Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Is Google "PageRank" a good proxy ?

The struggle over the Obama Eligibility Controversy essentially amounts to a propaganda war. The pro-Obama forces have essentially a huge advantage, being much better organized and better funded

Those of us wanting to see the Obama Eligibilty Controversy addressed are a rag-tag group of volunteers and amateurs. We do not have the support of the mainstream media, which is still powerful but represents a slowly waning influence. We do not even have the support of most mainstream conservative media, for the most part, including Fox News and conservative talk radio. We do not have the support of the Republican Party, which one would expect to be our natural ally [1]. The conservative special interest groups, advocating controlled immigration, gun ownership rights, a pro-life agenda, etc have mostly avoided us so far, and been essentially silent, although we have reached out to them. We have been branded as fruitcakes, flakes, nutjobs and conspiracy theorists; lunatics who wear tin foil hats, worry about One World Government and the end of the world. Even in the "new media" arena on the internet, getting the message out about potential problems with Obama's eligibility has been an uphill struggle.

Since Google has a huge market share among search engines[2][3], ranking of links in Google searches is a vital way to get information out on the internet. At the moment, the top 10 hits on a Google search for the phrase "Obama birth certificate" are heavily weighted towards pro-Obama sites. Here are the current links that I obtained:

1. A "Politifact" article from June 27, 2008 debunking rumors that the Obama birth certificate posted online is suspect (supposedly owned by St. Petersburg Times). There is no evidence that "politifact" is neutral or the result of any scholarly effort. It references the "Fight the Smears" website, the official Obama Campaign website, as a reliable "authority".

2. An LA Times blog article from June 16, 2008, and supposedly updated in August, 2008, presenting the "Fight the Smears" Certification of Live Birth as a valid Hawaiian birth certificate, allegedly "proving" eligibility. I would not trust the LA Times editorial page in this matter, and I have even less respect for an LA Times blog article. 

3. A "snopes.com" article, last updated November 15, 2008 but apparently originally written in June of 2008, quoting material from the websites "Fight The Smears" and "Factcheck.org" (uncredited) and quoting the dismissal of the first Berg case. Although the Berg case was dismissed on the issue of "standing" and not for the substance of the evidence or arguments presented by Berg, the supposedly neutral "snopes" site spun their article in a completely partisan way. Snopes was started by a husband and wife at home, although might have been purchased later. We do not know who owns snopes at this point. However, the credentials of the original founders has never been ascertained with any degree of confidence. Do you trust two essentially anonymous and self-appointed bloggers writing a website at their kitchen table to determine the eligibility of someone who will occupy the most powerful office on the planet?

4. A Google news news article; depending on what is the top news item judged by the Google algorithm at any given time, this entry might be favorable to Obama, or it might not be, or it might be irrelevant. At the moment, the search I just performed produced an irrelevant news article.

5. The "Factcheck.org" article purporting to show that Obama's Certification of Live Birth is an unaltered official copy that proves Obama's eligibility. Many questions have been raised about this article and the document presented. An investigation into the staff at factcheck.org shows that the team consists of theatre majors, political science majors, undergraduates and other nonexperts. This were no forensic document experts involved. Connections of factcheck.org with the Annenberg Foundation at least give the appearance of impropriety.

6. An Israeli Insider article describing in detail some reasons the presented Obama COLB(s) appear to be fraudulent.

7. A link to a Youtube video describing reasons that the Obama COLB is suspicious

8. The original Fight The Smears article about the Obama birth certificate. This is the official Obama campaign website. 

9. A link to the Chicago Tribune article about the dismissal of the Donofrio Case on December 8, 2008. 

10. A second link to the original Fight The Smears article.

11. A list of 3 blog posts on the issue:

a. The left-wing Huffington Post's December 8, 2008 article on the dismissal of the Donofrio case

b. A December 4, 2008 article from Latest News blog about the flourishinng of lawsuits

c. A December 9, 2008 article from the left-wing Huffington Post entitled "Obama Birth Certificate Kooks In Court"

So at the moment, on the first page of Google-retrieved links, I find seven out of ten are pro-Obama articles, 2 of which are from Obama's official campaign site, and all seven of which are somewhat doubtful. In addition, Google retrieved three blog articles, and two out of 3 the blog posts are pro-Obama articles. Most of these articles are weeks if not months out of date. 

