Russian and Ukrainian armies shaping up for initial military clash over Slavyansk

Russia and Ukraine were heading Sunday, April 27, for their first battle over the rebel-held flashpoint town of Slavyansk, DEBKAfile’s military and US sources report. The outcome will determine who controls the Donetsk region and possibly all of East of Ukraine – the separatists or the provisional government in Kiev.

With a superior, professional and well-trained force armed with a preponderance of fire power, the Kremlin has several options to choose from for this engagement:

1. To order the 11,000 troops, based at Rostov on Don 40 kilometers from the Ukrainian border, to cross over and head for Slavyansk and Donetsk.

2. To send a tank column against the 15,000 Ukrainian troops deployed over the weekend around Slavyansk. According to Russian sources, the force from Kiev is armed with 160 tanks, 230 armored personnel carriers and 150 pieces of artillery and missiles.

3. To send warplanes and helicopters from the giant Russian airbase of Tsentralniy - a prospect gaining ground in recent hours. This action would broaden the engagement into a major war operation between Russia and Ukraine.

4. Moscow, Kiev and their backers may understand how such a war began, but once it is under way, no one can tell how it will end.

5. In the event of a major escalation, Moscow ill have to decide whether to throw into battle the special rapid deployment and paratroop units stationed at Tsentralniy, which are held ready for intervention in the Middle East and are now in reserve for action in Ukraine.

6. The Kremlin must decide whether to go for an overall invasion of Ukraine.DEBKAfile’s military sources report that the force poised on the border is smaller than the 40,000 estimated by Kiev. It consists of 15,000 armored corps soldiers with T-72B tanks and one division each of infantry and paratroops.

A Russian invasion would bring about the partition of Ukraine between the Russian-controlled East + Crimea and the sector ruled by the pro-Western administration of Kiev.

Moscow would find it hard to present this as a “peacekeeping” or “humanitarian” operation.
For Kiev, it might be the last straw that undermines its already shaky rule.
The Ukrainian army’s capacity to beat the Russian invaders, or even stop them in their tracks, is close to nil. Its threat to blockade the more than a dozen towns where separatists are entrenched in official buildings is unconvincing.

Indeed, the Kiev government faces five fairly dismal prospects once a militlary collision begins:

a) A full-blown military clash will test the limits of US and European readiness to come to its aid against Russian forces. The US and NATO are more likely to pitch in with condemnations and sanctions than by sending troops to the rescue. The Ukrainian government would find itself exposed as incapable of defending itself and bereft of effective international protectors.

b) The Ukraine government has not been able to summon up international financial or economic assistance.

c) The 15,000 troops concentrated at Slavyansk have more or less scraped the bottom of the barrel of Ukraine's operational military assets. The 150,000-strong army is sizeable enough but it is not ready for war, and the loyalty of most units and their officers to the Kiev regime is questionable.

d) If the Ukrainian government opts nonetheless to enter into a lengthy battle with an invading Russian force, it will play into the hands of Moscow, which strongly objects to the May 25 general election. Any delay would further undermine the stability of the interim regime in Kiev.

e) The Obama administration would find itself in difficult straits. President Barack Obama has repeatedly warned Moscow of “costs” for failing to restrain the pro-Russian separatists’ advances in Ukraine or pull its army back from the border.
He is finding it harder than ever to follow through on a concerted US-European economic and military challenge to Russia’s military steps in and around Ukraine.

In a round of phone calls to British, French, German and Italian leaders Friday, Obama met reluctance on their part to join aggressive sanctions against Moscow over its threats to Ukraine, when they were weighed against the heavy costs to the deep and longstanding trade ties and business partnerships that Europe has developed with Russia.
Obama managed to persuade the G7 to agree on another round of penalties for Moscow but had to delay the announcement of specifics to Monday, April 28.

This frustration was registered in Obama’s remarks in Kuala Lumpur Sunday: The United States will be in a stronger position to deter Vladimir Putin once he sees the world is unified in sanctioning Russia, he said. Russia isn't abiding by a deal reached to de-escalate the conflict. "Russia has not lifted a finger to help" he said and stressed: “The US and Europe must act collectively.” 

But America’s allies have made it clear that a broad international coalition for a strong stand against Russia will not be forthcoming. President Obama is left with the option of striking almost alone, or climbing down from his threats.




Credit to Debkafile

Pastor Mark Biltz - Blood Moons: Decoding the Imminent Heavenly Signs Part II

Is A Crash Inevitable? The Spiral Vortex Of Debt And Corruption

 

Submitted by Martin Armstrong of Armstrong Economics blog,

The economy will decline in the USA following 2015.75 and will have several important impacts that will shape our future. The Big Bang is inevitable – YES! The outcome is to be determined. This is why I do what I do. I too have a family and fear for their future. I am not 23, so my shelf time is expiring thank God so I do not have to live in this age of tyranny too long. Nevertheless, all I can do is try to educate as many people for if they understand how things work, then when it comes time for the rebuilding, perhaps we can choose freedom over more authoritarian-tyranny...

So my concerns are for our future – not to sell bullshit. This is far more important. Unfortunately, the primary impact will be:

The USA is the only economy holding up the entire world right now. GDP Growth is collapsing everywhere from Europe, Russia, and into China. Once the USA turns down, the civil unrest will rise in the USA as well. The Occupy Wall Street was a dress rehearsal.

Governments will find it increasingly harder to sell their debt. This trend has already hit both China and Russia. We will see it hit Europe, Japan and then the USA. This will drive the trend to raise taxes further as governments will assume that they need to restore confidence within their debt structures. As they do this, the global economy will turn downward into a spiral vortex.

While governments claim to be mad at the NSA, behind the curtain there is legal swapping going on. Foreign nations are using the NSA to gather data for taxes on their own citizens while denying they spy on their own people yet get that info from the NSA. In return, the NSA allows the British to spy on Americans so the NSA can deny it is doing so domestically and then swaps the info. Germany and Switzerland also participate in this domestic spying for taxes.

The G20 agreement to swap all financial info to hunt down international capital is all about getting tax revenue to sustain the debt structure. There is no long-term planning here and they cannot see that they are creating the next MAJOR GREAT DEPRESSION to make all previous downturns loop like speed-bumps. I reported that even I could not wire $15,000 for expenses to Asia in advance. HSBC refused to accept the wire for they could not guarantee I had no ownership in the account the wire was directed. I had to write a check. You cannot even do business because these people are hunting all capital and PRESUME any transaction over $3,000 is to hide money – not for commerce.

Government will not collapse. This early stage will be about fighting hard to sustain their power. War is part of that.International War takes place either to fill the treasury with the spoils of war and or power as was in the good old days (Putin’s ideas), or the more modern version to act as a distraction to deflect civil unrest (USA to come) and to unleash the dogs of war to settle old scores (China v Japan, North v South Korea, Russia v West).

What you have to realize is that this trend is inevitable – YES. Why?Because there can be no change without pain. It is unrealistic to expect government to simply say OMG, you are right – let’s reform! Gee, here is the power we stole unconstitutionally – sorry! My bad! Political change does not take place without pain. This is what revolution is all about. Government has NEVER even once in recorded history simply said it was wrong and handed back power without anything causing such a change. This is just the way things function. This is Jefferson’s Tree of Liberty that must be feed with the blood of tyrants and patriots.

Therefore, predicting the trend of the MOB is simple and that is what cycles are all about. However, that does not mean we are hopelessly lost as individuals. We personally possess the free will to act like dumb sheep or to see the train coming down the track and move out of its way. This is why there are always two forces politically. People ask me what would happen if everyone used our models? Very simple – that would never happen. There is always people who will never believe simply because they cannot see things in a dynamic structure. They can only see the world in a linear fashion.

So yes – it is inevitable. I can rally a few hundred thousand people and we can all march on Washington. It will change nothing as was the case with the Occupy Wall Street gathering. Government simply arrested people under all sorts of pretense. Michael Bloomberg, who was Mayor of NYC at the time, was more concerned about people drinking soda than the freedom of speech. God forbid they protest against his bankers – never forget he came from Salomon Brothers.

Just as the pretend liberal Bloomberg sought to crush the freedom of speech yet cared so much about people drinking soda, we are hopelessly lost in a declining spiral vortex of debt and corruption that will only change with war and civil unrest.

Credit to Zero Hedge

War looms in Ukraine

Kerry: Israel could become ‘apartheid’

US Secretary of State John Kerry has said that Israel could become “an apartheid state” if the so-called peace talks with the Palestinian Authority fail.

In an exclusive report published on Sunday, The Daily Beastsaid it obtained a recording of remarks made by Kerry during a closed-door Friday meeting in which he lashed out against Israel’s settlement-building activities and failure to achieve a peace deal with the PA.

“A two-state solution will be clearly underscored as the only real alternative. 

Because a unitary state winds up either being an apartheid state with second class citizens,” Kerry told a room of influential world leaders including senior officials and experts from the US, Western Europe, Russia, and Japan.

Kerry has been leading Washington’s efforts to resume the stalled negotiations between Israel and the PA, with the final aim of brokering a deal. However, the talks have remained deadlocked since they were resumed last summer under the intense US pressure.

Earlier this year, remarks made by Kerry at the Munich Security Conference also angered Israeli officials when the top US diplomat said failure to reach a deal with the Palestinians could lead to more boycotts, referring to a growing international boycott campaign against Israel.

Some Israeli officials even went as far as accusing Kerry of endorsing and “amplifying” what they called “anti-Semitic” efforts to impose sanctions on Israel by issuing the warning.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hit back hard at Kerry, saying calls for boycotts of Israel to pressure it to abandon settlement construction in the occupied Palestinian territories were “immoral and unjustified.”

The US Department of State quickly responded to the criticism, saying Kerry had been referring to the actions of others and opposed boycotts.

Credit to Press TV

James Turk-They're Not Going to be Able to Save the System This Time Around

Will Humanity Survive the Depopulation Agenda of the Global Elite?

Do you remember when your mother asked you if you would jump off a cliff if everyone else was doing it? It turns out that all of us would have been wise to heed the advice from our mothers as the globalists aren’t just encouraging us to jump off a cliff, they are, in fact, pushing us off of the proverbial cliff in a deliberate attempt to fulfill the their mandate which is to eliminate a substantial portion of humanity. Meanwhile, the globalists will be safely tucked away in some underground structure free from the harm that they are perpetrating upon humanity. Sadly, many of our friends and family members are willingly going to their demise without so much as a whimper.

Heretofore, the topic of intentional depopulation was the perceived product of paranoid delusional conspiracy theorists who had too much time on their hands. The most frequent refrain from the unaware is that “they” would never do that. However, the globalists have left an unmistakable paper trail in which their true agenda is exposed.

Ronald Reagan Understood
President Reagan understood a common enemy had the potential to unite humanity. He often spoke a potential alien threat to mankind as being the unifying force which had the potential to bring all of us together.

Indeed, all of mankind does face a common foe. However, it is not aliens. Our common foe are the elite that presume that they have the God-given right to exert ownership over all of us including the right to life or death. And for 95% of us, the elite are actively engaged in systematic extermination of mankind.

If we were to borrow from Reagan’s wisdom, we have the potential to unite humanity against our common foe. For those who are awake, it is your duty to your creator and to fellow man to relentlessly educate humanity as to the true nature of the elite along with exposing their final solution.

Along these lines, I have collected a sample of well-known quotes from the global elite, both past and present. And even people who cannot find the courage to abandon their normalcy bias, will have a difficult time denying the disturbing quotes which follow. .

Officials in the United Nations Want You Dead

Surely, the peace loving United Nations, complete with its expressed desire to save the world from any and all evil would stand in line to thwart any expressed threat to inhabitants of this planet, right? Well, not exactly. The United Nations is permeated with individuals who are Satanically inspired and have repeatedly, on many fronts, have expressed their intent to reduce the world’s population by dramatic means, if necessary. Please consider the following quotes:

“No one will enter the New World Order unless he or she will make a pledge to worship Lucifer. No one will enter the New Age unless he will take a Luciferian Initiation.”
David Spangler, Director of Planetary Initiative, United Nations

The present vast overpopulation, now far beyond the world carrying capacity, cannot be answered by future reductions in the birth rate due to contraception, sterilization and abortion, but must be met in the present by the reduction of numbers presently existing. This must be done by whatever means necessary.”
Initiative for the United Nations ECO-92 EARTH CHARTER


“One America burdens the earth much more than twenty Bangladeshes. This is a terrible thing to say in order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day. It is a horrible thing to say, but it’s just as bad not to say it.”
Jacques Cousteau, UNESCO Courier


“A reasonable estimate for an industrialized world society at the present North American material standard of living would be 1 billion. At the more frugal European standard of living, 2 to 3 billion would be possible.”
United Nations, Global Biodiversity Assessment


“A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline would be ideal.”
Ted Turner, founder of CNN and major United Nations contributor

Is anyone else bothered by the fact that this pack of Eugenicists are overseeing our elections? Perhaps the officials at the United Nations stand alone among elite leaders on the planet.

What About Our Educated Elite?
Although it is painfully obvious that the United Nations elite have a high level of contempt for the average person, surely those people responsible for educating our children will teach the time honored virtues of the United States Constitution. Surely, they will teach their students to develop a healthy respect for American sovereignty so that the genocidal lunatics running the United Nations are unable to put their genocidal schemes into motion. Upon further review, this is not the case as I bring to you the words of those who educate and mold the minds of our young people.

War and famine would not do. Instead, disease offered the most efficient and fastest way to kill the billions that must soon die if the population crisis is to be solved. AIDS is not an efficient killer because it is too slow. My favorite candidate for eliminating 90 percent of the world’s population is airborne Ebola (Ebola Reston), because it is both highly lethal and it kills in days, instead of years. “We’ve got airborne diseases with 90 percent mortality in humans. Killing humans. Think about that. “You know, the bird flu’s good, too. For everyone who survives, he will have to bury nine”

Dr. Eric Pianka University of Texas speaking on the topic of reducing the world’s population to an audience on population control.

A cancer is an uncontrolled multiplication of cells, the population explosion is an uncontrolled multiplication of people. We must shift our efforts from the treatment of the symptoms to the cutting out of the cancer. The operation will demand many apparently brutal and heartless decisions.”
Stanford Professor Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb

“We have to take away from humans in the long run their reproductive autonomy as the only way to guarantee the advancement of mankind.”
Francis Crick, The discoverer of the double-helix structure of DNA

It strongly appears that the Eugenicists patrolling corridors of educational institutions possess the same disdain for mankind as do the lunatic officials from the United Nations.

What About the Environmental Elites?
It is apparent that humanity cannot look to the sociopathic leaders of the United Nations and America’s top academic leaders for salvation. But certainly the eco-friendly environmentalists, with their penchant for saving the whales and the spotted owl will ride to the rescue of mankind. Regrettably, this is also not the case. It seems that the humanitarian spirit of the environmentalists does not apply to any species which possess a collapsible thumb, the power of speech and has a well-developed cerebral cortex. Again, the words of the elite exposes their depopulation agenda.

“If I were reincarnated I would wish to be returned to earth as a killer virus to lower human population levels.”
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, Leader of the World Wildlife Fund

Malthus has been vindicated; reality is finally catching up with Malthus. The Third World is overpopulated, it’s an economic mess, and there’s no way they could get out of it with this fast-growing population. Our philosophy is: back to the village.”
Dr. Arne Schiotz, World Wildlife Fund Director of Conservation


What About Our Government Leaders?
Historically, many Americans believe that they can look to the government to protect them from the evils of the world. It is clear that our blind trust in our public officials misplaced. Our leaders are not our friends, and have not been for a very long time as evidenced by the following quotes:


“Society has no business to permit degenerates to reproduce their kind”
Theodore Roosevelt

“There is a single theme behind all our work–we must reduce population levels. Either governments do it our way, through nice clean methods, or they will get the kinds of mess that we have in El Salvador, or in Iran or in Beirut. Population is a political problem. Once population is out of control, it requires authoritarian government, even fascism, to reduce it….” “Our program in El Salvador didn’t work. The infrastructure was not there to support it. There were just too goddamned many people…. To really reduce population, quickly, you have to pull all the males into the fighting and you have to kill significant numbers of fertile age females….” The quickest way to reduce population is through famine, like in Africa, or through disease like the Black Death….
Thomas Ferguson, State Department Office of Population Affairs

“Depopulation should be the highest priority of foreign policy towards the third world, because the US economy will require large and increasing amounts of minerals from abroad, especially from less developed countries.”
Dr. Henry Kissinger

“The world’s population needs to be reduced by 50%,” and “The elderly are useless eaters”
Dr. Henry Kissinger

“The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes.”
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes


“Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of.”
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg


“The Planetary Regime might be given responsibility for determining the optimum population for the world and for each region and for arbitrating various countries’ shares within their regional limits. Control of population size might remain the responsibility of each government, but the Regime would have some power to enforce the agreed limits.”
Obama’s science czar John P. Holdren: From Ecoscience

“It is easier to kill a million people rather than trying to control a million people… people are fighting back…our capacity to impose control over humanity is at an historical low…”
Zbignew Brzezinsk

One percent of the population is sociopathic. Here are two clear markers for Sociopaths, discoverable in their behavior patterns: 1) Sociopaths have no conscience. Hence, 2) Sociopaths cannot feel guilt nor remorse, like ordinary people can.

These are evil people, very evil people. Superficially charming, they are selfish, greedy, unemphathetic, manipulative, and prone to violence and abuse. They steal, cheat, vandalize others property, swindle, and they are pathological liars. They are unconcerned with the feelings of other humans, who are mere objects to be used, and have little or no conscience

A recent book, authored by Martha Stout, in which the material came from released government documents CEO’s are three times more likely to be a sociopath than the general population. Politicians arefour times more likely to be sociopathic than you and I. These are the people who seek power and once they obtain that power, the seek absolute power, much to detriment of the soon-to-be extinct members of human race.

What Is Humanity To Do?

If humanity is to preserve itself in its present form, it will be necessary to educate the masses as to the planned perils which lie ahead. The pro-human preservation movement needs bodies, billions and billions of bodies. Yet, the very victims of the coming planned genocide are dumbed down by various federal education programs and propagandized into a false sense of security by the mainstream media which is owned by six global elite corporations who also want you gone.

Judge a Man by What He Does, Not What He Says
As you attempt to educate your fellow man, you will, no doubt, be asked the question as to how the elite are attempting to accomplish their depopulation agenda. The true weapons of mass destruction include some of the following:

1. Aluminum based vaccines.

2. Chemtrails laced with barium and aluminum.

3. Fifty percent of “rushed to market” pharmaceuticals.

4. Hospitals are replete with virulent and deadly staff infections.

5. Cancer-causing GMO’s.

6. The hording of food.

7. The hording of water.

8. Unabated and deliberate exposure to Fukushima radiation.

9. The specter of World War III, complete with nuclear weapons, breaking out in Ukraine.

10. Democide (death by government) killed 260 million people in the 20th century and many feel that the globalists are just getting armed up.

11. The anesthetization of America through deliberately dumbing down of the citizens.

12. The United States, alone, has enough chemical, biological and nuclear weapons to destroy the world 100 times over.


Don’t write to me and ask me what I am going to do. It is time for the “awake” to get to work. What are you going to do?

Credit to Common Sense 

Pro-Russian Mayor Of East Ukraine City Of Kharkiv Shot In The Back

On the day in which Barack Obama announced earlier he would unveil another round of sanctions against Russia (most likely involving the heads of both Gazprom and Rosneft), moments ago the already tense situation took another turn for the worse when Interfax blasted news out of East Ukraine that the pro-Russian mayor of Kharkiv, the second largest city in Ukraine, Gennady Kernes, has been shot in the back and is currently undergoing an operation.

Kyiv Post reports that Kernes was an avid supporter of former President Viktor Yanukovych and spoke out against the EuroMaidan Revolution that forced the ex-head of state to flee the country. Since then, Kernes has flip-flopped under pressure from EuroMaidan activists and the new Kyiv government in order to remain in office. 

Following the news, presidential candidate and close Kernes confidant Mikhail Dobkin canceled his scheduled press conference.

Will this be the provocation that finally breaks the Russian bear's back and forces the Kremlin to send in "peacekeepers"?

Some more early reports from Reuters:

Gennady Kernes, the mayor of Ukraine's second-biggest city, Kharkiv, is in hospital undergoing emerging surgery after being shot in the back, Interfax Ukraina news agency quoted the mayor's spokeswoman as saying on Monday.

"The doctors are fighting to save his life," the agency quoted the spokeswoman, Tatiana Gruzinskaya, as saying.

And WSJ chimes in too:

Kharkiv Mayor Gennady Kernes, a one-time supporter of the ousted Ukrainian president who has since taken a more conciliatory approach to the new government, was shot in the back around noon local time and was rushed to a hospital for surgery.

"Doctors are fighting for his life. He is now in the emergency room undergoing an operation," the council said in a statement on its website.

The statement offered no details about the circumstances of the shooting, but Zurab Alasania, the director general of Ukraine's state-run National Television Company, wrote on his Facebook page that Mr. Kernes was shot while swimming in a local spring near Kharkiv.

Kharkiv had been an early target at the beginning of a pro-Russian separatist movement, in which mobs seized government buildings in the east of the country, but authorities had been successful in forcing the protesters out, unlike in other cities.

The colorful Mr. Kernes, 54 years old, was elected mayor in 2010, narrowly defeating Arsen Avakov, who is now Interior Minister. Mr. Avakov and his allies claimed the vote was rigged, which Mr. Kernes denied.

Mr. Kernes was a staunch ally of former President Viktor Yanukovych. During the antigovernment protests this winter, Mr. Avakov alleged that Mr. Kernes helped recruit gangs of civilians that were sent to Kiev to attack protesters. He denies this.

When Mr. Yanukovych fled at the end of February, Mr. Kernes briefly left the country before returning and adopting a softer tone toward new authorities. In March, he was placed under house arrest while police investigate alleged connections to kidnapping and threats.

The diminutive 54-year-old is known for his colorful lifestyle captured on his Instagram account where he posts photos of himself working out and posing with animals.

Details of the mayor's condition or the motive behind the shooting are still absent, although it is clear this latest provocation will hardly reduce regional tensions. We will update once we get more.

Credit to Zero hedge

Philippines and U.S. announces defense pact

The U.S. and the Philippines have agreed on a new 10-year defense pact that will allow increased presence of U.S. troops in the Philippines, White House officials said Sunday.

The deal came in advance of President Obama's arrival in the Philippine capital, Manila, on Monday, the last stop on his four-country Asian tour.

The Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, which has been under negotiation for eight months, is "the most significant defense agreement that we have concluded with the Philippines in decades," said Evan Medeiros, National Security Council senior director for Asian affairs.

The accord will give U.S. forces temporary access to select Philippine bases and allow them to position planes and ships there.

Details of the size, duration and location of the increased U.S. presence are yet to be worked out, but it is a significant step in the Obama administration's pivot toward Asia, a region with a rising power in China and a large number of volatile territorial disputes in the East and South China seas.

The Philippines has long been seeking additional support in its disputes with China over areas such as the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal. For the U.S., the pact is an opportunity to reassert its presence in the region and monitor its interests, particularly freedom of navigation on the South China Sea.

Obama has been careful not to antagonize China on this Asia trip, which included visits to Japan, South Korea and Malaysia.

"We're not interested in containing China," he said in South Korea on Friday. "We're interested in China's peaceful rise and it being a responsible and powerful proponent of the rule of law and an international system."

"The Chinese consider U.S. action encirclement and containment.," he said. "China may not want U.S. ships regularly patrolling the region, but the rules of engagement will be more readily understood between the two and potentially create a temporary maritime balance."

The Philippines has a long-standing and deep connection with the U.S. It was an American colony from 1898 to 1946, and the countries' military defense treaty, signed in 1951, is the oldest U.S. treaty alliance in Asia. Throughout the Cold War, the United States maintained a large military presence in the Philippines at Clark Air Base and Subic Bay Naval Station.

Still, U.S. military presence in the Philippines has long been an emotionally charged topic, evoking issues of sovereignty and national pride. Intense debates in the Philippine Senate ultimately led to closing Subic Bay Naval Station, the last permanent U.S. base in the country, in 1992.

Credit to USA Today

Arkansas Tornadoes: 'Utter Devastation', At Least 16 Deaths

A dangerous scene played out northwest of Little Rock, Arkansas, on Sunday night when a massive tornado slammed Mayflower and Vilonia, demolishing homes and tossing cars like toys.

The tornado touched down Sunday about 10 miles west of Little Rock at around 7 p.m., then carved an 80-mile path of destruction as it passed through or near several suburbs north of the state capital, including Vilonia. It grew to be a half-mile wide and remained on the ground for much of that route, authorities said.

The Arkansas Department of Emergency Management confirmed at least 16 deaths from the tornado – 10 in Faulkner County, five in Pulaski County and one in White County.

In Faulkner County, sheriff Andy Shock told the Associated Press there is "utter devastation," and that family members are searching for missing relatives. Shock said there is widespread confusion and a medical triage area had to be opened in a Mayflower home-improvement store's parking lot to treat the injured.

The American Red Cross has opened two emergency shelters and is supporting four community shelters for residents displaced by tornadoes in three Arkansas counties. The tornado that hit Arkansas didn't form until night was setting in, so the full extent of the damage won't be known until after sunrise Monday.




Storm chasers were on the scene shortly after, and Brett Adair told The Weather Channel that they assisted injured residents in nearby communities affected by the tornado. After hitting Mayflower, the tornado also left severe damage in Vilonia and El Paso.

"It was like a war zone," said Tom Marsh, who was in Vilonia when the tornado hit the town.

Among the ruins was a new $14 million intermediate school that was set to open this fall.

"There's just really nothing there anymore. We're probably going to have to start all over again," Vilonia Schools Superintendent Frank Mitchell said after surveying what was left of the building.

Matt DeCample, a spokesperson for Gov. Mike Beebe, told the AP that the tornado was at least a half-mile wide when it slammed Vilonia. Three years ago, this central Arkansas city of just over 3,800 was hit by a tornado that killed four people on April 25, 2011.

Karla Ault, a Vilonia High School volleyball coach, said she sheltered in the school gymnasium as the storm approached. After it passed, her husband told her their home had been reduced to the slab on which it had sat.


"I'm just kind of numb. It's just shock that you lost everything. You don't understand everything you have until you realize that all I've got now is just what I have on," Ault said.

Credit to Weather.com

why are nearly 50 million Americans dealing with food insecurity?

If the economy really is "getting better", then why are nearly 50 million Americans dealing with food insecurity?  In 1854, Henry David Thoreau observed that "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation".  The same could be said of our time.  In America today, most people are quietly scratching and clawing their way from month to month.  Nine of the top ten occupations in the U.S. pay an average wage of less than $35,000 a year, but those that actually are working are better off than the millions upon millions of Americans that can't find jobs.  The level of employment in this nation has remained fairly level since the end of the last recession, and median household income has gone down for five years in a row.  Meanwhile, our bills just keep going up and the cost of food is starting to rise at a very frightening pace.  Family budgets are being squeezed tighter and tighter, and more families are falling out of the middle classevery single day.  In fact, a new report by Feeding America (which operates the largest network of food banks in the country) says that 49 million Americans are "food insecure" at this point.  Approximately 16 million of them are children.  It is a silent epidemic of hunger that those living in the wealthy areas of the country don't hear much about.  But it is very real.

The mainstream media and our politicians continue to insist that "things are getting better", and that may be true for Wall Street, but the man who was in charge of the new Feeding America report says that the level of suffering for the tens of millions of Americans that are food insecure has not changed...

“Nothing is getting better,” said Craig Gundersen, lead researcher of the report, “Map the Meal Gap 2014,” and an expert in food insecurity and food aid programs.

“Let’s stop talking about the end of the Great Recession until we can make sure that we get food insecurity rates down to a more reasonable level,” he added. “We’re still in the throes of the Great Recession, from my perspective.”

In fact, a different report seems to indicate that hunger in America is actually getting worse...

Children's HealthWatch, a network of doctors and public health researchers who collect data on children up to 4 years old, says 29% of the households they track were at risk of hunger last year, compared with 25% the year before.

If someone tries to tell you that "the economy is getting better", that person is probably living in a wealthy neighborhood.  Because those that live in poor neighborhoods would not describe what is going around them as an "improvement".

In particular, many minority neighborhoods are really dealing with extremely high levels of food insecurity right now.  The following comes from a recent NBC News article...

"Minorities are facing serious hunger issues. Ninety-three percent of counties with a majority African-American population fall within the top 10 percent of food-insecure counties, while 60 percent of majority American Indian counties fall in that category"

But if you don't live in one of those areas and you don't know anyone that is facing food insecurity, it can be difficult to grasp just how much people are actually suffering out there right now.

For example, consider the story of a young mother named Tianna Gaines Turner...

Tianna Gaines Turner can't remember the last time she went to bed without worrying about how she was going to feed her three children.

She can't remember the last time she woke up and wasn't worried about how she and her husband would make enough in their part-time jobs to buy groceries and pay utilities on their apartment in a working-class section of Philadelphia.

And she can't remember the last time she felt confident she and her husband wouldn't have to skip meals so their children could eat.

Have you ever been in a position where you had to skip meals just so that other family members could have something to eat?

I haven't, so it is hard for me to imagine having to do such a thing.  But there are millions of parents that are faced with these kinds of hard choices every day.

Things can be particularly hard if you are a single parent.  Just consider the story of Jamie Grimes...

After Jaime Grimes found out in January that her monthly food stamps would be cut again, this time by $40, the single mother of four broke down into sobs — then she took action.

The former high school teacher made a plan to stretch her family’s meager food stores even further. She used oatmeal and ground beans as filler in meatloaf and tacos. She watered down juice and low-fat milk to make it last longer. And she limited herself to one meal a day so her kids — ages 3, 4, 13, and 16 — would have enough to eat.

I have such admiration for working single mothers.  Many of them work more than one job just so that they can provide for their children.  It can be absolutely frustrating to work as hard as you possibly can and still not have enough money to pay the bills at the end of the month.

Those that believe that the economy has gotten "back to normal" just need to look at the number of women that have been forced to turn to government assistance.  As I mentioned the other day, a decade ago the number of American women that had jobs outnumbered the number of American women on food stamps by more than a 2 to 1 margin. But now the number of American women on food stamps actually exceedsthe number of American women that have jobs.

The truth is that we are nowhere close to where we used to be.  The last major economic downturn permanently damaged the middle class, and now the next major economic downturn is rapidly approaching.

Right now, there are nearly 50 million Americans that are facing food insecurity.  When the next economic crisis strikes, that number is going to go much higher.

There is going to be a great need for love and compassion in this country during the hard times that are coming.  Instead of just cursing the darkness, I hope that you will choose to be a light to those that desperately need it.

Credit to Economic Collapse

Investigation reveals how easy it can be to access voicemails without PINs

Phone hacking dominated the news during the Leveson Inquiry, but despite the high-profile exposure, voicemails are still at risk.

During an investigation by The Register, journalist Simon Rockman was able to use a Skype-style Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) handset to access the inboxes of EE, Three and Orange customers.

EE, which owns the Orange and T-Mobile networks, has now fixed the flaw as a result of the investigation, but Three is said to still be at risk.



During an investigation by The Register, journalist Simon Rockman was able to use a Skype-style VoIP service to access the inboxes of EE, Three and Orange customers. By linking a mobile number to a VoIP handset, Rockman was able to trick the inbox into thinking it was the number's owner and access the inboxes

WHAT IS VOICE OVER INTERNET PROTOCOL (VOIP)?

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is sometimes referred to as Voice over Networks or (VoN), Voice over Broadband (VoB) and sometimes Internet Telephony.

VoIP lets people make free, or low cost, telephone calls over the web.

Popular VoIP services include Viber and Skype.

VoIP can be used anywhere in the world and can call landline and mobile numbers.

When you call voicemail from a handset registered with the account, the inbox is automatically opened because it assumes the caller is the phone’s owner.

But when calls are made from another phone, users are asked for a PIN - or denied access if no PIN has been set up.

By linking the mobile number, and therefore a voicemail account, to a VoIP handset, Rockman was able to trick the inbox into thinking it was the number’s owner on three of the major network operators.

When calling the external voicemail number on EE, the inbox was accessed immediately.

It was the same situation on Three.

On Orange, Rockman was able to not only access the voicemails but also change the voicemail greeting.

Although this access was granted intermittently - sometimes access was given automatically, while at other times it asked for a PIN.



EE, which owns the Orange and T-Mobile networks, has now fixed the flaw, but Three is said to still be at risk. Three offers advice on how to set up a voicemail PIN on its support page, and recommends its users select the option that asks for their phone number and PIN every time they access their voicemail

It is worth noting that accessing someone else's voicemail account without their permission is illegal and falls under computer misuse legislation.

EE told MailOnline: 'Our engineers have worked hard since then to identify the root fault and work on a fix.

'We can now confirm that we have urgently updated our systems and patched the issues raised in the article.'

Three offers advice on how to set up a voicemail PIN on its support page, and recommends its users select the option that asks for their phone number and PIN every time they access their voicemail to get the highest level of security.

This would effectively stop people accessing the account in the way The Register demonstrated.

Credit Mailonline.com

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2613258/Are-voicemails-STILL-risk-hacked-Investigation-reveals-easy-access-inboxes-without-PINs.html#ixzz306d772qY