US President Obama Guilty of Treason?

Is US President Obama guilty of treason? Looks like it might be that way. Looks like he authorized selling weapons to Libyan rebels who used those weapons to kill our "Ambassador" and two guards. Also gave the "stand down" order - not once but twice - to not to rescue our "Ambassador" and his guards when they were under attack.

From Bracken: Did Obama Withhold Cross-Border Authority?

Libya, as far as standing down the rescue, is 100% Obama’s show, and nobody else’s. Only he can grant CBA, not Biden, not Panetta, not Dempsey, not Hillary, and certainly not Ham in Germany.

The entire episode is explained perfectly inside the context of not granting CBA. The CIA QRF in Tripoli? No problem, send them on the local Tripoli station chief’s say-so. He merely informs up COC that he has done so. CCs them so to speak. “This is what I am doing.” Ditto if Predators were in country, no problem using them.

But the big rescue air armada streaming toward Libya right away after the alarm got to Stuttgart and Africom? That has to stop. I believe at the 5pm meeting with Panetta and Biden in the Oval Office, he said, “No outside military intervention,” on the basis that the last report was the “lull” from the consulate, at about 1030 p.m. in Benghazi, when the attack appeared to be over and the situation stabilizing.

Read that full text and you can see the ramifications of what we have here: A president who seems that he is guilty of treasonous acts like arming our sworn enemies then not allowing our military to come to the aid of Americans in danger.

But now it seems that this episode is getting hotter by the second. This just in from Testosterone Pit: President Obama Must Release the Truth About Benghazi:

We have continuously warned that that the United States’ use of the Central Intelligence Agency to funnel weapons and logistics to jihadi warriors in support of Arab Spring rebellions would lead to a vicious blow-back against the strategic interests of the United States.  Clearly that has come to pass with the murder of the first American Ambassador since 1979 and the ejection of American influence across the Middle East.  But as Benghazi cover-up continues to unwind, the U.S. is headed for a Constitutional crisis that will have a deep and lasting impact on our nation.  President Obama must immediately release the truth about Benghazi for the good of the nation.

In 2011, the United States overseas weapons sales tripled to $66.3 billion, accounting for approximately three quarters of all the foreign weapons sales in the world.  Over half of the American sales, $33.4 billion worth of weapons, went to Saudi Arabia.  Another $6 billion went to the Persian Gulf nations of the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Oman. 

According e-mails from Stratfor Global Intelligence hacked by WikiLeaks, Chief Executive Jamie Smith of “security” firm SCG International stated his organization had been contracted to U.S. intelligence agencies to supply arms to overthrow Muammar Gaddafi in Libya and was now working with Saudi Arabia and Qatar to provide weapons to hard-liner Islamic jihadists brigades to overthrow Assad in Syria.  Smith stated that SCG was also working to recover missing Libyan surface-to-air missiles from Benghazi, Libya.

In March of 2011, Chris Stevens was appointed by Secretary of State Clinton as the official U.S. liaison to the al-Qaeda-linked Libyan rebels, working directly with Abdelhakim Belhadj of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group  (LIFG).  Shortly thereafter, a non-fly-zone was declared by the U.S. and Stevens moved into Benghazi, Libya.  When Libya was liberated in September, Stevens moved to Tripoli as the U.S.

Get that last part? Chris Stevens, the supposed "Ambassador" wasn't an "Ambassador" at all it seems. It seems he must have been a CIA agent assigned to selling weapons to Al-Qaeda linked rebels! If this is all true, then Obama is just as guilty, if not more so than Ronald Reagan was of the Iran-Contra affair.

Obama must come clean on this. This is treason and is impeachable if true and possibly even deserving of prison time for the person who authorized this... And that could only be the Commander in Chief, Obama.

This video makes even more shocking allegations...

Disclaimer: I think Romney is just as bad as Obama and would pull the same sorts of stunts. In many ways, Romney is more dangerous to us than even Obama. But that doesn't excuse this crime...