I know that the Googlebots update rankings more frequently than that. It is awfully hard for me to believe that the top-ranked articles from the Google PageRank algorithm on this issue remain two articles from June of 2008, namely the politifact article and the LA Times blog article. 

Previous searches using the Google search engine over the last 2 or 3 months showed that the LA Times blog article was the top-ranked hit for weeks on end and has never dropped out of its top ranking until this "politifact" article replaced it. At that point, the LA Times blog article assumed its current position in second place. 

Of the three remaining articles, one is the result of a feed from Google news, so does not quite count. One is from Youtube, so again it does not quite count. Of the 8 "regular" articles chosen by the Google algorithms for top-ten ranking, 7 are pro-Obama. Of the 3 blog articles chosen by the Google algorithms to display, 2 are pro-Obama. The pro-Obama articles are almost all wildly out of date. Ancient history, by internet standards.

This is probably the result of either (1) "pagerank engineering" or (2) intervention by Google. It is fairly easy to get a link to rise in search engine ranks. It mainly involves linking to the site from other highly ranked sites, at least in the case of Google Searches. It would not be too difficult to believe that the Obama internet team, with its funding and depth and resources, would easily be able to accomplish. 

Less likely, but still possible, is that Google itself has "pinned" certain articles to be high ranking. Reportedly Google CEO Eric Schmidt backs Obamahas campaigned for him, and even is being considered for a position in the Obama administration

Even if I go to the second page of Google-chosen articles, I find something similar going on, although it is not quite as extreme. I find 3 pro-Obama articles (again, mostly out of date), 5 links associated with the Obama Eligibility Controversy, and 2 news articles. 

Maybe I am confused and misleading myself, but I put a fair amount of stock in the reports of uneasiness of the US military with Obama's presidency [4][5][6], the informal AOL survey showing 53 percent believe there are some unanswered questions about Obama's eligibility and accounts that Obama's base of support is fracturing. When I look at reporting of polls in the mainstream media, the results appear to be "cooked" to make Obama look more popular than he is. 

I suspect we are observing what is essentially a "new age" publicity campaign, using the internet, to convince us that Obama is universally wildly popular and there are no serious questions about his eligibility. Even the numerous "o-bots" that turn up on our comment pages here seem to be extraordinarily driven to spread disinformation. Why is that? 

What are they so afraid of? A little openness and transparency?


Monday, December 29, 2008

More O-Bot Disinformation and Distraction

An anonymous visitor left this comment:

"“I
t is inescapable that if Obama was born in Kenya, and he did not at any time get citizenship from his U.S. citizen mother (which I do not believe he could because she was only 18 years old at the time of his birth), and he did not obtain a green card or naturalize (which he cannot do if he does not have a green card), then he is an illegal alien." - Mario Apuzzo, Esq." 
 
Brilliant! ... and from an attorney no less. There is NO PROOF that his mother was ever actually in Kenya. NONE. Furthermore, his father left Kenya in 1960 and did not return until 1965, as evidenced by travel records. He was born in Hawaii, and until you can PROVE different, case closed.

"Anonymous" in this case was probably a paid Obama operative, patrolling these forums and blogs to try to cast doubt on the proceedings and spread disinformation. He seems pretty frantic to come in here with claims of travel records and so on. These travel records are publically available? Where? How do you know? Provide me a reference. You are clearly full of nonsense.


What evidence is there that there is something amiss with Obama's eligibility? For starters, consider:

*Obama's paternal grandmother and other family members have asserted repeatedly that he was born in Kenya

*Obama has fought for months in court using several teams of lawyers to avoid producing the documentation that would end this controversy, quickly and inexpensively and easily.

*The Kenyan Ambassador to the US has stated that it is well-known in Kenya that Barack Obama was born in Kenya. 

*We have no evidence whatsoever that Obama was born in Hawaii. The Hawaiian Health Department never confirmed that Obama was born in Hawaii and refuses to do so, even when they have been asked to do so many times. They have even refused to answer court subpoenas for the information from other states. 

There are dozens and dozens of other pieces of evidence that something is wrong with Obama's eligibility. Any single piece of evidence might be dismissed, but when you put the entire list together, it gets a bit more difficult to explain it all away. 

For example, maybe his paternal grandmother is senile and confused. But why would his sister Maya give conflicting locations for his birth on different occasions? Why are there multiple reports of birth records from Kenya? Maybe his birth was registered in Kenya as some sort of social custom, as some have suggested. But then why not release them? In fact, why not just release ALL of  the birth information, from whatever location, so it could be confirmed? Why do the certificates of live birth that were posted on the internet appear to have been altered? 

