Case 330 - Suez-Lyonnaise Des Eaux (SLDE)

Suez-Lyonnaise Des Eaux (SLDE), now named just Suez is a leading French-based multinational corporation headquartered in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, with operations primarily in water, electricity and natural gas supply, and waste management. Suez was result of a 1997 merger between the Compagnie de Suez and Lyonnaise des Eaux, a leading French water company. In the early 2000s Suez also owned some media and telecommunications assets, but has since divested these. According to the Masons Water Yearbook 2004/5, Suez served 117.4 million people around the world. The company conducted a merger of equals with fellow utility company Gaz de France on 22 July 2008 to form GDF Suez. The water and waste assets of Suez were spun off into a separate publicly-traded company, Suez Environnement.



The privatization of water has had a disastrous impact on the human right to clean water, and the French company Suez is the worst perpetrator of this abuse. The company’s billions of dollars in profit come at the expense of poor people living in countries where thousands lack access to potable water, and, because of private water contracts, are also facing skyrocketing water prices.

Suez goes by many names around the world-<>Ondeo, SITA and others-to mask its worldwide net of controversial activities. In Manila, Philippines, after seven years of water privatization under a Suez company (Maynilad Water) contract, studies showed that water rates increased in some neighborhoods by 400 to 700 percent. These studies also showed that the negligence of the company resulted in cholera and gastroenteritis outbreaks that killed six people and severely sickened 725 in Manila’s Tondo district.

In Bolivia, a Suez company (Aguas de Illimani) left 200,000 people without access to water and caused a revolt when it tried to charge between $335 and $445 to connect a private home to the water supply. Countless people were unable to afford this charge in a country whose yearly per capita GDP is $915.

Unfortunately, the IMF and World Bank are playing a key role in pushing water privatization all over the world. Many countries have been required to open up their water supply to private companies as a condition for receiving IMF loans, and the World Bank has approved millions of dollars in loans for the privatization of water systems.

CASE 329 - False flags

"False flag terrorism" occurs when elements within a government / corporation or even the elite stage a secret operation whereby the banks or government forces pretend to be a targeted enemy while attacking their own forces or people. The attack is then falsely blamed on the enemy in order to justify going to war against that enemy.



False flag operations are covert operations conducted by governments, corporations, or other organizations, which are designed to deceive the public in such a way that the operations appear as if they are being carried out by other entities. The name is derived from the military concept of flying false colors; that is, flying the flag of a country other than one's own. False flag operations are not limited to war and counter-insurgency operations, and have been used in peace-time; for example, during Italy's strategy of tension. The term comes from the old days of wooden ships, when one ship would hang the flag of its enemy before attacking another ship in its own navy. Because the enemy's flag was hung instead of the flag of the real country of the attacking ship, it was called a "false flag" attack. There are many examples of false flag attacks throughout history. For example, it is widely known that the Nazis, in Operation Himmler, faked attacks on their own people and resources which they blamed on the Poles, to justify the invasion of Poland. And it has now been persuasively argued — as shown, for example, in this History Channel video — that Nazis set fire to their own parliament, the Reichstag, and blamed that fire on others. The Reichstag fire was the watershed event which justified Hitler's seizure of power and suspension of liberties.



And in the early 1950s, agents of an Israeli terrorist cell operating in Egypt planted bombs in several buildings, including U.S. diplomatic facilities, then left behind "evidence" implicating the Arabs as the culprits (one of the bombs detonated prematurely, allowing the Egyptians to identify the bombers). Israel's Defense Minister was brought down by the scandal, along with the entire Israeli government. Click here for verification.

The Russian KGB apparently conducted a wave of bombings in Russia in order to justify war against Chechnya and put Vladimir Putin into power (see also this essay and this report). And the Turkish government has been caught bombing its own and blaming it on a rebel group to justify a crackdown on that group. Muslim governments also play this game. For example, the well-respected former Indonesian president claimed that their government had a role in the Bali bombings.

CASE 328 - Tourism

Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people who "travel to and stay in places outside their usual environment for more than twenty-four (24) hours and not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes not related to the exercise of an activity remunerated from within the place visited."
Tourism has become a popular global leisure activity. In 2010, there were over 940 million international tourist arrivals, with a growth of 6.6% as compared to 2009. International tourism receipts grew to US$919 billion (euro 693 billion) in 2010, corresponding to an increase in real terms of 4.7%. As a result of the late-2000s recession, international travel demand suffered a strong slowdown beginning in June 2008, with growth in international tourism arrivals worldwide falling to 2% during the boreal summer months. This negative trend intensified during 2009, exacerbated in some countries due to the outbreak of the H1N1 influenza virus, resulting in a worldwide decline of 4% in 2009 to 880 million international tourists arrivals, and an estimated 6% decline in international tourism receipts.



