Rockaway Park NY 11694 * September 11 2001 * * in the 32nd year of the Society "For God Republic and Society
Lockerbie Air Disaster: Twenty Years On
On 21st December, 1988, Boeing 747-121 blew up over the Scottish village of Lockerbie killing 243 passengers and sixteen crew members plus an additional eleven people on the ground killed by fire and falling fuselage. In all, the total death toll was 270. The plane was on a Trans-Atlantic route and had taken off from London only minutes earlier. Luggage had been transferred in Frankfurt and originally loaded in Malta. The investigation uncovered fragments of a Samsonite suitcase believed to have contained the bomb that blew up the aircraft and they believed it had been loaded on the plane in Malta. The suitcase also contained vestiges of baby clothes, which were traced to a Maltese shopkeeper named Tony Gauci, who claimed he could remember having sold the clothes to a Libyan, Abdelbasset Ali Mohammed Al Megrahi, only a few days previously. Megrahi had been on Malta on 7th December so this was the presumed sales date.
What was not known to the defense was that Gauci had seen a picture of Megrahi in a magazine connecting Megrahi to the bombing. Such is the human mind that one can confuse this with having met someone. Besides how many people go in a clothes shop to buy clothes in the course of three to four days? The Scottish police also failed to inform the defense that another Libyan man was seen making a similar purchase. The bomb timer was similar to that found on a Libyan Intelligence Agent ten months previously and could allegedly be traced to the Libyan military. The firm making the timer was Mebo and an employee, Ulrich Lumpert, on oath confirmed that a fragment of the timer corresponded to devices that had been supplied to Libya. This was in 1991. In 2002, Ulrich Lumpert confessed by affidavit in Switzerland to having lied. Edwin Böller, owner of Mebo, later stated that he had turned down $4 m. from the FBI to state that the bomb was of Mebo fabrication. This leaves the two key witnesses against Al Megrahi as extremely suspect. The Mebo employee admitted to lying and so his testimony falls away. It only leaves a fairly simple Maltese shopkeeper, who claims to have served Al Megrahi in his shop three or four days earlier. It seems no stronger than circumstantial evidence to convict Al Megrahi.
Moreover, in a film of 27th April 2009, film director, Gideon Lacy interviewed former FBI laboratory scientist, Fred Whitehurst, who described the FBI lab as a 'crime scene', where an unqualified colleague, Thomas Turman, would continually alter scientific reports. The timer was the only real piece of evidence against Libya and, when asked of the importance of the timer in convicting Al Megrahi, FBI Task Force Chief, Richard Marquise, stated, "It would be very difficult to prove. I don't think we would ever (have) had an indictment" (quoted from Wikipedia). However, we have just seen that Ulrich Lumpert confessed to lying about the timer at the trial. In 2001, an Appeals Court of five judges, all of them lords (no jury so similar to the Supreme Court) rejected Al Megrahi's appeal that there had been a 'miscarriage of justice' (the only grounds for appeal in Scotland) in his case. He was interred briefly in Camp Zeist (Holland), where he was in contact with an international observer appointed by the UN. This man, Hans Köchler, later called the case a terrible miscarriage of justice and began campaigning for it at the UN.
September 2003, Al Megrahi's lawyers appealed again, following two reports by Köchler, who now described the trial as a 'spectacular miscarriage of justice'. There was another appeal on 11th October 2007 Finally, on 25th July 2009, Al Megrahi appealed to be released from jail on compassionate grounds. On 12th August, he dropped his appeal and on 20th August 2009 was released. He had terminal prostate cancer and was being sent home to die. However, the question arises as to whether he was quietly released because he was becoming an ever-growing embarrassment to the British and American governments. Was Al-Megrahi guilty? The timer and baby clothes were circumstantial and possibly lies. Did the government 'lean' on the witnesses? Probably. Did they try to corrupt them? That possibility can neither be precluded nor proven. What seems a possibility is that when things were going badly wrong with the case and when Hans Köchler was pushing it forward at the UN, the British took the path of caution and quietly released Al Megrahi. Al Megrahi also took the path of caution and gave up his appeal. However, Libya admitted responsibility for the bombing and compensated the victims' families at $2.5 m. each. Was his act of contrition a payment for entering once again into the international conclave of nations? We will never know.