You see, there just start to be too many questions that remain unanswered to be able to sweep this all under the carpet. Something is amiss. Where there is smoke, there is fire. 

You want to believe otherwise? Tell me why. But so far, I have not seen any compelling explanations for this immense pile of evidence that suggests Obama was not born in Hawaii. 

In many ways this is a moot point, however, since even if Obama was born in Hawaii, he still is not a natural born citizen by the definition in place at the time the constitution was written, and which has been affirmed repeatedly by decisions of the US Supreme Court over the years, and even by Senate Resolution 511 this year which was unanimously adopted.  And therefore, Obama is ineligible to take the office whether he was born in Kenya or not. 

O-bot central

I notice we have a lot of visitors from certain websites that specialize in "Obama Apologetics". I visited a couple to get an idea what they focus on. I did include an example, but the person who owns the site objected strenuously.

I will remove the content and paraphrase it instead to remove any claims I have appropriated their material without attribution.



There was a general complaint that articles in the media appear with this quote:

“Unfortunately the way state laws are written we are not allowed to confirm vital information and vital records,” said Janice Okubo, a spokeswoman for Hawaii’s department of health. “I cannot confirm individual information because that is against the law.”

Then it was implied that Okubo did not actually say this, and had been misquoted. Further, the allegation was made that under Hawaiian law, although the Health Department will not reveal information, it will verify any information you already know (see §338-14.3). It was argued that although to get an actual Hawaiian birth certificate one must have a "tangible interest", one can obtain "verification" under a much looser set of standards (see §338-18(g)(5)), and information can be released to

an individual employed, endorsed, or sponsored by a governmental, private, social, or educational agency or organization who seeks to confirm information about a vital event relating to any such record in preparation of reports or publications by the agency or organization for research or educational purposes.

Finally, readers were cautioned that this could not be done through a telephone transaction, but instead some sort of application was required and a five dollar fee.


Absolutely amazing, the lies that they are willing to tell to protect their "Messiah". First, any direct quote attributed to Okubo in a newspaper that appears to bolster the claim that Obama was born in Hawaii, particularly when taken out of context or otherwise mischaracterized, they accept verbatim, no questions asked. When Okubo is quoted stating that she cannot confirm or deny that Obama was born in Hawaii, immediately they doubt the quote.

Interesting, huh? They only trust quotes from Okubo if they can be possibly construed to imply that Okubo has confirmed that Obama was born in Hawaii. All other reported quotes from Okubo are immediately suspect and must be falsehoods, according to the Obama apologists.

Have you called the Hawaiian Health Department and asked about Obama's birthplace? I have. Several others have. And everyone is given the same reply, which is essentially the same as the Okubo quote above.

I invite you to try it if you doubt me. Call the Hawaiian Health Department. Ask if they will tell you where Barack Obama was born. Ask anything you like about his official records and see if they will tell you anything or send you anything. Call (808) 586-4533 or send email to vr-info@doh.hawaii.gov.

As for verifying anything someone already knows, for 5 dollars, I think you would have a hard time getting official documents from the Hawaiian Health Department confirming the birthplace of Barack Obama, wherever it is (Kenya, Hawaii, or someplace else). After all, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent on both sides of this issue in lawyers' fees and court costs and other expenses on just this very question. Many many requests for Obama's birth documents have been made by lawyers, by private citizens, by authors, and by private investigators. All were turned down. Subpoenas from several courts in other states for the records have been sent to the Hawaiian Health Department. All were turned down.

If this material was as easy to obtain as the writer claims, people would not have wasted so much time, money and effort to get ahold of the documents.

And if there was not something to hide, Barack Obama would not have spent so much time and money and effort trying to prevent anyone else from getting ahold of the documents.

You are really so sure you want to take such an indefensible position? It is beyond ludicrous to think that all anyone would have to do is ask for the documents and pay 5 dollars (in person of course; not over the phone).

If the writer of this post on the other blog feels it is so easy to get ahold of Obama's officially certified birth records, I challenge him to do it. I can even give him the name of a Private Investigator in Hawaii who will appear in person and pay the five dollars if the writer does not want to fly to Hawaii and do it himself. Do it and shut me up. You will also be famous forever for doing it. Show that those who are behind the two dozen lawsuits are all misguided fools. Demonstrate once and for all that the Obama Eligibility Controversy has been created by conspiracy theorists wearing tin foil hats. Put up or shut up.

