Jerome R. Corsi's Blog, page 335

Obama's America: 92 million don't work

NEW YORK – The Bureau of Labor Statistics announcement that unemployment has dropped from 6.7 percent in March to 6.3 percent in April was partly attributed to some 800,000 workers dropping out of the labor force last month, reducing the labor participation rate to 62.8 percent, a new low for the Obama administration.

After adjusting the BLS unemployment number to what is known as “U-6” – a measure that includes total unemployed, plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force, plus total part-time employed for economic reasons – unemployment in April was 12.3 percent.

The amount (not seasonally adjusted) of Americans not in the labor force in April rose to 92,594,000, almost 1 million more than the previous month. In March, 91,630,000 Americans were not in the labor force, which includes an aging population that is continuing to head into retirement.

According to John Williams, an economist known for arguing the government reports manipulate “shadow statistics” of economic data for political purposes, drops in the unemployment rate as reported by the BLS have become virtually meaningless.

“The broad economic outlook has not changed, despite the heavily-distorted numbers that continue to be published by the BLS,” Williams writes in his subscription newsletter on ShadowStats.com. “The unemployment rates have not dropped from peak levels due to a surge in hiring; instead, they generally have dropped because of discouraged workers being eliminated from headline labor-force accounting.”

Williams recreates a ShadowStats alternative unemployment rate reflecting methodology that includes “long-term discouraged workers.” In 1994 under the Clinton administration, the Bureau of Labor Statistics removed that category from those considered “unemployed” in any of the government’s unemployment measures.

The BLS publishes six levels of unemployment, but only the headline U3 unemployment rate gets the press. The headline number does not count as unemployed the “discouraged” workers who have not looked for work in the past four weeks because they believed no jobs were available.

Discouraged workers

Williams has demonstrated that it takes an expert to truly decipher BLS unemployment statistics.

The U6 unemployment rate is the BLS’s broadest measure. It includes those marginally attached to the labor force and the “under-employed” – those who have accepted part-time jobs though they are looking for full-time employment. Also included are short-term discouraged workers who have not looked for work in the last year because there are no jobs to be found.

Since 1994, however, the long-term discouraged workers, those who have been discouraged for more than one year, have been excluded from all government data.

Williams calculates his “ShadowStats Alternative Unemployment Rate” by adding to the BLS U6 numbers the long-term discouraged workers.

He argues that his ShadowStats Alternative Unemployment measure most closely mirrors common experience.

“If you were to survey everyone in the country as to whether they were employed or unemployed, without qualification as to when they last looked for a job, the resulting unemployment rate would be close to the ShadowStats estimate,” Williams told WND.

The headline BLS unemployment rate has stayed relatively low because it excludes all discouraged workers, Williams argues.

As the unemployed first become discouraged and then disappear into the long-term discouraged category, they also vanish from inclusion in the headline labor force numbers. Those workers, however, are ready to take a job if one becomes available. They are unemployed and consider themselves to be unemployed, but the government’s popularly followed unemployment reporting ignores them completely.

Below is a more complete unemployment table that includes the seasonally adjusted unemployment percentages for U3 unemployment as well as the same for U6 unemployment, followed by the ShadowStats Alternative Unemployment rate, comparing April 2013 for March and April 2014.

Economy of part-time jobs

In August 2013, the House Ways and Means Committee documented that seven out of every eight new employees under Obama have been part-time employees.

“The headlines citing last week’s jobs report as the lowest unemployment rate in years may have been technically accurate, but they are also reminders that looks can be deceiving,” the House Ways and Means report noted at the time.

“The reality, as you dig into the latest jobs data, reveals that few are finding the full-time work they want and need, and many are forced to accept part-time employment.”

To support the argument, the House Ways and Means Committee produced the following table drawn from Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The House Ways and Means Committee linked to an article Associated Press published Aug. 4, 2013, that stated: “So far this year, low-paying industries have provided 61 percent of he nation’s job growth, even though these industries represent just 39 percent of overall U.S. jobs, according to Labor Department numbers analyzed by Moody’s Analytics.”

AP economics writer Paul Wiseman noted part-time work had made up more than 77 percent of the job growth so far that year, with part-time work defined as being less than 25 hours a week.

Appearing on PBS’s “McLaughlin Group” in October 2013, real estate mogul Mort Zuckerman said that “88 percent of the jobs that have been created this year (2013) are part-time jobs.”

“A large part of the reason for that number of part-time jobs, which is unprecedented in American history, is because people are apprehensive about the impact of Obamacare and the costs of Obamacare on full-time jobs,” he said.

Dismal GDP triggers double-dip recession fear

NEW YORK – A Bureau of Economic Analysis report released Wednesday by the Commerce Department indicated the U.S. economy could be entering a second dip after the 2008-2009 recession as U.S. Gross Domestic Product slowed to a disappointing annual rate of 0.1 percent growth in the first quarter of this year.

Still, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed on Wednesday at a record high, a phenomenon WND has reported will likely continue as long as the Federal Reserve continues its Quantitative Easing policy under which it buys billions of dollars of U.S. government-generated debt every month.

Perversely, investors on Wall Street interpreted the bad GDP growth numbers as confirmation the underlying economy remains so weak that the Federal Reserve would not dare stop pumping dollars into the U.S. economy.

Almost immediately after the BEA reported the dire GDP growth numbers, the GOP jumped on the news, with House Speaker John Boehner’s office issuing a press statement charging the report proved the failure of Obamanomics. The House GOP leadership interpreted the unexpected low number as a reflection of the “real economic despair in the sixth year of the Obama administration.”

The report was made public as Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., chairman of the House Budget Committee, announced a third hearing on the government and the poor. Ryan argued that the poverty rate is stuck at 15 percent, reflecting a failure of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s war on poverty declared in 1964 and continuing federal government spending on some 92 federal programs designed to combat poverty that amounted to approximately $800 billion in fiscal year 2012.

In what has to be regarded as unfortunate timing for the White House, the BEA report of barely positive economic growth in the first quarter was made public at the same time Judicial Watch provided records documenting the travel costs of the Obama first family and the Biden family. The costs have surpassed $40 million, with the Air Force reporting that two golf outings by President Obama this year cost $2.9 million.

The news was perhaps only encouraging to Republican candidates facing election for the House and Senate in November. Bad economic news likely will make the mid-term elections, typically difficult for the political party controlling the White House, even more difficult for the Obama administration. Democrats already are struggling to manage the news of polls showing prospective voters reacting negatively to a problematic and politically difficult Obamacare rollout.

The coming depression

Economist John Williams, author of the ShadowStats.com blog, has been warning that the economy since the 2008-2009 has not entered the type of economic recovery the Obama administration has boasted was under way.

“The official story of U.S. economic activity of the last seven or eight years – one of plunge, full recovery and new economic expansion in business activity – is a statistical illusion created by government statistical bureaus understating the pace of inflation in recent years,” Williams warned in a report entitled “Hyperinflation 2014 – Great Economic Tumble,” published on his website April 8.

“The year ahead will be an extraordinarily difficult time, with a confluence of already-intensifying crises and likely panics pummeling the moribund economy, roiling the markets, and destabilizing the financial and political systems.”

Williams puts much of the blame on the Federal Reserve’s continued policy of Quantitative Easing.

“With the federal government and Federal Reserve locked into their respective systematic-destructive fiscal and monetary policies, a related, continuing massive loss of global and domestic confidence in the U.S. dollar should lead to an outright dumping of the U.S. currency in the global markets, setting the initial stages of a hyperinflationary great depression,” he warned.

As one indicator of an economic turndown resuming, Williams points to the continued decline in existing-home sales.

“Except for a one-month bounce of 0.8 percent in December 2013, existing-home sales activity has been sliding since July 2013, with the March 2014 annualized sales pace of 4,590,000 down by 14.7 percent from the post-recession high of July 2013, and at the lowest level seen since July 2012,” he noted.

