Obama continues to support the brutal Bahraini dictatorship, valuing ruthless control of the Persian Gulf over democracy. - The US-backed dictatorship in Bahrain has banned all rallies and protests in the country, the latest repressive measure imposed on the population in response to persistent pro-democracy protests that have not let up for almost two years now. Lt. Gen. Shaikh Rashid bin Abdullah Al Khalifa, Bahrain’s interior minister, issued a statement on Monday essentially announcing that freedom of expression in Bahrain is a threat to the state and inserting lies about the pro-reform movement’s ties with “extremism.” The Obama administration, contrary to its own propaganda about being on the side of the people in the Arab Spring, has continued to lend economic, military, and diplomatic support to the tiny Persian Gulf monarch throughout its brutal repression of peaceful demonstrators since early 2011, when forty-seven unarmed protesters were shot and killed with live rounds by security forces. Banning all protests and demonstration is a dramatic violation of basic rights, but it is only one aspect of the repressive, martial-law type responses from the US-supported dictatorship. Others have included systematic torture, beatings, weaponizing tear gas, imposing curfews, harassing well-known activists, show trials and detentions, and cracking down on press freedoms, among many others.

There's A Huge Plan In The Works To Give The UN Control Of The Internet. - When delegates gather in Dubai in December for an obscure UN agency meeting, fighting is expected to be intense over proposals to rewrite global telecom rules to effectively give the United Nations control over the Internet. Russia, China and other countries back a move to place the Internet under the authority of the International Telecommunications Union, a UN agency that sets technical standards for global phone calls. U.S. officials say placing the Internet under U.N. control would undermine the freewheeling nature of cyberspace, which promotes open commerce and free expression, and could give a green light for some countries to crack down on dissidents. Observers say a number of authoritarian states will back the move, and that the major Western nations will oppose it, meaning the developing world could make a difference.

For decades, almost half of Germany's gold has been stored deep below the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Now, with the euro crisis swirling, German politicians are asking their central bankers to take stock of the reserves. Some even say that the gold should be shipped home.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York holds 1,536 metric tons of German gold, nearly half of Berlin's reserves. This enormous hoard of gold is stored in the fifth subfloor of the bank's building on Liberty Street, 25 meters (80 feet) below street level, and 15 meters below sea level. Bundesbank President Jens Weidmann wanted to personally convince Peter Gauweiler that the German gold was still where it should be. Early this summer, the head of Germany's central bank took the obstinate politician from the conservative Christian Social Union (CSU), a party that is a member of the government coalition in Berlin, and a number of his colleagues into the Bundesbank's inner sanctum: the gold vault. But even this personal inspection wasn't enough to reassure the visiting member of parliament -- on the contrary: "The Bundesbank monitors its domestic gold in an exemplary fashion," Gauweiler says, "and this makes it all the more incomprehensible that the bank doesn't look after its reserves abroad." For quite some time now, Gauweiler has been pestering the government and the Bundesbank with questions concerning where and how the country's reserves are stored, and how often they are checked. He has submitted requests and commissioned reports on the topic. Last week, Gauweiler celebrated his greatest triumph to date in his gold campaign, which has been a source of some amusement for many fellow German politicians: A secret report by the Federal Audit Office had been made public -- and it contained stern criticism of the German central bank in Frankfurt. The Bonn-based auditors urged a better inventory system, including quality checks. This demand, which even the bank's inspectors saw as nothing more than routine, alarmed the Berlin political establishment. Indeed, the partially blacked-out report read like the prologue to an espionage thriller in which the stunned central bankers could end up standing in front of empty vaults in the US.

War on Iran would destabilize the region, harming the interests of Arab regimes and worsening the lot of Arab populations. - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday tried to convince Arab states that an Israeli military strike on Iran would benefit their interests and that “a feeling of relief would spread across the region” immediately following an attack. After failing to pressure the Obama administration to back a preventive Israeli strike on Iran before the US presidential elections, Netanyahu has continued to make veiled threats of war catered for different audiences. In an interview with a French magazine, Netanyahu pushed back against the claim that an Israeli strike on Iran would destabilize the region and worsen tensions.

Iraq's air force has found out Israeli company RADA has planted information recording systems in its F-16 fighters recently purchased from the American Lockheed Martin Company, a media report said. - The Iraqi air force in a letter to Lockheed Martin Company (the manufacturer of F16 aircraft) has questioned the company about the installation of RADA information systems onboard its F16 aircraft, Akhbar Al-Khaleej quoted Iraqi air force officials as saying. The F16 fighters purchased by Egypt, Turkey, Oman, and Iraq have also information systems manufactured by Israeli RADA Company, it cited the Iraqi air force letter as saying. Iraq signed a new contract in June to buy its second set of 18 F-16 fighters from the United States as part of a deal to purchase 36 of the jets to rebuild its air force. Baghdad signed an initial deal for the first set of 18 jets in September 2011 valued at $3bln.

The so-called 99 per cent have come together in the wake of Superstorm Sandy, with Occupy Wall Street using its grassroots strength to organize relief efforts and help those worst effected by the storm.

Some 750,000 New Yorkers are still without power and at least 18 have been killed, as large swaths of New York City remain underwater. Starting in the Lower East side and moving through New York's five boroughs, OWS volunteers have teamed up with international environmental organization 350.org and people-powered disaster aid group recovers.org, to help bring together those in need with those wishing to aid the relief effort. With social media as their beacon, OWS is using the limitless organizational power of the web to make a real impact on the ground with the help of local churches and city agencies. Occupy asked those wishing to get involved to tweet using the hashtag #SandyVolunteer and for those who need help to tweet using the hashtag #SandyAid. They have also set up a Facebook page to help coordinate logistical efforts.

ConnectMidMissouri: Could Hurricane Sandy delay the election?
Russia Today: Nowhere to run: Homeless battle elements as Superstorm Sandy hits
Hurricane hammers NY: 10 dead, houses destroyed by fire, freak floods in subway - PHOTOS

No doubt about it, David Barboza of the New York Times has achieved a journalistic coup. His deep dive into the financial wherewithal of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao’s family exposed a total net worth of a staggering $2.7 billion. Other journalists, of course, have investigated the family holdings of Chinese leaders: a team of Bloomberg reporters broke the secrecy barrier with reports on the wealth of Bo Xilai’s family, and last June published an in-depth look into the burgeoning financial holdings—almost $400 million—of soon-to-be Chinese President Xi Jinping’s extended family. Frankly, anyone who spends much time in China knows about the oligarchic nature of the Chinese elite, but the extent and distribution of the Wen family wealth is eye-opening. The implications of the NYT article, moreover, go well beyond simply another story about the ability of another Chinese leader’s family to profit from political connections. The piece has the potential to significantly influence the broader near-term Chinese political landscape in a couple of respects.

A political expert says the European Union’s decision to block Iranian broadcasting is essentially a declaration of war against the Islamic Republic, Press TV reports. - “They want to silence Press TV and they want to silence any voice from Iran,” Ralph Schoenman, a political commentator from Berkeley, told Press TV in an exclusive interview on Tuesday. “We have to understand that this is part of essentially a declaration of economic and overall war against the population and the nation of Iran by the American imperialism and by the NATO countries,” Schoenman stated. The expert referred to a recent debate between US presidential hopefuls, where incumbent President Barack Obama bragged about his administration’s unprecedented restrictions against Iran while his Republican rival Mitt Romney called for yet tougher sanctions.

[General Strike: I Will Not Pay Until The Overthrow
(of The Current Regime)] (Photo: E. Theodoropoulos)

The General Confederation of Greek Workers and the Greek Civil Servants’ Confederation have organized a demonstration and march on Wednesday in central Athens against austerity measures, particularly in the areas of health care and education.

The Greek public water company is waging a class war against renters and working on behalf of landowners. This company has an obligation to protect the public interest, yet in the last 6 months has proven that they have no regard for the fact that water is a human right. As reported in a previous post, upon the landlord’s request, the Greek water company terminated water service to a flat where a family of six resides, showing that they consider renters second-class citizens. The water company is waging a class war on consumers who rent. This important issue illustrates how Greek society behaves. The said family of six have spent five days without water and still have no water, even after paying money they owed to the water company. The water company is punishing renters and supporting vindictive landlords.

Russia Today: Greek journalists go on strike, alleging state censorship
Stephen Lendman: Greek Whistleblower/Journalist Risks Imprisonment

On October 30, British sociologists with London’s Legatum Institute revealed their annual prosperity index featuring the world’s ten happiest nations among 144 developed countries. The raking was determined by eight key factors: economy, entrepreneurship and opportunity, governance, education, health, safety, personal freedom and social capital. The biggest shock was the US dropped out of Top Ten, landing only 12th, an astonishing result the researchers attributed to staggering economic growth and rocketing foreign debt. The country of fjords, Norway landed atop the chart thank to the world’s highest social security and safety.

The Telegraph: The 10 most prosperous countries in the world – in pictures - Legatum recently published its 2010 Prosperity Index, which ranks 110 countries – covering 90pc of the world's population. Each nation was evaluated according to 89 variables sorted into eight subsections: economy, entrepreneurship, governance, education, health, safety, personal freedom and social capital. The UK ranked 13th.

Facing off in last week’s foreign policy debate, Mitt Romney nodded in agreement with much of what President Obama has done with his powers as chief executive — including a full-on embrace of the president’s claim to sole authority to expand drone strikes to kill terrorist suspects. - The Republican presidential nominee has reserved the right to deploy U.S. military power to world hot spots, as Mr. Obama did in Libya, and to greenlight unilateral action against Iran. To the dismay of civil liberties activists, he has shifted his position on indefinite detention, agreeing with the president that U.S. citizens deemed “enemy combatants” are not entitled to habeas corpus.

Daily Caller: Obama executive order expands Homeland Security reach into local law enforcement

Iran risked Israeli military retaliation Monday with the dispatch of a naval task force to Sudan just days after a widely reported airstrike by the Jewish state against a missile base run by Tehran in Khartoum. - Sudanese state media said that a docking ceremony was staged in Port Sudan to receive the convoy led by an Iranian naval frigate and corvette warship. Commanders of the Iranian flotilla reportedly met Sudanese navy chiefs as a gesture of "peace and friendship". But Israel sees the increasingly close military links between Iran and Sudan as a credible threat. It fears Iran is building missiles to supply Hizbollah and the Syrian regime.

ICH: Israeli Jets Bomb Sudan "Missile Site" in Dry Run for Iran attack

Interior ministry order is latest effort to counter anti-government uprising in which [at least] 50 people have died since early last year. - [The illegitimate] Bahrain regime banned all protest gatherings on Tuesday and threatened legal action against groups said to be backing escalating demonstrations and clashes. The interior ministry order is the most sweeping attempt to quash the anti-government uprising in the Sunni-ruled kingdom since martial law was imposed during the early months of unrest last year. It sharply increases pressure on political groups from Bahrain's Shia majority, which has led the protests in support of a greater political voice.

Firefighters used a boat to rescue 25 people from a huge fire in Queens, New York on Monday. At least five buildings were burning on the heavily flooded street. (Oct. 30)

Monster Storm Sandy slammed into the East Coast Monday, killing at least 16 people, hurling a record-breaking 13-foot surge of seawater at New York City and knocking out power to over 6 million people. - The massive storm was downgraded from a hurricane after it barged ashore in southern New Jersey, bringing more than 85-mph winds and a roiling wall of seawater as it moved through New York City. It sent water surging into two major commuter tunnels and into subway stations and tracks. It was unclear how much water had come in. The 16 deaths were reported in New Jersey, New York, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. Some of the victims were killed by falling trees. Police in Toronto said a woman was killed by a falling sign as high winds closed in on Canada's largest city. The power was out for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers and an estimated 6.2 million people altogether across the East, with the full extent of the storm's damage across the region unclear and unlikely to be known until daybreak.

LiveOilPrices: Brent oil price up over $109 as Hurricane Sandy threatens partial operation shutdown
Business Insider: While Almost Everyone Else Is Dark, The Lights Are Still Shining At Goldman Sachs
Yahoo: Nation's oldest nuclear plant on alert
The Guardian: Sandy hits US east coast causing flooding and power cuts - live updates
The Independent: 13 killed, New York flooded and in darkness and 6 million without power as superstorm Sandy throws a 4-metre wall of water at US

In the early 1970s, the prison population in the United States was small and was steadily falling relative to the size of the population. Experts imagined that in a few decades, the prison system as we know it could be successfully dismantled, but that began to change after President Nixon began the War on Drugs in 1971, resulting in a huge influx of convicts. The massive increase in prisoners has given rise to what some call the Prison Industrial Complex. Like its cousin, the Military Industrial Complex, government policy and spending continues to make private involvement in the prison system very lucrative. Taxpayer money is transferred to corporations to satisfy the increasing number of prisoners as a result of the drug war. As these corporations become bigger and more powerful, they can lobby for policies that will increase their business. Their business is to see you behind bars. More prisoners means more profit, which means more influence. It’s a continuing cycle that has reached a tipping point. Like all big businesses, private prisons invest heavily in government lobbying to ensure an ever increasing supply of new customers, in this case prisoners. Currently, private prison companies are negotiating with states to buy and manage public prisons, if in exchange the state can promise occupancy rates remain above 90 percent for at least 20 years. This of course only adds to incentivize the states to prosecute more citizens for more crimes.

A vessel with a nine-person crew and 700 tons of gold ore onboard has gone missing in stormy seas off Russia’s Pacific Coast. - The ship sent a distress call on Sunday as it was sailing from the coastal town of Neran to Feklistov Island in the Sea of Okhotsk. The vessel, hired by mining company Polymetal, was carrying 700 tons of gold ore from one deposit to another where it was to be processed. Gold ore is the material from which gold is extracted and contains only a small percentage of the precious metal. Polymetal’s spokesman on Monday would not estimate the value of the cargo. The company said it has shipped ore via that route before, and there was nothing unusual in shipping it by the sea.

Andrew Haldane said protestors were correct to focus on inequality as the chief reason for 2008 economic crash. - The Occupy Movement has found an unlikely ally in a senior Bank of England official, Andrew Haldane, who has praised protesters for their role in triggering an overhaul of the financial services sector. Haldane, who oversees the City for the central bank, said Occupy acted as a lever on policymakers despite criticism that its aims were too vague. He said the protest movement was right to focus on inequality as the chief reason for the 2008 crash, following studies that showed the accumulation of huge wealth funded by debt was directly responsible for the domino-like collapse of the banking sector in 2008. Speaking at a debate held by the Occupy Movement in central London, Haldane said regulations limiting credit use would undermine attempts by individuals to accumulate huge property and financial wealth at the expense of other members of society. Allowing banks to lend on a massive scale also drained funding from other industries, adding to the negative impact that unregulated banks had on the economy, he said.

Daily Bell: Now Central Bankers Directly Boost Occupy Movement
The Independent: Top Bank of England director admits Occupy movement had a point

Are you made uneasy by the soaring number of surveillance cameras being installed in big cities across the US? If so, don’t take solace in your sedan: cops are using cameras to collect intelligence on cars, even when no crimes are being committed.

License plate scanners are nothing new for law enforcement, but more and more agencies across the US are relying on the technology as equipment becomes more affordable. As the cost of being able to catch a glimpse at every automobile in town drops day by day, though, the odds of being surveilled for simply riding around town is doing just the opposite. A recent post published on the PrivacySOS.org blog directs viewers to a YouTube video produced by PIPS Technology, the self-described world leader in automated license plate recognition, or ALPR, technology. PIPS’ devices are deployed in police cruisers across the US, and in Little Rock, Arkansas, for example, cops say the equipment is well worth the $18,000-per-unit price tag. But while PIPS may be touting their product as something of a must-have for police agencies, the manufacturer is staying silent when it comes to discussing the blatant privacy violations it commits every second its in use. "(It) can scan the mall parking lot in a matter of minutes," Sergeant Brian Dedrick, of the North Little Rock Police Department tells Arkansas Matters of his ALPR scanner. "We couldn't even do that three years go."

Polish investigators found traces of explosives on the wreckage of the government jet that crashed in Russia two years ago, killing Poland's president and 95 others, daily Rzeczpospolita reported on Tuesday. - Without citing sources, the newspaper said prosecutors and explosive experts who examined the remains of the plane in Russia found signs of TNT and nitroglycerin on the wings and in the cabin, including on 30 seats. Traces of explosives were also found in the area where the Tu-154 crashed during its approach to a small airport near the Russian city of Smolensk on April 10, 2010, the daily reported. Poland's military prosecutor's office plans to respond to the report later on Tuesday, its spokesman said. Russian investigators had blamed the Polish crew for trying to land in heavy fog, while their Polish counterparts also said the airport controllers should not have allowed the plane to attempt an approach. Some rightist groups in Poland, including main opposition party Law and Justice, had rejected the findings and suggested the crash could have been an assassination of President Lech Kaczynski and political and military leaders who flew with him.

Zuma first sued for about $500,000, then cut his demand to a much lower amount and an apology, and after the cartoonist laughed at that offer Zuma finally quit the suit and agreed to pay a portion of the respondent’s legal fees. The cartoon, by satirist “Zapiro” aka Jonathan Shapiro, was published in 2008 before Zuma became president but after he was acquitted of rape and while he was up on corruption charges (he was acquitted). Cartoon is below. As to why the cartooned Zuma has a showerhead protruding from his skull: explanation here.

New York Stock Exchange located on Wall Street in a flood zone.

U.S. stock exchanges will be closed Monday as Hurricane Sandy bears down on New York. The New York Stock Exchange said in a statement late Sunday that it will close its markets Monday. Markets are likely to remain closed on Tuesday as well. The Nasdaq stock market, which trades many technology stocks including Google and Microsoft, will also be closed Monday. The exchange will later announce plans for Tuesday. New York has declared a state of emergency and the city suspended subway service, bus and commuter rail service starting at 7 p.m. ET Sunday. The NYSE originally planned on staying open for electronic trading, while closing its trading floor, but later said all operations would close after consultations with regulators and other exchanges.

Reuters: Federal offices in Washington area closed Monday due to storm
WaPo: Metro system to shut down on Monday
WaPo: Early voting cancelled in Maryland on Monday due to approach of Hurricane Sandy
Russia Today: Concerns on the rise as Hurricane Sandy expected to hit 26 nuclear power plants

A senior Iranian lawmaker says the Islamic Republic is in possession of intelligence on Israeli secret sites obtained by Hezbollah’s Iranian-developed drone Ayub, which recently flew over occupied Palestinian territories. - “These aircraft transmit their images online and we are now in possession of the images of [Israeli] forbidden zones,” Deputy Head of the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Committee Esmail Kowsari said in an interview with Al-Alam on Sunday. Hezbollah recently sent a radar-evading drone deep into the Israeli airspace. The operation, code-named Hussein Ayub, saw Hezbollah’s drone fly hundreds of kilometers into the Israeli airspace and get very close to Dimona nuclear plant without being detected by advanced Israeli and US radars, Hezbollah Secretary General Nasrallah said during a televised speech on October 11.

Yahoo: Iran has pictures of restricted Israeli areas: Iran MP

Insurgent groups fighting against the Syrian government continue their attacks in different parts of the country despite a temporary ceasefire being in place.

According to the Syrian sources, insurgents carried out a series of attacks in several parts of the country, including the capital, Aleppo and Dayr al-Zawr, on Sunday, violating a UN-brokered ceasefire for the third straight day. At least three civilians, including a child, were killed in an insurgent attack in Aleppo. Terrorist groups also attacked an army checkpoint near Aleppo. And in the capital, Damascus, a roadside bomb planted by armed men exploded near a local hospital, but no one was injured in the explosion. Insurgents also opened fire on an army checkpoint in al-Rashdiya neighborhood of Dayr al-Zawr, forcing the army to respond.

PressTV: West seeks Libya-style campaign repeat in Syria, journalist says - Video
PressTV Global News: Syrian opposition will not observe the truce: Webster Tarpley - Video

Tony Cartalucci: Subversion of Syria Was Planned By the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia Since 2007 - NATO Using Al Qaeda Rat Lines to Flood Syria With Foreign Terrorists. 2007-2008 US West Point reports reveal Al Qaeda network behind NATO's so-called "freedom fighters." Extremists in Syria were behind Iraq War foreign terrorist influx, not Syrian government.

It seems President Obama has been engaged in gun-walking on a massive scale. The effect has been to equip America’s enemies to wage jihad not only against regimes it once claimed were our friends, but inevitably against us and our allies as well. - That would explain his administration’s desperate and now failing bid to mislead the voters through the serial deflections of Benghazigate. Thanks to intrepid investigative reporting — notably by Bret Baier and Catherine Herridge at Fox News, Aaron Klein at WND.com and Clare Lopez at RadicalIslam.org — and information developed by congressional investigators, the mystery is beginning to unravel with regard to what happened that night and the reason for the subsequent, clumsy official cover-up now known as Benghazigate.