Shep Smith: I Would Have Published WikiLeaks In A Red Hot, New York Second

Shep Smith: I Would Have Published WikiLeaks In A Red Hot, New York Second

While Julian Assange twiddles his thumbs in jail and much of the media and most of Washington continues their full-blown, sometimes worrisome, meltdown over the WikiLeaks dump, Shep Smith is standing strong on the side of the leak.

Really strong.

Here's what he told Judge Napolitano earlier this afternoon.

What jumps off the page to me, as one who seeks information and disseminates it...when I see these documents I don't think bad guy who got it, I think 'oh my God, look how we're conducting ourselves.' ...I would have published [the documents] in a red hot New York second.

Is Shep the best anchor on cable TV? We post, you decide. [Yes.]

Meanwhile, when Napolitano notes that Assange isn't being afforded due process, Shep points out this isn't anything new "look at Gitmo." Vid below.

Woman who cannot feel fear may help in treating PTSD

Spiders did not worry the woman

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• Libido problems 'brain not mind'

A woman who cannot feel afraid because of a missing structure in her brain could help scientists discover treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Research published in Current Biology showed the woman felt no fear in a variety of scary situations.

These included exposure to snakes and spiders, horror films and a "haunted house".

The woman feels other emotions but said as an adult, she had never felt afraid.

She is the first known case of someone who is unable to process fear.

Researchers at the University of Iowa said her inability to feel frightened was because she is missing a structure in her brain called the amygdala.

The structure has long been associated with emotional learning - experiments in animals have shown that removing it makes them fearless.

However, it has never been observed in a human before.

Tarantula risk

The woman experienced fear as a child and knows that some situations should be frightening.

As an adult she has been in various frightening situations, including being threatened with a knife and held at gunpoint.

Continue reading the main story

“Start Quote

It is quite remarkable that she is still alive”

End Quote Justin Feinstein Iowa University

These did not make her afraid.

Researchers at the University of Iowa, in Iowa City, observed and recorded the woman's responses in situations that would make most people feel fear.

She watched a series of horror films, went to a reputedly haunted house and to an exotic pet store - where she handled dangerous snakes and asked to handle a tarantula.

She showed no fear in any of the situations and had to be prevented from touching the tarantula because of the high risk of being bitten.

When asked why she wanted to touch something that she knows is dangerous, she replied that she was overcome with curiosity.

Lead researcher Justin Feinstein said: "Because she is missing her amygdala, she is also missing the ability to detect and avoid danger in the world.

"It is quite remarkable that she is still alive."

Adam Perkins, a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London who specialises in researching the causal basis of anxiety and fear looked at the research.

He said the study was interesting because it suggested the amygdala is the neural seat of fear - and specifically responsible for generating feelings of fear, rather emotions in general.

The researchers hope that by studying the woman they can understand how the brain processes fear.

This could be useful in treating patients suffering from PTSD - such as soldiers who have been serving in conflict areas.

Mr Feinstein added: "Their lives are marred by fear and they are often-times unable to even leave their home due to the ever-present feeling of danger."

By studying the woman, researchers hope to create treatments that selectively target the brain areas that can sometimes allow fear to take over.

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Gasland - Rethink Review & Discussion

Regulation = Safety, by keeping the cops in play.

Deregulation = Creating safety hazards, no one out there to protect us.

Mother and Daughter Arrested for 'Dangerous Drug' Ibuprofen

A Georgia mother and daughter have been arrested for dealing and possession of a dangerous drug, respectively, after the daughter's stash of prescription-strength ibuprofen was discovered in her purse in school on Monday.

The 12-year-old girl, who was suffering from menstrual cramps, was busted for carrying a bottle of 11-and-a-half pills of ibuprofen in her purse, which the Baker Middle School searched. Another student had claimed the girl was carrying a knife, which was apparently not found. (More on Time.com: Federal Study Finds Teen Marijuana Use Up; Binge Drinking, Smoking Rates Down)

Baker Middle School's policy is to contact police if students are discovered with drugs. In addition to the drug charge, the girl was suspended from school for 10 days.

Although it is impossible to get high on any strength of ibuprofen — sold over-the-counter under the brand names Advil and Motrin in up to 200 mg doses — Georgia law considers higher-dose tablets, of 400 mg or 800 mg, to be "dangerous drugs," when possessed without a prescription.