“The March 2014 sales level still was 36.9 percent below the July 2005 pre-recession peak in activity. As with the new-home sales series, existing-home sales activity never came close to recovering peak pre-recession activity and now the numbers are turning down again.”

In recent economic reports, Williams has analyzed at length the impact of free trade agreements that have driven millions of high-paying jobs offshore. The result has been a rapidly shrinking middle class, as the government tries to hide the real impact of unemployment by generously adjusting employment statistics to increase dramatically the proportion of previously employed workers who have simply dropped out of the labor force.

“Until income growth picks up substantially relative to inflation, and/or credit is flowing freely enough to boost willing consumption, there is no chance for sustained economic growth or economic recovery in the United States,” he continues to warn.

Williams’ predictions are dire: “The contraction of business activity so far in the extreme downside since 2006/2007 is the most severe and protracted since the first down-leg of the Great Depression in the 1930s. As the hyperinflation breaks and the regular domestic commerce become severely impaired, the downturn likely will evolve into the worst great depression in U.S. history.”

Dire economic straits for middle-class America

In recent days, headlines on the Drudge Report have been peppered with reports of a severe decline in the U.S. middle class.

On Monday, CNSNews.com reported that in 20 percent of U.S. families, not one member of the family was employed.

On Tuesday, Bloomberg.com reported the homeownership rate in the U.S. declined to the lowest point since 1995 as rising property prices and mortgage rates held back demand.

On Wednesday, the New York Times reported nearly half of New Yorkers are struggling just to get by economically.

Perhaps the statistic that most describes the decline of the middle class under Obama economics is the increase in the number of American households on food stamps. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported in January that in the average month of fiscal year 2013 there were 23,052,388 households receiving food stamps, representing 20 percent of all American households.

Internet in bull's-eye for new 'hate speech' plan

It was the Southern Poverty Law Center that called the World Congress of Families, which promotes the “natural family,” an “anti-LGBT hate group.”

The same SPLC has blasted the Drudge Report for covering “black crime,” charging that the immensely popular Internet news aggregator “has been rife with what the online publisher calls ‘scary black people’ stories.”

Another prominent leader of a major online source, Breitbart Editor Ben Shapiro, also was targeted by SPLC over purported “hate.”

The site said Shapiro quoted FBI “hate crime statistics” to show there are about the “same number of attacks on Jews in this country as there are homosexuals.”

Joseph Farah, WND founder and CEO, long has been targeted by SPLC, which has described WND as “the conspiracist ‘news’ site.”

“Hate crimes” and “hate speech” have surged into the headlines this week as WND reported that if two Democratic lawmakers have their way, Barack Obama’s Justice Department soon will submit a report for action against any Internet sites, broadcast, cable television or radio shows determined to be advocating or encouraging “violent acts.”

That’s from the text of a new bill from Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.

The Hate Crime Reporting Act of 2014 “would create an updated comprehensive report examining the role of the Internet and other telecommunications in encouraging hate crimes based on gender, race, religion, ethnicity, or sexual orientation and create recommendations to address such crimes,” stated a news release from Markey’s office.

The president of the National Hispanic Media Coalition, Alex Nogales, thanked Markey for the work “to confront and combat hate speech in the media that targets our most vulnerable communities.”

He said NHMC “has long-recognized that an update to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s 1993 report, ‘The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes,’ is long overdue and desperately needed given the incredible evolution of our communications systems over the past 21 years as well as the ever-increasing numbers of hate crimes targeting Latinos and others.”

“As the author of the original piece of legislation directing the 1993 report, there is nobody better than Senator Markey to join Congressman Hakeem Jeffries and others in calling on the NTIA to study this pressing issue once again,” Nogales said.

NHMC, along with its fellow Soros-funded group SPLC, have worked on the idea of a federal rule against “hate speech” in the political content of all forms of telecommunications, including the Internet.

Markey’s effort dates back to 1992, when as a congressman from Massachusetts he used the Telecommunications Authorization Act to direct the NTIA to produce a report on the role of telecommunications media in hate crimes, the first and only report ever so completed by any federal agency at the direction of Congress.

That report, issued in December 1993 under the supervision of then-Secretary of Commerce Ron H. Brown, “The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes,” focused on broadcast television and radio, as well as cable public access channels, telephone hotlines and the computer bulletin boards that preceded today’s Internet.

The 1993 NTIA report’s most frequently cited source was a February 1992 SPLC report,  “Klanwatch Intelligence Report.” It was cited in the first footnote and 18 subsequent footnotes referencing the Ku Klux Klan as the prototypical right-wing extremist hate group in America.

SPLC not only provides “resources” to lawmakers across the nation, it also boasts of providing training to law enforcement officers “at the local, state and federal level.”

“Thousands of officers have received training that helps them recognized and deal with hate crimes.”

In fact, SPLC lists pages of helps for law enforcement, from legal commentaries to videos, articles and publications.

It also operates a “Hate Map,” which apparently was used by a confessed terrorist to identify Christians to kill in 2012.

In that case, Floyd Lee Corkins II identified SPLC as his source of information when he decided to murder staff members at a Christian organization in Washington, the Family Research Council.

Corkins, a homosexual activist, told investigators he had gotten details about FRC from  SPLC, which publicly had labeled FRC a “hate group” because of its biblical position on homosexuality.

After Corkins’ confession, he was sentenced by Chief U.S. District Judge Richard W. Roberts to 25 years in prison because, on Aug. 15, 2012, he walked into FRC headquarters and started to shoot with the intention of killing “as many people as I could.”

He managed to shoot and injure just one person, facilities manager Leo Johnson, who is credited with heroically stopping the attack

Corkins admitted he picked FRC because the organization was listed as an “anti-gay” hate group by the SPLC on its website.

FRC promotes traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs about the family and homosexuality, but SPLC claims the organization’s “real specialty is defaming gays and lesbians.”

Corkins, a former volunteer at an LGBT community center, pleaded guilty to terrorism.

Other individuals and groups publicly condemned by SPLC for their positions on moral issues included Fox News, blogger Pamela Geller, former Ambassador John Bolton and retired Lt. Gen. William Boykin.

It was NHMC that in 2009 revitalized a concerted effort to carry on Markey’s idea to establish federal government regulation of telecommunications content by seeking to institutionalize an annual NTIA report. The hope was to establish a link between the use of telecommunications media and hate crimes.

On Jan. 28, 2009, NHMC, assisted by attorneys from the Soros-funded Media Access Project, filed a petition to the Federal Communications Commission, asking the FCC to invite public comment on hate speech in the media, “including the relationship between hate speech in the media and hate crimes,” with a view to explore “options for counteracting or reducing the negative effects of such speech.”

In a letter addressed Aug. 11, 2009, NHMC wrote to the NTIA administrator requesting NTIA update its 1993 report on “The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes,” the report Markey had been responsible for creating. NHMC charged that since 1993, the radio, cable television and the Internet “are now permeated with hate speech – which was not the case in 1993.”

On Jan. 13, NHMC wrote a letter to Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., that suggested behind-the-scenes coordination may have been occurring or that NHMC had prior knowledge of a plan to implement the telecommunications hate crimes measure. The letter thanks Jeffries for introducing to the House a telecommunications hate crimes bill Jeffries actually introduced two days later.

The NHMC letter claimed the 1993 NTIA report was now outdated because “one could not have anticipated the explosion of the Internet or the multitude of ways we all stay connected today.” It argued that an updated NTIA report “will augment the record with current data and information in a way that will raise awareness about the depth and impact of hate speech across all media platforms.”

The letter was signed by some 45 leftist organizations, including SPLC.

WND reported the new one-page bill calls for the Justice Department and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights to “analyze information on the use of telecommunications, including the Internet, broadcast television and radio, cable television, public access television, commercial mobile services, and other electronic media, to advocate and encourage violent acts and the commission of crimes of hate.”

