Reblogged from : Earth First News Wire
They sat down in chairs in front of the tents, wearing headbands and happi coats.
“We are not removing the tents,” they announced in a statement. “We are against the restart of nuclear power reactors.”
“People who are fighting for the end of nuclear power generation meet here and get information here,” said Setsuko Kuroda, 62, of Koriyama, Fukushima Prefecture, who frequently visits the tents.
Reblogged from : Earth First News Wire
from Facing South
City leaders in Oxford, Ala. have approved the destruction of a 1,500-year-old Native American ceremonial mound and are using the dirt as fill for a new Sam’s Club, a retail warehouse store operated by Wal-Mart.{C}A University of Alabama archaeology report commissioned by the city found that the site was historically significant as the largest of several ancient stone and earthen mounds throughout the Choccolocco Valley. But Oxford Mayor Leon Smith — whose campaign has financial connections to firms involved in the $2.6 million no-bid project — insists the mound is not man-made and was used only to “send smoke signals.”
“The City of Oxford and its archaeological advisers have completed a review and evaluation of a stone mound that was identified near Boiling Springs, Calhoun County, Alabama, and have concluded that the mound is the result of natural phenomena and does not meet the eligibility criteria for the Natural [sic] Register of Historic Places,” according to a news release Smith issued last week.
In fact, the report does not conclude the mound is a result of “natural phenomena” but says very clearly it is of “cultural origin.” And while the University’s Office of Archaeological Research does not believe the site qualifies for the National Register of Historic Places, the Alabama Historical Commission disagrees, noting that the structure meets at least three criteria for inclusion: its “association with a broad pattern of history,” architecture “embodying distinctive characteristics,” and for the information it might yield to scholars.
The site is also significant to Native Americans. The Woodland and Mississippian cultures that inhabited the Southeast and Midwest before Europeans arrived constructed and used these mounds for various rituals, which may have included funerals. There are concerns that human remains may be present at the site, though none have been found yet.
United South and Eastern Tribes, a nonprofit coalition of 25 federally recognized tribes from Maine to Texas, passed a resolution in 2007 calling for the preservation of such structures, which it calls “prayer in stone.” Native Americans have held protests against the mound’s demolition, and last week someone altered a sign for the Leon Smith Parkway that runs past the development to read “Indian Mound Pkwy.”
**********************************************************************************************************
After writing the post yesterday about how the city of Oxford is destroying a 1500-year-old Indian mound to use it as fill for the building of a Sam’s Club, I just had to go see it for myself.
You can see how the hill has just been scraped clean – there are roads around the mound all the way to the top. This hill used to be wooded and now there is just a sad clump of a few trees at the very top where the stone mound is (just to be crystal-clear here – the stone mound is at the top of this hill. It’s the stone mound at the top that is man-made. The hill itself is not man-made):
We watched truck after truck come down the hill fully loaded with earth.
From the back of the hill, you can see this backhoe (bottom right of this pic below) scraping the hill clean:
When we were there, we met three other people who were watching what was going on with disgust. One young woman was there taking pictures and had been approached by the construction people to stop taking pictures and to get off ‘private property’. They said they were going to take the phone she was using to take pictures and she refused.
I’m sure some of these people are workers who don’t want to get mixed up in the moral or ethical conflict and are just trying to make a living; who is really to blame is the mayor, Leon Smith, and those in the city’s Commercial Development Authority, which owns the mound.
What’s really rich is that the street that runs in front of the mound is ‘Leon Smith Parkway’.
The AP article titled ‘Oxford Pays for Demolition of Indian Mound’ details the incestuous relationship between the city’s no-bid contract and political contributions from the construction company directly to the mayor’s campaign. Ugly!!
It is unfortunate that the link they give to the AP article can no longer be found. I did however find and article from the Tuscaloosa news.com and I have posted some of it below.
*********************************************************************************************************
A stone mound created by American Indians sits behind the Oxford Exchange, Thursday. The stone mound will soon disappear and whether Oxford’s taxpayers wanted it or not, they paid for its destruction.
The Associated Press
OXFORD | A stone mound on a hill behind the Oxford Exchange created by American Indians 1,500 years ago will soon disappear.
And whether Oxford’s taxpayers wanted it or not, they paid for its destruction.