The girl's mother told the school that she gave her daughter the ibuprofen.

Why anyone would believe that possibly burdening a 12-year-old with a criminal record for possession of any drug — let alone one that isn't psychoactive — and potentially locking up her mother for "drug distribution" would be a productive use of the criminal justice system, I can't say. Even suspending someone from school for this type of offense is ludicrous and counterproductive.(More on Time.com: FDA Warns Consumers to Stop Taking Sexual Enhancement Pills)

If adults don't demonstrate a sense of proportion or even common sense, how can we expect children to do so?

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Commentary

If anyone in this country deserves a Presidential or Governor endorsed pardon, it is these two people.

Anyone and everyone should do their best to help this Mother and Daughter in their time of need.

This story personifies the very definition of oppression and injustice.

Ron Paul Catches Shutdown Fever: ‘I Don’t Think It Would Hurt One Bit’

Ron Paul Catches Shutdown Fever: ‘I Don’t Think It Would Hurt One Bit’

Earlier today, Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) appeared on Fox News with 9/11-truther Andrew Napolitano. With funding for the federal government set to run out this weekend, Napolitano asked Paul if it was worth continuing to provide funding or if we should just “go on without the federal government for a little while?” Paul agreed, arguing that he didn’t think a government shutdown would hurt “one bit”:

NAPOLITANO: Would it be good fiscally and philosophically if the government did shut down for a few weeks and the American people could see life would go on without the federal government for a little while?

PAUL: I don’t think it would hurt one bit. If an individual can’t pay their rent on time, they might ask their landholder to say “look, I’ll be there next week.” They adjust. The owner and the renter adjust. This is the way the government should adjust. If they can’t pay their bills, wait. But they are afraid the world would panic and the world would come to an end. But it would be an admission that we’re in big trouble. But we are in big trouble. But to deny it and to continue to spend and continue to inflate and waiting for the bond bubble to burst, that doesn’t make sense to me.

Watch it:

Rather than simply speculate whether Paul is correct or not, we have a recent historical occurrence to look to for guidance: the federal government shutdown of 1995. During the nearly four-week shutdown, Social Security checks were not mailed, nor were Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements sent out. All non-essential government employees were sent home without pay. And according to a Center for American Progress report entitled “The Big Freeze”, the entire ordeal “cost the American taxpayer over $800 million and rattled the confidence of international investors in U.S. government bonds.”

The architect of that debacle, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, remains unperturbed about the damage caused during the shutdown. Appearing on Fox News this morning, Gingrich declared that the shutdown was “absolutely” worth the risks to the country because it helped Republicans win reelection:

HOST: Taking a look back and seeing what happened back in 1995, would say that it was worth it? It was worth the risk, not only to the country—

GINGRICH: Absolutely!

HOST: Absolutely? Why is that?

GINGRICH: Absolutely. For two reasons. First of all, as Republicans, no Republican majority in the House had been reelected since 1928, but when we stood firm against liberals and we said were prepared to really fight, all of our base said, you know, these folks are different, they’re not just normal politicians, they don’t just go to Washington to sell out. And we became the first House majority to be reelected since 1928.

Watch it:

These comments from Paul and Gingrich echo the demands being pushed by the Shutdown Caucus – a group of seven (and growing) GOPers pushing to shut down the federal government next year.

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Commentary

This explains perfectly why Ron Paul is weak on Economic issues, even if he's strong on foreign policy.

He's an old Trickle down Reagan Conservative who has not sat in a modern economics class in more than 4 decades, so I can't blame him for his ignorance.

But shutting down the government is always a bad idea. In the end it costs more than it gains, unless of course you politically gain from the pain of millions of Americans.

That at the end of the day is oppression to suit your own greedy needs and should not be applauded.

Mexico's drug war: Number of dead passes 30,000

The fight against drugs is exacting a heavy toll

Continue reading the main story

MEXICO'S DRUGS WAR

• Charting Mexico's violence
• Q&A: Mexico's drug violence
• 'No alternative' to Mexico's drug war
• Battling the cartels

More than 30,000 people have died in drug-related violence in Mexico since President Felipe Calderon took office four years ago, the government says.