Tourism is vital for many countries, such as France, Egypt, Greece, Lebanon, Israel, United States, Spain, Italy,and Thailand, and many island nations, such as The Bahamas, Fiji, Maldives, Philippines and the Seychelles, due to the large intake of money for businesses with their goods and services and the opportunity for employment in the service industries associated with tourism. These service industries include transportation services, such as airlines, cruise ships and taxicabs, hospitality services, such as accommodations, including hotels and resorts, and entertainment venues, such as amusement parks, casinos, shopping malls, music venues and theatres.



Wealthy people have always traveled to distant parts of the world, to see great buildings, works of art, learn new languages, experience new cultures and to taste different cuisines. Long ago, at the time of the Roman Republic, places such as Baiae were popular coastal resorts for the rich. The word tourism was used by 1811 and tourist by 1840. In 1936, the League of Nations defined foreign tourist as "someone traveling abroad for at least twenty-four hours". Its successor, the United Nations, amended this definition in 1945, by including a maximum stay of six months, but it wasn't until the 60's when the working class could hop on a plane and soak up the beaches of torremolinos, Costa brava, Marbella, san tropez, Ibiza.

Leisure travel

Leisure travel was associated with the Industrial Revolution in the United Kingdom – the first European country to promote leisure time to the increasing industrial population. Initially, this applied to the owners of the machinery of production, the economic oligarchy, the factory owners and the traders. These comprised the new middle class. Cox & Kings was the first official travel company to be formed in 1758.
The British origin of this new industry is reflected in many place names. In Nice, France, one of the first and best-established holiday resorts on the French Riviera, the long esplanade along the seafront is known to this day as the Promenade des Anglais; in many other historic resorts in continental Europe, old, well-established palace hotels have names like the Hotel Bristol, the Hotel Carlton or the Hotel Majestic – reflecting the dominance of English customers.
Many leisure-oriented tourists travel to the tropics, both in the summer and winter. Places of such nature often visited are: Bali in Indonesia, Colombia, Brazil, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Malaysia, Mexico the various Polynesian tropical islands, Queensland in Australia, Thailand, Saint-Tropez and Cannes in France, Florida, Hawaii and Puerto Rico in the United States, Barbados, Sint Maarten, Saint Kitts and Nevis, The Bahamas, Anguilla, Antigua, Aruba, Turks and Caicos Islands and Bermuda.

Winter tourism

Although it is acknowledged that the Swiss were not the inventors of skiing it is well documented that St. Moritz, Graubünden, became the cradle of the developing winter tourism: Since that year of 1865 in St. Moritz, many daring hotel managers choose to risk opening their hotels in winter but it was only in the seventies of the 20th century when winter tourism took over the lead from summer tourism in many of the Swiss ski resorts. Even in Winter, portions of up to one third of all guests (depending on the location) consist of non-skiers.
Major ski resorts are located mostly in the various European countries (e.g. Andorra, Austria, Bulgaria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Norway, Poland, Serbia, Sweden, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland), Canada, the United States (e.g. Colorado, California, Utah, Montana, Wyoming, New York, New Jersey, Michigan, Vermont) New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Chile, Argentina, Kenya and Tanzania.

Mass tourism

High rise hotels such as these in Benidorm, Spain, were built across Southern Europe in the 1960s and 1970s to accommodate mass tourism from Northern Europe.
Mass tourism could only have developed with the improvements in technology, allowing the transport of large numbers of people in a short space of time to places of leisure interest, so that greater numbers of people could begin to enjoy the benefits of leisure time.

In the United States, the first seaside resorts in the European style were at Atlantic City, New Jersey and Long Island, New York.
In Continental Europe, early resorts included: Blackpool, Brighton and scarborough in the UK and Ostend, popularised by the people of Brussels; Boulogne-sur-Mer (Pas-de-Calais) and Deauville (Calvados) for the Parisians; and Heiligendamm, founded in 1793, as the first seaside resort on the Baltic Sea. The future of tourism, is said to be Space tourism

CASE 327 - The history of Poland

The History of Poland is rooted in the arrival of the Slavs, who gave rise to permanent settlement and historic development on Polish lands. During the Piast dynasty Christianity was adopted in 966 and medieval monarchy established. The Jagiellon dynasty period brought close ties with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, cultural development and territorial expansion, culminating in the establishment of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569.
The Commonwealth in its early phase constituted a continuation of the Jagiellon prosperity. From the mid-17th century, the huge state entered a period of decline caused by devastating wars and deterioration of the country's system of government. Significant internal reforms were introduced during the later part of the 18th century, but the reform process was not allowed to run its course, as the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia and the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy through a series of invasions and partitions terminated the Commonwealth's independent existence in 1795.
From then until 1918 there was no independent Polish state. The Poles had engaged intermittently in armed resistance until 1864. After the failure of the last uprising, the nation preserved its identity through educational uplift and the program called "organic work" to modernize the economy and society. The opportunity for freedom appeared only after World War I, when the partitioning imperial powers were defeated by war and revolution.