Write in Ron Paul.

New Credit Card Rule in Japan Bad For Small Businesses

Because of so many credit card scams and crooks running around nowadays, it seems that the credit card companies are getting stricter and stricter by the day.... 

A good friend at Citi Bank informs me that the Japan Credit Card Association has passed a new rule that says all internet companies using credit card must register with the association and get a individual "credit card approval stamp" for their site and every sale must run through their approval process first before each and every purchase is made! 

The big companies like Amazon and Rakuten have rejected this new rule but the association, according to my friend, is insisting upon new and small businesses to toe the line by early next year... 

This is just another scam targeting small businesses and making it more difficult for them. 

How this process works is like this: A customer decides to buy something. They must access the Japan Credit Card Association site first to get an approval (to confirm they are the registered user of that card and not a fraudster). The customer gets the approval first, then receives some sort of numbered identification. Then, after that, they go to an individual site and buy what they were looking for! 

It's obvious that this is damaging to small businesses and just the big guys (like Amazon or Rakuten) can say "No! We're not going to do this!" But to others, this is another block in the road. 

Anyhow, it seems, according to my friend at Citi, that there is a fight going on about this right now but the association is insisting upon it.

Like I said, the big guys won't follow the rules (Why should they? They have all the money and money equals clout!) But the little guys and small businesses will be damaged by this new rule as customers will find it troublesome to have to go through just another process and a bunch of clicks to buy something.

Amazon's and Rakuten's "One-Click" systems will become even easier to use... The small businesses? They'll lose sales.

Computer Problems, Writer's Block and Blogging

I haven't been blogging as much recently. My apologies.

There's been two problems recently that I have to explain (and I must add that I hate excuses...) but the first was killing my computer.

I went to a drinking establishment with a potential business partner and, after several drinks, I just couldn't resist the urge to show him my new business. Big mistake! As I opened up my MacBook Pro and booted it up to show him the wonderful business idea I had, he said,

"Just a second, Mike. I gotta go to the restroom."

When he stood up, he knocked over his glass full of alcohol right on top of my keyboard. I just watched in total shock. It was like watching the Titanic!

The keyboard was completely underwater for a few seconds. I felt like I couldn't move. I knew it was done for.... And it was. It clicked off. Lifeless. Dead to the world.

Luckily for me the Genius people at Apple looked at my computer and they were able to recover all the information off the hard drive... I guess that's why they call the service counter at Apple Stores, "Genius Bar"... Those folks really are the best...

I'll never even look at a Windows computer ever again.... But, even though I backed up my data, most of my programs no longer ran because they weren't on my main drive....So I didn't have any word-processing software until I installed it just yesterday....

But, anyway, soon after the "Titanic sinking" happened, I was to find out that another company was thinking the same thing as me and they came out with a service that is a carbon copy of what I was doing...

Once again, a Start-up (mine, this time) has serious problems due to under-funding... That caused me much distress.

I haven't given up yet, but the mountain I have to climb to do something positive about the situation has risen considerably.

This has weighed quite heavily on my mind....

And that's why, I suppose, I am having a bout of Writer's Block...

It's not the first time for Writer's Block. I go through times when I can write volumes in a few hours... Then times, like these last few weeks, when I have a problem even getting the engine started.

I do know, though, to beat Writer's Block, one must force themselves to write. Hence, this boring blog post....

I hope to go back to blogging everyday and writing some fun and interesting things like this "My Life is Like a "B" Horror Movie" from today....

Monster Roll: Sushi Chefs in Epic Battle!

Want more great cinema? You got it.  Badass Digest has the scoop:

I love a good short, and there's lots to admire about Monster Roll. The idea is simple: gigantic sea monsters have come ashore and only the greatest Asian-American sushi chefs can battle them. Unfortunately, the short lacks Jiro Ono, but it does feature the incredible Gerald Okamura as a blind chef. This also marks the third film I've seen in the last month about the high artistry involved with making sushi. It really makes me want to move back to Asia.