The bill does not define which actions by broadcasters would be considered to have encouraged violence, seemingly leaving that open to interpretation.

Once the report is compiled, the bill calls for “any recommendations” for action “consistent with the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States” that is determined to be an “appropriate and necessary” way to address the purported encouragement of violent acts.

The Boston Herald took issue with the bill, calling it “frankly chilling” that Markey is seeking to “empower an obscure federal agency to begin scouring the Internet, TV and radio for speech it finds threatening.”

“Perhaps he could crack a briefing book on the crisis in Ukraine rather than looking for his own extra-constitutional methods of punishing speech he finds unacceptable,” added the Herald editorial.

The latest plan is perceived by critics as the next step in Obama’s campaign against “hate crimes,” which earlier included the creation of a federal hate crimes law that targets for additional punishment those who may commit crimes while in a certain mindset.

The original law, called the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, was signed by Obama when Democrats strategically attached it to a “must-pass” $680 billion defense-appropriations bill in 2009.

The law cracks down on any acts that could be linked to criticism of homosexuality or even the “perception” of homosexuality. Obama boasted of his accomplishment.

“After more than a decade, we’ve passed inclusive hate-crimes legislation to help protect our citizens from violence based on what they look like, who they love, how they pray or who they are,” he said.

But the criticism was vocal and pointed. American Family Association President Tim Wildmon warned the new law “creates a kind of caste system in law enforcement, where the perverse thing is that people who engage in non-normative sexual behavior will have more legal protection than heterosexuals. This kind of inequality before the law is simply un-American.”

He pointed out that the legislation also creates possible situations in which pastors could be arrested if their sermons on sexuality can be linked in even the remotest way to acts of violence. For example, if someone hears the biblical description of homosexuality as a sin and uses that message as a reason for acting.

The Alliance Defending Freedom also blasted the “hate-crimes” bill, calling it “another nail in the coffin of the First Amendment.”

“All violent crimes are hate crimes, and all crime victims deserve equal justice,” ADF Senior Legal Counsel Erik Stanley said in a statement. “This law is a grave threat to the First Amendment because it provides special penalties based on what people think, feel or believe.”

Brad Dacus, president of Pacific Justice Institute, testified before Congress against the hate-crimes bill.

“It is fundamentally unjust for the government to treat some crime victims more favorably than others, just because they are homosexual or transsexual,” Dacus said. “This bill is an unnecessary federal intrusion into state law-enforcement authority, and it is an unwise step toward silencing religious and moral viewpoints.

 

 

 

 

Canonized popes declared 'giants of the 20th century'

Banner with images of Popes John Paul II (left), Francis (center) and John XXIII (right)

VATICAN CITY – In a Canonization Mass attended by Pope Benedict XVI, Pope Francis celebrated as saints Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, calling them two giants of the Catholic Church in the 20th century.

In his homily, Pope Francis remembered Pope John Paul II as the “pope of the family,” and John XXIII as the “the “good pope who was the pope of the Holy Spirit.”

Declaring his intention to convene two church conferences or synods to be dedicated to the family – one this October and the other next year – Pope Francis concluded his homily by calling on the two newly declared saints to intercede with God to restore worldwide the sanctity of the family.

Tying together the themes of Easter Sunday that last week began one of the most holy weeks in the history of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis said Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II were sustained through the great tragedies of the 20th century because they were “two brave men, filled with the frankness of the Holy Spirit, who knew the risen Christ bore witness to God’s goodness and mercy.”

Pope Francis celebrated the lives of Pope John XXIII and John Paul II as proving that in the final analysis God in His divine mercy is a forgiving God who “simply loves us all.”

Could Pope Francis be “The Last Pope” in history? Check out the film that explores this explosive prophecy!

Pilgrims poured into Rome on foot by the thousands all day Saturday as Rome police blocked streets in the attempt to control traffic in the Eternal City for Sunday, the historic day when two living popes, Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, joined together to celebrate the Mass of Canonization.

Vatican police opened St. Peter’s Square at 6:00 a.m. on Sunday to those few thousands lucky enough to get front and center for the historic canonization ceremony. Close to a quarter million people managed to get into St. Peter’s Square on a first-come, first-serve basis, and nearly one million lined the entire length of the Via della Conciliazione, stretching from the Vatican to the Castel Saint Angelo on the Tiber River.

Most of the estimated three million who came to Rome to be present when Pope John XIII and Pope Paul II were canonized lined the streets around the Vatican, with many thousands having spent the nigh sleeping in the streets, just to be close to the Vatican during the Canonization Mass.

Throughout Rome, security was tight as Italy’s federal police, the Carabinieri, stood guard openly armed with automatic weapons in front of dozens of hotels housing approximately 100 heads of state who came to Rome to attend the historic event in person.

Strong applause broke out when Pope Benedict XVI appeared in St. Peter’s Square, with his frail image broadcast on the dozens of giant televisions the Vatican positioned in St. Peter’s Square and along the Via della Conciliazione. The crowds applauded again when Pope Francis appeared, looking joyous, filled by the emotion of the moment and the impact of so many Catholic faithful who traveled from around the world just to be present in Rome during the event.

Though rain had been predicted in Rome for Sunday, at most a light drizzle fell intermittently as the ceremony concluded successfully under cloudy skies.

More than 150 bishops and cardinals sat with Pope Benedict XVI as Pope Francis celebrated the Canonization Mass, during which some 600 priests moved into St. Peter’s Square to distribute communion to the Catholic faithful.

2 popes to celebrate sainthood of 2 past pontiffs

VATICAN CITY – The Vatican has never seen this before.

On Sunday, two living popes, the current Pope Francis and his now retired predecessor Pope Benedict XVI, will celebrate a Mass of canonization for two former pontiffs, declaring as saints Pope John Paul XXIII and Pope John Paul II.

WND will livestream the event.

A record-breaking 2 million people are expected to descend upon Rome starting Saturday, hoping to be in St. Peter’s Square to witness the canonization ceremonies in the open piazza in front of St. Peter’s Basilica. The square was filled with half that number for the open-air Mass Francis celebrated Easter Sunday.

To ease gridlock, law enforcement authorities in Rome are planning to set up roadblocks on the edge of the city, allowing only pilgrims on feet and some 2,000 registered tour buses to enter the city limits.

Delegations from more than 90 countries and 24 heads of state are expected to attend Sunday’s double canonization.

More than 150 bishops and cardinals will participate in the Mass celebrated by Pope Francis as part of Sunday’s double canonization ceremony, along with some 600 priests required to administer communion to the Catholic faithful.

As WND reported Thursday, President Obama has sent to represent the United States a delegation of three Democrats with a history of supporting abortion, a move that reflects Obama’s determination to force faith-based groups to pay for abortions and contraception as part of Obamacare.

“I don’t think there’s ever been a canonization of two popes as saints together,” New York’s Cardinal Timothy Dolan said.

“You’ve got a good chunk of humanity who can remember vividly these two men. This is going to be a very vivid way to say that holiness, heroic sanctity, the pursuit of virtue is for today. These are two men, both of whom would say, ‘There’s nothing saintly about me. I’m a sinner. I need God’s grace and mercy.’”

In an unprecedented move, the Vatican announced St. Peter’s Square will be open to the public at 5:30 a.m. Sunday, as local roads in the immediate vicinity of the square will be accessible only by foot.

In another unprecedented move, the Vatican has declined to issue tickets through the local parishes in Rome or to VIPs internationally, meaning all access to St. Peter’s Square will be on a first-come, first-serve basis. All who plan to be in St. Peter’s Square for the canonization ceremonies will be required to pass though metal detectors run by Vatican security in conjunction with civil law enforcement authorities.

Crowds are expected to begin gathering Saturday night, with the most determined of the faithful planning to wait in line all night to be sure they are able to get in to the square.

