To Curb Immigration Read more

Ron Paul’s War Chest Swelled in 4th Quarter

Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul may lag behind in public-opinion polls. But after raising about $19 million for the final three months of the year, he is now among his party’s front-runners in the race for campaign cash.When the books close on the year’s fourth quarter today, the plain-spoken antiwar Texas congressman will have posted one of the best fund-raising periods of any Republican presidential candidate this year.

To be sure, other Republican candidates hadn’t disclosed their fourth-quarter fund-raising figures as of yesterday. But to date, only former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has issued a better three-month report, and just once: $20.8 million in the first quarter, not counting loans the former venture capitalist made to his campaign.

Mr. Paul’s fund-raising performance is all the more remarkable because his bid for the Republican nomination remains such a long shot. An advocate of small government who opposes American participation in most international organizations and treaties, and who would leave questions like abortion up to the states, Mr. Paul registers in single digits in polls nationally and in the key early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire. His fourth-quarter fund-raising figures represent a remarkable acceleration; for the first three quarters of this year combined, he raised just $8.2 million.

The 72-year-old congressman, who is also an obstetrician, is the only candidate in either party so far to disclose his fourth-quarter fund-raising figures. He posts a running tally on his Web site, updated frequently, and with the names of his most recent contributors displayed. As of midday yesterday, Mr. Paul had raised $18.95 million and had more checks to count that had come in through the mail.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a folksy Baptist minister who has surged to the top of the polls in Iowa and elsewhere with strong support from Christian evangelicals, also had his best fund-raising quarter. However, Mr. Huckabee’s campaign declined to announce its total take.

Mr. Huckabee’s Web site shows he has raised nearly $5 million online during the quarter — and that alone is more than double the $2.3 million he raised in the first nine months of the year. In a conference call with reporters Friday, Mr. Huckabee said he now has about $2 million in the bank and no campaign debts.

Neither Mr. Romney nor any of the other Republican candidates would say yesterday how much they had raised in the quarter. The deadline for filing public reports of their year-end finances is Jan. 31.

Mr. Paul’s ability to reel in increasingly large hauls of campaign cash is a measure of his supporters’ passion for his libertarian views — and an unflattering mirror of his better known rivals’ campaigns, whose fund-raising trends have been downward.

Mr. Paul’s total is all the more impressive because, unlike other candidates, few of his donors are giving the maximum $2,300 check. About 90 percent of Mr. Paul’s contributions come through online donations that average $100 per donor, said his spokesman, Jesse Benton. “We have powerful grassroots support,” he said. “It shows how hungry people are for real change.”

It also means Mr. Paul will have money to run television ads and hire staff for campaign operations even in big states, like Florida, which holds its primary on Jan. 29.

With his war chest and strong appeal to political independents, Mr. Paul could possibly be a spoiler for candidates like John McCain or former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani in New Hampshire, where both candidates are angling for such voters. Independents have special influence in New Hampshire, because the state’s Jan. 8 primary elections are open to voters who haven’t chosen any party affiliation.

Enthusiasm has been much greater on the Democratic side, if fund raising is the barometer. The top two candidates, Sens. Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois, had raised a combined $170 million through Sept. 30. That was roughly the same amount as the entire Republican field, which originally numbered 11 candidates, had raised in the same period.

The Republican money struggles come amid low approval ratings for President Bush and the lack of any clear heir apparent, such as a vice president, running for the nomination.

“Republican donors are being more methodical in how they chose a candidate this time,” said Jennifer Bannister, a Republican fund-raising consultant who isn’t working for any presidential campaign. “I’m hearing people say they are waiting to get behind a candidate when one pulls out in front.”

The Wall Street Journal | MARY JACOBY | December 31, 2007

Canada better than U.S., U.K. at protecting citizens’ privacy: study

Canada is one of the world’s leading nations when it comes to protecting the privacy of its citizens, but this country’s safeguards are slipping, says a new international survey.Canada faired significantly better than the United States and parts of Europe, areas where privacy protections have been eroded in recent years, according to Privacy International, a London-based human rights group.

The group, which has just released its 2007 ranking, says that around the globe nations are increasingly infringing on the privacy of their citizens in the name of security and immigration control.

“The 2007 rankings indicate an overall worsening of privacy protection across the world,” says an overview of Privacy International’s findings on the group’s website.

The report describes “an increasing trend amongst governments to archive data on the geographic, communications and financial records of all their citizens and residents.

“This trend leads to the conclusion that all citizens, regardless of legal status, are under suspicion,” the report states.

The countries that received the highest marks for protecting individual privacy in 2007 were Greece, Romania and Canada.

However the news wasn’t all good for Canada.

Last year this country was described as having “significant protections and safeguards.” The new ranking says Canada has “some safeguards but weakened protections.”

The lowest ranking countries in the survey were Malaysia, Russia and China.

The United States, which has been criticized for its domestic surveillance as part of its war on terrorism, joined the United Kingdom on the list of nations described as “endemic surveillance societies” - the ranking’s worst category.

“In terms of statutory protections and privacy enforcement, the U.S. is the worst ranking country in the democratic world,” the study found.

“In terms of overall privacy protection the United States has performed very poorly, being out-ranked by both India and the Philippines.”

The organization also blamed the trend on “the emergence of a profitable surveillance industry dominated by global IT companies and the creation of numerous international treaties that frequently operate outside judicial or democratic processes.”

Privacy International has been doing its global survey since 1997.

The organization says more than 200 experts - from scholars, to human rights advocates, to journalists - provided materials and commentary for the latest report, which is more than 1,100 pages long.

CanWest News Service | Keith Bonnell | Sunday, December 30, 2007

Mexico to Microchip Central American Migrants

As an omen of things to come, in March the National Immigration Institute of Mexico will demand Central Americans workers and visitors carry ID cards with electronic chips. The ID cards “will record every arrival and departure of so-called temporary workers and visitors, mostly from Guatemala,” reports KGBT 4 out of Harlingen, Texas. “Officials say the purpose is to guarantee security for workers and visitors.”Of course, the real purpose has nothing to do with the well-being or security of workers and visitors, but is part and parcel of the emerging control grid to be implemented by the NAU at the behest of world government. Read more

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