Almost 12,500 have been killed so far this year, a sharp increase on 2009.

Mexico's attorney-general said the number of deaths was "regrettable", but showed that the security forces were having success in their fight against the drugs gangs.

President Calderon has sent thousands of troops to battle the cartels.

The latest figures were announced by the attorney-general, Arturo Chavez.

He said 12,456 people had been registered killed in drug-related violence so far this year, compared to 9,600 in 2009, bringing the total to 30,196 since President Calderon took office in December 2006.

But he said the figures reflected the "desperation" of the cartels in the face of pressure from the security forces.

Mr Chavez said the government had seized record quantities of arms and drugs and captured or killed 10 of the 24 most wanted drug traffickers.

The Mexican government says many of the deaths are the result of fighting between rival gangs over territory and smuggling routes into the US.

Most of the killings are concentrated in certain regions, particularly the northern border states.

The border city of Ciudad Juarez alone has seen 3,000 killings so far this year, ten times more than in 2007.

Critics of Mr Calderon's policies say they have increased the level of violence without reducing the flow of cocaine and other drugs into the US.

Human rights groups have also raised concerns that using the military has exposed civilians to possible abuse.

Source

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Commentary

The Drug war's pain is seen on 3 front:

1) Firstly it supports one of the largest prison populations in the world. America is addicted to throwing drug addicts into prison where they aren't properly treated and are thrown into and out of the system like a spinning top. That's not how a Just society should treat it's most vulnerable citizens.

2) Secondly the war on drugs causes pain at home with the gangland style fights that are so common in Los Angeles, leaving a trail of bodies of innocent women and children. The Bloods and the Crypts would have nowhere and nothing to fight over if they were defunded and weren't making record profits off illegal drugs.

3) Finally the pain is felt in Mexico where the cartels show the government who really calls the shots.

They lost 3 (9/11's) worth of citizens this year, more than 9,000 people total.