To deal with the unprecedented crowd, the Vatican has arranged for the some 600 volunteers from all across Italy to be part of a red-uniformed Red Cross task force. The volunteers will be deployed along with 23 special ambulances to deal with critical emergencies, 33 regular ambulances, a mobile reanimation unit, 43 health-care teams on foot, a Code White or pediatric emergency tent and four “Mom Points” for families with small children.

Dedicated websites on Twitter (@CRI_RM) and Facebook have been set up to transmit real-time information and to post alerts dealing with heath and weather emergencies in English, French, Italian, Polish and Spanish.

On Thursday, the first charter flight from Poland arrived at Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci–Fiumicino Airport, carrying 90 pilgrims waving national flags and wearing scarves with the papal symbol. Among them were families from Krakow, Pavianice and Lodz who want to pay tribute to Polish-born John Paul II.

Obama sends pro-abortion delegation to Vatican

President Obama meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican March 27

VATICAN CITY – As the Vatican prepares the canonization ceremonies for Pope John Paul XXIII and Pope John Paul II this Sunday, the unspoken issue dividing the Roman Catholic Church and the White House is President Obama’s determination to force faith-based groups to pay for abortions and contraception as part of Obamacare.

Pope Francis, affirming Catholic doctrine, recently characterized abortion as an “unspeakable crime.”

Obama, nevertheless, is sending to the Vatican a three-person delegation with an activist pro-abortion history to represent the U.S. at the canonizations.

At a Planned Parenthood conference in Washington, D.C., one year ago, President Obama ended his remarks with: “Thank you, Planned Parenthood. God bless you. God bless America,” despite the group’s status as the No. 1 provider of abortions in the U.S.

On April 11, just two weeks after Obama’s meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican, the pope characterized abortion as an “unspeakable crime” in a speech to the Italian pro-life group Moviemento per la Vita, Movement for Life.

“We know human life is sacred and inviolable,” Francis said. “Every civil law is based on the recognition of the first and fundamental right, that to life, which is not subject to any conditions, neither economic nor qualitative nor ideological.”

Characterizing “one of the most serious risks today” as the divorce between economics and morality, Francis strongly supported the rights of the unborn, saying: “It is therefore necessary to reiterate the strongest opposition to any direct attack on life, especially innocent and defenseless life, and the unborn child in the mother’s womb is the innocent par excellence.”

To underscore the fact that he was articulating Roman Catholic doctrine, Francis recalled the words of the Second Vatican Council, saying, “From the moment of conception, life must be guarded with the greatest care while abortion and infanticide are unspeakable crimes.

The White House announced April 11 its delegation to the canonizations Sunday consists of the following:

John Podesta, the former White House chief of staff under Bill Clinton and the current counselor to the president who founded the leftist Washington-based think tank Center for American Progress;
Rep. Xavier Becerra, D-Calif., chairman of the House Democratic Caucus; and
Katie Beirne Fallon, assistant to the president and director of legislative affairs in the White House.

All three are Democrats with a history of supporting abortion as a central issue in the Democratic Party-framed debate over “a woman’s reproductive rights.”

Sally Steenland, the director of the Faith and Progressive Policy Initiative at the Center for American Progress and an outspoken critic of pro-life religious groups, wrote a stinging criticism of faith-based objections to abortion in a Feb. 5 article on the CAP website.

“Anti-choice voices have tried to monopolize morality and God, even as they increasingly jeopardize a woman’s health by making it very difficult for her to get the health care she needs,” Steenland wrote, expressing a Democratic Party theme that has attempted to frame Republicans as opposing “women’s reproductive rights” because of the religious right’s opposition to abortion on moral grounds.

The abortion-rights group NARAL has given Becerra a 100 percent rating for his voting history on abortion issues.

Fallon, a former senior aide to Sen. Charles Schumer , D-N.Y., and a confident to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is widely credited as being a leading strategist in developing the Obamacare rule that requires employers to provide abortion coverage in employer-sponsored health insurance.

‘We didn’t choose this fight’

More than 100 lawsuits have been brought by religious ministries, individuals, organizations and companies against Obamacare on the grounds it violates religious rights by forcing citizens to pay for abortion-causing procedures, even if it violates their beliefs.

The vast majority of the rulings in the lawsuits have favored religious believers, but a federal precedent is expected to be set this year by the U.S. Supreme Court, which accepted a pair of cases.

Oral arguments were heard last month in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. and Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp. v. Sebelius.

Both companies are owned by Christian families.

As WND reported, supporters gathered outside the Supreme Court March 25 to greet the Hahn family, owner of Conestoga Wood, and the Green family, owner of Hobby Lobby, as they gave statements after the court heard oral arguments.

“Rather than sacrifice our obedience to God, my family, the Green family, and many others have chosen to take a stand to defend life and freedom against government coercion,” declared Anthony Hahn, CEO of Conestoga Wood Specialties, a Mennonite.

“We didn’t choose this fight,” Hahn said. “Our families would have been happy to just continue providing good jobs and generous health-care benefits. But the government forced our hand.”

WND reported a federal judge issued an injunction last Friday preventing the federal government from imposing the abortifacient mandate against Dr. James Dobson and his radio ministry, Family Talk.

When the lawsuit was filed last year, Dobson explained his group was suing then-HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius “for forcing or trying to force all of us to give abortifacient medications to our employees, and I just absolutely refuse to do it.’

“We’ll close down before I’ll do it,” he said.

'Obama eligibility source' could 'embarrass' U.S., U.K.

This is the third of three articles examining the criminal defense planned by British barrister Michael Simpson on national security charges in a London jury trial scheduled to begin Nov. 10.

LONDON – Self-proclaimed international intelligence expert Michael Shrimpton plans to launch a vigorous defense on charges of making false claims to British government officials that a terrorist nuclear attack was under way during the 2012 Olympics in London, raising the possibility documents and testimony he plans to subpoena will embarrass the U.K., German and U.S. governments.

As WND reported, Shrimpton, who faces a Nov. 10 trial, also appears in a 2008 video that began re-circulating earlier this year on the Internet in which he claims to have been privy to shocking intelligence information on Obama’s origins. Shrimpton contends to this day that the CIA collected DNA from then-Sen. Obama and a grandparent establishes that Stanley Ann Dunham was not Obama’s biological mother. He intends to subpoena from the CIA and British intelligence any records either agency may have on Obama’s DNA.

WND also reported several British military intelligence sources with a long track record say they are prepared to testify in Shrimpton’s trial.

Former Margaret Thatcher adviser Christopher Monckton told WND in London that the defense Shrimpton launches acting as his own lawyer will open up areas of inquiry that could grant him access to classified documents.

“In the event the government instructs the Crown Prosecution Service to proceed with Shrimpton’s criminal case, the rights of the defendant in a criminal trial are no less than they are in the United States,” Monckton noted. “Mr. Shrimpton is entitled to see just about any documents he asks for, however heavily classified they may be.”

Monckton speculated that one reason Judge Alistair William McCreath at the March 17 hearing in Southwark Crown Court may have postponed Shrimpton’s trial was to give the CPS time to consider dropping the case.

Repeatedly, credible intelligence agents in London and the U.S. who were reluctant to be named cautioned that even if Shrimpton could not prove 100 percent of the claims he makes, the government will have to admit disinformation that was peddled not to alarm citizens about domestic and foreign policy corruption.

Jerome Corsi’s “Where’s the Real Birth Certificate?” untangles the glaring inconsistencies, blackouts and outright fabrications of Barack Obama’s life narrative.

A prominent intelligence expert outside London noted to WND in a private interview that Shrimpton has made claims regarding the prominent U.K. case of the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.

McCann’s disappeared at the age of 3 the evening of May 3, 2007, from her bed in a resort apartment in Portugal, where she was on holiday with her family.