Then there is the BP theory. Earlier this year, BP acquired off-shore oil-drilling rights to Libyan oil and the release of Al Megrahi will have 'oiled' the wheels there. For what it's worth, my own opinion is that British and American Intelligence got the wrong man. They were so pressured into finding a scapegoat that they took what they could find. Al Megrahi was released before the world could discover what a terrible blunder MI 5 and the FBI had made due to political pressure to come up with a culprit. Much as we may deplore the plight of Al Megrahi, if indeed he was framed, we should not lose sight of the broader perspective. It seems the British and American Intelligence Services were out to catch a gnat. Would it not have been more courageous to draw the conclusion that the Libyan government and Muhammed Ghadaffi were behind the terrorist attack. The solution was not to find a scapegoat but to bomb the living daylights out of the enemy behind the cowardly terrorist attack.
SHOULD ARIZONA PASS LAWS DESIGNED TO CRACK DOWN ON ILLEGALS
Geoff Jackson:
Street Controls in Arizona
Recently, I moved my apartment in a small northern Danish town and already two weeks ahead of time, I was requested to register my change of address with the People’s Register (Folkeregister). It’s so for everyone. When I changed telephone companies, I was amazed that my new company’s computer could find my address without me needing to write it in, all by itself. Goodness knows who else knows all about me. Particularly in the wake of pedophile cases, educational establishments ask for a ‘clean criminal record’, which the police can give you in a matter of minutes and I assume banks and other commercial establishments make use of this too.
As a person of British origins, I am still rather shocked at these controls. Britain, like the States, requires people to fill in documentation on entering and leaving the country but has otherwise no manner of identifying them. Denmark is a peninsula with many islands and lots of points of entry. There is really nothing to stop Moslems importing terrorists in and concealing them in a net of Moslem connections. But all legal residents are registered.
The law in Arizona, whereby people on the street can be required to produce their papers is a disturbing departure from American liberties. In particular, there are many in the American south-west, who are of Mexican ethnic background. Some are in because nineteenth century treaties with Mexico re-drew frontiers so that ‘Mexicans’ became ‘Americans’ and others have also been resident for generations. They are now open to harassment on the streets while their blond, blue-eyed brethren are never troubled.
However, Mexico is in a state of Civil War. Drug barons have infiltrated the government and money and violence, corruption and lies have led to a breakdown of law and order. The war is largely financed by American dollars because too many Americans have a habit, which the Mexican drug barons feed on.
The drug cartels are moving north. Cocaine, crack, heroine, meth-amphetamine etc is crossing the border all the time. Criminals from Columbia, Central America and Mexico are entering the States illegally and – make no mistake – they are guerilla fighters, who know no other trade than urban warfare. Not only the south-west, but as far north as New York State, these hoods have established themselves and their evil trade in shattered lives.
In the case of war, civil liberties have to be surrendered. Why should peaceable citizens be subjected to body searches and general harassment at airports? Why should Hispanic thugs be allowed to overturn the American way of life and cause widespread police harassment to the people of Arizona? We have to fight the war against terror.
As yet, only Arizona has turned to extreme measures of control. Homeland Security might be a better answer. Is the systematic registering of the entire population as in Scandinavia, France, Germany and most European countries, the answer? The frightening death toll of drugs has to be dealt with. I leave it for my American reader to take time out to ponder the problem.
Geoff Jackson
EDWIN JACQUES:
PUBLIC NECESSITY
ARIZONA SHOULD HAVE THE RIGHT TO PASS ANY LAWS THE CITIZENS FEEL NECESSARY FOR THE GOOD OF THEIR STATE.
EDWIN JACQUES
AWESOME DAVID LAWRENCE:
PAPERS PLEASE
Should Arizona pass laws that require immigrants to display identification on request?