Workers hired by the city’s Commercial Development Authority are using the dirt from the hill as fill for a new Sam’s Club. The project has angered American Indians who, along with a Jacksonville State University archaeology professor, say the site could contain human remains.
Oxford Mayor Leon Smith and City Project Manager Fred Denney say it was used to send smoke signals.
The city’s CDA uses taxpayer money and assets to lure commercial businesses. The $2.6 million no-bid CDA contract for preparing the Sam’s site went to Oxford-based Taylor Corp. That money came from the sale of city property to Georgia-based developers Abernathy and Timberlake and from additional money provided by the city.
In Alabama, CDAs are exempt from bid laws, meaning contracts can go to whichever company the board chooses. Oxford’s CDA board and its actions have multiple connections to Smith’s political fundraising:
n
At least three board members or their employers have contributed to his political campaigns.
n
Taylor Corp., under the ownership of Tommy Taylor, has received thousands of dollars in city contracts for non-CDA work. Taylor donated $1,000 to Smith in 2004 and $1,000 in 2008.
n
Abernathy and Timberlake donated $1,000 to Smith’s re-election campaign in 2004.
n
*********************************************************************************************************
OXFORD, Alabama (AP) – Bucket loaders and bulldozers are tearing apart a hill that researchers call the foundation of an ancient Native American site to provide fill dirt for a wholesale warehouse, a move that appalls preservationists.
Tribal advocates and state officials say a large stone mound that tops the 200-foot rise was put there a millennium ago by Indians during a religious observance. It is similar to rock mounds found up and down the Eastern Seaboard, historians say, and likely dates to Indians of the Woodlands period that ended in 1000 A.D.
“It’s just heartbreaking,” said Elizabeth Ann Brown of the Alabama Historical Commission. “I find it hard to believe that for fill dirt anyone would do this.”
Despite a city-commissioned study that found tribal artifacts in the red clay that makes up the mound, Oxford Mayor Leon Smith denies the work by the city is damaging anything important. He said the stones atop the hill are a natural part of what locals call Signal Mountain and were exposed by millions of years of erosion.
“It’s the ugliest old hill in the world,” said Smith, who has overseen a mushrooming of big-box stores in this east Alabama city of 15,000 during his seven terms as mayor.
The hill certainly is an eyesore these days. Its wooded sides have been stripped bare, and the red soil is being trucked downhill to the site of a new Sam’s warehouse store and a small retail strip, where it’s being used to build up a good base for foundations.
The rock mound perched atop the hill is mostly undisturbed so far, though it is denuded save for a few spindly trees that haven’t been knocked down. Officials with Sam’s Club, a division of Wal-Mart Stores Inc., said no material from the rock mound is going into the site where the store is under construction.
Brown said the state lacks the power to halt the project, and petitions and protests haven’t done anything to stop the work. Big yellow dump trucks rumble up and down the hill, located behind a retail development just off Interstate 20.
City project manager Fred Denney said officials plan to remove the top of the hill eventually to create an elevated, eight-acre site that will overlook the Choccolocco Valley and the city of Oxford.
“It would be a beautiful view,” said the mayor, who envisions a motel or restaurant atop the hill.
Happiness is not the one has no problems.
If so there would be no happy people.
Happiness is having problems without letting them have you.
My conundrum ...
Beautiful hearts usually belong to those who have suffered much and found the only thing that stands the test of time is kindness and love.
The loneliest are often the kindest, the poorest are often the generous, the most damaged are often the least judgmental, all because they never wish others to suffer as they have ... and so their pain has taught them beauty and how to love.
Every human has so many thoughts that go through the mind that are never spoken and therefore never "heard" by another human being.
These thoughts are like SILENT WORDS.
But are they really silent or are they simply "SEEN" instead?
Isn't it possible that silent words speak in the way you present yourself, how you respond or react to joyous moments, dreadful experiences or by the way you love ...
It's alright.
Everything is going to be okay.
Beauty surrounds you every second of every day ... in between the ugly... behind the bad ... throughout the universe ... when we are sad.
Babies are being conceived ~ beauty
Cancer is being conquered ~ beauty
Hearts are being transplanted ~ beauty
Galaxies are being discovered ~ beauty
Love is being enjoyed ~ beauty…
Reblogged from : 
A documentary made by the team of Russia 24 channel correspondents in Syria.
