Central Asia in the 21st century

Justice John Paul Stevens recently resigned from the U.S. Supereme Court. It's a radical change in the court since Stevens was mostly a liberal/moderate when he made decisions in the court. There are many names that President Barack Obama is considering to replace Stevens on the court. One person is the Solicitor General Elena Kagan. She is pro-abortion like Stevens is. All sides agree that a new Justice ought to be a male or female that decides cases form an impartial format. Kagan was the dean of Harvard Law School. She spent most of her career in academia and government. He was in the legal counsel in the administration of pro-abortion President Bill Clinton. Kagan was said by the ACLU with shaping Clinton's policy on hate crimes. "Abortion groups are actively attempting to create the impression that international norms require countries to provide access to abortion. During Kagan’s nomination hearing for Solicitor General, Senator Specter questioned her about the use of foreign sources of law in constitutional decision-making," Wright said. Kagan said before: ""At least some members of the Court find foreign law relevant in at least some contexts. When this is the case, I think the Solicitor General's office should offer reasonable foreign law arguments to attract these Justices' support for the positions that the office is taking." This is wrong since federal and state law in determing cases take precident above international law (especially international laws that aren't treaties or have no connection with Constitutional law at all). Kagan oppose defunding of taxpayer funded clincis that promote abortions when a majority of Americans don't want their tax dollars to fund abortion providers. A Supreme Court Justice should accurately interpret cases without abitrarily making laws. The two other names that most observers agree are most likely to be nominated are federal judges with long records on the bench: Diane Wood from the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, and Merrick B. Garland from the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The Supreme Court will have some interesting developments in the world.

Redmond cops use drugs as an excuse to establish a warrantless checkpoint. This new method is trying to address drug trafficking through the city. They have set up a special enforcement operation on North Highway 97 Reroute Thursday afternoon, stopping drivers for traffic violations and searching some vehicles if they had cause to believe drugs might be found. These traffic control take place between 2:30 and 5:30 pm. The warning signs were placed along the highway. They are advising motorists that drug detection dogs could be working in the area according to Lt. Nathan Garibay. “If, when vehicles were stopped for traffic violations, police had any reason to believe there might have been drugs involved, they furthered their investigation and had the dog check the car,” said Capt. Brian McNaughton. Two people were arrested on drug charges, including the driver of a semi truck that was pulled over and searched, turning up a small quantity of cocaine, McNaughton said. Garibay said that the new step is being taken, because like most communities Redmond has found that much of the crimes residing in that city is connected to drug manufacture, delivery, and use. Redmond police identified illict drugs as one of the top community priorities during the strategic plan developed in 2008. "We are committed to protecting our citizens from all crimes and ensuring our community remains safe," the lieutenant said. McNaughton noted that Deschutes County is called a High Intensity Drug Traffic Area. This provides federal funding for drug fighting efforts. The Warm Springs Indian Reservation recently recieved a similar designation as did Lane County. McNaughton said that they expect to conduct the traffic/drug operations at least once a month or even every couple of weeks. So, there is nothing wrong with wanting to make our communities safe in the USA, but not at the expense of violating human civil liberties at all.

Big Brother and the government wants to monitor dissent in the Internet. These costs cost money. People want to see our Internet activities. There are programs that deal with electronic surveillance, hacking, state operatives, GPS tracking, CCTV cameras linked in to state databases, RFID chipped commodities, biometrics, and other ohter tools. The Pentagon has just stood up a biometrics Identity Management Agency or the BIMA data mining, watch listing, and on and on. New York Times columnist, Thomas Friedman, would have it, "The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist--McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas, the designer of the F-15." That means that Internet monitoring merges intelligence agencies, police state entities, and the corporate elite. The Patriot Act has been used to find a treasure trove of information for the sake of "national security." There have been FBI agents getting help from AT&T and other giant telecommunication firms. CAU or the Communications Analysis Unit get exigent letters when the FBI issues thousands of National Security Letters. These letters want emails, internet searches, call records, bank statements, etc. The Justice Department Office of the Inspector General admitted in a heavily redacted report in January that the FBI was caught violating repeatedly the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. Overall, American taxpayers have shelled-out some $451 million to an endless parade of contractors, Lockheed Martin being the latest. Delays are expected to cost "at least $30 million in cost overruns on a project considered vital to national security" Lichtblau wrote, citing Congressional "officials." Corporations are funding Big Brother programs via Lockheed Martin, etc. There are the secretive continuity of government programs.