The Second Polish Republic was established and existed from 1918 to 1939. It was destroyed by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union by their Invasion of Poland at the beginning of World War II. Millions of Polish citizens perished in the course of the Nazi occupation. The Polish government in exile kept functioning and through the many Polish military formations on the western and eastern fronts the Poles contributed to the Allied victory. Nazi Germany's forces were compelled to retreat from Poland as the Soviet Red Army advanced, which led to the creation of the People's Republic of Poland.
The country's geographic location was shifted to the west and Poland existed as a Soviet satellite state. Poland largely lost its traditional multi-ethnic character and the communist system was imposed. By the late 1980s Solidarity, a Polish reform movement, became crucial in causing a peaceful transition from a communist state to the capitalist system and parliamentary democracy. This process resulted in the creation of the modern Polish state.

CASE 326 - LulzSec

Lulz Security, commonly abbreviated as LulzSec, is a 6 man computer hacker group that claims responsibility for several high profile attacks, including the compromise of user accounts from Sony Pictures in 2011. The group also claimed responsibility for taking the CIA website offline. The group has been described as a "cyber terrorism group" by the Arizona Department of Public Safety after their systems were compromised and information leaked. Other security professionals have applauded LulzSec for drawing attention to insecure systems and the dangers of password reuse. It has gained attention due to its high profile targets and the sarcastic messages it has posted in the aftermath of its attacks.

At just after midnight (BST) on 26 June 2011, LulzSec released a "50 days of lulz" statement, which they claimed to be their final release, confirming that LulzSec consisted of six members, and that their website is to be taken down. This breaking up of the group was unexpected. The release included accounts and passwords from many different sources. Despite claims of retirement, the group committed another hack against newspapers owned by News Corporation on 18 July, defacing them with false reports regarding the death of Rupert Murdoch. London Metropolitan Police have announced the arrests of two teenagers they allege are LulzSec members T-flow and Topiary. The group helped launch Operation AntiSec, a joint effort involving LulzSec, Anonymous, and other hackers.




Overview

LulzSec draws its name from the neologism "Lulz", (from LOLs), "laughing out loud", which often signifies laughter at the victim of a prank, and "Sec," short for "Security". The Wall Street Journal has characterized its attacks as closer to Internet pranks rather than serious cyber-warfare, while the group itself claims to possess the capability of stronger attacks. It has gained attention in part due to its brazen claims of responsibility and lighthearted taunting of corporations that have been hacked. It frequently refers to Internet memes when defacing websites. The group first emerged in May 2011, and has successfully attacked the websites of several major corporations. It specializes in finding websites with poor security, and then stealing and posting information from them online. It has used well-known straightforward methods, such as SQL injection, to attack its target websites. Several media sources have described their tactics as grey hat hacking. Members of the group may have been involved in a previous attack against the security firm HBGary.

The group has used the motto "Laughing at your security since 2011!" and its website, created in June 2011, plays the theme from The Love Boat. It announces its exploits via Twitter and its own website, often accompanied with lighthearted ASCII art of boats. Its website also includes a Bitcoin donation to help fund its activities. Although exact motivation of the group is unknown, Ian Paul of PC World has written that, "As its name suggests, LulzSec claims to be interested in mocking and embarrassing companies by exposing security flaws rather than stealing data for criminal purposes."[13] The group has also been critical of white hat hackers, claiming that many of them have been corrupted by their employers.

Some in the security community have lauded them for raising awareness of the widespread lack of effective security against hackers. They have also been credited with inspiring LulzRaft, a group which has been implicated in several high-profile website hacks in Canada.

The group's first recorded attack was against Fox.com's website. It claimed responsibility for leaking information, including passwords, altering several employees' LinkedIn profiles, and leaking a database of X Factor contestants containing contact information of 73,000 contestants. They claimed to do so because the rapper Common had been referred to as "vile" on air.