The McCann abduction

In his forthcoming book, “Spyhunter: The Secret History of German Intelligence,” Shrimpton argues McCann’s disappearance was organized by the Deutsche Verteidigungs Dienst, the German Defense Agency, or DVD, a secret intelligence agency Shrimpton says is headquartered near Dachau, Germany. He asserts the kidnapping was in furtherance of a pedophile plot involving top government officials in the U.K. and the European Union.

Shrimpton wrote:

The DVD have no idea how much upset this caused in England. Half the toddlers in the country wanted to know what had happened. Little Madeleine McCann was kidnapped from Praia da Luz Portugal by a DVD pedophile ring on 3rd May 2007. She was selected for sex abuse by a senior official on the European Commission in Brussels. Her photograph, annexed to an e-mail as a jpeg file, was picked up by NSA at the email account (not in his name) by the DVD pedophile ring in Brussels which services the Commission, NATO HQ and the Court of European Justice in Luxembourg and other European institutions. There is a second ring, servicing the Belgian government and bureaucracy.

Shrimpton believes Madeleine McCann was murdered in or about December 2008, after she had been transported by German submarine to pedophile rings operating in Argentina and Chile.

Since 2008, Shrimpton in various published reports has tied EU President Jose Manuel Barroso and former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair to the international pedophile rings that abducted the McCann child.

Pedophilia in the U.K.

Numerous reports published by credible news sources document pedophile rings organized by top EU government officials over the past few years.

In 2010, the Independent in the U.K. reported that at the conclusion of the longest trial in Portugal’s history, during which more than 800 witnesses, including 32 alleged victims, gave testimony, seven defendants were convicted of using orphanages to rape and abuse scores of teenage boys. Among the guilty were Carlos Cruz, a popular television chat-show host with 30 years of show business experience, and Jorge Ritto, a former Portuguese ambassador sent home from Germany in disgrace after Internet postings alleged he had had an improper relationship with a young boy in a park.

On Feb. 22 2013, the Independent reported Tory MP Geoffrey Dickens, in his 16-year career as a conservative in Parliament, had feared for his life after declaring in Parliament for four years that Sir Peter Hayman, a diplomat and MI6 operative, was trading in a U.K. child pornography ring run by gangsters.

In 1983, Dickens campaigned for the outlawing of Hayman’s Pedophile Information Exchange, PIE, claiming the network included “big, big names – people in positions of power, influence and responsibility” that Dickens threatened to expose in Parliament.

The Independent reported that in a debate on child abuse in the House of Commons Nov. 29 1985, Dickens said pedophiles were “evil and dangerous,” adding child pornography generated “vast sums.”

“The noose around my neck grew tighter after I named a former high-flying British diplomat on the floor of the House,” Dickens said. “Honorable members will understand that where big money is involved, and as important names came into my possession, so the threats began. First, I received threatening telephone calls followed by two burglaries at my London home. Then, more seriously, my name appeared on a multi-killer’s hit list.”

Last December, the Daily Mail in London reported Home Office Permanent Secretary Mark Sedwill had launched an investigation into allegations the Voluntary Services Unit of the British government had given thousands of pounds in grants since the 1970s to organizations that posed as charities but were in reality associated with Hayman’s Pedophile Information Exchange, which campaigned openly to legalize child abuse.

Last month, while WND was in London, the McCann case resurfaced in British news with an article published in the Guardian. It reported Scotland Yard was investigating 12 incidents in which a supposed intruder and serial sex criminal entered holiday accommodations in three resort areas, including the one in Portugal where Madeleine McCann went missing in May 2007.

Four of the cases between 2004 and 2006 allegedly involved assaults on girls aged 7 to 10 and one involved two children.

However, the serial sex offender named by Scotland Yard as under investigation by police in Portugal as the lead suspect in the McCann disappearance died in 2009.

Shrimpton maintains the government has advanced the suspect precisely because he is dead. He says the government intends to end the investigation and deflect his argument in his defense that top officials in the U.K. and EU were complicit in the McCann disappearance.

Monckton observed that by forcing Shrimpton to defend himself in a jury trial in November, the Crown Prosecution Service could force disclosure of documents and testimony in a sex scandal that could conceivably involve government officials in the U.K. and the EU, assuming Judge McCreath allows Shrimpton to pursue the topic to establish a factual basis for his suspicions.

Shrimpton faces his own sex-related charges. He is appealing his conviction in a summary court judgment of a criminal misdemeanor charge for having on his computer pornographic images. The images were discovered by British police after government officials in conjunction with filing criminal indictments regarding the 2012 Olympics case seized from his home his computers and electronic equipment.

Shrimpton insists he did not place the images on his computer. He contends the government has no evidence that would link him to the source of the images.

The disappearance of Flight 370

On March 15, Shrimpton published in his blog at VeteransToday.com an article claiming a 636 Kilo class Chinese submarine brought down the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 using a Chinese-made copy of a Hughes Aircraft AIM-54A Phoenix missile, originally supplied to Iran in the 1970s.

The search for the missing Boeing 777 most recently focused on a wide expanse of the Indian Ocean to the west of Australia, but now befuddled searchers say they may have to start the investigation from scratch.

An investigation of past airline disasters suggests Shrimpton’s claim is plausible.

On Sept. 1, 1983, a Korean Airlines jet flying from New York City to Seoul, with a stopover in Anchorage, Alaska, veered off course and appeared to cross into Russian airspace over the Kamchatka Peninsula, where top-secret Soviet military installations were known to be located.

It turned out that the jetliner was brought down over the Sea of Japan by a heat-seeking missile fired by a Soviet fighter jet that failed to make contact with the pilots.

A similar controversy continues regarding the explosion of TWA Fight 800 near East Moriches, N.Y., on July 17, 1997, minutes after taking off from JFK International Airport, which killed all 230 people aboard.

Separate investigations conducted by the FBI and the National Transportation Safety Board concluded the probable cause of the accident was the explosion of flammable fuel vapors in a short-circuited fuel tank.

Pierre Salinger, former press secretary for President John F. Kennedy, maintained at the time he had obtained from an undisclosed intelligence source in France documentary evidence that TWA 800 was shot down by a missile.

Salinger’s argument was buttressed by a photograph showing what appears to be a missile in the sky at the time the Boeing 747 exploded, taken by Linda Kabot from an outdoor deck of a restaurant in East Quoque, N.Y.

In their 2003 WND-published book “First Strike: TWA Flight 800 and the Attack on America,” investigative reporter Jack Cashill and co-author James Sanders argued TWA 800 was brought down by a missile. One theory is that it was accidentally hit by a U.S. Navy missile during routine maneuvers.

Cashill told WND he sees parallels between TWA 800 and Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

“In 95 percent or more of all airline crashes, there is little mystery about what happened,” Cashill said. “There are so many ways that distress is communicated. When all those ways are negated, as was the case with the Malaysia Airline 370 and TWA 800, the objective observer has to be suspicious.”

Cashill explained that while he might not agree with Shrimpton that the Chinese intentionally shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, he remained suspicious the Chinese might have shot down the airliner accidentally and were seeking to cover-up the incident.

“The TWA Flight 800 investigation taught us that governments are willing and able to conceal a friendly fire missile disaster,” he said. “I would not rule out an accidental Chinese shoot down as the cause of Malaysian Airlines Flight 370’s demise.”

'Obama eligibility source' challenges U.K. gov't

Michael Shrimpton

This is the second of three articles examining the criminal defense planned by British barrister Michael Shrimpton on national security charges in a London jury trial scheduled to begin Nov. 10.

LONDON – Several British military intelligence sources with a long track record say they are prepared to testify in the trial of a barrister charged with allegedly making false claims to British government officials that a terrorist nuclear attack was under way during the 2012 Olympics in London.

As WND reported, Michael Shrimpton, who faces a Nov. 10 trial, also appears in a 2008 video that began re-circulating earlier this year on the Internet in which he claims to have been privy to shocking intelligence information on Obama’s origins. Shrimpton contends to this day that the CIA collected DNA from then-Sen. Obama and a grandparent, establishing that Stanley Ann Dunham was not Obama’s biological mother. He intends to subpoena from the CIA and British intelligence any records either agency may have on Obama’s DNA.

After a March 17 hearing in the London case, WND met in the U.K. with British intelligence experts who were asked to evaluate Shrimpton and his defense.

Evaluating the case

Christopher Monckton, a former aide to British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and a WND columnist, said he believes Shrimpton was acting in good faith when he made the terror-threat report to the British government.

“My best guess is that the government will eventually see the sense in dropping the criminal prosecution against Shrimpton, since it is quite clear from my own earlier discussions with Shrimpton about this episode that he genuinely believed that terrorists had obtained a redundant German submarine and were planning to sail it up the Thames and blow up the Olympics with a nuclear weapon,” Monckton said in an interview with WND in London.

Glaring inconsistencies, blackouts and outright fabrications in Barack Obama’s life narrative have generated widespread doubts about his presidential eligibility — Jerome Corsi’s “Where’s the Real Birth Certificate?” sets the record straight.

“It was entirely clear from my discussions with Michael that he was trying to do the right thing, and the authorities do not, in the end, want to deter people from making reports that might prevent mass murder on a horrific scale,” Monckton said.

After reviewing court filings Shrimpton had prepared in his defense, Monckton concluded Shrimpton has legitimate contacts in the military intelligence community. Monckton considers it possible that at trial Shrimpton could subpoena classified documents and expert testimony that would support his various claims.

“However, it is also possible that the government may be stupid enough to try to proceed with the case,” he cautioned.

Particularly problematic for the prosecution, according to Monckton, could be Shrimpton’s charges that the CIA conducted DNA tests on Barack Obama in 2008 that Shrimpton alleges prove Ann Dunham was not Obama’s natural mother.

“If Shrimpton were to be shown a CIA document indicating that a DNA test had been done on Mr. Obama, there would be some stringent conditions of confidentiality,” Monckton said.

“Shrimpton would probably not be allowed to have a copy of the document, but would be required to read it in the presence of an agent.”

British law

Monckton stressed that Shrimpton will not have to prove at trial that he was precisely correct in every aspect of his reporting to the government of a perceived threat. But he will have to establish that he has legitimate intelligence sources. Also, his charges, while appearing initially outrageous to many, cannot be dismissed without serious investigation, Monckton said.

In the final analysis, if Shrimpton can establish his competence in the intelligence field and present reason to believe his information was true, then it is hard to see how the government can convict Shrimpton.

That Shrimpton in his various writings makes various claims that are later shown to have been factually incorrect will not be sufficient to establish his guilt under Section 51(2) of the Criminal Law Act 1977, a statute written to punish those who deliberately carry out hoaxes.

Section 51(2) of the Criminal Law Act 1977, written to apply to bomb hoaxes, reads as follows:

“A person who communicates any information which he knows or believes to be false to another person with the intention of inducing in him or any other person a false belief that a bomb or other thing liable to explode or ignite is present in any place or location whatever is guilty of an offence.”

A person convicted of a criminal offense under the hoax law in Crown Court is subject to up to seven years in prison.

The law, however, carries a high threshold for establishing guilt, as noted by British legal commentator Allen Green in TheLawyer.com blog.

Green said the Crown “would have to discharge a high burden of evidential proof to convict under this offence: They have to show beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant intended to induce in another person a false belief that a bomb or other thing liable to explode or ignite is present.”

“Unless the prosecution can show this then the defendant cannot be convicted,” he said.

Prosecuted for a tweet

Perhaps the most famous case that could have been tried under Section 51(2) of the Criminal Law Act 1977 was a bomb threat posted on Twitter on Jan. 10, 2010, by Paul John Chambers. The tweet was sent in frustration that Robin Hood Airport near Doncaster, South Yorkshire, was closed due to a snowstorm.

Chambers had hoped to fly to Belfast, Ireland, to meet a girlfriend he had met on Twitter. He tweeted: “Crap! Robin Hood Airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your sh** together, otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!”

As the case developed, Chambers was found guilty of a misdemeanor under Section 127(1) of the Communications Act of 2003 that prohibits sending “by means of a public electronic communications network a message or other matter that is grossly offensive of an indecent, obscene or menacing character.”

In May 2010, Chambers was convicted by district judge Jonathan Bennett of the Doncaster magistrates court and fined 1,000 British pounds. However, the conviction was overturned on appeal two years later.

The London Guardian reported the Crown Prosecution Service was criticized by various members of Parliament for having wasted public money on a joke and putting Chambers, aged 27 at the time of his appeal, through two and a half years of serious stress.

How realistic are threats of nuclear terrorism?

On March 23, while WND was in London, the U.K.’s Mirror newspaper published an article titled “Al-Qaida target Premier League matches and sporting events attended by Queen in chilling online magazine.”

The article explained recent online postings by al-Qaida operatives have heightened security concerns that a wave of British “lone wolf” jihadists fresh from battlegrounds in Syria may be plotting murderous terrorist attacks on horse races watched by the Queen as well as prominent soccer games and tennis matches.

“Security surrounding the monarch was tonight stepped up after al-Qaida chiefs urged terrorists to blow up sports events she is most likely to go and see,” the Mirror reported.

The British paper said an article by the English-language online magazine ‘Inspire,’ produced by the terror group, gives tips on car bombing and disguises, and identifies potential high-profile targets around the globe.

The Inspire article, by an author calling himself the AQ Chef, says: “In the beginning of summer we have Cheltenham and [at] the end of the summer we have Epsom, whereby horse races are attended by thousands from around the kingdom including the Queen.”

Accompanying the article in the Mirror was a comment by Col. Richard Kemp, former director of international terrorist intelligence for the Investigative Intelligence Agency COBRA

“Major sporting events have long been on al-Qaida’s list of targets,” Kemp wrote.

“Huge crowds in packed stadiums can make security checks very difficult and lead to mass casualties. When televised live they give the terrorists what they want – footage that will be beamed around the world. Although Inspire’s authors know getting the chance of getting near the Queen are remote, they realize attacking a venue where she is present will be huge news.”

Two days later, President Obama, while attending the 2014 Nuclear Security Summit in the Hague, Netherlands, said at a news conference that he was more worried about a terrorist nuclear weapon being detonated in Manhattan than he was concerned about Russian intentions in Ukraine.

“So my response then continues to be what I believe today, which is: Russia’s actions are a problem, but they don’t pose the number one national security threat to the United States,” Obama said. “I continue to be much more concerned when it comes to our security with the prospect of a nuclear weapon going off in Manhattan.”

While the reports don’t confirm Shrimpton’s specific accusations, they indicate a terrorist nuclear attack on London during the Olympics was a legitimate security concern.

In the 2005 WND-published book “Atomic Iran: How the Terrorist Regime Bought the Bomb and American Politicians,” the author of this article devoted the largest part of a chapter to explaining how a terrorist group could smuggle an improvised nuclear device into New York City and detonate it with catastrophic consequences.

‘I was in the building myself’

Outside London, WND was introduced by Shrimpton to a British military intelligence expert who is listed as a prosecution witness in Shrimpton’s trial.

The credentials of the source, who asked not to be identified, have been verified by WND, stretching back to Germany in the pre-World War II era.

The source said the judge in Shrimpton’s trial will have to provide an opportunity for testimony in closed session if he is to be questioned about classified intelligence information he believes would be helpful to Shrimpton’s case.

He told WND that he believed Shrimpton was correct in fearing a terrorist nuclear attack was being planned to take place during the 2012 Olympics in London. However, he begged off affirming the nuclear weapon in question was stolen from the submerged Russian submarine Kursk.