According to writer/director Dan Blank, the film is a "proof of concept" for a feature. So, watch it and spread it around. Hopefully someday soon we'll get to see the whole thing.

What more do you need? It's only six minutes long, it's hilarious, it has giant monsters, and Gerald Okamura is in it. Watch the shit out of it!

What more can I say except "Itadakimasu!" (Bon appetit!)

Enjoy!

There's more fun stuff at the movie web site: http://www.monsterroll.com/

Thanks to Taro Furukawa for the tip!

The Japanese Are Getting Fat - And the Results Won't Be Good

Yes. It's true. The Japanese are getting fat. They are not getting as near as fat as the Americans are, but they are getting fat. Fifteen or twenty years ago, you rarely ever saw a fat Japanese person. Nowadays, you see them all the time.

Along with the fat people here comes to diseases like heart disease, cancer and diabetes....

No wonder, though... The Japanese are starting to copy SAD (Standard American Diet) and we can already see the future, just by traveling to the USA today, what that means for the Japanese population of tomorrow.

Things like the five-decker hamburger in the poster below used to be unheard of. Now? Just about every restaurant offers "extra sizes" and helpings.

Oxford Journals reports in: 

Coronary heart disease risk in Japan – an East/West divide?

While total cholesterol levels have been decreasing in the US population, a marked increase in the Japanese population began in the 1980s, such that by the later part of the decade, mean levels in Japanese women exceeded those in US adults. These increases appear to be associated with the marked increase in ischaemic heart disease mortality observed in Japanese men and women in the early 1990s.  Japanese men and women who were around 20 years of age at the time of the study had higher cholesterol levels than did their US counterparts. This age group is now around 40 years of age and there is concern that the elevated cholesterol levels may be associated with increased cardiovascular disease as this segment of the population ages. In addition to an increasing prevalence of elevated total cholesterol between 1980 and 1990 for each decade of age, these data also suggest a high prevalence of elevated cholesterol in older, post-menopausal women.

The frequency of diabetes is also increasing in Japan, with survey data indicating a doubling of the prevalence of diabetes between 1980 and 2000. According to Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare statistics, the estimated population of diabetic patients in Japan is expected to increase from 6.9 million in 1997 to 10.8 million in 2010.

(Interestingly enough, and I'm sure it has nothing to do with this article, but the very first McDonald's opened in Japan in 1971!)

You can see what this is going to do to the Japanese in the video preview of "Forks Over Knives" below:

Free Online Japanese Horror Movie: Tales of Terror: The Haunted Apartments

Just in time for Halloween! The 2006 movie Tales of Terror: The Haunted Apartments (幽霊マンション). This movie is in it's entirety and with English subtitles.

Asian Wikipedia says about the Haunted Apartments:

Ai and her father, Yamato, have had a hard time since Ai's mother died in a car accident. When they agree to move into their new apartment, the other tenants seem strangely excited to greet them and help them move in.

There are some strange "rules" that the tenants must follow. The landlord insists that everyone be home before midnight every night. An odd string tied tied to two rocks marks the point that all the residents must cross before midnight. And tenants are only allowed to move out under certain circumstances. A mysterious ghost haunts the residents every night and seeks revenge on anyone who stays out after midnight...

The movie stars hot actress Mei Kurokawa. I wouldn't kick her out of bed for eating sembei.

Enjoy!

From the WTF! Files: Man Dies After Being Swept Up by Street Cleaner

Yeah. You can't make this stuff up.

News On Japan reports: Man found dead in Tokyo after being swept up by street cleaner

A man has been found dead at a garbage sorting facility in Tokyo's Koto Ward, and police suspect he was accidentally caught by a street cleaning truck.

The Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) said the body of a man was found Oct. 16 and it is questioning a 34-year-old street cleaner driver on suspicion of negligent driving resulting in death. "I didn't notice anything at all," the driver was quoted as saying.