To activate the subtitles click on the icon CC at the bottom right of the screen
Reblogged from: 
YouViewed/Editorial
” Saudi national Abdul Rahman Ali al-Harbi, who was briefly held as a “person of interest” in the Boston bombings and then downgraded in less than 24 hours to a witness, visited the White House on numerous occasions since 2009, The Rightscoop reports today.
Reblogged from : The Grey Enigma
As with every terrorist attack and high-profile killing, the Boston bombing has prompted calls for Americans to give up civil liberties for the sake of security. Rather than gun control or airport pat-downs, this time the call is for a Big Brother-like network of police cameras allowing authorities to more closely monitor people who move about the streets.
But the story of the Boston bombers — the details of their crime and their capture — makes the opposite argument. We don’t need more government surveillance. We need to maintain robust civil society and public spiritedness.
Responding to IRA bombings and then going further after 9/11, London has created a “ring of steel,” with chokepoints and thousands of closed-circuit television [CCTV] cameras. Wherever you go in London, Big Brother can watch you.
At Slate, Farhad Manjoo wrote, “Thanks to CCTV cameras, the identities of the bombers and their co-conspirators were determined in a few days’ time.”
But guess who else determined the identities of bombers in a few days’ time, without thousands of police surveillance cameras? U.S., Massachusetts and Boston police.
Law enforcement in Boston used cameras to ID the bombing suspects, but not police cameras. Instead, authorities asked the public to submit all photos and videos of the finish-line area to the FBI, just in case any of them had relevant images. The surveillance videos the FBI posted online of the suspects came from private businesses that use surveillance to punish and deter crime on their property.
So it turns out we already have plenty of cameras on the street. They’re not government cameras, but rather cameras owned and operated by private individuals and businesses. In a bout of public spiritedness, these pedestrians and businesses willingly shared their videos with law enforcement. Even if the crime had not been so notorious, the police could expect public cooperation — what merchant wouldn’t share his surveillance tapes to aid in a murder investigation?
So what do we gain by having the government run its own cameras? That would mean the police wouldn’t need to turn to the public for help. This would create efficiencies, but it seems the public responded pretty efficiently last week.
Reblogged from: The Grey Enigma
Abdul Rahman Ali Al-Harbi in the hospital.
UPDATED 5AM EST Apr 24, 2013:
Confirmation that Abdul Rahman Ali Al-Harbi, the Saudi national and initial “person of interest,” is indeed being deported this week now is spreading across the Internet. More details are emerging this weekend as Arabic sources and Saudi papers themselves are confirming “rumors” swirling in the US. (more at bottom)
Moreover, the Saudi papers are detailing the visit by the Obamas, especially Michelle to the hospital and this man. The “rumors” of the President meeting with Saudi officials in the hospital just prior to his “approved deportation” is a bragging right in their press.
More notable is the assertions that Abdul Rahman Ali Al-Harbi is free an clear of terrorist ties, when in fact over 10 names from his clan are already linked to Al-Qaeda.
Michelle Obama visits Al-Harbi in Boston Hospital? Image source and accuracy unknown
Many from Al-Harbi’s clan are entrenched in terrorism and are members of Al-Qaeda as identified by the Islamic governments.
Out of a list of 85 terrorists listed by the Saudi government shows several of Al-Harbi clan to have been active fighters in Al-Qaeda:
Then you have Al-Harbi clan members in Gitmo:
There are specific Saudi clans that are rife with members of Al-Qaeda, which has fueled critics questions the hundred thousand student visas are issued to these and how ICE officials seem clueless to make the connection with the clans when it comes to terrorism.
The BBC reported Khaled Alharbi was married to the daughter of al-Qaida’s number two, Ayman al-Zawahiri. He reportedly appeared with bin Laden in a video praising the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Another top al-Qaida operative is Adel Radi Saqr al-Wahabi al-Harbi, a Saudi national identified by the State Department as “a key member of an al-Qaida network operating in Iran.”
The State Department has offered a multimillion-dollar reward for the capture of Abdel Alharbi, saying he is an Iran-based al-Qaida facilitator who serves as the deputy to Muhsin al-Fadhl, who runs al-Qaida’s Iran network.
At a site called Sabq, Alharbi’s father talks about how a member of the Aldawsari clan – Ali Aldawsari – visited his son in the hospital. Remember what we wrote about Khalid Aldawsari here:
