Why did Gary McKinnon hack into 97 computer systems that belong to the Pentagon, NASA and the US military? He claimed that he wanted to find evidence that the US was covering up UFO encounters.

McKinnon hacked into Earle Naval Weapons Station in New Jersey shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The US government has indicted him and began its extradition proceedings in 2005. For some reason, the governments have not accused him of terrorist attacks. McKinnon faces 60 years in a US maximum security prison if he does not agree to a plea bargain and the prosecutors turn this into a terrorist case.

Source: Telegraph.co.uk

The foremost scientific ufologist in North America, and likely in the world, Stanton T. Friedman distills more than forty years of research on UFOs in his new book, Flying Saucers and Science: A Scientist Investigates the Mysteries of UFOs: Interstellar Travel, Crashes, and Government Cover-Ups.

He answers physics questions in layman’s terms, and proves that travel to nearby stars is within reach, giving evidence that government policy is false and misleading–comparing a Cosmic Watergate. Flying Saucers and Science presents intriguing data from large-scale, scientific UFO studies and deals with a host of questions concerning the cover-up, reasons that aliens come to Earth and why they don’t land on the White House lawn.

Friedman reveals insider information about the SETI program and answers:

• What types of energy and technologies could provide travel between the stars?
• Where in the universe do aliens come from, and why have they chosen Earth?
• Who believes in the flying saucer phenomenon?
• Why is our government afraid to reveal the truth?
• What are the false arguments against saucers by prominent science fiction writers?

A nuclear physicist who has worked at McDonnell Douglas and Aerojet General on classified nuclear aircraft, fission and fusion rockets, and nuclear power, Friedman has testified at Congressional hearings and at the UN, and has lectured at more than 700 colleges and over 100 professional groups in North America and in a dozen countries. He has published more than 80 papers and appeared on hundreds of radio and TV programs including the History Channel, Larry King Live and Nightline.

Friedman was the original civilian investigator of the 1947 Roswell Incident and a major contributor to The Roswell Incident. He is the author of Top Secret/Majic: Operation Majestic-12 and the United States Government’s UFO Cover-Up; and he co-authored Crash at Corona and Captured! The Betty and Barney Hill UFO Experience.

Joe McGonagle, a self-described UFO researcher in the UK cites that the British government didn’t conceal anything about UFO sightings. They simply failed to investigate the sightings properly from the beginning.

According to McGonagle, there is no vast UFO project that handles these cases. In reality, there is one tired civil servant who files a report.

As for the US government’s position, they closed Project Blue Book in 1969 because they couldn’t be bothered, said The New York Times. With civilian claims, yes. But they still won’t fess up to what happened at Roswell and never will. After combing the Project Blue Book Archives for a good thirty minutes, I have yet to find any documentation about that day.

Source: New York Times

Eleven years, three convictions, two deportations, ten thousand pints, six barring orders and a legion of leather-clad groupies later, Dave Walsh, Barry Kavanagh and Damien DeBarra (the cheap tarts that brought you Blather.net) bring you their latest labour of love: A Load of Blather: Unreal Reports from Ireland and Beyond, the first book that anyone has been nuts enough to let them publish. Shamelessly re-working articles which have been online for years anyway, this magnificent tome is a veritable smorgasboard of smut; bursting out of its trousers with a great heaving cavalcade of paranormal events, superstitions, mysterious happenings, conspiracy theories, hordes of rampaging kangaroos in the Dublin hills, and the previously untold story of General Michael Collins’ forays into outer space. There’s even a bit about talking cows in there. If the lawyers haven’t cut it out. There’s guest articles too, from the likes of Sue Walsh, Oliver Bayliss and Dr. Stewart Roberts.

Judging by the Table of Contents, this book promises to be entertaining, if not outrageously hilarious. The book is scheduled for release on May 12, 2008.