If you are able to produce an officially signed, certified, notarized document from the Hawaiian Health Department, together with an official signed letter, showing that Obama was born in Hawaii, and providing enough detail that this can be verified independently, then I will gladly concede. I and most others will just walk away, even though Obama might still not be a "natural born citizen" according to the strict historical and legal definition.

While I am at it, here is another little gem of a similar nature, also paraphrased:

It was alleged that Alvin Onaka would not suffer any legal jeopardy for alerting someone in authority to the existence of an altered or fake document, since that was one of his assigned tasks as part of his employment. It was alleged that he should not be disquieted or anxious by any possibility of retribution, particularly of a lethal nature, and my post was mocked for being incommensurate with the environment this author experiences in his day-to-day existence.


This character seems to believe that all officials glady will report any and all fake documents they come across. If that is true, why are there so many forged and fake documents floating around?

I wonder if this author is aware that we have 15-30 million illegal immigrants in the US. They have forged documents; that is how they survive. The 911 hijackers had forged documents as well.

Most law enforcement officials encounter them all the time. My car was struck by an illegal alien's car. The police just let her go. No whistle was blown. Nothing was done.

From the UK newspaper that broke the story about Obama's aunt that was living illegally in Boston and illegally on public assistance, we find interviews with US Immigration officials in which it is stated that this situation was known and ignored by the relevant authorities. I guess no whistle was blown there, was it?

There are lots of reasons fraud is ignored. And please show me where in Onaka's job description it is written that it is his duty to decide who is and who is not natural born, and if the US constitution should be upheld or not. If I was Onaka, I would keep my mouth shut too.

As for being afraid of being killed, you obviously have not talked privately to judges and attorneys involved in this matter. Believe me, all are quite aware that pro-Obama forces might very well threaten their lives or more. I guess this author does not live in the same world where Black Panthers guarded Philadelphia polling places on election day with guns and nightsticks, threatening anyone who might vote for McCain. I guess this author does not live in the world where the police said they could not and would not do anything about these Black Panther "guards". I guess this author does not live in the same world as I do, where close Obama associate William Ayers wished he could have "done more" in a New York Times interview (more what? bombings and killings? later he tried to backpeddle, but...). I guess the author does not live in the same world as I do where Missouri Governor Matt Blunt issued a press release about Obama using Missouri law enforcement resources to threaten and intimidate his critics. I guess this author does not live in the same world I do, where Odinga supporters rioted after Obama's cousin Odinga lost the election, slaughtering their rivals (Odinga lost even though Obama had helped to fund the Odinga campaign). And Odinga has been invited to the Obama Inauguration I notice. Is that true in this author's world I wonder?

I guess this author does not live in that world. But that is the world that most of the rest of us live in. The real world.

Open letter to Member of Congress

URGENT REQUEST FOR ACTION – TO PRESERVE OUR CONSTITUTION

Dear Member of the U.S. Congress;

On January 8th, 2009, you will be meeting in a joint session of Congress in order to perform the final step of COUNTING and CONFIRMING the electoral votes for the President of the United States (POTUS).

This urgent letter is a request by your (and Mr. Obama’s) employers, We The People, for you to submit an OBJECTION to those votes being counted due to the Constitutional INELIGIBILITY of Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. to serve as POTUS:

1. No proof that he was born on U.S. sovereign territory, as required by Article II of the U.S. Constitution (the posting of his forged & fraudulent Certification of Live Birth (C.O.L.B.) only proves fraud – and that he’s INELIGIBLE;

2. No proof that he ever applied for U.S. citizenship, when reaching the age of majority, following his years as a citizen of Indonesia (this would make him ‘naturalized’, and therefore INELIGIBLE);

3. No proof that he was born of two parents of U.S. citizenship, with both owing allegiance to and being under the jurisdiction of the U.S., as required by law and/or the Constitution, in order to be a ‘natural-born citizen’. (actually he has freely admitted the opposite to be true, and therefore INELIGIBLE);

4. No proof that he was authorized, as a ‘natural-born U.S. citizen’ with a U.S. Passport, to travel to Pakistan in 1981 (he could not by law), or that he re-applied for ‘naturalized’ U.S. citizenship on his return, which would also make him INELIGIBLE;