The group has begun taking suggestions for sites to hit with denial-of-service attacks. The group has also been redirecting telephone numbers to different customer support lines, including the line for World of Warcraft, magnets.com, and the FBI Detroit office. The group claims this sends five to 20 calls per second to these sources, overwhelming their support officers. On 24 June 2011, The Guardian released leaked logs of the one of the group's IRC chats, revealing that the core group is a small group of hackers with a leader Sabu who exercises large control over the group's activities. It also reveals that the group has connections, though is not formally affiliated with, Anonymous. Some LulzSec members had once been prominent Anonymous members, including member Topiary.

At just after midnight (GMT) on the twenty-sixth of June, LulzSec released a "50 days of lulz" statement, which they claimed to be their final release, confirming that LulzSec consisted of six members, and that their website is to be taken down.[22] The group claimed that they had planned to be active for only fifty days from the beginning.[23] "We're not quitting because we're afraid of law enforcement. The press are getting bored of us, and we're getting bored of us." a group member said in an interview to The Associated Press. Members of the group have been reported to have joined with Anonymous members to continue the AntiSec operation. However, despite claiming to retire, the group attacked the websites of British newspaper The Times and The Sun on 18 July, leaving a false story on the death of owner Rupert Murdoch.
Members and associates

LulzSec consists of six core members. The online handles of these six have been established through various attempts by other hacking groups to release personal information of group members on the internet, leaked IRC logs given to The Guardian, and through confirmation from the group itself.

Sabu – One of the group's founders who seemed to act as a kind of leader for the group, often Sabu decides what targets to attack next and who could participate in these attacks. He may have been part of the Anonymous group that hacked HBGary. Various attempts to release his real identity have claimed that he is an information technology consultant with the strongest hacking skills of the group and a knowledge of the Python programming language.
Topiary – Topiary is also a suspected former member of the Anonymous AnonOps, where he used to perform media relations, including hacking the website of the Westboro Baptist Church during a live interview. Topiary ran the LulzSec Twitter account on a daily basis; following the announcement of LulzSec's dissolution, he deleted his own Twitter page. Police arrested a man from Shetland, United Kingdom suspected of being Topiary on 27 July 2011. The man was later identified as Jake Davis and was charged with five counts, including unauthorized access of a computer and conspiracy.
Kayla – Also identified as "lol" in LulzSec chat logs, Kayla owns a botnet used by the group in their distributed denial-of-service attacks. The botnet is reported to consist of about 8,000 infected computer servers. Kayla also may have participated in the Anonymous operation against HBGary.
T-flow – The fourth founding member of the group identified in chat logs, attempts to identify him have labelled him a PHP coder, web developer, and performer of scams on PayPal. The group placed him in charge of maintenance and security of the group's website lulzsecurity.com. London Metropolitan Police announced the arrest of a 16 year-old hacker going by the handle Tflow on 19 July 2011.
Avunit – He is one of the core six members of the group, but not a founding member. He left the group after their self-labelled "Fuck the FBI Friday". He was also affiliated with Anonymous AnonOps HQ.
Pwnsauce – Pwnsauce joined the group around the same time as Avunit and became one of its core members.[27]

Associates and former members include:

M_nerva – M_nerva, once a member of the group, leaked some of the group's chat logs to The Guardian. May have participated with LulzSec in the attack on Fox.com. In response to the leak, LulzSec published M_nerva's personal information and records of the illegal hacking activity performed with them.
Joepie91 – Though he is one of the most frequent participants in LulzSec IRC chat logs, the group stated that he is not a core member.
Neuron – Neuron is not a core member of the group, but may have supported them by building software and taking part in some of their distributed denial-of-service attacks. He is thought to be an engineering student in the United States.
Ryan Cleary – A 19-year-old from Essex, United Kingdom who was arrested by Metropolitan Police on 21 June 2011 and charged with violating the Computer Misuse Act and the Criminal Law Act 1977. Though not a member of the group, LulzSec admitted that he did run one of the IRC channels that they used for communicating.

An ASCII graphic used by the group in its Chinga La Migra torrent, an associated statement, and also appearing in press coverage.

LulzSec does not appear to hack for financial profit. The group's claimed main motivation is to have fun by causing mayhem. They do things "for the lulz" and focus on the possible comedic and entertainment value of attacking targets. The group occasionally has claimed a political message. When they hacked PBS, they stated they did so in retaliation for what they perceived as unfair treatment of Wikileaks in a Frontline documentary entitled WikiSecrets. A page they inserted to the PBS website included the title "FREE BRADLEY MANNING. FUCK FRONTLINE!" The 20 June announcement of "Operation Anti-Security" contained justification for attacks on government targets, citing supposed government efforts to "dominate and control our Internet ocean" and accusing them of corruption and breaching privacy. The media has most often described them as grey hat hackers.