That's 10 (9/11's) worth if you count these last 4 years. Where is their war on terror? Where are their wars in Afghanistan and Iraq? Why are they neglecting these terrorist attacks on their homeland?

~~~~~~~~~

On a philosophical and fundamental level, it is not my place to stop people from ingesting substances. I may suggest a better path or an alternative one, but it's not my place to stop them from walking down a dangerous road.

By trying to circumvent that axiom or universal construct, we have created a problem that disturbs the lives of millions of people.

A Just society aims to reduce death and violence, even if it cannot aim to reduce people from taking dangerous paths.

That's why we legalized Alcohol, a horrible substance that is just as deserving of a ban as any other drug is.

The Crusades

An important comment was noted on a video about the crusades:

Kingdom of Heaven, is a good movie to watch for more information about the topic.

The fact remains, only one side declared war on the other. So the offender and defender becomes very clear.

Popes today have denounced the crusades, also a fact worth noting, as their bloody history has stained the garments of the church for centuries.

Ron Paul Defends WikiLeaks On House Floor (VIDEO)

In the wake of the recent WikiLeaks document dump, Representative Ron Paul (R-Texas), the self-styled libertarian crusader who's spent the past half-decade building up a massive grassroots following, has emerged as a principal voice in support of the transparency that WikiLeaks has provided. In a speech on the House floor yesterday, Paul held forth at length on the controversy.

Others may disagree, but I don't read Paul's remarks as a defense of Julian Assange specifically -- Assange is only mentioned three times during the five minute oration. This was perhaps wise, given the fact that Assange is facing charges unrelated to WikiLeaks abroad, and has become a fractious enough figure within the WikiLeaks organization itself that internecine battles have broken out, with one faction preparing to open their own site, "OpenLeaks." But it's certainly a defense of WikiLeaks in principle, and whistleblowers in general -- Paul spends more time discussing Daniel Ellsberg than he does Assange.

On balance, Paul's speech primarily touches on themes that he's advanced throughout his career: his antipathy to neo-conservative empire-building, the lies that precipitated the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the primacy of individual liberty, and the value of dissent. WikiLeaks simply gives Paul's convictions some urgency.

[WATCH]

TRANSCRIPT:

WikiLeaks release of classified information has generated a lot of attention in the past few weeks. The hysterical reaction makes one wonder if this is not an example of killing the messenger for the bad news. Despite what is claimed, the information that has been so far released, though classified, has caused no known harm to any individual, but it has caused plenty of embarrassment to our government. Losing our grip on our empire is not welcomed by the neoconservatives in charge.

There is now more information confirming that Saudi Arabia is a principal supporter and financier of al Qaeda, and that this should set off alarm bells since we guarantee its Sharia-run government. This emphasizes even more the fact that no al Qaeda existed in Iraq before 9/11, and yet we went to war against Iraq based on the lie that it did. It has been charged by experts that Julian Assange, the internet publisher of this information, has committed a heinous crime, deserving prosecution for treason and execution, or even assassination.

But should we not at least ask how the U.S. government should prosecute an Australian citizen for treason for publishing U.S. secret information that he did not steal? And if WikiLeaks is to be prosecuted for publishing classified documents, why shouldn't the Washington Post, the New York Times, and others also published these documents be prosecuted? Actually, some in Congress are threatening this as well.

The New York Times, as a results of a Supreme Court ruling, was not found guilty in 1971 for the publication of the Pentagon Papers. Daniel Ellsberg never served a day in prison for his role in obtaining these secret documents. The Pentagon Papers were also inserted into the Congressional record by Senator Mike Gravel, with no charges of any kind being made of breaking any national security laws. Yet the release of this classified information was considered illegal by many, and those who lied us into the Vietnam war, and argued for its prolongation were outraged. But the truth gained from the Pentagon Papers revealed that lies were told about the Gulf of Tonkin attack. which perpetuated a sad and tragic episode in our history.

Just as with the Vietnam War, the Iraq War was based on lies. We were never threatened by weapons of mass destruction or al Qaeda in Iraq, though the attack on Iraq was based on this false information. Any information which challenges the official propaganda for the war in the Middle East is unwelcome by the administration and the supporters of these unnecessary wars. Few are interested in understanding the relationship of our foreign policy and our presence in the Middle East to the threat of terrorism. Revealing the real nature and goal of our presence in so many Muslim countries is a threat to our empire, and any revelation of this truth is highly resented by those in charge.

Questions to consider:

Number 1: Do the America People deserve know the truth regarding the ongoing wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen?

Number 2: Could a larger question be how can an army private access so much secret information?

Number 3: Why is the hostility mostly directed at Assange, the publisher, and not at our governments failure to protect classified information?

Number 4: Are we getting our moneys worth of the 80 Billion dollars per year spent on intelligence gathering?

Number 5: Which has resulted in the greatest number of deaths: lying us into war or Wikileaks revelations or the release of the Pentagon Papers?

Number 6: If Assange can be convicted of a crime for publishing information that he did not steal, what does this say about the future of the first amendment and the independence of the internet?

Number 7: Could it be that the real reason for the near universal attacks on Wikileaks is more about secretly maintaining a seriously flawed foreign policy of empire than it is about national security?

Number 8: Is there not a huge difference between releasing secret information to help the enemy in a time of declared war, which is treason, and the releasing of information to expose our government lies that promote secret wars, death and corruption?