Yes. When I was twenty I was asked in both France and Spain to show my passport. Why not? I had nothing to hide. I was even kind of honored that they cared enough about me to want to know where I was from. I didn’t imagine that the French or Spanish were Nazis trying to shake me down. Perhaps, they were profiling me because I looked American. Good. American youth were druggy, crazy hippies at the time and they should have checked into me. The current fear of exposing your identity has to do with American’s no longer having an identity. We can’t even say we’re not Mexican. Everyone is the same. Everyone speaks Spanglish.
AWESOME DAVID LAWRENCE
Dr James Davies:
DON`T CRY FOR ME ARIZONA
No one cried for me when I had to comply with massive government documents and multiple sets of identification just to get to work.
Dr James Davies, DF
John Amendall:
Arizona’s Activist Attacks
As one grows older fewer heroes emerge. Nevertheless I recently found a heroine- Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona. She stepped up to the plate and signed SB 1070 “making it a state crime to lack legal residency.” Imagine that? “The law also authorizes police to determine the status of people they lawfully stop and suspect are in the country illegally.” How brassy can you get? Almost sounds like Arizona is enforcing the law of the United States in absentia. Man does Arizona have a nerve. But that’s the problem. The federal government has failed to provide leadership in this issue leaving the states to do the heavy lifting. Time will tell whether Governor Brewer’s legislation will stand the test of time or prove to be her undoing for continued elected office. Depending on one’s politics Governor Brewer is revered or reviled. I’m not from Arizona but place me in the former category. SB 1070 is not a new initiative in regards to immigrant legislation. Colorado, Nebraska and Tennessee already have immigrant related laws. Legislators in S. Carolina, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Rhode Island and Michigan have introduced bills similar to Arizona’s but the latter has become a lightning rod for liberals.
John Amendall: Arizona’s Activist Attacks continued col 3
THE OBAMA PROSE POEM OPERA IN THREE PARTS
HIGH HEAD
Obama's problem is that he holds his chin too high. It makes him seem arrogant. He descends from a Kenyan philandering drunk father and a hippy, African loving black-boys-are-delicious mother. A lot to be proud about there. Maybe he feels if he keeps his chin up and his head back his parents will slide down his spine and disappear. Maybe he will get a new birth certificate that says he is the son of Louis XVIth and Marie Antoinette? Maybe he will ride a cyclone to a valueless universe near Oz while he leaves behind the American mess of his Marxism, entitlements and divisiveness? Maybe he won't be so high-and-mighty as he transforms the self-reliant United States into a nation of neediness and handouts.
MICHELLE, MY BELLE
Michelle Obama's hips are too big. Despite the mainstream press, she can't be Jackie O looking like that. She could be a basketball player or a lady wrestler. Forgive my bitchy gossip but you can't be classy if you can't fit in a chair. I mean where's she going to put those hips? Is she going to put them in her pockets? I don't want to talk about her ass but does she have a specially designed wide toilet? Not that looks matter. But they do. We all like good-looking women. Except the Bettie Friedan's and ugly feminists of the sixties. They would blind us rather than have us see the truth. Marc Anthony set a thousand ships to sail for Cleopatra's beauty. I don't even see a rowboat leaving the Central Park boathouse to celebrate Michelle Obama.
HISTORY TEACHER
Obama is the exhaust pipe in my car. I don't own a car. I'd like to disown Obama. I do not want to live in naïve fields of socialism or George Orwell's "Animal Farm." I don't want to trade shares in the utopian derivatives of Communist ideas or derivatives of Mau and Stalin. I don't care that Obama recommends service for me and his flunkies while he wants to service us up to his own spoiled whims. I don't think I should join the Peace Corp to do volunteer work when Obama earned five million dollars last year. I don't envy people richer than me. I don't knock Wall Street when Obama praises millionaire movie stars. I don't want a meretricious black man to demerit all future black leaders. I'd like him out of there. I'd like him teaching idealized history to high school seniors in May when they are already past their need for college admissions.