He also backed up a further claim Shrimpton made that a secret German intelligence operation known as the Deutsche Verteidigungs Dienst, or German Defense Service, known as DVD, exists and operates in buildings located close to the site of the former Nazi concentration camp in Dachau, Germany.

“I have been in the DVD headquarters building myself, and I am willing to so testify under oath in court,” the intelligence source told WND.

Subsequent to the meeting, Shrimpton addressed a March 24 email to the Crown Prosecution Service in which he wrote:

This is to advise you as a courtesy that (name deleted) was gracious enough to accept a luncheon invitation from Dr. Corsi and myself over the weekend. He is not of course on the ‘no contact’ list. The venue was (location deleted).

During the luncheon (name deleted) was gracious enough to confirm in Dr. Corsi’s presence and hearing that a nuclear warhead HAD been inserted into London in 2012, i.e. that my intelligence briefing to the Secretary of State, qualified as it was, was essentially accurate. Commodore English has already confirmed of course in his witness statement that the DVD exists and that he has visited its HQ in Dachau.

In my opinion these statements fairly reflect the state of opinion amongst senior members of the Intelligence Community.

The CPS did not respond to WND inquiries asking whether the prosecution intended to call source to testify.

Confidential sources

Over the course of 10 days in the U.K., WND witnessed repeated instances in which credible military intelligence agents telephoned Shrimpton to give him inside information regarding current developments in British politics and in matters of foreign affairs.

“The great problem in what I do,” Shrimpton explained, “is that intelligence sources provide me with information on the condition I use them as background sources only, keeping their names out of the press.

“If I violate this trust, I risk the informant might deny my report while cutting me off from any further information the source might otherwise have been willing to leak to the public through me.”

Intelligence experts WND interviewed were unanimous that Shrimpton at trial would have to find a way to disclose key sources to the judge and jury.

During the hearing in Judge McCreath’s court on March 17, Shrimpton read a list of witnesses he wished to call in his defense, without identifying his reasons for selecting each one.

In doing so, Shrimpton made McCreath aware that provisions may have to be made at trial to examine classified documents Shrimpton planned to subpoena and to take the testimony of credible military intelligence experts with top-secret information behind closed doors.

In the approximately 20 minutes Shrimpton took to make this pleading to the court, McCreath in each instance instructed Shrimpton to put his request in writing, promising a ruling on the requests “at the appropriate time.”

Obama's origins resurface at intel expert's trial

Michael Shrimpton

This is the first of three articles examining the criminal defense planned by British barrister Michael Shrimpton on national security charges in a London jury trial scheduled to begin Nov. 10.

LONDON – In a nearly empty courtroom at the Southwerk Crown Court by the historic London Bridge, a hearing took place in a criminal case that not only has national security implications for the United Kingdom, but, curiously, is woven into the increasingly bizarre fabric of the controversy over Barack Obama’s presidential eligibility.

When it came his time to speak, defendant Michael Shrimpton, a middle-aged London barrister by profession and self-proclaimed intelligence expert, politely issued to the judge a series of interrogatories that made clear he plans to launch a vigorous defense, representing himself before the court.

The criminal charges brought by the British government against Shrimpton under Section 51(2) of the Criminal Law Act 1977 accuse him of falsely notifying the British government to prepare for a terrorist nuclear attack on the 2012 Olympics in London that the British government claims had no basis in reality.

It’s the same Michael Shrimpton who appears in a 2008 video that began re-circulating earlier this year on the Internet in which he claims to have been privy to shocking intelligence information on Obama’s origins. Shrimpton contends to this day that the CIA collected DNA from then-Sen. Obama and a grandparent, establishing that Stanley Ann Dunham was not Obama’s biological mother.

The video naturally has raised questions about Shrimpton’s credibility and his qualifications to make such an extraordinary claim.

Glaring inconsistencies, blackouts and outright fabrications in Barack Obama’s life narrative have generated widespread doubts about his presidential eligibility — Jerome Corsi’s “Where’s the Real Birth Certificate?” sets the record straight.

Meanwhile, Shrimpton has been indicted for having telephoned in 2012 the secretary of state for defense in London and declaring that a nuclear weapon stolen from the Russian submarine Kursk that sank in the Barents Sea on Aug. 12, 2000, had been smuggled into Britain.

Shrimpton said the smugglers were agents of a top-secret German intelligence agency that intended to detonate the weapon to cause massive damage and murder members of the Royal family and top government officials attending the London Olympics.

Postponed trial

On March 17, in a courtroom devoid of news media except for WND, a short-tempered Senior Circuit Judge Alistair William McCreath, a resident judge based at Southwark Crown Court, surprised the Crown Prosecution Service and the defense by postponing Shrimpton’s trial until Nov. 10.

It was originally scheduled to begin that day.

The postponement meant any issues Shrimpton wants to pursue in his defense will not be aired in court until after the November mid-term elections in the U.S.

Government intelligence experts on both sides of the Atlantic marginalized Shrimpton as a loud-mouthed nuisance and gadfly who lacks professional credentials as an intelligence expert. But McCreath, nevertheless, dismissed a prosecution motion to order Shrimpton to undergo a psychiatric examination, making it clear a trial on the merits would take place.

Shrimpton was born in RAF Hospital Ely on March 9, 1957, to an RAF officer father and a Welsh mother. He was schooled in Wales one year then in Australia, beginning in 1964. He earned a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of Queensland in Australia in 1976 and from the University College Cardiff at the University of Wales in 1981. He attended the Inns of Court School of Law in 1982 and 1983, and was called to the Bar in 1983.

His biography, while admirable in its educational achievements, irreparably placed Shrimpton outside the British social classes from which the most distinguished professional intelligence agents and lawyers have traditionally been recruited. Most come from the upper classes of British society with pedigrees and sufficient financial resources to be educated at boarding schools such as Eton, followed by university studies at Oxford or Cambridge.

Although Shrimpton has never held an official government job, he has published in a peer-reviewed intelligence publication, the Journal of International Security Affairs. The editor at the time of Shrimpton’s publication was the late U.S. Ambassador Harvey Feldman, perhaps best known for the role he played in helping plan President Nixon’s 1972 visit to China.

Shrimpton is the author of an upcoming book, “Spyhunter: The Secret of German Intelligence,” which is being finalized now for publication in the U.K. this week.

Confirming military satellite intelligence?

Shrimpton intends to defend himself in a November jury trial by demanding to see specific intelligence information he believes will exonerate him.

In a document shared with WND that Shrimpton submitted to the court in his defense, he put CPS prosecutors on notice that he intends to subpoena radar signature readings taken by U.S. military satellites.

In particular, Shrimpton wants to obtain readings from U.S. intelligence satellites involved in the KH-13 satellite surveillance program operated by the NRO, the highly secretive U.S. National Reconnaissance Office headquartered in unincorporated Fairfax County, Va., two miles south of Dulles International Airport. It operates as one of 16 U.S. intelligence agencies that along with the CIA, the National Security Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency is considered one of the “big five” of U.S. intelligence agencies.

Shrimpton believes readings from U.S. military intelligence satellites operating in low orbit between 2200 hours GMT and 0100 on April 20 through 21, 2011, downloaded to a ground station near Fort Belvoir, Va., will indicate a source of weapons-grade plutonium was adjacent to, and then on, the Blackwater River Estuary in Essex.

“This Satellite Intelligence (SATINT) is consistent with reporting of a viable IND [Improvised Nuclear Device] being removed from the U.K. by a German SSD [State Security Department],” Shrimpton’s brief to the court claims. “The SATINT would have been made available to GCHQ [British General Communications Headquarters] as a matter of course under the UKUSA (originally BRUSA) Intelligence Treaty and on balance is probably being withheld from the CPS, the defense, and the court.”

Nuclear weapon stolen from Kursk?

In London, WND interviewed John Large, head of Large and Associates Consulting Engineers, a group with established nuclear expertise that had been contracted by the Russian government for advice on how best to salvage the Kursk submarine.

