Scientist to Congress: U.S. risks 'catastrophe' in nuke EMP attack

Expert says growing threat posed by Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, terrorists

WASHINGTON – A top scientist today warned the House Armed Services Committee America remains vulnerable to a "catastrophe" from a nuclear electromagnetic pulse attack that could be launched with plausible deniability by hostile rogue nations or terrorists.

William R. Graham, chairman of the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack and the former national science adviser to President Reagan, testified before the committee while presenting a sobering new report on "one of a small number of threats that can hold our society at risk of catastrophic consequences."

It is the first report from the commission since 2004 and identifies vulnerabilities in the nation's critical infrastructures, "which are essential to both our civilian and military capabilities."

Not taking the steps necessary to reduce the threat in the next three to five years "can both invite and reward attack," Graham told the committee.

The scariest and most threatening kind of EMP attack is initiated by the detonation of a nuclear weapon at high altitude in the range of 25 to 250 miles above the Earth's surface. The immediate effects of EMP are disruption of, and damage to, electronic systems and electrical infrastructure. Such a detonation over the middle of the continental U.S. "has the capability to produce significant damage to critical infrastructures that support the fabric of U.S. society and the ability of the United States and Western nations to project influence and military power," said Graham.

"Several potential adversaries have the capability to attack the United States with a high-altitude nuclear weapon-generated electromagnetic pulse, and others appear to be pursuing efforts to obtain that capability," said Graham. "A determined adversary can achieve an EMP attack capability without having a high level of sophistication. For example, an adversary would not have to have long-range ballistic missiles to conduct an EMP attack against the United States. Such an attack could be launched from a freighter off the U.S. coast using a short- or medium-range missile to loft a nuclear warhead to high altitude. Terrorists sponsored by a rogue state could attempt to execute such an attack without revealing the identity of the perpetrators. Iran, the world's leading sponsor of international terrorism, has practiced launching a mobile ballistic missile from a vessel in the Caspian Sea. Iran has also tested high-altitude explosions of the Shahab-III, a test mode consistent with EMP attack, and described the tests as successful. Iranian military writings explicitly discuss a nuclear EMP attack that would gravely harm the United States. While the commission does not know the intention of Iran in conducting these activities, we are disturbed by the capability that emerges when we connect the dots."

William R. Graham

Graham reminded the committee even smaller nuclear weapons can create massive EMP effects over wide geographic areas. He also pointed out that United Nations investigators recently found that "the design for an advanced nuclear weapon, miniaturized to fit on ballistic missiles currently in the inventory of Iran, North Korea and other potentially hostile states, was in the possession of Swiss criminals affiliated with the A.Q. Khan nuclear smuggling network."

Theoretically, an EMP attack is devastating because of the unprecedented cascading failures of major infrastructures that could result. Because of America's heavy reliance on electricity and electronics, the impact would be far worse than on a country less advanced technologically. Graham and the commission see the potential for failure in the financial system, the system of distribution for food and water, medical care and trade and production.

"The recovery of any one of the key national infrastructures is dependent upon the recovery of others," he said. "The longer the outage, the more problematic and uncertain the recovery will be. It is possible for the functional outages to become mutually reinforcing until at some point the degradation of infrastructure could have irreversible effects on the country's ability to support its population."

Graham took the EMP debate out of the realm of science fiction by reminding the committee that as recently as May 1999, during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, Russian leaders threatened a U.S. congressional delegation with the specter of such an attack that would paralyze the U.S.

He also quoted James J. Shinn, assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific Security, who two weeks ago told the same House committee that China's arms buildup includes exotic experiments with electromagnetic weapons that can devastate electronics with bursts of energy similar to those produced by a nuclear blast.

"The consequence of EMP is that you destroy the communications network," Shinn said. "And we are, as you know, and as the Chinese know, heavily dependent on sophisticated communications, satellite communications, in the conduct of our forces. And so, whether it's from an EMP or it's some kind of a coordinated [anti-satellite] effort, we could be in a very bad place if the Chinese enhanced their capability in this area."

Graham says terrorists who get their hands on one or a few unsophisticated nuclear weapons might well calculate they could get the most bang for their buck from attempting an EMP attack.