Karim Hijazi, CEO of security company Unveillance, has accused the group of blackmailing him by offering not to attack his company or its affiliates in exchange for money. LulzSec responded by claiming that Hijazi offered to pay them to attack his business opponents and that they never intended to take any money from him. LulzSec has denied responsibility for misuse of any of the data they breach and release. Instead, they place the blame on users who reuse passwords on multiple websites and on companies with inadequate security in place.

In June 2011, the group released a manifesto outlining why they perform hacks and website takedowns. In it they reiterated that "we do things just because we find it entertaining" and that watching the results can be "priceless". However, they also claim to be drawing attention to computer security flaws and holes. They contend that many other hackers exploit and steal user information without releasing the names publicly or telling people they may possibly have been hacked. LulzSec said that by releasing lists of hacked usernames or informing the public of vulnerable websites, it gives users the opportunity to change names and passwords elsewhere that might otherwise have been exploited.

The group's latest attacks have had a more political tone. They claim to want to expose the "racist and corrupt nature" of the military and law enforcement. They have also expressed opposition to the War on Drugs. Lulzsec's Operation Anti-Security has been characterized as a protest against government censorship and monitoring of the internet. In a question and answer session with BBC Newsnight, LulzSec member Whirlpool said, "Politically motivated ethical hacking is more fulfilling". He claimed the loosening of copyright laws and the rollback of what he sees as corrupt racial profiling practices as some of the group's issues.

Initial targets

The group's first attacks came in May 2011. Their first recorded target was Fox.com, which they retaliated against after they called Common, a rapper and entertainer, "vile" on the Fox News Channel. They leaked several passwords, LinkedIn profiles, and the names of 73,000 X Factor contestants. Soon after on 15 May, they released the transaction logs of 3,100 Automated Teller Machines in the United Kingdom. In May 2011, members of Lulz Security gained international attention for hacking into the American Public Broadcasting System (PBS) website. They stole user data and posted a fake story on the site which claimed that Tupac Shakur was still alive and living in New Zealand. In the aftermath of the attack, CNN referred to the responsible group as the "Lulz Boat".

Lulz Security claimed that some of its hacks, including its attack on PBS, were motivated by a desire to defend WikiLeaks and Bradley Manning.[50] A Fox News report on the group quoted one commentator, Brandon Pike, who claimed that Lulz Security is affiliated with the hacktivist group Anonymous. Lulz Security claimed that Pike had actually hired it to hack PBS. Pike denied the accusation and claims it was leveled against him because he said Lulz Security was a splinter of Anonymous.

In June 2011, members of the group claimed responsibility for an attack against Sony and took data that included "names, passwords, e-mail addresses, home addresses and dates of birth for thousands of people." The group claimed that it used a SQL injection attack, and was motivated by Sony's legal action against George Hotz for jailbreaking into the PlayStation 3. The group claims it will launch an attack that will be the "beginning of the end" for Sony. Some of the compromised user information has since been used in scams. The group claimed to have compromised over 1,000,000 accounts, though Sony claims the real number was around 37,500

CASE 325 - Marranos

The Marranos were Sephardic Jews or some say cryptic jews, or Jewish people living in the Iberian peninsula, who had converted to Catholicism-Christianity in Castile and Aragon (Spain) yet secretly practiced their old rites. They attained a vast amount of wealth in just a couple of decades, but were banished, almost fazed out of all of the European countries, so.. they needed an order.

The Jesuits control the Jews but all spawned from the Marranos

The Jesuits created by a cyrpto jew Marrano St. Ignatius of Loyola, have used ‘the Jews’ or 'zionist powerhouse' as a ‘smokescreen’ – as a ‘cover’ for their own nasty activities throughout the centuries. The Jesuit Order (i.e., The Society of Jesus – the Company, led by the Jesuit Superior General) has frequently put some high-profile Jews in their ‘front groups’ (such as occurred during the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia) while they remained hidden “behind the scenes”. As it was during the Bolshevik Revolution (where a large number of the first Politburo members were Jews, and a large number of gulag camp commandants were Jews), so it now appears in modern America (where a significant number of the ‘Neo-Conservatives’ in and around the U.S. government are Jews)! Yet, who is pulling the ‘strings’ from “behind the scenes”?

This term came into use in 1492 with the Castilian Alhambra Decree, reversing protections in the Treaty of Granada (1491), and used for conversos, or 'confirmed converts', at first. However, soon Marranos was used for people who continued to practice Judaism secretly, crypto-Jews preserving their Jewish identity, 'the secret Jews' or judíos escondidos. In Hebrew, forced converts were known as anusim, which means forced ones, though the term would also include those who did not retain their Judaism.