Austin, Texas is the 2nd city to force pregnancy centers to post non-abortion signs. This capita of Texas is the 2nd city in the nation after Baltimore, Maryland to force pregnancy centers to post signs saying they don't do abortions. Abortion advocates promoted the measure because they are upset such centers provide women with abortion alternatives and pregnancy help. The goal of this ordiance is to besmirch the work the centers do in helping women because they have taken clients away from abortion businesses. City council member Bill Spelman proposed the idea and was assisted in promoting then new ordiance by member Laura Morrison and Mayor Pro Tem Mike Martinez. The city council voted unanimously 7-0 this morning to approve it and now the 4 or 5 pregnancy centers in town will be forced to post the signs. The vote came about despite the tesimony from pregnancy centers and their supporters (who pointed out that the proposed law doesn't require abortion centers to inform women that they don't provide pregnancy assistance). Under the terms of the ordinance of not posting a sign constitutes a Class C misdemeanor and centers would face fines of up $450 each time they fail to post the signs. Jonathan Saenz is the director of legislative affairs at Liberty Institute. He condemned the vote in an email to Lifenews.com. “This pro-abortion, political effort by the City Council and NARAL is an outrageous example of out of control government,” he said. “Why is the City of Austin so hostile to the needs of pregnant women served by charitable pregnancy centers?” Saenz said that NARAL pushed the ordianance in Austin as it did in Baltimore and he said court action could be forthcoming in Texas as is the case in Maryland. He complained that the new target pregnancy centers unfairly and doesn't apply similar standards to abortion centers. "This ordinance is the first-of-its-kind in Texas, and requires only PRCs to post signs at their entrance that they do not provide or refer for abortions or birth control. There is no corresponding requirement that abortion facilities post signs about the services they do not provide," he said. the ordinance requires pregnancy centers to prominently display at the entrance of their office, which is made up of 2 black and white signs. One is in English and one is in Spanish. It reads that: "...This center does not provide abortions or refer to abortion providers. This center does not provide or refer to providers of U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved birth control drugs and medical devices..." Each sign must be at least eight and one-half inches by eleven inches and the text must be in a font dize of at least 48 point according to the proposal. The Austin Mayor Lee Leffingwell must sign the new ordinance into law, but NARAL indicated before the vote it expected him to do so. Melinda Delahoyde is the President of Care Net. Care Net is a national network of pregnancy centers. She told Lifenews.com that such laws are "nonsensical," "unwarranted," and "discriminatory." Delahoyde said that the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute noted that the abortion rate in the U.S. has decreased 9 percent since 2000 to 19.4 abortions per 1,000 women of reproductive age in 2005. This is thanks in part because of pregnancy centers that provide women with meidcal, legal , educational, financial and other support during their pregnancies. The women's leader told Life News.com that: "...Pregnancy centers help to reduce abortions by providing free, compassionate support and practical help to women facing unplanned pregnancies. For nearly 30 years, the first center Care Net opened, the Greater Baltimore Center for Pregnancy Concerns, has been faithfully serving the women of Baltimore...In this economy, and with abortion on the rise, wouldn't it make more sense for the City Council to pass a resolution praising the contribution of pregnancy centers, which rely solely on charitable contributions, not on state or local funding?..." She said that this sends a message to city residents that local pregnancy center may not be completely forthcoming about their services. This couldn't be further from the truth and is an affront to women who rely on their support. So, pregnancy centers ought not to be demonized callously, but respected for their efforts in helping pregnant women the world over. Abortion is still murder.

Kyrgyzstan is having their conflicts. Now, this is playing out the the geopolitical affairs of China, Russia, and Central Asia definitely. The Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev was deposed five years after and in the same manner as he came to power, in a bloody uprising. He was elected President 2 months after the Tulip Revolution of 2005. This Revolution was one that Bakiyev helped to engineer. He was since the head of state of the main transit nation for the U.S. and NATO war in Afghanistan. The Pentagon formed the Manas Air base in Kyrgyzstan shortly after its invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001. As of last year, it was known as the Transit Center at Manas. There are more than 170,000 coalition personnel passed through the base on their way in or out of Afghanistan. Manas was the transit point for 5,000 tons of cargo including spare parts and equipment, uniforms, and various items to support personnel and mission needs. Now, there are currently 1,000 troops along with a few hundred from Spain and France (are assigned to the base). Richard Holbrooke was the White House's Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan paid his frist visit in his current position to Kyrgyzstan. There are 3 other Central Asian republics bordering Kyrgyzstan (They are Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. He said in Febraury that 35,000 U.S. troops were transisting each month on their way in and out of Afghansitan. There coulld be 420,000 trops annually being transisting in the region based on that rate. The U.S. and NATO have established military bases in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan for the war in South Asia, but on a smaller scale. U.S. military forces were ordered out of the second country following what the government claimed was a Tulip Revolution type armed uprising in the province of Andijan less than 2 months after the Kyrgyz precedent. Germany maintains a base near the Uzbek city of Temerz to transmit troops and military equipment to Afghanistan's Kunduz province where the bulk of its 4,300 forces is concentrated. Kyrgyzstan in February 2009 evicted the U.S./NATO forces from its country. It stopped the goal in June when Washington offered it $60 million to reverse its decision. Kyrgyzstan borders China. China and Russia are concerned about the U.S./NATO influence in the world. This is similar to Russian/Chinese troops near Mexico. Kyrgyzstan is apart of the post-Soviet Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) along with Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan - seen by many as the only counterpart to NATO on former Soviet space - and of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) with China, Russia and the three above-mentioned Central Asian nations. The Color Revolution was promoted by the Anglo-American elite in order to further have control and influence in former Soviet Republics especially in Georgia and Central Asia. The leader of the "color revolution" prototype, Georgia's Mikheil Saakashvili, gloated over the Kyrgyz "regime change," attributing the "brave" actions of the opposition in Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan "to the Georgia factor," and added, "We are not waiting for the development of events, but are doing our best to destroy the empire in the CIS." Washington wants more power over the Baltics states, the Caucasus region, and in Central Asia (under the guise of democracy and globalization). Georgia had the Rose Revolution, which was supported by Mikheil Saakashvili. There was the Purple Revolution in Iraq, the Orange Revolution in the Ukraine, and the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon. So, Eurasia is a new strategic battlezone in the 21st and 22nd centuries. Russia, China, and the USA want its power and resources.

By Timothy