“With the salvage of the Kursk, the Russian Federation took the standard government line of refusing to confirm or deny the presence of nuclear weapons on board, but there were six nuclear weapons on board when the submarine went down,” Large told WND.

“My work was to set up the procedure assuming nuclear weapons were on board, and the Russian Federation implemented the procedures we devised based on the malfunction of a weapon with its conventional charge being released.”

Large said the submarine had been at the bottom of the sea for a year, and two of the weapons silos housing the nuclear-tipped weapons were at the front, near the site of the explosion that sank the vessel.

WND asked Large if all the nuclear weapons were on board the submarine when the salvage operations took place.

“We have no idea,” Large responded. “We assumed the nuclear weapons were on board.”

He said the submarine sank in 110 meters of water, or 360 feet, and the Russians had a guard ship above the location from the moment the submarine sank.

“Because of weather, the guard ship may have run for shelter three or four times during the year when the Kursk was sunk,” he said. “It would be difficult at that depth to do a submarine recovery given the shallowness of the sea there, but you certainly could do a surface recovery if you had saturation divers. But again, a surface ship would be immediately spotted by the Russian Federation.”

Still, Large explained to WND that he and his staff were not present during Russian Federation recovery efforts.

“We worked very closely with the Russian Federation during the Kursk salvage operations, so we assumed and we were never challenged that the nuclear weapons were still on board,” he said.

“But if I were to testify in Michael Shrimpton’s case, I couldn’t say if any of the nuclear weapons were missing or not missing when the Kursk was recovered, because I wasn’t there to observe it.”

Large concluded the interview by saying he was surprised the CPS was going forward with the prosecution.

Large also had no explanation for why the judge postponed the case until November. However, he speculated that the judge may have wanted to give the prosecution time to consider whether or not prosecuting Shrimpton in a public jury trial and allowing him to launch a defense was really in the British government’s national security interest.

While he was doubtful a nuclear weapon had been stolen from the Kursk while submerged, Large cautioned that terrorists could have obtained a nuclear weapon in the chaos that occasioned the end of the Soviet Union.

“Iran could also have a nuclear weapon anytime Iran wants one,” Large also said. “With Iran making rapid progress toward a nuclear weapon, the probability of a terrorist nuclear attack is a realistic risk. Iran could get a nuclear weapon today, if Iran wants, from North Korea or rogue elements in Pakistan.”

Secret German intelligence group?

WND traveled to Marlborough Wiltshire west of London to meet with distinguished retired British Intelligence officer Lt. Col. Dr. Harry Beckhough, MBE, who Shrimpton plans to call as a defense witness via video link from Newbury Magistrates Court. Advanced age has limited Beckthough’s mobility.

Among Beckhough’s many career achievements are having worked as a code-breaker at Bletchley Park during World War II and having served with the British 8th Army in the World War II campaign in North Africa. His duties included working on Lt. Gen. Thomas Montgomery’s intelligence staff with the assignment to break Nazi Gen. Erwin Rommel’s military codes.

Beckhough presented WND two books he has authored, one titled “Germany’s Four Reichs” and the other “Germany’s Fourth Reich,” in which he documented the rise a secret German intelligence agency. The Deutsche Verteidigungs Dienst, the DVD, or German Defense Agency, he said, was created as a post-World War II continuance of the Nazi Abwehr military intelligence organization operated by Admiral Wilhelm Franz Canaris.

Beckhough told WND he was willing to testify at Shrimpton’s trial that the DVD continues to operate from its headquarters outside Dachau as a secret German military intelligence operation.

Obama’s birth story

In the U.S., Shrimpton recently has drawn attention with the re-circulation of a video that shows him claiming that the CIA collected DNA from Obama and a grandparent in 2008 as Obama was running for president.

See the Shrimpton video:

Shrimpton says he was informed that Obama was born in Mombasa, Kenya, in about 1960, which means, he said, the information sits in British intelligence files, because that territory was under the British Empire at the time.

Shrimpton alleged that through DNA tests conducted during Obama’s initial presidential campaign, the CIA established Stanley Ann Dunham was not Obama’s biological mother.

He said Dunham was not pregnant in July 1961, yet it is claimed that she gave birth to Barack Obama Jr. on Aug. 4, 1961.

Shrimpton said it was his understanding that the DNA samples were collected at a fundraising dinner from water glasses that were bagged after the dinner.

However, Stanley Ann Dunham’s father, Stanley Amour Dunham, died in 1992. Her mother, Madelyn Dunham, died of cancer Nov. 2, 2008, and was not know to have made public appearances in Obama’s campaign, though she did turn up briefly in an April 2008 Obama TV commercial. A TV news report on the commercial by Honolulu’s KITV said Madelyn Dunham had tried to stay out of the campaign and declined formal interviews. When a KITV reporter reached her by phone, she said she hadn’t seen the commercial and was surprised to learn she was in it.

See the KITV report:

In conversations with WND, nevertheless, Shrimpton doubled down on the claims he made in 2008 by asserting that NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, as part of his negotiations to leave Hong Kong, agreed to deliver to Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow the classified U.S. military intelligence file on Obama’s DNA.

Shrimpton made clear he intends to subpoena from the CIA and from British intelligence any records either agency may have on Obama’s DNA.

“I intend to stand by my allegations regarding the Obama birth certificate, knowing that U.S. intelligence agencies will prefer to characterize me as crazy and delusional rather than admit the CIA has the files I believe they have on Obama DNA,” Shrimpton insisted.

Feds monitor Boston Marathon for nuclear attack

NEW YORK – The federal government is conducting radiation tests at the site of the Boston Marathon as part of its emergency preparedness for a nuclear attack.

The National Nuclear Security Administration, NNSA, issued a statement Wednesday explaining a helicopter will be flying at low altitudes over the city Friday through Sunday to measure naturally occurring radiation to establish baseline levels, which is “a normal part of security and emergency preparedness.” The marathon is scheduled for Monday.

On March 25, President Obama, https://www.nss2014.com/en while attending the 2014 Nuclear Security Summit in The Hague, Netherlands, said he was more worried about a terrorist nuclear weapon being detonated in Manhattan than about Russian intentions in Ukraine.

“So my response then continues to be what I believe today, which is: Russia’s actions are a problem, but they don’t pose the number one national security threat to the United States,” Obama explained. “I continue to be much more concerned when it comes to our security with the prospect of a nuclear weapon going off in Manhattan.”

In 2005, WND published “Atomic Iran: How the Terrorist Regime Bought the Bomb and American Politicians,” which explained how a terrorist group with ties to the Iranian nuclear weapons program could smuggle an improvised nuclear device into New York City and detonate it with catastrophic consequences.

At last year’s Boston Marathon, two pressure-cooker bombs exploded, killing three people and injuring an estimated 264. The suspects were two Muslim brothers from Chechnya, Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

The NNSA announcement warned residents that a helicopter “may be seen flying at low altitudes while the radiation assessment is conducted and will cover approximately 10 square miles.”

NISA describes itself as a semi-autonomous agency, established in 2000 within the U.S. Department of Energy, responsible for enhancing natural security through the military application of nuclear science.

The Weekly Standard noted the U.S. Government Accountability Office, GAO, issued a report in 2006 that found “significant benefits” to the type of radiation survey NISA is planning for Boston.

The surveys can be used to help compare changes in radiation levels to “help detect radiological threats in U.S. cities more quickly” and “measure contamination levels after a radiological attack to assist in and reduce the costs of cleanup efforts.”

Without a baseline radiation survey, the GAO explained, cleanup crews would not know the extent to which they would have to decontaminate the area.

The GAO report noted that in 2006 the only U.S. city to have conducted an aerial radiation survey was New York City, where in 2005, the New York Police Department asked DOE to conduct a survey of the New York City metropolitan area at a cost of $800,000.