Recovery from a widespread EMP attack could take months or years, Graham warned. The fact that key components of the U.S. electrical grid are not even manufactured in America and must be ordered a year in advance from foreign suppliers suggests just how complicated and time-consuming recovery might be. The high state of automation within America's utilities further complicates recovery. There just might not be sufficient trained manpower available to get the job done in a timely way.

"The commission's view is that the federal government does not today have sufficient human and physical assets for reliably assessing and managing EMP threats," said Graham. "The commission reviewed current national capabilities to understand and to manage the effects of EMP and concluded that the U.S. is rapidly losing the technical competence and facilities that it needs in the government, the national laboratories and the industrial community."

Graham said it's not too late for Congress to take the bull by the horns and take the steps necessary to prepare for the threat – and thereby reduce it.

"A serious national commitment to address the threat of an EMP attack can lead to a national posture that would significantly reduce the payoff for such an attack and allow the United States to recover from EMP, and from other threats, man-made and natural, to the critical infrastructures," said Graham.

Graham's predecessor as chairman of the commission had equally tough words on the impact of the EMP threat.

"Their effects on systems and infrastructures dependent on electricity and electronics could be sufficiently ruinous as to qualify as catastrophic to the nation," Lowell Wood, acting chairman of the commission, told members of Congress in 2005.

The commission's previous report went so far as to suggest, in its opening sentence, that an EMP attack "might result in the defeat of our military forces."

Federal Judge Says SSNs May Not be Legal ID

While guilty pleas and convictions for identical and similar offenses were going down around him across the nation as he mulled his ruling, Tennessee Eastern District Court federal Judge Harry S. Mattice Jr. stopped two illegal aliens – one of whom had previously been deported – as they were about to enter the guilty pleas they’d planned to enter.

What the two men - Juan Luis Dardon-Canelo and Andres Loarca-Reynoso - were prepared to plead guilty to earlier this week was using phoney Social Security cards to get employment at a Pilgrim’s Pride poultry processing plant earlier raided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. But Mattice stopped the two men before they could enter their pleas, declaring they might not technically have broken the law, explaining that a Social Security card is not necessarily a form of legal identification. He told the two defendants’ lawyers they should reevaluate whether guilty pleas are appropriate.

“I’m not sure you can base this charge on a false Social Security card,” Mattice said at the hearing, pointing to another case in which a federal judge dropped a similar charge against Tyson Foods because of a loophole in US immigration law.

With successful convictions having already been obtained elsewhere in the nation, and many other federal criminal cases hinging on the use of fraudlent Social Security cards pending, federal prosecutors and other federal officials are shaking their heads at Mattice’s stunning ruling, wondering just how seriously his decision will affect outstanding cases. ....

An Ally Betrayed

Last week’s daring rescue of 15 Colombian hostages held by the Marxist FARC has been universally hailed as a triumph of military strategy. But at least one group besides the gulled guerilla jailers looks diminished in its aftermath: Congressional Democrats.

While Colombia’s military will rightly reap praise for the rescue, the operation was in no small measure an American achievement. In addition to U.S. satellite intelligence that pinpointed the FARC guerillas’ jungle location, Colombian security forces have benefited from $4 billion in American aid since 2002.

For this assistance – so vital in last week’s events – Colombia does not have Democrats to thank. To the contrary, since assuming control of Congress in 2006, Democrats have made a cynical practice of slighting Latin America’s most pro-American government, not least on the issue of military aid.

Last year in particular saw an upsurge of anti-Colombian agitation on Capitol Hill. Goaded on by Vermont’s Patrick Leahy, head of the Senate subcommittee overseeing foreign aid, Democrats froze $55 million in military aid in April 2007. Al Gore, adding insult to injury, refused that same month to appear at an environmental conference with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe. Why a respected head of state would even wish to be seen alongside a political washout and global warming hysteric was unclear. Nonetheless, Gore’s no-show was a stinging insult to Uribe. It was not the last.

Nancy Pelosi, fresh from an April 2007 sit-down with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, threatened to withhold an audience with the democratically elected and widely popular Uribe during his May visit. Eventually agreeing to a talk with Uribe, Pelosi didn’t conceal her contempt. In stark contrast to her visit to the Hezbollah-sponsor Syria, where Pelosi gushed that the “the road to Damascus is a road to peace,” Pelosi berated Uribe, accusing his government of aiding “illegal paramilitary forces” and implicitly decrying him as the enemy of Colombians who want “to build a stronger democracy.” So much for Democrats’ vaunted diplomatic tact.