Marrano in 15th century Spanish first meant pig, from the ritual prohibition against eating pork, practiced by both Jews and Muslims. Marrano acquired connotations of "filthy-dirty" (sucio) and "unscrupulous" (sin escrúpulos) during the time of the Spanish Inquisition, when the term was used to impugn the character of the recalcitrant crypto-Jew. In contemporary Spanish the word is no longer associated with Jews. In contemporary Portuguese the word refers only to crypto-Jews, with marrão meaning the animal pig or swine.

The converts were also known as conversos, and as Cristianos nuevos and Cristãos novos (new Christians) in Spain and Portugal, respectively.

Within Jewish tradition there was sympathy for forced converts and an assumption that they would prefer to practice their original faith.

Under state pressure in the late 15th century, an estimated 100,000–200,000 Jews in the Iberian Peninsula converted to Christianity. The numbers who converted and the effects of various migrations in and out of the area have been the subject of considerable debate by historians. A phylogeographic study in 2008 of 1150 volunteer Y-chromosome DNA haplogroups appeared to support the idea that the number of forced conversions has been significantly underestimated, as 20% of the tested Iberian population had haplogroups consistent with Sephardic ancestry. This percentage was suggested as representing the proportion of Sephardi in the population at the time of mass conversions in the 14th and 15th centuries. However, these results have not been replicated in the broad array of genetic studies that have looked at Iberian heritage, and the conclusion has been questioned even by the authors themselves and by Stephen Oppenheimer, who pointed out that much earlier migrations, 5000 to 10,000 years ago from the Eastern Mediterranean, might also account for these haplogroup proportions. Indeed, in a different study the same year the same authors attributed most of those haplogroup lineages in Iberia and the Balearic Islands to Phoenician origin.

CASE 324 - The watch tower cult

Jehovah's Witnesses have often found themselves on the receiving end of sharp criticism where ever they go as they seek to spread their gospel. Why is this? A variety of reasons may be cited, ranging from blatantly religious bigotry to ignorant mockery, attacks we certainly in no way support but would roundly condemn. Roughing anyone up verbally or physically is certainly the work of carnally insensitive and ignorant individuals that no one should have to endure. However, one of the charges that is often leveled at Witnesses by those they call upon is that their organization, far from being a Christian ministry, is instead a destructive cult group that has adversely affected the members of the community. This unpleasant accusation follows Jehovah's Witnesses where ever they go, and has increasingly been a serious impediment to their work. It puts fear into the witness families, section them from other non witness families, very strange beliefs and its all linked to freemasonry, in fact its inventor Charles Taze Russell, who was born in 1852 and worked in Pittsburgh as a haberdasher is buried in a freemason graveyard. He was raised a Congregationalist, but at the age of seventeen he tried to convert an atheist to Christianity and ended up being converted instead—not to outright atheism, but to agnosticism. Some years later he went to an Adventist meeting, was told that Jesus would be back at any time, and got interested in the Bible.



The leading light of Adventism had been William Miller, a flamboyant preacher who predicted that the world would end in 1843. When it didn’t, he "discovered" an arithmetical error in his eschatological calculations and said it would end in 1844. When his prediction again failed, many people became frustrated and withdrew from the Adventist movement, but a remnant, led by Ellen G. White, went on to form the Seventh-Day Adventist Church.

It was this diminished Adventism which influenced Russell, who took the title "Pastor" even though he never got through high school. In 1879, he began the Watch Tower—what would later be known as the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, the teaching organ of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. In 1908 he moved its headquarters to Brooklyn, where it has remained ever since.

Before he got his religious career well underway, Russell promoted what he called "miracle wheat," which he sold at sixty dollars per bushel. He claimed it would grow five times as well as regular wheat. In fact, it grew slightly less well than regular wheat, as was established in court when Russell was sued. Later he marketed a fake cancer cure and what he termed a "millennial bean" (which a wag has said probably got that name because it took a thousand years to sprout).

The February 15, 1994 issue of The Watchtower magazine represents one of the more recent efforts by the Watchtower Society to counter the numerous charges made against it that it is not a Christian fellowship but a destructive cult. The title of the issue, which reads "Jehovah's Witnesses: A Cult or Ministers of God," is the first sign the casual reader may have that the Society has been experiencing a serious amount of mounting trouble trying to convince both it's Witness constituency and outsiders that it is not a cult that destroys lives.


How They Make Converts

Most religions welcome converts, and the Witnesses’ very reason for existence is to make them. To accomplish this they follow several steps.