Number 9: Was it not once considered patriotic to stand up to our government when it is wrong?

Thomas Jefferson had it right when he advised 'Let the eyes of vigilance never be closed.' I yield back the balance of my time.

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Economic Downturn, Financial Rescues, and Legacy of Bush Era Policies Drive Record Deficits

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We are not in this mess because of Social Security, which has a 2 trillion dollar Surplus.

We are not in this mess because of Medicare/Medicaid, because far too few people are covered under these programs.

We are in this mess because of Defense spending(wars), Tax cuts, and Bailouts.

They are the real Axis of Evil.

Jason Linkins Jason Linkins jason@huffingtonpost.com | HuffPost Reporting Become a Fan Get Email Alerts from this Reporter Roger Simon Whines About T

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Roger Simon Whines About The 'Class Warfare' That The Top One Percent Decisively Won Years Ago

People who live outside the Beltway may not be aware of the fact that in Washington, DC, we have a local competition to see who can write the most shallow, cotton-headed thing about politics. That competition is known locally as "Politico," and today, the 2010 contest appears to have been won by Roger Simon, who has penned what, for all intents and purposes, is a tone-poem to pure inanity.

The rich are different from you and me. They are swine.

So begins this piece, written by someone who is doing a lot better in this economy than say, many of the people who will show up in this forthcoming book, about the economic realities in America. Simon goes on to paint a strange picture of what's been going on in the Congressional debates of the past year:

So say many of the Democrats in the House of Representatives who would rather that jobless people lose their unemployment checks and middle-class people lose their income tax breaks than that the rich get a dime extra.

What Simon appears to believe is that because many Democrats do not support the tax cut compromise on offer, this means that they want people to lose their unemployment benefits. This neatly omits the fact that Congressional Democrats have had to wage a grueling war over the past year to keep the unemployed afloat, in a job market where there are five job seekers for every job opening.

In reality, the Democrats who oppose the tax cut measure are fully aware of the parts of the deal that are there to make it painful to oppose -- unemployment benefits and the further economic stimulus that Charles Krauthammer recently termed "a swindle." (He opposes the tax deal, too, by the way, because he is a terrible hater of the wealthy, I guess?) The tax cut compromise is essentially a massive helicopter drop of money into the economy, and Democrats who oppose it do so because they correctly recognize that a disproportionate share is going to be lavished on people who have done very well in America's recession, and who didn't do much, in terms of productivity, with the largesse over the life of the original Bush tax cuts.

Simon seems to think that Obama has made this deal happen because he is animated by his robust book sales, thus giving him a sympathetic perspective into the lives of wealthy people and the terrible things they have to endure. Actually, we are where we are today because all the Democrats punted on the issue of rolling back the tax cuts on the wealthy when they had a modicum of leverage, and now they have to give up on a 2008 campaign promise because the GOP knows that the Democrats will never be able to bluff them again. For fans of the "first as tragedy, then as farce" theory of history, flashforward to 2012, where we will apparently have another "showdown" over this issue. (SPOILER ALERT: The middle class gets rolled again.)

But now that Simon has slapped you across the face with the blunt edge of his rapier wit, we're off on one, long emo saga about Growing Up Roger Simon In America, with a soundtrack by Arlo Guthrie.

To me, this flies in the face of the American dream, which is to work hard, play by the rules, save your money and marry wealthy. As a kid, I dreamed about being adopted by a rich family. My father was a truck driver and my mother was a housewife, and adoption seemed the quickest route.

It was not, however, to be. But I never resented the rich. On weekends, my father used to take the family on drives through wealthy neighborhoods -- I am not making this up -- so we could ogle the homes of the affluent.

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The good news for Simon is that there are whole neighborhoods of houses just sitting around empty now, because of the economic collapse, and he can have his pick of the litter once he chases all the coyotes off the property.

Then there are paragraphs documenting how Simon basically got jobs and saved money and bought a terrible teevee and a crappy car, and later bought a less terrible teevee and a Toyota, and, I guess he wants a medal for doing what lots of Americans used to be able to do pretty successfully, most notably back when the wealthiest were taxed at the Clinton-era rates. At the very least, to Simon, people who want things shouldn't be mad at the people who have things, which is really the shallowest take on income inequity I have ever heard.

But I never resented that. Which is why class warfare doesn't work in America and why congressional Democrats are being stupid. In America, the class structure is fluid. You don't have to stay in the economic class into which you were born. People don't really hate the rich, and we don't really want to confiscate their wealth.

Only half of the wealthiest people in America inherited their wealth. The rest earned it. But whether their wealth is earned or inherited, I just want the rich to pay their fair share of taxes, not some kind of punitive share.

Yes, the gap between rich and poor is growing in this country, and too small a percentage of the population owns too much of the wealth.

Don't like the way wealth is distributed? Then you can join congressional Democrats and grump about it, or you can get some wealth for yourself.

This is some of the most out-of-touch-with-what's-happening-in-contemporary-America nonsense I have ever read in my life, because here is a rebuttal to it, in its entirety, in a single word: bailout.

Here's the link if you'd like to see for yourself. Burn the internet after reading, obviously.

RELATED:
15 Mind-Blowing Facts About Wealth And Inequality In America [Business Insider]

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