Colombia’s delegation was so jarred by Democrats’ hostility that, according to journalist Robert Novak, Vice President Francisco Santos publically contemplated severing U.S.-Columbian ties.

In response, Democrats only stepped up their attacks. ...

University attacks student for reading this book

A student at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis who first faced discipline when officials caught him reading a history book that was available in the school library during a break at work was cleared of those charges, but now officials say he is guilty of something but they won't say what.

If that sounds complicated, you're in company with Keith John Sampson, who first was convicted of racial harassment for reading a history book about the defeat of the Ku Klux Klan in a 1924 street brawl. And you'd be in company with officials with the Foundation for Individual Responsibility in Education, who are arguing on behalf of Sampson. ...

... By reading the book, "Notre Dame vs. the Klan: How the Fighting Irish Defeated the Ku Klux Klan," in a university work break room, he was told, he was guilty of racial harassment.

The fact that the book documented how Notre Dame students fought in the streets with – and defeated – members of the KKK was ignored. The school told him his racial harassment involved "openly reading the book related to a historically and racially abhorrent subject."

Then this year, "in the face of withering public criticism," the school "revoked its original finding," according to documentation from FIRE, which said it got a letter from Chancellor Charles R. Bantz, "stating that IUPUI 'regret[s] this situation took place.' The letter also confirmed that no documents regarding the incident are in Sampson's file."

However, in their talks with Rabinowitz about the case, school officials apparently have changed the field of play again, explaining that the book was not an issue at all, but something else was.

"If IUPUI really thought that Sampson had engaged in some 'racially harassing' behavior rather than reading a book, there is no reason why they would not have brought it up at the time – and no reason why they couldn't [say] what it is now," said FIRE Vice President Robert Shibley. "This apparent whispering campaign against Sampson is truly appalling." ...

U.N. scheme to make Christians criminals

Dozens of nations dominated by Islam are pressing the United Nations to adopt an anti-"defamation" plan that would make Christians criminals under international law, according to a United States organization that has launched a campaign to defend freedom of religion worldwide.

"Around the world, Christians are being increasingly targeted, and even persecuted, for their religious beliefs. Now, one of the largest organizations in the United Nations is pushing to make a bad situation even worse by promoting anti-Christian bigotry," the American Center for Law & Justice said yesterday in announcing its petition drive.

The discrimination is "wrapped in the guise of a U.N. resolution called 'Combating Defamation of Religions,'" the announcement said. "We must put an immediate end to this most recent, dangerous attack on faith that attempts to criminalize Christianity." ...

OPEC chief warns of 'unlimited' oil prices if Iran is attacked

VIENNA: The head of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries warned Thursday that oil prices would see an "unlimited" increase in the case of a military conflict involving Iran, because the group's members would be unable to make up the lost production.

"We really cannot replace Iran's production - it's not feasible to replace it," Abdalla Salem El-Badri, the OPEC secretary general, said in an interview.

Iran, the second-largest producing country in OPEC, after Saudi Arabia, produces about four million barrels of oil a day out of the daily worldwide production of close to 87 million barrels. ...

My Plan to Escape the Grip of Foreign Oil

By T. BOONE PICKENS
July 9, 2008; Page A15

One of the benefits of being around a long time is that you get to know a lot about certain things. I'm 80 years old and I've been an oilman for almost 60 years. I've drilled more dry holes and also found more oil than just about anyone in the industry. With all my experience, I've never been as worried about our energy security as I am now. Like many of us, I ignored what was happening. Now our country faces what I believe is the most serious situation since World War II.

The problem, of course, is our growing dependence on foreign oil – it's extreme, it's dangerous, and it threatens the future of our nation.

Martin Kozlowski

Let me share a few facts: Each year we import more and more oil. In 1973, the year of the infamous oil embargo, the United States imported about 24% of our oil. In 1990, at the start of the first Gulf War, this had climbed to 42%. Today, we import almost 70% of our oil.