First they try to get a copy of one of their magazines into the hands of a prospective convert. They lead off with a question designed to tap into universal concerns such as, "How would you like to live in a world without sickness, war, poverty, or any other problem?" If the prospect is willing to speak with them, they arrange what’s known as a "back call"—that is, they return in a week or so for more discussions. This can be kept up indefinitely.

At some point the missionaries invite the prospect to a Bible study. This is not the usual sort of Bible study, where passages are examined in light of context, original word meaning, relevance to other verses in Scripture, etc. Instead, this "Bible study" is really an exposition of Witness doctrine by means of Watchtower literature. Simple questions are presented in the literature which are derived directly from the text. The answers, therefore, are readily discernible, making the prospective convert feel spiritually astute, since he or she can answer all the questions "correctly." The Bible study is directed along lines mandated by the officials in Brooklyn, and the prospect is there to learn, not to teach. If he progresses well, he’s invited to a larger Bible study, which may be held at a Kingdom Hall.

About this time he’s invited to attend a Sunday service. At the Kingdom Hall, which resembles not so much a church but a small lecture hall, the prospect hears a Witness discuss a few verses of Scripture and how those verses can be explained to non-Witnesses or how to "refute" standard Christian doctrines such as the Trinity, hell, the immortality of the soul, etc. The service includes taped music to accompany the singing of hymns, and there is always time allotted for obtaining Watchtower literature and publications.


Sharing Techniques

The prospective convert gets still more of this if he proceeds to the next step, which consists of going to meetings on Wednesday or Thursday nights. At those meetings Witnesses trade stories, explaining how they’ve done that week in going door to door, giving advice to one another, figuring out better ways to get the message across, and logging their hours. (Every month each Kingdom Hall mails to the headquarters in Brooklyn a detailed log of activities, including hours spent "witnessing" door-to-door, the number of converts made, and the number of pieces of literature distributed.)

If the prospect goes through all these steps, he’s ready for admission to the sect. That involves baptism by immersion and agreeing to work actively as a missionary. Many missionaries take only part-time jobs so they can devote more time to their evangelization. Witnesses will typically spend 60-100 hours each month in their evangelizing work. Some will even go so far as to work full time for the WTS, receiving little more than room and board for their efforts.

Life as a Witness

Although not every Witness can put in so many hours, every Witness is expected to do what he can by way of missionary work. There is no separate, ordained ministry as is found in Protestant churches. Their sect operates no hospitals, sanitariums, orphanages, schools, colleges, or social welfare agencies. From their perspective it will all disappear in a few years anyway, so they don’t expend their energies in these areas.

Jehovah’s Witnesses live under a strict regimen. They may be "disfellowshipped" for a variety of reasons, such as attending a Catholic or Protestant church or receiving a blood transfusion. Disfellowshipping is the sect’s equivalent of excommunication, though somewhat more harsh. A disfellow-
shipped Witness may attend Kingdom Hall, but he is not allowed to speak to anyone, and no one may speak to him. The others are to act as though he no longer exists. This applies even to his family, who may only communicate with him as much as absolutely necessary.

They recognize the legitimacy of no governmental authority, since they believe all earthly authority is of Satan. They will not serve in the military, salute the flag, say the Pledge of Allegiance, vote, run for office, or serve as officials of labor unions.

No matter how peculiar their doctrines, they deserve to be complimented on their determination and single-minded zeal. However, as Paul might have said concerning them, "I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge"

CASE 323 - Motor cars

By definition an automobile or car is a wheeled vehicle that carries its own motor and transports passengers. The automobile as we know it was not invented in a single day by a single inventor. The history of the automobile reflects an evolution that took place worldwide.
It is estimated that over 100,000 patents created the modern automobile. You can point to the many firsts that occurred along the way to producing the modern car

Starting with the first theoretical plans for a motor vehicle that had been drawn up by both Leonardo da Vinci and Isaac Newton.

In 1769, the very first self-propelled road vehicle was a military tractor invented by French engineer and mechanic, Nicolas Joseph Cugnot (1725 - 1804). Cugnot used a steam engine to power his vehicle, built under his instructions at the Paris Arsenal by mechanic Brezin. It was used by the French Army to haul artillery at a whopping speed of 2 1/2 mph on only three wheels. The vehicle had to stop every ten to fifteen minutes to build up steam power. The steam engine and boiler were separate from the rest of the vehicle and placed in the front. The following year (1770), Cugnot built a steam-powered tricycle that carried four passengers.

In 1771, Cugnot drove one of his road vehicles into a stone wall, making Cugnot the first person to get into a motor vehicle accident. This was the beginning of bad luck for the inventor. After one of Cugnot's patrons died and the other was exiled, the money for Cugnot's road vehicle experiments ended.