MPD officials said that the body is believed to be that of a 69-year-old man from Sumida Ward after bloodstains and his shoes were found near his home on a road swept by the street cleaner.

Now I'm going to be real careful from now on when I drink, get too drunk and then decide to nap by the side of the road!

You are Your Own Brand - Do Quality Work or Don't Do it at All

In these days when the economy is bad and jobs are few and far between, I think it is always wise to remember the words taught to me by a great and extremely wealthy old friend;

"Remember, sometimes the jobs you reject are just as important as the jobs you accept."

These are wise words.

You are your own brand. You are the custodian of your work quality. Don't let that quality drop.

Whether you are working at a great enterprise, a new start-up, your magnum opus, or even at the counter of a fast food restaurant, always strive to do the best and highest quality work you can.

Never let a moment go to waste; strive for perfection.

As an aside, some might laugh and wonder how can one do perfection when working at a fast food restaurant? That's easy. Here's the words of Ray Kroc of McDonald's fame;

"If you have time to lean, you have time to clean."

Even at the slow times at the fast food counter, when others are standing around waiting, you should be using that time to set yourself apart from the rest: You should be cleaning. You should be looking for "what needs to be done" and do it before being told to do so. That's how to get promotions.

When it comes to your work quality, only you can decide what you can and cannot do. You are responsible for your results.

Before accepting any job, you must decide:

1) Will you make the effort? Will you dedicate to being the best?

2) Are your co-workers and the company good enough? (You know the old saying, "It's hard to soar with eagles when you work with turkeys.")

3) Are you being given the proper tools and budget to get the job done and get it done right?

These are critical questions. If you answered "No!" to any of the above, you shouldn't take that job.

If you can't be your best and cannot dedicate to that worthy goal, then remember,  "Sometimes the jobs you reject are just as important as the jobs you accept."

Never have your name associated with poor quality.

What is Open Cloud? A Fantastic 3-Minute Cartoon Tells All!

Hi readers! I just got this from my friend Allie Bosworth. He sends along a fantastic animation explaining what is Open Cloud that I know you'll just love !

Here's Allie's letter:

Hi Mike

I wanted to take a second to pass along a little 3 minute video about the Open Cloud.  This video does a good job of breaking down the origin and evolution of the cloud over the past decade and how the opening of the cloud is freeing app developers from the limitations of closed code.

I hope you enjoy the video and perhaps it is something you would consider sharing with your readers. Have a great day!

Best,

Allie

Thanks Allie! Here's the video. It is excellent! Enjoy!

Uh oh! Chinese Warships off Coast of Disputed Islands?

This game is getting out of hand... Mainichi News reports:

7 Chinese Navy warships pass waters near Okinawa island

Seven Chinese Navy warships on Tuesday passed the contiguous zone, a band of water just outside Japan's territorial waters, around an Okinawa island amid a dispute over the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, which are claimed by China, the Japanese Defense Ministry said.

The seven ships were spotted sailing at around 7 a.m. about 49 kilometers south-southeast of Yonaguni Island in Okinawa Prefecture, the ministry said.

The disagreement and argument about Senkaku Islands (known as Daioyu in China) has grown way out of proportion and has already greatly damaged business ties between Japan and China. Please refer to: Diplomatic Row a Blow to Japanese Brands.

If cooler heads don't prevail here, especially when a new Chinese government is coming in that seems to be much more nationalistic, then we have a troubled future ahead of us indeed.

Global Warming Scandal Redux: 40,000 Scientists Come Out Against Global Warming Hoax

This is a redux of yesterday's blog entitled, "UK Met Office: Global Warming Stopped over 16 Years Ago" in which I wrote;

"You know that anytime the government tells you that there is some kind of problem and the cure to that problem is more taxes from the pocket of you, the taxpayer, then it's time to be extremely skeptical."

Well, now here, this morning comes this story from Alexander Higgins: Taxpayers are ripped off of over $45 Trillion dollars for imaginary Global Warming Threat.