5. No certified proof that he registered for the draft/Selective Service between the ages of 18 and 26, as required by law, thereby rendering him ineligible, by law, for employment in the Executive Branch of our government, and therefore INELIGIBLE for POTUS. (NOTE: over a year of multiple FOIA requests produced a forged and blatantly fraudulent Selective Service Registration form that should be cause for indictments and arrests);

6. No proof that he is, in fact, not an illegal alien, and therefore subject to the same penalties that would befall all illegal aliens in his situation. Therefore, INELIGIBLE;

Constructive Knowledge would inform and confirm to all who have examined the facts of this collossal fraud being perpetrated upon We The People of America (see www.DrOrly.Blogspot.com – ‘Open Letter to C.J. Roberts’) that confirming the electoral votes and thereby furthering the act of installing Mr. Obama as POTUS could possibly be construed as failure to honor one’s oath of office.

Therefore, we are calling on you, as a member of Congress, sworn to uphold, protect, and defend that Constitution, to OBJECT to the counting and confirmation of those electoral votes until proof of his eligibility or ineligibility can be determined, and to call for indictments in regard to any and all alleged violations of U.S. laws and one’s sworn oath.

Please let us know if you intend to stand with We The People in this epic battle to defend and preserve our Constitution. Our Nation can survive four years of any President. It cannot survive without a Constitution.


Sincerely;

We The People of the United States of America


Please advise of your INTENT TO OBJECT to dr_taitz@yahoo.com


Note: Do not use this email address if you are not a member of Congress. 

Saturday, December 6, 2008

Supreme court of CA acted expediently and gave me an opportunity to file in the Supreme court of the US as early as Monday.

I wanted to thank the Justices of the Supreme Court of California and Chief Justice Ronald M. George for acting so expediently.Within two days the Justices have reviewed the case and entered their disposition on it today, on Friday night, at 9:53 PM. They have denied on my pleadings, which gives me an opportunity to file immediately in the Supreme Court of the United States.

Supreme Court Justice assigned to our ninth circuit (includes CA) is an Honorable Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy.

I have attached a wikipedia article about Honorable Judge Kennedy.

Thank you again for all your support. Orly

The Hawaiian Health Department

Part of the difficulty in sorting through this issue is that there are a lot of rumors and misinformation on the internet. For example, there was a planted phantom decision about a nonexistent Virginia lawsuit from a "Wild Bill" that surfaced on November 3, 2008. No one has ever been able to verify that this VA lawsuit ever existed.

Similarly, many have claimed that the Hawaiian Health Department has issued a formal statement asserting that Barack Obama was born in Hawaii and the images of the certifications of live birth circulating on the internet are valid Hawaii birth certificates. However, on closer inspection, a lot of these purported official statements by the Hawaiian Health Department seem to evaporate.

For example, the October 31, 2008 offical statement by Director of the Department of Health for the State of Hawaii Dr. Chiyome Fukino is:

"There have been numerous requests for Sen. Barack Hussein Obama's official birth certificate. State law (Hawai'i Revised Statutes §338-18) prohibits the release of a certified birth certificate to persons who do not have a tangible interest in the vital record.

"Therefore, I as Director of Health for the State of Hawai'i, along with the Registrar of Vital Statistics who has statutory authority to oversee and maintain these type of vital records, have personally seen and verified that the Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures.

"No state official, including Governor Linda Lingle, has ever instructed that this vital record be handled in a manner different from any other vital record in the possession of the State of Hawai'i."

which was extrapolated by the Associated Press to produce a story entitled "State declares Obama birth certificate genuine". The Honolulu Advertiser similarly padded this simple official statement into the November 1, 2008 article "Obama's certificate of birth OK, state says", which includes an assertion by reporter Dan Nakaso that "Fukino issued her statement to try to stomp out persistent rumors that Obama was not born in Honolulu — and is therefore not a U.S. citizen and thus ineligible to run for president." Note that this sentence in the article is not attributed to Fukino; this is purely an unfounded claim injected into the piece by the reporter.

One of our team contacted Colin McMahon of the Chicago Tribune, about his December 6, 2008 article, "Barack Obama, Sarah Palin dogged by Internet birth rumors", and he responded by email that we had surely missed the "recent" interviews with Hawaiian officials affirming that Obama was born in Hawaii. When queried about these "recent" interviews, McMahon directed us to this same November 1, 2008 Honolulu Advertiser article. Not particularly recent, and obviously a fairly misleading packaging of the October 31, 2008 official statement by Fukino.