Steam engines powered cars by burning fuel that heated water in a boiler, creating steam that expanded and pushed pistons that turned the crankshaft, which then turned the wheels. During the early history of self-propelled vehicles - both road and railroad vehicles were being developed with steam engines. (Cugnot also designed two steam locomotives with engines that never worked well.) Steam engines added so much weight to a vehicle that they proved a poor design for road vehicles; however, steam engines were very successfully used in locomotives. Historians, who accept that early steam-powered road vehicles were automobiles, feel that Nicolas Cugnot was the inventor of the first automobile.




After Cugnot Several Other Inventors Designed Steam-Powered Road Vehicles

•Cugnot's vehicle was improved by Frenchman, Onesiphore Pecqueur, who also invented the first differential gear.
•In 1789, the first U.S. patent for a steam-powered land vehicle was granted to Oliver Evans.
•In 1801, Richard Trevithick built a road carriage powered by steam - the first in Great Britain.
•In Britain, from 1820 to 1840, steam-powered stagecoaches were in regular service. These were later banned from public roads and Britain's railroad system developed as a result.
•Steam-driven road tractors (built by Charles Deitz) pulled passenger carriages around Paris and Bordeaux up to 1850.
•In the United States, numerous steam coaches were built from 1860 to 1880. Inventors included: Harrison Dyer, Joseph Dixon, Rufus Porter, and William T. James.
•Amedee Bollee Sr. built advanced steam cars from 1873 to 1883. The "La Mancelle" built in 1878, had a front-mounted engine, shaft drive to the differential, chain drive to the rear wheels, steering wheel on a vertical shaft and driver's seat behind the engine. The boiler was carried behind the passenger compartment.
•In 1871, Dr. J. W. Carhart, professor of physics at Wisconsin State University, and the J. I. Case Company built a working steam car that won a 200-mile race.



Early Electric Cars

Steam engines were not the only engines used in early automobiles. Vehicles with electrical engines were also invented. Between 1832 and 1839 (the exact year is uncertain), Robert Anderson of Scotland invented the first electric carriage. Electric cars used rechargeable batteries that powered a small electric motor. The vehicles were heavy, slow, expensive, and needed to stop for recharging frequently. Both steam and electric road vehicles were abandoned in favor of gas-powered vehicles. Electricity found greater success in tramways and streetcars, where a constant supply of electricity was possible.



Combustion engine and the 'clean car era' conspiracy
Electric cars are a conspiracy of the worst kind. They are heralded as a ticket to a new age when in fact they are a mere link in the chain of energy in the United States. Opponents of the old Henry Ford world of combustion engines are embracing electric car technologies with open arms, but they fail to realize that electric cars perpetuate the same problems as their more common ICE (Internal Combustion Engine) brethren.

Still have a question?
Ask it in the Solar & Alternative Energy forum Companies like Chevrolet, Nissan, Honda, and others pushing electric and various alternative transportation technologies are announcing these ideas with trumpets as if they have ushered in a new era or a transportation revolution. Consumers readily embrace these new ideas with commensurate enthusiasm, but all concerned fail to realize that the revolutionary nature of the new cars is predicted upon a reality that does not exist.

Advocates of the green energy movement point to the use of electric cars as a method of reducing air pollution. The fact that the new Nissan Leaf can advertise itself as lacking an exhaust pipe has customers lined up more than 20,000 reservations in advance to purchase their own piece of “history.” Even the Leaf’s name is designed to inspire thoughts of clean, renewable energy and environmental concern. But where does the electricity in the United States come from?

Overwhelmingly, the electrical power grid is supplied by fossil fuels. More than half of all the nation’s electricity comes from disgustingly polluted coal power plants, many of which are outdated and pump out more carbon dioxide and monoxide than they should because of obsolete technology still in use. But, the government continues to give these antiquated plants a pass instead of forcing them to update their technology. About a quarter of our power comes from natural gas, which is a fossil fuel as well. While on the natural gas subject, it should be noted that Honda’s touted FCX Clarity fuel cell car requires hydrogen. Current hydrogen production is the result of either expensive hydrolysis (splitting of water) or (largely) from natural gas.

What does this mean? Basically, the electric cars that companies say are bringing clean fuel options to consumers are really just perpetuating the old system. It is a great gimmick to remove one bottleneck from the fossil fuel chain, but without cheap, reliable ramping up of American electrical output through solid sources like nuclear power, we will still be utilizing fossil fuels. The new designs bring some good efficiency to the table, but the U.S. power grid will have to follow the example of the French nuclear program in order for us to truly benefit from electric cars.