Alexander writes;

The objections of tens of thousands of scientists goes ignored as the global warming hoax is being used to squander $45 trillion from the masses.

If you have any doubt about the global warming hoax or somehow have been deceived by the corporate media into believing that the verdict is out on climate change the open letter below should clear up the subject.

While you may not buy into the premise of massive global conspiracies, just like the LIBOR rigging scandal, this one is real and the hoax has been repeatedly disproved.

In fact, the letter I show below is prominently linked to on the home page of the Western Australian Skeptics Association and if your not familiar with the skeptics movement it consists of debunkers, in many case doing so for academic notoriety or to get rewards or scholarships of up to $100,000 and higher,  that run sites like this and this go around debunking and making fun of conspiracies theories and ‘troll’ discussion forums like GodLikeProductions and /r/conspiracy  on forums like /r/conspiratardcausing drama like this.

Point being, is this isn’t some crackpot conspiracy that can’t be substantiated and instead is accepted by critical thinkers who are skeptical of anything that isn’t supported by facts and scientific data to back it up and even they accept it.

So here’s the highlights for those who don’t like long reads:

LIE: Media outlets repeatedly parroted statements politicians’ statements from governments worldwide claiming 4,000 IPCC scientists appointed from nearly every government on the globe had agreed that human’s were influencing climate change.

TRUTH: 80% of IPCC members weren’t even scientists. Those that were received their funding from governments who wanted certain findings. Reports from IPCC scientists who submitted results contrary to the expect outcome did not have their work accepted. Of that only Fifty-three authors and five reviewers are all that can be said to explicitly support the claim of a significant human influence on climate and even those people made their claim of support based on research of other IPCC scientists which had been altered and manipulated.

LIE: The mainstream scientific consensus, including that of the 4,000 IPCC scientist had agreed. “The evidence was in the global warming debate was over and it has been confirmed to be due to the man-made causes”

Truth: The views of those few author and viewers is disputed by Tens of Thousands of reputable mainstream scientists who turned activist in objection to the IPCC’s junk science only to be entirely disregarded.

The article goes into much more detail, like the purposeful omission of temperatures doing he medieval period which showed global temperatures  much higher than they are now, how corporate media news outlets pressured reporters not write anything that was was critical of the consensus of the scientific community, how global ocean temperatures were excluded even thought they showed cooling, how a clique of scientists prevented anything contrary to ‘concensus’ from achieving peer-reviewed status, how satellite data was ignored and much more.

It also delves into who suffers – the global consumers who are being squandered for $45,000,000,000,000 dollars – and who benefits – the carbon traders who are becoming billionaires of the hoax that is destroying economies around the globe.

To read the complete report, click here (if that link doesn't work, use this: http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2012/08/23/squandering-45-trillion-imaginary-threat-174051/)

What have I been telling you? If the mass media tells you to panic then it's a sure sign of sensationalism designed to sell ad space and promote propaganda.

UK Met Office: "Global Warming Stopped 16 Years Ago"

What did I tell you?

I've been saying this since 2006; "Don't believe the hype." You know that anytime the government tells you that there is some kind of problem and the cure to that problem is more taxes from the pocket of you, the taxpayer, then it's time to be extremely skeptical.

I've learned this over 30 years of being in the mass media.

I've heard it all before. Not being the sharpest tool in the shed, it took me almost 20 years of being in that mass media before I figured out that one cannot believe what they are told.

My favorite saying is: "Eighty percent of everything you see or hear on TV is bullshit. The other twenty percent are commercials."

We have heard it all before. Just in the last decade or so; Iraqi troops were killing babies in Kuwaiti incubators; SARS was going to kill 150 million people; the Avian Flu was going to kill another 100 million more; Swine flu? Ditto. Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons... The list went on and on... They were all lies...

Then, another huge lie; the Global Warming farce.

I was broadcasting my complete skepticism about this one day on my morning drive time FM radio show here in Tokyo when a listener - a hard core believer in Global Warming religion - called the station and threatened to burn it down. I invited him over to do so and told him we'd be waiting for him with the Fire Department and the police.