This is a staggering number, particularly for a country that consumes oil the way we do. The U.S. uses nearly a quarter of the world's oil, with just 4% of the population and 3% of the world's reserves. This year, we will spend almost $700 billion on imported oil, which is more than four times the annual cost of our current war in Iraq.

In fact, if we don't do anything about this problem, over the next 10 years we will spend around $10 trillion importing foreign oil. That is $10 trillion leaving the U.S. and going to foreign nations, making it what I certainly believe will be the single largest transfer of wealth in human history.

Why do I believe that our dependence on foreign oil is such a danger to our country? Put simply, our economic engine is now 70% dependent on the energy resources of other countries, their good judgment, and most importantly, their good will toward us. Foreign oil is at the intersection of America's three most important issues: the economy, the environment and our national security. We need an energy plan that maps out how we're going to work our way out of this mess. I think I have such a plan.

Consider this: The world produces about 85 million barrels of oil a day, but global demand now tops 86 million barrels a day. And despite three years of record price increases, world oil production has declined every year since 2005. Meanwhile, the demand for oil will only increase as growing economies in countries like India and China gear up for enhanced oil consumption.

Add to this the fact that in many countries, including China, the government has a great deal of influence over its energy industry, allowing these countries to set strategic direction easily and pay whatever price is needed to secure oil. The U.S. has no similar policy, because we thankfully don't have state-controlled energy companies. But that doesn't mean we can't set goals and develop an energy policy that will overcome our addiction to foreign oil. I have a clear goal in mind with my plan. I want to reduce America's foreign oil imports by more than one-third in the next five to 10 years.

How will we do it? We'll start with wind power. Wind is 100% domestic, it is 100% renewable and it is 100% clean. Did you know that the midsection of this country, that stretch of land that starts in West Texas and reaches all the way up to the border with Canada, is called the "Saudi Arabia of the Wind"? It gets that name because we have the greatest wind reserves in the world. In 2008, the Department of Energy issued a study that stated that the U.S. has the capacity to generate 20% of its electricity supply from wind by 2030. I think we can do this or even more, but we must do it quicker.

My plan calls for taking the energy generated by wind and using it to replace a significant percentage of the natural gas that is now being used to fuel our power plants. Today, natural gas accounts for about 22% of our electricity generation in the U.S. We can use new wind capacity to free up the natural gas for use as a transportation fuel. That would displace more than one-third of our foreign oil imports. Natural gas is the only domestic energy of size that can be used to replace oil used for transportation, and it is abundant in the U.S. It is cheap and it is clean. With eight million natural-gas-powered vehicles on the road world-wide, the technology already exists to rapidly build out fleets of trucks, buses and even cars using natural gas as a fuel. Of these eight million vehicles, the U.S. has a paltry 150,000 right now. We can and should do so much more to build our fleet of natural-gas-powered vehicles.

I believe this plan will be the perfect bridge to the future, affording us the time to develop new technologies and a new perspective on our energy use. In addition to the plan I have proposed, I also want to see us explore all avenues and every energy alternative, from more R&D into batteries and fuel cells to development of solar, ethanol and biomass to more conservation. Drilling in the outer continental shelf should be considered as well, as we need to look at all options, recognizing that there is no silver bullet.

I believe my plan can be accomplished within 10 years if this country takes decisive and bold steps immediately. This plan dramatically reduces our dependence on foreign oil and lowers the cost of transportation. It invests in the heartland, creating thousands of new jobs. It substantially reduces America's carbon footprint and uses existing, proven technology. It will be accomplished solely through private investment with no new consumer or corporate taxes or government regulation. It will build a bridge to the future, giving us the time to develop new technologies.

The future begins as soon as Congress and the president act. The government must mandate the formation of wind and solar transmission corridors, and renew the subsidies for economic and alternative energy development in areas where the wind and sun are abundant. I am also calling for a monthly progress report on the reduction in foreign oil imports, as well as a monthly progress report on the state of development of natural gas vehicles in this country.

We have a golden opportunity in this election year to form bipartisan support for this plan. We have the grit and fortitude to shoulder the responsibility of change when our country's future is at stake, as Americans have proven repeatedly throughout this nation's history.

We need action. Now.

Mr. Pickens is CEO of BP Capital.