John Amendall:
Arizona con't
If I was an immigrant czar, and President Obama has appointed numerous unqualified czars including a border czar, I’d push for Texas, New Mexico and California to follow Arizona’s lead. This would certainly make illegal immigration more difficult than it is. Coupled with SB 1070 a fully committed National Guard from the border states and the scope and magnitude of the problem would be significantly reduced. Alas major detachments of National Guard are presently pursuing President Obama’s Afghanistan War. That opinion may not be politically correct in some quarters, but liberals never hesitated to squawk about Mr. Bush’s Iraqi War. Liberals point to elitist thinking. Resistance to diversity. Confusion from conflicting state laws. And their favorite screed racism. Not to worry. The U. S. Department of Justice that bastion of perpetrator’s rights will straighten this out. It has filed a lawsuit to stop the Arizona law from taking effect July 29. The Department maintains that immigration policy is a national responsibility (that they haven’t addressed) and a “patch work of state laws that will only create more problems than it solves.” Let’s look at the existing problems before confusion creates more to solve. The following data was put together by Arizona in preparation for SB 1070. Taxpayer’s money supports food assistance programs such as food stamps, WIC, and free school lunches for illegal aliens; Medicaid, primary and secondary school education for children here illegally and they cannot speak a word of English. Billions a year are spent for education for the American-born children of illegal aliens known as anchor babies. In a different vein 30% of all federal inmates are illegal aliens. Millions of dollars a day are spent to incarcerate illegal aliens. They have a crime rate in the U. S. that’s two and a half times that of white non-illegal aliens.
During 2005 there were 4 to 10 million illegal aliens that crossed our southern border. It was estimated that as many as 19,500 illegal aliens from terrorist countries also entered the country. Millions of pounds of drugs, cocaine, meth, heroin and marijuana crossed into the U. S. This can be verified in a Homeland Security Report. In 2006 illegal aliens sent home $45 billion in remittances to their countries of origin. This is from people paying no taxes and receiving welfare. The Arizona Research reported a whopping $338.3 billion a year for all these services in the U. S. This amount would certainly be enough to stimulate the economy for U. S. citizens. Now liberals would complain Arizona is gilding the lily with these data to support its “unfair” new law vilifying illegal aliens. But from the Los Angles Times. Forty % of all workers in L.A. County (10.2 million people) are working for cash and not paying taxes. This is because they are predominantly illegal immigrants working without green cards. Ninety-five % of warrants for murder in L.A. County are for illegal aliens and 75% of people on the most wanted list are also. Over 2/3 of all births in L.A. County are to illegal alien Mexicans on Medi-Cal whose births were paid for by taxpayers. Nearly 35% of all inmates in California detention centers are Mexican nationals here illegally. The FBI reports half of all gang members in L.A. are most likely illegal aliens from south of the border. The above facts were published in the Los Angeles Times a traditionally liberal newspaper. Less than 2% of illegal aliens are farm workers, but 29% are on welfare. Over 70% of the U. S. annual population growth ( and over 90% of California, Florida and New York) results from immigration and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi wants them to become voters. If all of this doesn’t insult our intelligence for letting it continue, Pelosi wanted to put a windfall tax on retirement income. This would tax what you have made by investing for your retirement. When asked how these new tax dollars would be spent, she replied: “We need to raise the standard of living of our poor, unemployed and minorities. For example, we have an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants (my bold) in our country who need our help along with millions of unemployed minorities. Stock market windfall profit taxes could go a long way to guarantee these people the standard of living they would like to have as Americans.” But the 12 million illegal immigrants aren’t Americans and she’s proposing to continue to support them with retirement money. Recall Arizona informed us that U. S. taxpayers were already doing this with $338.3 billion a year, and Pelosi wants more for these unfortunates. If we aren’t prodded to do anything about massive, irresponsible outlays of money to non-citizens, let’s at least do something about undocumented soldiers entering our country. Reallocation of $338.3 billion dollars a year towards border containment would go a long way to reduce illegal immigration from terrorist countries. Liberals claim we’re crying wolf about this. However during WW II, we know from Russian sources that their illegal nationals had infiltrated the country for a variety of espionage activities. How long will we have to wait before we generate an effective, safe and fair immigration program? Let’s hope Governor Brewer’s efforts aren’t wasted.
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