He never showed up, of course.

Consider the idiocy: The ice bergs are all going to melt and raise the seas levels by 30 meters? What? Ice bergs float on water. They displace the weight of the water. If they melt the water wouldn't rise by a millimeter. When your ice melts in your drinks, does your cup run over?

That's the simple mindedness of the argument of the Global Warmist Cult.

People were scaring other people about Global Warming merely to increase taxes and to line the pockets of their friends with government grants for bankrupt industries like the Solayndra scandal.

Doing his part to fight global warming!

Well, they are all running around with their tails between their legs now. Now, enjoy these two tidbits (that certainly will not get enough press in the mass media) from the former front running leader of the Global Warming scare: The UK Metrological Office:

Global warming stopped 16 years ago, reveals Met Office report quietly released... and here is the chart to prove it:

• The figures reveal that from the beginning of 1997 until August 2012 there was no discernible rise in aggregate global temperatures
• This means that the ‘pause’ in global warming has now lasted for about the same time as the previous period when temperatures rose, 1980 to 1996

And....

British Press Acknowledges Antarctic Ice at Record Levels:

“Ice around the South Pole has expanded to cover a record area, scientists revealed yesterday – a month after saying that the North Pole had lost an unprecedented amount of its ice.”

They say the only two certain things in life are death and taxes. Yes. True. So, keeping that in mind, like I said, whenever there's a problem and someone shows up and says, 

"I'm from the government. And I'm here to help."

You should turn around and start running the other way.

Global Warming is going to kill us all? Ha! As my favorite financial blog Zerohedge says, "On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone is zero."

Cool & Strange Music - Japan Vol. 6 - Ryukyu (Okinawa) Beatles & More! (Part 1)

This week I went to 76.1 InterFM to be on the show entitled "6 O'Clock Yatsura" and had a great time. While I was there I heard some very cool and strange sounds that I know you are going to dig!

First was a CD of instrumentals by a band named Soul Gakkudan (奏流楽団) which is also known as the Ryukyu Beatles. This is fab!

Also, recently on the show, Taro Furukawa has been playing a lot of old cool songs from Japanese sixties bands. There's a great compilation CD out featuring a bunch of them and it's called, "GS I Love You: Japanese Garage Bands of the Sixties." 

I've mentioned before how much western music has influenced the Japanese pop scene but these groups were totally crazy about the Beatles and the British Invasion of the sixties (Just like America!)... But some of them had enough good sense to know that, as long as the music is cool, Japanese lyrics were fine too!

Here's a few of my favorites: 

The Out Casts - Everything's Alright

I tried to find some info about the Out Casts, but nothing on Wikipedia so.... On to the next band. It's one of Japan's most popular sixties "GS" (Group Sounds) bands! The Spiders!

The Spiders - Dynamite

Wikipedia says about the Spiders:

The Spiders were a Japanese band in the Group Sounds era, who were one of the top three bands of that genre, a cultural pop music scene unique to Japan.

Band members were Hiroshi "Monsieur" Kamayatsu (rhythm guitar and backing singer), Jun Inouye (singer), Masaaki Sakai (tambourine and backing singer), Shochi Tanabe (drums), Takayuki Inouye (lead guitar and backing singer), Mitsuru Kato (bass guitar) and Katsuo Ono (steel guitar and electronic organ). They had many hit singles, made feature films and were popular in the late 1960s and early 1970s in Japan. They toured Europe in 1966, and the United States, including Hawaii, in 1967. All of the band members are still active in the music industry.

Next up? 

The Terry's - Stop Dance

Playboy - Shevidevi De Yuko

The Swing West - Ajoen Ajoen

The Napoleon - Koe no Kesunda

Those are just a few of the cool track on this great CD. I'll be back next time with a few more tracks (as well as back to the Cool & Strange music for the world) next time.

Until then, stay Cool & Strange!