Of course, as most people should know by now, you can have a valid Hawaiian certificate of live birth, either short or long form, and still be born outside of Hawaii or even the US (per Hawaii law 338-17.8). After all, there is even a space for registering foreign births on the form, a box "7C" (see an example of a valid long form showing box 7c here or here). And the Hawaiian Health Department, as far as we have been able to determine, has never issued a statement about what is in box 7C of Obama's certificate of live birth. All that Fukino stated is that "Hawai'i State Department of Health has Sen. Obama's original birth certificate on record in accordance with state policies and procedures." Which to be honest, is somewhat vague and is not really the information that is being sought.

As another example, we are frequently told that Director of Communications of the Hawaiian Department of Health Janice Okubo has verified that Barack Obama is a "natural born citizen". Recently we asked for a source for this, and were given a quote from a post by Chicago Tribune reporter James Janega on the Chicago Tribune's Washington Bureau political blog, "The Swamp", on November 3, 2008,:

Does this mean Obama was born in Hawaii?

"Yes," said Hawaii Health Department spokeswoman Janice Okubo, in both email and telephone interviews with the Tribune. "That's what Dr. Fukino is saying."


Read the complete blog post to see it in context.

This was supposedly sent to "The Swamp" by email and mentioned in phone conversations with Janice Okubo. It is interesting to me that when our group repeatedly contacted the Hawaiian Health Department, the Hawaiian Health Department representatives stated that they will not discuss whether Obama was born in Hawaii or not, as a matter of policy and law. Others have had similar responses. For example, David Serchuk wrote on Forbes.com on November 21, 2008 that:


"Unfortunately the way state laws are written we are not allowed to confirm vital information and vital records," said Janice Okubo, a spokeswoman for Hawaii's department of health. "I cannot confirm individual information because that is against the law."

She added, though, that Dr. Fukino does have authority over and maintains records for individuals born in Hawaii.


If Janega's blog post is accurate, then the Hawaiian Health Department should issue a formal statement on this issue. Perhaps some compromise could be found which reveals the information that is being sought, but still protects the privacy of the individuals involved. It is unfortunate that the Hawaii government and/or the Obama clique has not allowed this, particularly when Hawaiian government officials and Obama are being sued in court over this matter in more than one complaint. More openness would probably have prevented this current unpleasant situation.

If someone in the Hawaiian Health Department was willing to make this sort of assertion in print, or better yet, under oath, then this entire contretemps would probably not have ballooned to its present proportions. However, the incredible amount of foot-dragging, evasion, ambiguous statements and legal wrangling makes it less likely that most skeptics will be satisfied by anything except a careful examination of the evidence at this point.

The short form document Obama produced, the Hawaiian certification of live birth (as distinct from the Hawaiian certificate of live birth, or long form document) has much less information on it, and is lacking information about the hospital and attending physician, etc. This extra information can be used to corroborate the information on the document. The short form document is even judged to be inadequate for participating in Hawaiian government programs. Also, in some circumstances, the Hawaiian birth documents can be changed later.

As an aside, it is interesting that two different "original" Hawaiian certifications of live birth have been produced by the Obama campaign, at factcheck.org and fightthesmears.com. I wonder why they produced two different documents? Both are "originals"? How can there be two originals? Why are they so different? Could it be that a more convincing version had to be produced after many deficiencies in the "fightthesmears" digital image were pointed out?

Robert Stevens

Monday, December 1, 2008

20,000 troops deployed on US soil

20,000 Troops To Be Used as U.S. Policemen


Monday, December 1, 2008 7:53 AM







WASHINGTON -- The US Department of Defense plans to deploy 20,000 troops nationwide by 2011 to help state and local officials respond to terror or nuclear attacks and emergencies, The Washington Post said Monday.

Citing Pentagon officials, the newspaper said the plan calls for three rapid-reaction forces.

The first 4,700-strong unit, built around an active-duty combat brigade, is based at Fort Stewart , Georgia , and is already available for deployment, according to General Victor Renuart, commander of the US Northern Command, it said.

Two additional groups will later join nearly 80 smaller National Guard and reserve units made up of about 6,000 troops to support local and state authorities nationwide, The Post said.

They will all would be trained to respond to domestic chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, or high-yield explosive attacks.

The newspaper said that civil liberties groups and libertarians had expressed concern that the plan could undermine the Posse Comitatus Act, a 130-year-old law restricting the military's role in domestic law enforcement.

© 2008 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved.