Snowden Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize, As American Political “Leaders” Call Him A Traitor

 

A Swedish professor has nominated NSA leaker Edward Snowden for the Nobel Peace Prize for his revelations of the surveillance program, but also to redeem the award’s prestige after it was awarded to President Obama in 2009.

In his letter to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Umea University’s Stefan Svallfors argues that Snowden, who would be the award’s youngest winner at 30, exemplified that “individuals can stand up for fundamental rights and freedoms.” Svallfors lauded Snowden’s “heroic effort at great personal cost.”

Edward Snowden: ‘Being Called a Traitor by Dick Cheney Is the Highest Honor You Can Give an American’

In 2009, President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize after less than a year in office, drawing criticism for the committee’s prematurity, including from Svallfors. The professor says that picking Snowden would “help to save the Nobel Peace Prize from the disrepute incurred by the hasty and ill-conceived decision to award US President Barack Obama the 2009 award.”

“This example is important because since the Nuremberg trials in 1945 has been clear that the slogan ‘I was just following orders’ is never claimed as an excuse for acts contrary to human rights and freedoms,” Professor Svallfors wrote.

He emphasized that the decision to award the 2013 prize to Edward Snowden would also “help to save the Nobel Peace Prize from the disrepute incurred by the hasty and ill-conceived decision to award US President Barack Obama 2009 award.”

But Kristian Berg Harpviken, senior researcher and deputy director at the International Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), told Interfax news agency that it is very unlikely that Snowden will become a Nobel Prize laureate.

Harpviken said that all major deadlines have passed, meaning that Snowden will have very little chance of making the shortlist.

When asked whether Snowden deserves the award, Harpviken replied with a “careful yes.”

Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee Thorbjoern Jagland (L) applauses as laureate, US President Barack Obama hands the diploma and medal to Nobel Peace Prize, during the Nobel Peace prize award ceremony at the City Hall in Oslo on December 10, 2009 (AFP Photo)

The head of the International Committee of the Russian State Duma Aleksey Pushkov has also argued that the US won’t let Nobel Peace Prize go to Snowden.

“Not in a million years will the United States allow Snowden to get the Peace Prize. But his nomination is significant. Many in the West see him as a champion of democracy,” he tweeted on Monday.

As a sociology professor at Umeå University, which has recently top-ranked among the world’s best young universities, Svallfors is included in the limited circuit of people who can deliver nominations to the Nobel committee. These include members of international courts and national assemblies; university rectors; professors of social sciences, history, philosophy, law and theology; directors of peace research institutes and foreign policy institutes.

Nominations for laureates should be postmarked for consideration in the following December’s prizes no later than February 1 for the advisers to review the short list of the suggested candidates.

Since 1901, when the Nobel Peace Prize was launched, it has been awarded to a hundred individuals who “shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”

Last year Bradley Manning, the US soldier accused of passing secret materials to WikiLeaks, was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. The nomination was proposed by the Movement of Icelandic Parliament, which asserted that revelations produced by the documents Manning allegedly exposed “have helped to fuel a worldwide discussion about America’s overseas engagements, civilian war casualties, imperialistic manipulations, and rules of engagement.”

In 2011 founder of the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks Julian Assange was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize by Norwegian MP Snorre Valen.

Snowden’s nomination is expected to be reviewed by the committee for next year’s prize. Should Snowden get the coveted award, he would be the youngest Nobel Peace Laureate in the history of the prize.

The 30-year-old nominee is wanted in the US on charges of espionage after revealing secret NSA surveillance programs and could face the death penalty in his home country. He fled American soil for Hong Kong in May and then flew to Moscow, where he has been stuck in an airport transit zone for three weeks.

On Friday Snowden said he is seeking political asylum in Russia because he cannot fly to Latin America.

A journalist looks at a display with a picture of former CIA employee Edward Snowden (RIA Novosti)

During his meeting with rights activists and lawyers at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport, Snowden explained what was behind his decision to leak the secret NSA spying programs. He said he did what he believed to be right and “began a campaign to correct this wrongdoing.” Snowden underlined that he did not seek to enrich himself, or to sell American secrets.

“I took what I knew to the public, so what affects all of us can be discussed by all of us in the light of day, and I asked the world for justice,” Snowden said, adding that he does not regret his decision.

Russian migration officials said that they have not yet received an asylum plea from the NSA leaker.

America has launched a persecution campaign in response, “threatening with sanctions” countries who stand up for Snowden’s rights.

So far, three countries in Latin America – Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua – said they could offer Asylum to the American whistleblower.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had earlier stated that Moscow would grant him asylum if Snowden stopped activities aimed at harming “our American partners.”

Senior Republican says U.S. must step up efforts to get Snowden

A key congressional Republican said on Sunday that the Obama administration must step up efforts and exert “any and all pressure” on Russia to get it to hand over Edward Snowden, the former U.S. spy agency contractor turned fugitive leaker.

“I’m sure Russia loves this,” Representative Michael McCaul, chairman of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, said of the Snowden drama that has opened the United States to international criticism.

McCaul told “Fox News Sunday” that the Russians are “making a mockery” of U.S. foreign policy, and, “I’m sure every day, they’re extracting more and more information from this man.”

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Let me see. Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize before doing anything.  The same NPP winner went on to sign the NDAA, boosted the NSA spying program, funds new wars…. the list goes on and on…. drone attacks, assassination, and aggressively prosecuting whistleblowers, and he is tasked with hunting down Snowden. Does anyone see the irony in all of this? Snowden said, ‘Being Called a Traitor by Dick Cheney Is the Highest Honor You Can Give an American’ …you got that right, Edward, forget the Nobel Prize, you already have your badge of honor. 

US Military, Monsanto Targeting GMO Activists and Independent Scientists, New Investigation Alleges

A shocking new investigative report from the largest daily newspaper in Germany alleges that Monsanto, the US Military and the US government have colluded to track and disrupt both anti-GMO activists and independent scientists who study the adverse effects of genetically modified food.

As revealed yesterday by Sustainable Pulse, on July 13th the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung detailed information on how the US Government “advances the interests of their corporations,” focusing on Monsanto as a prime example.

The report titled, “The Sinister Monsanto Group: ‘Agent Orange’ to Genetically Modified Corn,” described a ‘new fangled cyber war’ being waged against both eco-activists and independent scientists by supporters and former employees of Monsanto, who are described as “operationally powerful assistants” and who have taken up sometimes high ranking posts in the US administration, regulatory authorities, and some of whom have connections deep within the military industrial establishment, including the CIA.

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Editors Note: Monsanto has a history of hiring an unscrupulous mercenary army (see below)

 

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Why Does Monsanto Need an Army of Mercenary Soldiers?

The Monsanto Company likes to proclaim that they are the good guys, here to selflessly feed the world, help with sustainable agriculture, and, as if those lofty goals are not enough, champion human rights across the globe.

So why does such a noble, benevolent company require the services of the most notorious mercenary army of modern times?  Why did Monsanto dish out half a million dollars to an arm of Blackwater called Total Intelligence.

What is Blackwater?

Blackwater is now known as Academi.

“…previously known as Xe Services LLC, Blackwater USA and Blackwater Worldwide—is a private military company founded in 1997 by Erik Prince and Al Clark. Academi is currently the largest of the U.S. State Department’s three private security contractors. Academi provided diplomatic security services in Iraq to the United States federal government on a contractual basis.  Academi also has a research and development wing that was responsible for developing the Grizzly APC along with other military technology. The company’s headquarters is located in Arlington County, Virginia.”

How are Blackwater and Monsanto connected?

While rumor had it that Monsanto had actually purchased Blackwater, that is not the case. Monsanto contracted with the mercenary group for “security services”.  In 2010, an illuminating report called Blackwater BlackOps, written by Jeremy Scahill, of The Nation, revealed that Monsanto had given a contract worth up to half a million dollars to Blackwater.

Biometric Vending Machines

Your thumbprint might soon be the key to an afternoon candy bar. A Massachusetts based vending machine company is joinng the growing ranks of companies that are field-testing new technologies.

Next Generation Vending and Food Service is experimenting with biometric vending machines that would allow a user to tie a credit card to their thumbprint.

“For a certain demographic that is pretty cool,” says company president John S. Ioannou.

Next Generation is currently testing about 60 of the biometric machines in various locations in the northeast. The company is also testing other technologies. Ioannou says the key to the transforming the vending machine business is making the consumer feel more engaged.

Potentially coming to every corner of the globe are these Hitachi Biometric Vending Machines. This machine requires no cash, the Hitachi Biometric Vending Machines simply uses finger vein biometric authentication systems. A customer just has to give the Hitachi Biometric Vending Machine the finger.Well, the Hitachi Biometric Vending Machine scans the customer’s finger and if the person is registered, the price of the soda or snack will be deducted from a chosen credit card.

Implications –  The desire to be a part of shifts and development in technology causes consumers to purchase items they were previously uninterested in. The convenience offered by coin-free vending machines offers customers a unique and practical buying experience. Companies can attract potential buyers by offering technological enhancements to their already-established products.

This Wall Street Journal video shows a Japanese vending machine that uses a camera to identify (guess?) your gender and age. Based on that data, and the weather, it recommends a particular drink to you. Interestingly, this report also presents banana vending machines as innovative.

 

Scientists Are Developing Robot Farmers

Seattle Times
July 15, 2013

On a windy morning in California’s Salinas Valley, a tractor pulled a wheeled, metal contraption over rows of budding iceberg lettuce plants. Engineers from Silicon Valley tinkered with the software on a laptop to ensure the machine was eliminating the right leafy buds.

The engineers were testing the Lettuce Bot, a machine that can “thin” a field of lettuce in the time it takes about 20 workers to do the job by hand.

The thinner is part of a new generation of machines that target the last frontier of agricultural mechanization – fruits and vegetables destined for the fresh market, not processing, which have thus far resisted mechanization because they’re sensitive to bruising.

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