Senate passes FISA bill after yearlong dispute

By Chris Strohm, CongressDaily

The Senate approved by a 69-28 vote Wednesday a sweeping revision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, giving the Bush administration long-sought spying powers and legal protections for telecommunications companies that have helped the government conduct electronic surveillance on U.S. residents without warrants. Enough Democrats joined Republicans to defeat three amendments to the bill that would have rolled back legal protections for the telecom firms. Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, voted for all three amendments, while Arizona Sen. John McCain his presumptive Republican rival for the White House, was absent. President Bush is expected to sign the bill, ending nearly a year of bitter partisan wrangling in the House and Senate over modernizing FISA.

Under the bill, the government would not need to obtain warrants to monitor foreigners whose phone or e-mail conversations pass through or are stored by U.S. communications hubs. The government also would not need warrants to monitor the communications of U.S. residents who come into contact with suspected foreign terrorists as long as the U.S. resident is not the target of surveillance and his or her communications are minimized. Individual warrants would be needed if the target of surveillance is a U.S. resident or, for the first time, an American traveling abroad. The administration would have to submit its surveillance procedures to the secret FISA court for approval before surveillance could begin, except under exigent circumstances.

The bill would give telecom firms retroactive legal immunity from civil lawsuits if they can show a federal district court judge that they received written directives from the Bush administration that the National Security Agency's warrantless electronic surveillance program was authorized by Bush and determined to be legal. A Senate Intelligence Committee report made clear that the firms received such directives, essentially guaranteeing that about 40 civil lawsuits against them will be dismissed. In a 66-32 vote, senators defeated an amendment by Sens. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., and Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., that would have stripped the immunity provision from the bill. It needed 50 votes to pass. Senators also defeated, 61-37, an amendment by Senate Judiciary ranking member Arlen Specter, R-Pa., that would have required the district court to determine if the warrantless surveillance program was constitutional before granting immunity to the companies. It needed 60 votes to pass. On a 56-42 vote, the Senate also rejected an amendment from Sens. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., Robert Casey Jr., D-Pa., and Specter that would have stayed the lawsuits against the companies until Congress could review the findings of a comprehensive inspectors general report on the warrantless surveillance program. It needed 60 votes to pass. Senior Bush administration officials had said they would recommend the bill be vetoed if any of the amendments were approved. The bill includes language making FISA the exclusive means under which the administration can conduct surveillance. Additionally, all provisions in the bill will sunset at the end of 2012.

Sharia Showdown on Wall Street

By Paul Sperry -- Sheik Muhammad Taqi Usmani has been a rock star of the Islamic finance world, sitting on the sharia supervisory boards of no fewer than a dozen Islamic banks and financial institutions worldwide.

For nearly a decade, the mufti also has advised the Dow Jones Islamic Market Index, which licenses more than 25 stock funds that comply with Islamic laws forbidding certain Western-style investments. The venerable Dow Jones & Co. first retained him in 1999.

Usmani's name is now missing from the Dow Jones website, where it had previously been prominently displayed. His bio and photo suddenly vanished without explanation.

Meanwhile, all references to Dow Jones disappeared from the website of the North American Islamic Trust, or NAIT, which runs a sharia-compliant mutual fund out of Burr Ridge, Ill.

For years the fund had been called the Dow Jones Islamic Fund. Dow had lent NAIT its good name under a licensing agreement.

But recently the trust felt compelled to rename its lead portfolio the "Iman Fund," and amend several pages in its prospectus to remove all references to Dow Jones, as well as Usmani. Again, no explanation was offered.

What's behind the mystery? It's all been very hush-hush, but according to a high-level document I've obtained, along with interviews with company insiders, Dow Jones recently terminated NAIT's license and dumped Usmani to protect its brand. The company, now under new management, no longer wants to be associated with either of them, especially after they received a spate of bad publicity this year.

Articles published on this webzine -- as well as in the National Review, Investor's Business Daily and the Washington Times, among other media -- have called attention to Usmani's fatwahs demanding that Muslims living in the West conduct or support violent jihad against infidels at every opportunity.

"Killing is to continue until the unbelievers pay jizyah (subjugation tax) after they are humbled or overpowered," the radical Pakistani cleric wrote in his book, "Islam and Modernism," which in 2006 was translated from his native Urdu into English.

Usmani advocates spreading sharia law in America and the West -- the barbaric legal code that not only justifies holy war, but the stonings, floggings, amputations and even beheadings for petty crimes seen in Muslim nations such as Saudi Arabia, Iran and Sudan.

The aim of Muslims, he wrote, is to "take out people from the rule of people and put them under the rule of Allah."

More, Usmani has run a Pakistani madrassa that's trained thousands of Taliban, according to the Washington-based Center for Security Policy.

Usmani is no longer employed by Dow Jones, which says it only recently learned of such "allegations."

NAIT, which until a few months ago managed a $40 million Dow Jones portfolio, also has come under fire.

Allegedly, the trust is a Saudi-tied front for the pro-jihad Muslim Brotherhood that holds title to some of the most radical mosques in America.

The Justice Department last year named NAIT an unindicted co-conspirator in a terror money-laundering scheme to funnel more than $12 million to Hamas suicide bombers and their families under the guise of charity.

Dow has since revoked NAIT's license.

The moves against Usmani and NAIT were made quietly, without any media announcements, by Dow Jones' front office in South Brunswick, N.J.

After NAIT's links to terrorism were brought to its attention by the media, "Dow Jones terminated its license agreement with the NAIT subsidiary and required it to remove all reference to Dow Jones from its website and fund-related offering materials," Dow Jones Indexes President Michael Petronella confirmed, following the mysterious disappearance of such references from NAIT's website.

Explaining Usmani's departure, he cited "certain allegations related to Mr. Usmani who was, at the time, a member of the DJIM Index Sharia Advisory Board."

"Mr. Usmani has since resigned from our board," he asserted.

Petronella explained the changes in a May 29 letter to officials with the Center for Security Policy, a leading watchdog against the spread of Islamofascism in the West.

CSP president Frank Gaffney and the group's top lawyer had fired off a legal memo to Dow charging it with "covering up" material facts from the investing public about the sharia-compliant funds it licenses -- namely, that sharia advisers like Usmani "embrace the law of violent jihad that seeks America's destruction." Petronella responded that Dow Jones had already taken corrective action based on earlier media reports.

Indeed, sharia-compliant funds offer little transparency. They disclose neither the radical ties of the scholars who are advising and running them, nor the subversive tenets that dictate the structuring of the investments.

The prospectuses merely state the investments are "ethical" or "socially acceptable," when in fact they're grounded in a religious doctrine that threatens America and the West.

Lost in Wall Street's scramble to grab management and other fees from these Islamic-compliant funds, which are growing fast thanks to Arab petrodollars, is that the funds must "purify" their returns by transferring at least 3% into Islamic charities, many of which funnel funds to terrorists.

So, the American financial community may unwittingly be helping our sworn enemy.

Dow Jones' dumping of one of its top sharia advisers and licensees is a welcome setback to the burgeoning sharia-finance industry in America, which forbids investments in key businesses that drive our economy, including financial services, entertainment and aerospace-defense, as well as alcohol, tobacco and pork-related products.

It's also a serious blow to the credibility of one of the world's leading sharia-finance authorities, as well as that of America's largest mosque landlord.

But the case merely points up the unknown risks associated with Islamic finance.

What other sharia advisers are closet jihadists lusting after the blood of infidels? What other Islamic investment funds may be steering money to terrorists with the imprimatur of one of Wall Street's most respected institutions?

Islamists have the West just where they want us

.... Flash forward to today. At the moment, another totalitarian ideology characterized by techniques and global ambitions strikingly similar to those of yesteryear's communists is on the march. It goes by varying names: "Islamofascism," "Islamism," "jihadism" or "radical," "extremist" or "political Islam." Unlike the communists, however, adherents to this ideology are making extraordinary strides in Western societies toward criminalizing those who dare oppose the Islamist end-state — the imposition of brutal Shariah Law on Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

Consider but a few indicators of this ominous progress:...

... If we go along with our enemies' demands to criminalize Islamophobia, we will mutate Western laws, traditions, values and societies beyond recognition. Ultimately, today's totalitarian ideologues will triumph where their predecessors were defeated.

To avoid such a fate, those who love freedom must oppose the seditious program the Islamists call Shariah — and all efforts to impose its 1st Amendment-violating blasphemy, slander and libel laws on us in the guise of preventing Western Islamophobia.

It's Time To Defend the US Against The Ultimate Denial of Service (DOS) Attack

... Simply put, an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) attack would occur when a nuclear weapon is discharged at a very high altitude, the explosion impacts the ionosphere and Earth's magnetic field in such a way as to cause an electromagnetic pulse to rush down to the surface. That pulse then bakes just about every electronic device within a very wide geographic area. By some estimates, a single device detonated over Kansas could cripple the nation's entire technical infrastructure.

From the 2004 Executive Report by the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack: ...

Phoenix Recycling Plant Evacuated After Bomb Is Found

Several Phoenix businesses were evacuated on Wednesday after an unexploded bomb was discovered a near a recycling plant. Police were responding to a report of a possible hostage situation at the time of the discovery. ...

INTELLECTUALS LIE, THE POWERLESS DIE

THE greatest lie intellectuals tell us is that "the pen is mightier than the sword." That's what cowards claim when they want to preen as heroes. ...

Senate Sends Terror Surveillance Bill, Telecom Immunity Provision to Oval Office

WASHINGTON — The Senate on Wednesday approved a bill that will overhaul rules on terrorist surveillance while giving the Bush administration a win it had sought for months: legal immunity for telecommunications companies that helped in its secret eavesdropping program ...

U.S. may conduct raids into Pakistan

WASHINGTON — American commandos are poised to stage "hot pursuit" raids into Pakistan's loosely governed tribal areas to stem mounting Taliban attacks against U.S. troops in Afghanistan and to disrupt resurgent al-Qaida operatives' efforts to map strikes against the U.S. homeland, according to three Texas congressmen briefed during a trip to the region....

Inventor: Use shock bracelet or pay $14 billion a year

A man who worked on the invention of a shock bracelet that the U.S. government has considered for using on all airline passengers says to gain a secure air travel experience, it's either his device or a tab of $14 billion a year.

In an interview with WND today, Per Hahne, whose device is being marketed now by Lamperd Less Lethal, a weapons corporation located near Toronto, said his product really isn't draconian.

"I would venture to say most people who are on board with a hijacker would welcome any kind of relief," he said. "Today the only thing there is is the bullet." .... "People have to realize this bracelet is not even armed until you are in an aircraft and a hijacking situation is under way," he said. "The bracelets are just bracelets." ....

Denning had objections. "Would every paying airline passenger flying on a commercial airplane be mandated to wear one of these devices? I cringe at the thought. Not only could it be used as a physical restraining device, but also as a method of interrogation, according to the same aforementioned letter from Mr. Ruwaldt.

"Would you let them put one of those on your wrist? Would you allow the airline employees, which would be mandated by the government, to place such a bracelet on any member of your family?"

Iranians consider mandatory execution for apostasy

A plan is being discussed by lawmakers in Iran that would require the death penalty for anyone who leaves Islam for Christianity or someone who promotes such a conversion even on the Internet, according to a new report from Compass Direct News.

Those discussions of a penal code that was drafted earlier this year bring urgency to situations such as the two men arrested recently and under interrogation for that very crime, the report said.

The report said Iranian authorities arrested a number of converts to Christianity in the city of Shiraz about two months ago on suspicion of "apostasy."...

Gates: Iran missile test proves Tehran is a threat

WASHINGTON (AP) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates says Iran's missile test bolsters the U.S. argument that Tehran is a threat. He also says it counters Russia's case against the need for a missile defense system in Europe.

Gates says the U.S. has said for some time that there is a real threat Iran could develop long-range missiles to use against Europe. He says Tehran's launch of several missiles Wednesday helps make that point....

Pelosi Asks Bush to Sell Off Oil Reserves

WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called on President Bush to release oil from the government's emergency reserve to knock down gasoline prices she says "are helping push the economy toward recession."...

New York's Chrysler Building Bought by Abu Dhabi Fund (Update2)

July 9 (Bloomberg) -- New York's Chrysler Building, an Art Deco icon that helps define the New York skyline, was bought by an Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund, the second purchase of a Manhattan landmark by Middle East investors in as many months. ...